How to Get Updates Via Email

Several people have asked me how to get updates about blog posts via email. I am just now figuring this out myself, so I figured I'd post here in case there are others who want to know.  At first I thought it was easy, but there are things like feedburns and pings and chiclets and other IT-y words, and these things are not my strength. My strength is talking about how I feel about these things, and that is useless when you are trying to get them to work.

If you already tried this and it didn't work, it was probably my fault. I had to click a secret "activate" button somewhere. I don't know, I pushed a lot of things since then.

You may have noticed the followers/members section on the right. It has little thumbnail pictures of people. You can join there if you want to follow via an RSS feed (like FeedReader or Feedly). That's like a virtual lasso that collects data from all your favorite blogs, but you have to check the RSS feed to get the content. If you don't want to check an RSS feed, continue to the follow by email directions below.

On the right, below the members section there is a button that says Subscribe By Email.  On this picture it says Follow by Email, but that's the old one that wasn't working. 

Type your email address into the box and press submit. I tried this with a google email address and with my yahoo address and it worked with both, so I'm thinking you shouldn't need a google account if you don't have one. 

Then it popped up confirmation of the email subscription request, and I entered the Captcha code to tell them I wasn't a robot. Please, I can barely figure out how to install an Subscribe By Email button, much less program a robot. 

Next I got instructions to check my email for a verification message. That email came immediately. I clicked the link in the email to verify my address and then I got confirmation that I was subscribed. 

Next you have to wait for an email. It won't send an email immediately when something new is published, but you'll get one email at the end of the day if there has been something new. I did a test post to check this, and I *think* it should be working now. When you get the email, it will show the first part of the post and you have to click on the blue title to get to the post and read the rest. 

Thank you for bearing with me, friends. My last post My Journey From Homophobia has gotten over 1000 hits. Blowing my mind! 

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