essay on how to create a website

If you sell professional services, can customers learn more about the services you offer and easily get in touch with your team if they have specific questions?

If you‘re an e-comm business, how easy is it for your customers to purchase something right off your website?

Interview your customers about their experience on your website, and don’t be afraid to run experiments on your copy or on other elements of your website.

Constantly iterating on the experience you provide your customers will help you perfect your website over time."

Below, I'm covering the process of building your website using a CMS from start to finish.

1. Choose a CMS.

The best CMS system for your business will align with your site's needs and goals.

Let‘s talk about some of the features you’d get from using HubSpot CMS Hub to give you an idea of some of the benefits of using content management software.

Example of CMS Software: HubSpot CMS

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Home / Guides / Citation Guides / MLA Format / MLA Website Citation

How to Cite a Website in MLA

If you are a student faced with creating an MLA website citation for the first time, you may be confused about where to begin. This guide is here to answer all of your questions and take the guesswork out of creating an MLA citation for websites.

All academic fields require students and researchers to document their sources. Those studying the humanities, including fields in language literature, will typically follow MLA format when structuring their papers as well as when documenting sources.

Citing your sources is a necessary part of any research paper or project. This element serves both to give credit to the researchers and authors whose work informed yours, as well as to preserve academic integrity. Any source that provided you with ideas or information that you have included in your work and which are not considered common knowledge must be included, including websites.

The Modern Language Association is not associated with this guide. All of the information, however, is based on the MLA Handbook, Ninth Edition as well as the MLA website, and is presented as guidance for students writing in this style.

If you are looking for help with APA format , our reference library can provide you with guidance for this and more styles .

What You Need

To cite a website, you should have the following information:

• Title of source.
• Title of the container ,
• Other contributors (names and roles),
• Publication date,
• Location of the source (such as DOI, URL, or page range).

The Modern Language Association refers to these guidelines as “core elements” on page 105 of the Handbook. If your teacher has asked you to cite your sources in this format, these elements will form the foundation for each MLA website citation included in your MLA Works Cited list, as well as the entries for sources in any other format.

If one of the elements does not apply, students may omit it. Supplemental items may also be included when necessary. In addition to the supplemental details discussed below, a list of additional supplemental components can be found on the MLA website.

If it’s an APA citation website page or an APA reference page you need help with, we have many other resources available for you!

Table of Contents

This guide includes the following sections:

• MLA9 Changes
• Citing websites with an author
• Citing websites with no author
• Citing websites with no formal title
• Citing social media websites
• In-text citations

Changes to MLA Citation for Websites in Ninth Edition

In previous editions, students and researchers creating an MLA website citation were not required to include the URL. However, beginning with MLA 8, it is recommended that you include the URL when creating a citation for a website unless your teacher instructs you otherwise. Even though web pages and URLs can be taken down or changed, it is still possible to learn about the source from the information seen in the URL.

When including URLs in a citation, http:// and https:// should be omitted from the website’s address ( Handbook 195). Additionally, If you are creating a citation that will be read on a digital device, it is helpful to make the URL clickable so that readers can directly access the source themselves.

If the website’s publisher includes a permalink or DOI (Digital Object Identifier), these are preferable as they are not changeable in the same manner as URLs. Whether you include a URL, permalink, or DOI, this information should be included in the location portion of your citation.

Another change that occurred with the eighth edition that impacts how to cite a website in MLA is the removal of the date the website was accessed. While you may still find it useful to include this information or your teacher may request it, it is no longer a mandatory piece of your citation. Should you choose to add this optional information, you may list it after the URL in the following manner:

• Accessed Day Month Year.
• Accessed 2 May 1998.
• Accessed 31 Apr. 2001.
• Accessed 17 Sept. 2010.

For an overview of additional formatting changes in the ninth edition, including resources to help with writing an annotated bibliography , check out the rest of EasyBib.com’s writing and citation guides, and try out our plagiarism checker for help with grammar and to avoid unintentional plagiarism.

MLA 9: Citing Websites With an Author

To make an MLA 9 citation for a website, you will need the following pieces of information:

• author’s name
• title of the article or page
• title of the website
• name of the publisher (Note: Only include the name of the publisher when it differs from the name of the website.)
• date the page or site was published (if available)

Citing a Website in MLA

Place the author’s name in reverse order, the last name first, followed by a comma, and then the first name followed by a period. The title of the web page or article is placed in quotation marks, with a period before the end quotation. The title of the website is written in italics followed by a comma. If the name of the publisher differs from the name of the website, include it after the title. Immediately following the publisher is the date that the page or article was published or posted. Finally, end with the URL, permalink, or DOI, followed by a period.

View Screenshot | Cite your source

In-text website citation with one author

The in-text citation for a website with an author is reflected as the author’s last name in parentheses, followed by a period. Unless the website includes numbered paragraphs or sections, you should not include any additional information. For the website used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

Cite your source

An APA parenthetical citation is similar, except it also includes the year the source was published.

To learn more about formatting MLA in-text & parenthetical citations , be sure to check out the rest of EasyBib.com’s resources and citation guides.

How to cite a website with two authors in MLA 9

According to Section 5.7 of the Handbook , for a website with two authors, place the authors’ names in the same order as the source (similar to an APA citation ). The first name should be formatted in reverse order as was done for a single author. The second name, however, is written as First Name Last Name and is followed by a period, as demonstrated in the template that follows:

In-text website citation with two authors

The in-text citation for a website with two authors should include both authors’ last names, in the order in which they are listed in the source and your works cited:

How to cite a website with three or more authors in MLA 9

For a source with three or more authors, you should place the authors’ names in the same order as the source. The first name is listed in reverse order and is followed by a comma and et al. Et al is the abbreviation for et alia, a gender-neutral Latin phrase meaning “and others.”

In-text website citation with 3+ authors

The in-text citation for a website with three or more authors should contain only the first author’s last name, followed by et al. ( Handbook 232):

Click on this page if you’re looking for information on how to create an APA in-text citation .

MLA 9 Citation for Websites with No Author

Sometimes, websites do not state who wrote the information on the page. When no author is listed, you may omit the author information from the MLA citation for the website and begin, instead, with the title ( Handbook 108).

Note about web pages by organizations/corporations:  Often, web pages are published by organizations or corporations with no author indicated. In these cases, you can assume that the publisher also authored the web page (like the example above). Since the author and publisher are the same in these cases, you can skip showing an author and just indicate the organization /corporation as the publisher ( Handbook 119 ).

In-text website citation with no author

The in-text citation for a website without an author is noted with the first noun phrase or words in the title in quotations and parenthesis, followed by a period. Unless the website includes numbered paragraphs or sections, you should not include any additional information. For the website used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

MLA 9 Citation for Websites Without a Formal Title

When citing a web page that does not include a formal title, it is acceptable to include a description of the page. Do not place the description in italics or quotation marks. Follow the description with the name of the website.

In-text website citation without a title

The in-text citation for a website without a formal title uses a shortened version of the webpage description for the in-text citation. Use the first noun phrase of the description from your Works Cited citation in parenthesis, followed by a period. For the website used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

MLA 9 Citation for Social Media Websites

In an increasingly digital world, social media platforms have become one of the most popular sources students turn to when writing a research paper. From Black history facts , to quotes from notable people, such as Martin Luther King and Winston Churchill , social media has become a mega influence in our world.

When citing social media in your work,  follow the same format as an MLA citation for a website. Here are some examples of ways you can cite various social media platforms in your work:

How to cite Twitter in MLA 9

Many notable individuals use Twitter as a platform to share intriguing ideas. It’s a shame Twitter was unavailable to long-gone scientists, authors, and presidents such as Albert Einstein , Mark Twain , and Abraham Lincoln . Luckily, we have the Twitter profiles of today’s great minds at our fingertips!

To cite a tweet, you will begin with the account holder’s name and their Twitter handle in square brackets, followed by a period ( Handbook 118). After this, in quotations, you should enter the full text of the tweet, including any hashtags. The publisher, Twitter, is then listed in italics, followed by the date the tweet was posted in day, month, year format. Finally, include a URL to the tweet followed by a period.

Note:  When the account name and username are similar, the username can be excluded from the citation. For example, if the account’s username was @FirstNameLastName or @OrganizationName.

In-text website citation of a Twitter post

The in-text citation for a Twitter post is reflected as the author’s last name in parentheses, followed by a period. For the tweet used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

How to cite Instagram in MLA 9

To cite an Instagram post, begin with the account holder’s name and their username in square brackets. In quotations, list the title of the photo, if it is given. If there is no title, write a brief description of the picture but do not place it in italics or quotation marks. The publisher, Instagram, is then listed in italics. Any other contributors (such as the photographer, if it is not the same as the account holder) are then listed, after which you will add the date the photo was published and the URL.

In-text website citation of an Instagram post

The in-text citation for an Instagram post is reflected as the author’s last name or the name of the account in parentheses, followed by a period. For the Instagram post used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

How to cite Facebook in MLA 9

To cite a Facebook post, begin with the account holder’s name or username. In quotations, list the title or caption of the post, if it is given. If there is no title or caption, write a brief description of the post, but do not place it in italics or quotation marks. Examples: Image of Malcolm X, or, Muhammed Ali headshot.

The publisher, Facebook, is then listed in italics, after which you will add the date posted and URL.

In-text website citation of a Facebook post

The in-text citation for a Facebook post is reflected as the author’s last name or the name of the account in parentheses, followed by a period. For the Facebook post used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

Social media and website comments

Citing the comments left on social media or a website begins with the commenter’s name or username. To indicate that you are citing a comment, follow the name with a period and then the words Comment on , followed by the title of the source (for example, the name of the article) in quotation marks. This is then followed by the title of the website in italics, and the publisher, if applicable. The date is then listed, followed by the URL, permalink, or DOI.

In-text citation of a social media comment

The in-text citation for a social media comment is reflected as the author’s last name in parentheses, followed by a period. For the post used in the example above, the in-text citation would be written as follows:

In-text Citations for Websites

In-text citations generally consist of parentheses and the last names of the authors or the first few words of the web page title.

Since there are no page numbers, unless the web page includes numbered paragraphs or sections, you don’t need to include any additional information.

When you have multiple authors, place them in the same order they are listed in the source.

If what you really need is an APA book citation or a reference for an APA journal , there are more guides on EasyBib.com for you to explore.

Visit our EasyBib Twitter feed to discover more citing tips, fun grammar facts, and the latest product updates.

Troubleshooting

Solution #1: when and how to reference entire websites versus specific pages in mla.

Reference an entire website when your information comes from multiple pages or if you are describing the entirety of the website. If your information is only from one page, only cite the singular page.

Whole website, author known

• Write the author’s name in last name, first name format with a period following.
• Next, write the name of the website in italics.
• Write the contributing organization’s name with a comma following.
• List the date in day, month, year format with a comma following.
• Lastly, write the URL with a period following.

Works cited example:

Night, Samuel. Food Creations , International Hypothetical Chefs’ Club, 21 May 2021,                 www.foodcreationshypotheticalwebsite.com/best_macaroni_recipe.

In-text example:

Whole website, author unknown

• If there is no specific author, begin the citation by writing the website name in italics.

Food Creations , International Hypothetical Chefs’ Club, 21 May 2021, www.foodcreationshypotheticalwebsite.com/best_macaroni_recipe.

( Food Creations )

Webpage, author known

If information is from only a few pages or the pages cover multiple topics, reference each page

• If an author is named, write the author’s name in last name, first name format.
• If a title is not provided, create your own description of the page.
• List the title of the website in italics with a comma following.
• Write the date that the page was created followed by a comma.
• Lastly, list the URL followed by a period.

Blake, Evan. “Best Southern Macaroni Recipe.” Food Creations , International Hypothetical Chefs’ Club, 21 May 2021, www.foodcreationshypotheticalwebsite.com/best_macaroni_recipe.

Webpage, author unknown

If an author is not named, write the name of the page in quotation marks with a period following.

“Best Southern Macaroni Recipe.” Food Creations , International Hypothetical Chefs’ Club, 21 May 2021, www.foodcreationshypotheticalwebsite.com/best_macaroni_recipe.

(“Best Southern Macaroni Recipe”)

Solution #2: Referencing a conversation on social media in MLA

The in-text citation should identify the author and talk about the format (e.g., video, post, image, etc.) in prose.

Lilly West’s photo of traditional Japanese sweets shows an example of nature influencing Japanese design.

The basic structure of a works-cited reference for social media stays the same no matter the format or the social media service (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc.). Here are works- cited-list entry guidelines:

• The name is listed in last name, first name format with a period following. If an organization, just write the organization’s name as it’s usually presented.
• If the username is very different from the author’s real name, include it in brackets after the user’s real name but before the period.
• Write the title, post text, or description of the post in quotation marks. End it with a period.
• Write the website name in italics with a comma afterward.
• List the day, month, and year that the post was created followed by a comma.
• List the URL followed by a period. Leave out “https://” and “http://”.

Facebook example:

West, Lily. “Kyoto Japanese sweets.” Facebook , 30 May 2021, www.facebook.com/hypotheticalexample/thispostisnotreal.

Twitter reference example:

West, Lily [@lilianhypotheticalwestbest]. “Kyoto Japanese sweets.” Twitter, 30 May 2021, www.twitter.com/hypotheticalexample/thispostisnotreal.

Instagram reference example:

West, Lily [@lilianhypotheticalwestbest]. “Kyoto Japanese sweets.” Instagram , 30 May 2021,            www.instagram.com/hypotheticalexample/thisphotoisnotreal.

Solution #3: How to cite a social media post without a title or text

If there is no text or title where the title element usually goes, instead describe the post without quotation marks. Example:

West, Lily [@lilianhypotheticalwestbest]. Photo of traditional Japanese sweets on a green plate. Instagram , photographed by Bethany Lynn, 30 May 2021,   www.instagram.com/hypotheticalexample/thisphotoisnotreal.

Solution #4: How to cite a social media post with a long title or text

If the text is very long, you can shorten it by adding ellipsis at the end of the text. Example:

West, Lily [@lilianhypotheticalwestbest]. “Nothing is better in life than feeling like all of the effort you’ve invested has finally. . . .” Twitter, 17 Feb. 2021, www.twitter.com/hypotheticalexample/thispostisnotreal.

• Works Cited

MLA Handbook . 9th ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

Published October 31, 2011. Updated June 5, 2021.

Written and edited by Michele Kirschenbaum and Elise Barbeau. Michele Kirschenbaum is a school library media specialist and the in-house librarian at EasyBib.com. Elise Barbeau is the Citation Specialist at Chegg. She has worked in digital marketing, libraries, and publishing.

MLA Formatting Guide

MLA Formatting

• Annotated Bibliography
• Bibliography
• Block Quotes
• et al Usage
• In-text Citations
• Paraphrasing
• Page Numbers
• Sample Paper
• MLA 8 Updates
• MLA 9 Updates
• View MLA Guide

Citation Examples

• Book Chapter
• Journal Article
• Magazine Article
• Newspaper Article
• Website (no author)
• View all MLA Examples

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No matter what citation style you’re using (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.), the EasyBib Citation Generator can help you create the right bibliography quickly.

Yes, there’s an option to download source citations as a Word Doc or a Google Doc. You may also copy citations from the EasyBib Citation Generator and paste them into your paper.

Creating an account is not a requirement for generating MLA citations. However, registering for an EasyBib account is free, and an account is how you can save all the citations you create. This can help make it easier to manage your citations and bibliographies.

Yes! Whether you’d like to learn how to construct citations on your own, our Autocite tool isn’t able to gather the metadata you need, or anything in between, manual citations are always an option. Click here for directions on using creating manual citations.

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It supports MLA, APA, Chicago, Harvard, and over 7,000 total citation styles.

If there is no author, the title becomes the website page’s identifier.

In-text example (no author): ( Honey Bee Medley )

Works cited example (no author): Honey Bee Medley . Hivemind Press, 2018, www.hivebees.com/honey-bees.

If there is no publication date, include an accessed date instead.

Works cited example (no author, no date): Honey Bee Medley . Hivemind Press, www.hivebees.com/honey-bees. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

If there is no title, briefly describe the source.

Works cited example (no author, no date, no title): Collage of honey bees. Hivemind Press, www.hivebees.com/honey-bees. Accessed 17 Nov. 2020.

To cite a website that has no page number in MLA, it is important that you know the name of the author, title of the webpage, website, and URL. The templates for an in-text citation and works-cited-list entry of a website that has no page number, along with examples, are given below:

In-text citation template and example:

You can use a time stamp if you are referring to an audio or video. Otherwise, use only the author’s surname.

(Author Surname)

Works-cited-list entry template and example:

Author or Organization Name. “Title of the Webpage.” Website Name . Publication Date, URL.

Dutta, Smita S. “What is Extra Sensory Perception?” Medindia . 16 Nov. 2019, www.medindia.net/patients/patientinfo/extra-sensory-perception.htm#3 .

Abbreviate the month in the date field.

MLA Citation Examples

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Internet Technology: Creating a Website

Introduction, creation of a website.

This paper is set to explain the way the internet has changed lives and its effect on the pace at which businesses are conducted all over the world today. It also highlights the benefits and problems posed by its use. Internet is about e-commerce and conduct of business which includes purchasing and selling of goods and services. It has also been used in marketing, advertisement, and public relations between people, companies, corporations, and organizations. It creates awareness and provides free information to clients, academicians, and other members of society. It has increased awareness and has endowed better judgment to clients.

The worldwide website has been used to connect the producer, supplier, consumer, and government. The major purpose of the creation of websites is to increase the speed of carrying out business transactions. Most companies choose to create their websites by following the following easy steps. This has led to e-commerce that has increased business transactions.

When creating a website, one should take into consideration what his business is about. This should lead one into getting a domain name. A domain name should be got by the company and should focus on what it markets or what the company is about. For example, if a company sells paintings then its domain name could be www.mypainting.co.uk. Then one should obtain a web space from hosting companies. Webspace is space on a computer owned by a hosting company. Most hosting companies rent webspace to companies that need it at a certain fee per year. Photos and images concerning the company are posted and linked. The domain name is registered online and this is done by the same hosting company.

While designing a website, several factors should be taken into consideration. Since most websites are designed for clients/ users they should be designed to be user-friendly. The speed of accessing this website should be fast.

This can be achieved by reducing the size of files, avoiding big graphics and images. Speed can also be improved by the use of cascading style sheets and much of it should be put into hypertext makeup language. (Html)The web pages designed should match the pages used in advertising in the media. The technical element of writing using Javascript should also be taken into account.

Navigation should be made easy by consistently arranging files according to their importance and making them clear. Web accessibility is important and it should cater to people with mild problems like color blindness, poor eyesight, blindness. There should be tools that fit all clients. Those that are physically impaired deaf & blind should have navigation tools that make accessibility easy.

It is advisable to set computer resolutions at a minimum of 640×480 pixels and a maximum of 1280×1024 pixels. The Colour used should match. It should not be overcrowded. Headlines should be highlighted to increase visibility. Fonts of adequate size should be used so that the users should not strain to read. The language of expression should be easy to understand and should not be offensive.

When implementing an e-commerce website, the human factor should be considered. Though most companies consider minimizing the costs involved in making a website, they fail to recognize the usability of the website by the end-user. It should be marketable and accepted by the end-user. It should increase the efficiency of user interface design. The experience earned by the user is the major key to achieving its acceptability. Every company should have a webmaster that will update the website on the latest information regularly.

To make your website popular, one can use email, posters, and flyers to advertise. One should also consider user experience and what their comments are about it. Post-sales support should be offered. A company can also offer incentives like free shipping and also discounts to increase its sales. One should display his phone number for easy phone orders. Questions asked frequently should be taken into consideration. Email addresses of the company should also be provided for easy contact by the clients.

Websites should be secured by having passwords. This can be got by clients after they call the company’s customer care service. Hackers provide a major threat to the existence and efficiency of websites. Some hackers may post error messages as part of dirty campaigns to scare away clients. Since websites are open to anyone other companies could provide the same service or products at lower prices reducing their profits. Breaching of the security of clients should not be done through most of them cannot pass their credit card details. Most companies have used so much money to protect their websites from corporate espionage and hackers.

A domain name that focuses on the company deals with is very important. People accessing the website do not have to go through a hard time looking for what they want. An example is youtube. Its domain name youtube has helped with marketing because it is designed for airing anyone’s views. This name is memorable and personal to some level. It focuses on you; the user.

On the positive side, eCommerce has increased sales for most companies because placing orders is fast. Information is easily accessible to clients. Society has become more informed due to increased awareness. Literacy levels have increased because of the eagerness of many to learn more from the websites. Suppliers and customers of the company have more information and can get their services and goods fast. The operation capital of most companies especially in marketing and advertising has been reduced.

In addition, the internet has also some detriments. Many a client can’t come to terms with trusting it. They find it risky to transact business with a company that they have not seen. Accessing the Internet in third-world countries is low due to poor infrastructure, poverty, and illiteracy. In some countries, some information is censured and sometimes companies are fined. This increases their operating costs. Some websites foster the sale of illicit drugs and lead to an increase in suicidal tendencies among young people.

In my opinion, the internet is good since it has increased the volume and pace of trading globally, reduced hurdles in communication making the world a global village.

Bauknecht K; and Min Tjoa A.; (2002); E- Commerce and Web Technologies , Springer.

Dasgupta S; (2001); Managing Internet and Intranet Technologies in Organizations ; Idea Group.

Garson G. D; (1999);  Information Technology and Computer Applications in Public Administration ; Idea Group Inc.

Khosrowpour M; (2000); Challenges of Information Technology Management in the 21 st Century ; Idea Group Inc.

Kissinger K. and Borchardt S; (1996); Information Technology for Integrated Health Systems , J. Wiley.

Lubbe S, and Maria J (2000); The Economic and Social Impacts of E-Commerce; Idea Group Inc.

Mariga J.R; Managing E- Commerce and Mobile Computing ; Idea group Inc.

Rosenfeld L, and Morville P; (2002); Information Architecture For the World Wide Web ; O’ Reilly.

Tull C; ( 2006); Web Designer’s Guide to Adobe Photoshop ; Word ware pub.

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How to make a website on Google: a beginner's guide

We show you how to use Google Sites to quickly make a website on Google – it's easy and it's free!

1. Access Google Sites

• 2. Select template
• 3. Add pages
• 4. Add text/images

5. Add other functionality

• 6. Preview and publish!

In this beginner’s guide, we’re going to look at how to make a website on Google – something you may not have even been aware you could do. Google isn’t always the best at publicising the various apps and services it offers, after all, and while Google Sites isn’t the most powerful or sophisticated website editor around, it’s easy to use, and it’s free for anyone with a Google account.

While there are many options geared more towards professionals – as collated in our guide to the best web builders for small businesses – Google Sites uses a block-based editor that requires no coding or design experience of any kind. It’s great for throwing together a quick site for a specific purpose – such as to publicise an event, or host a simple CV. Though, as we’ll see, you can get a bit more complex if you like. 

The first thing to do is head to sites.google.com, where you’ll find Google’s website builder. You will need to sign up for a Google account if you don’t have one already – it’s a quick and simple process. 

2. Select a template or create a blank site

Once you’ve got your account, you’ll be presented with the main dashboard to start a new site. It’s worth looking through the selection of templates Google Sites offers, in case there’s one that’ll suit your purposes better. Click ‘Template gallery’ on the right-hand side to expand the list.

For the purposes of this example, I’ll create a photography portfolio website. While there is a dedicated template for this purpose, I’m going to create one from a blank template, so I click the ‘+’ symbol to create a blank site.

Whatever you choose, you’ll be thrown straight into the main site editor. The first thing to do now is name your site, which you can do in the top-left corner.

3. Add pages and sub-pages

A good thing to establish at this point is how many pages you’re going to need on your site, which will depend on what you’re using it for. If you’re providing information for wedding guests, for example, you’ll probably only need one. If you’re opening a site for a restaurant, you’ll probably want a few more – menu, hours, reservations, etc.

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For my photography portfolio, I want to split my images into the following categories: colour film, black & white film, and digital. I also want a contact page so people can get in touch to hire me, or to buy prints (keep dreaming, one day it’ll happen). 

Click ‘Pages’ in the right-hand menu, then click ‘Add page’ at the bottom for each of the pages you want to add. 

You’ll notice that the page titles have been automatically added to the top nav bar of my site. If you need to, you can add sub-pages within pages, meaning they won’t show up in the top menu – click the three dots next to any page name, then select ‘Add subpage’ (here you can also duplicate pages).

The header currently has a generic image – we’ll get to replacing that in a moment, but if you’d like to change the size of the image, or not have one there at all, you can select ‘Header type’ below to change it.

4. Populate with text and images

Now it’s time to add the actual content of our site. As I’m making a photography portfolio, I have plenty of imagery to choose from already. If you don’t, you may want to consider stock imagery – check out our guide to the best stock photo libraries , which includes options for free images. 

As mentioned, Google Sites uses a block-based system for populating content which makes things easy. Click ‘Insert’ on the right-hand menu, and you’ll be presented with options of the different types of content blocks you can create. There are singular text and image blocks, as well as pre-made blocks that provide combinations of the two, and you can also embed content from other sites or import it from Google Drive.

The editor allows you to drag and drop content across the grid as you see fit – so experiment with how things look. You can also simply double-click on any blank area of the website to insert something directly.

In the ‘Insert’ menu, Google Sites offers many other functions and blocks you can insert, depending on the information you need to convey. You can use other Google products to embed different functions, such as interactive Google Maps, YouTube videos, Google Calendars, Docs, Sheets, Forms and more. 

There’s also the option to insert collapsible text, image carousels, and buttons that can link to specific pages on your site or elsewhere. You can also use the ‘Social links’ function to pull in your social media profiles – simply insert the link and Google Sites will display a button with the relevant logo.

6. Preview, peer review and publish!

Using the preview button in the top right of the editor, you can view how your site will look on mobile, desktop and tablet. Once you’re happy with it, click the ‘Publish’ button – but don’t worry, this won’t just dump your site onto the web for anyone to find. First you’ll be able to specify your domain name. This will take the form of sites.google.com/view/yoursitenamehere , unless you have a domain of your own already, in which case you can link it up in this menu (see our guide to the best web hosting services if you need one).

If you like, you can also specify your site to only be viewable to certain people, or only to people who have the direct link. This can be hugely useful for getting feedback on your site through peer review from people you trust.

And once you’re done, all that’s left to do is hit ‘Publish’!

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Jon is a freelance writer and journalist who covers photography, art, technology, and the intersection of all three. When he's not scouting out news on the latest gadgets, he likes to play around with film cameras that were manufactured before he was born. To that end, he never goes anywhere without his Olympus XA2, loaded with a fresh roll of Kodak (Gold 200 is the best, since you asked). Jon is a regular contributor to Creative Bloq, and has also written for in Digital Camera World, Black + White Photography Magazine, Photomonitor, Outdoor Photography, Shortlist and probably a few others he's forgetting. 

Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

MLA In-Text Citations: The Basics

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MLA (Modern Language Association) style is most commonly used to write papers and cite sources within the liberal arts and humanities. This resource, updated to reflect the MLA Handbook (9 th ed.), offers examples for the general format of MLA research papers, in-text citations, endnotes/footnotes, and the Works Cited page.

Guidelines for referring to the works of others in your text using MLA style are covered throughout the  MLA Handbook  and in chapter 7 of the  MLA Style Manual . Both books provide extensive examples, so it's a good idea to consult them if you want to become even more familiar with MLA guidelines or if you have a particular reference question.

Basic in-text citation rules

In MLA Style, referring to the works of others in your text is done using parenthetical citations . This method involves providing relevant source information in parentheses whenever a sentence uses a quotation or paraphrase. Usually, the simplest way to do this is to put all of the source information in parentheses at the end of the sentence (i.e., just before the period). However, as the examples below will illustrate, there are situations where it makes sense to put the parenthetical elsewhere in the sentence, or even to leave information out.

General Guidelines

• The source information required in a parenthetical citation depends (1) upon the source medium (e.g. print, web, DVD) and (2) upon the source’s entry on the Works Cited page.
• Any source information that you provide in-text must correspond to the source information on the Works Cited page. More specifically, whatever signal word or phrase you provide to your readers in the text must be the first thing that appears on the left-hand margin of the corresponding entry on the Works Cited page.

In-text citations: Author-page style

MLA format follows the author-page method of in-text citation. This means that the author's last name and the page number(s) from which the quotation or paraphrase is taken must appear in the text, and a complete reference should appear on your Works Cited page. The author's name may appear either in the sentence itself or in parentheses following the quotation or paraphrase, but the page number(s) should always appear in the parentheses, not in the text of your sentence. For example:

Both citations in the examples above, (263) and (Wordsworth 263), tell readers that the information in the sentence can be located on page 263 of a work by an author named Wordsworth. If readers want more information about this source, they can turn to the Works Cited page, where, under the name of Wordsworth, they would find the following information:

Wordsworth, William. Lyrical Ballads . Oxford UP, 1967.

In-text citations for print sources with known author

For print sources like books, magazines, scholarly journal articles, and newspapers, provide a signal word or phrase (usually the author’s last name) and a page number. If you provide the signal word/phrase in the sentence, you do not need to include it in the parenthetical citation.

These examples must correspond to an entry that begins with Burke, which will be the first thing that appears on the left-hand margin of an entry on the Works Cited page:

Burke, Kenneth. Language as Symbolic Action: Essays on Life, Literature, and Method . University of California Press, 1966.

In-text citations for print sources by a corporate author

When a source has a corporate author, it is acceptable to use the name of the corporation followed by the page number for the in-text citation. You should also use abbreviations (e.g., nat'l for national) where appropriate, so as to avoid interrupting the flow of reading with overly long parenthetical citations.

In-text citations for sources with non-standard labeling systems

If a source uses a labeling or numbering system other than page numbers, such as a script or poetry, precede the citation with said label. When citing a poem, for instance, the parenthetical would begin with the word “line”, and then the line number or range. For example, the examination of William Blake’s poem “The Tyger” would be cited as such:

The speaker makes an ardent call for the exploration of the connection between the violence of nature and the divinity of creation. “In what distant deeps or skies. / Burnt the fire of thine eyes," they ask in reference to the tiger as they attempt to reconcile their intimidation with their relationship to creationism (lines 5-6).

Longer labels, such as chapters (ch.) and scenes (sc.), should be abbreviated.

In-text citations for print sources with no known author

When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name, following these guidelines.

Place the title in quotation marks if it's a short work (such as an article) or italicize it if it's a longer work (e.g. plays, books, television shows, entire Web sites) and provide a page number if it is available.

Titles longer than a standard noun phrase should be shortened into a noun phrase by excluding articles. For example, To the Lighthouse would be shortened to Lighthouse .

If the title cannot be easily shortened into a noun phrase, the title should be cut after the first clause, phrase, or punctuation:

In this example, since the reader does not know the author of the article, an abbreviated title appears in the parenthetical citation, and the full title of the article appears first at the left-hand margin of its respective entry on the Works Cited page. Thus, the writer includes the title in quotation marks as the signal phrase in the parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader directly to the source on the Works Cited page. The Works Cited entry appears as follows:

"The Impact of Global Warming in North America." Global Warming: Early Signs . 1999. www.climatehotmap.org/. Accessed 23 Mar. 2009.

If the title of the work begins with a quotation mark, such as a title that refers to another work, that quote or quoted title can be used as the shortened title. The single quotation marks must be included in the parenthetical, rather than the double quotation.

Parenthetical citations and Works Cited pages, used in conjunction, allow readers to know which sources you consulted in writing your essay, so that they can either verify your interpretation of the sources or use them in their own scholarly work.

Author-page citation for classic and literary works with multiple editions

Page numbers are always required, but additional citation information can help literary scholars, who may have a different edition of a classic work, like Marx and Engels's  The Communist Manifesto . In such cases, give the page number of your edition (making sure the edition is listed in your Works Cited page, of course) followed by a semicolon, and then the appropriate abbreviations for volume (vol.), book (bk.), part (pt.), chapter (ch.), section (sec.), or paragraph (par.). For example:

Author-page citation for works in an anthology, periodical, or collection

When you cite a work that appears inside a larger source (for instance, an article in a periodical or an essay in a collection), cite the author of the  internal source (i.e., the article or essay). For example, to cite Albert Einstein's article "A Brief Outline of the Theory of Relativity," which was published in  Nature  in 1921, you might write something like this:

See also our page on documenting periodicals in the Works Cited .

Citing authors with same last names

Sometimes more information is necessary to identify the source from which a quotation is taken. For instance, if two or more authors have the same last name, provide both authors' first initials (or even the authors' full name if different authors share initials) in your citation. For example:

Citing a work by multiple authors

For a source with two authors, list the authors’ last names in the text or in the parenthetical citation:

Corresponding Works Cited entry:

Best, David, and Sharon Marcus. “Surface Reading: An Introduction.” Representations , vol. 108, no. 1, Fall 2009, pp. 1-21. JSTOR, doi:10.1525/rep.2009.108.1.1

For a source with three or more authors, list only the first author’s last name, and replace the additional names with et al.

Franck, Caroline, et al. “Agricultural Subsidies and the American Obesity Epidemic.” American Journal of Preventative Medicine , vol. 45, no. 3, Sept. 2013, pp. 327-333.

Citing multiple works by the same author

If you cite more than one work by an author, include a shortened title for the particular work from which you are quoting to distinguish it from the others. Put short titles of books in italics and short titles of articles in quotation marks.

Citing two articles by the same author :

Citing two books by the same author :

Additionally, if the author's name is not mentioned in the sentence, format your citation with the author's name followed by a comma, followed by a shortened title of the work, and, when appropriate, the page number(s):

Citing multivolume works

If you cite from different volumes of a multivolume work, always include the volume number followed by a colon. Put a space after the colon, then provide the page number(s). (If you only cite from one volume, provide only the page number in parentheses.)

Citing the Bible

In your first parenthetical citation, you want to make clear which Bible you're using (and underline or italicize the title), as each version varies in its translation, followed by book (do not italicize or underline), chapter, and verse. For example:

If future references employ the same edition of the Bible you’re using, list only the book, chapter, and verse in the parenthetical citation:

John of Patmos echoes this passage when describing his vision (Rev. 4.6-8).

Citing indirect sources

Sometimes you may have to use an indirect source. An indirect source is a source cited within another source. For such indirect quotations, use "qtd. in" to indicate the source you actually consulted. For example:

Note that, in most cases, a responsible researcher will attempt to find the original source, rather than citing an indirect source.

Citing transcripts, plays, or screenplays

Sources that take the form of a dialogue involving two or more participants have special guidelines for their quotation and citation. Each line of dialogue should begin with the speaker's name written in all capitals and indented half an inch. A period follows the name (e.g., JAMES.) . After the period, write the dialogue. Each successive line after the first should receive an additional indentation. When another person begins speaking, start a new line with that person's name indented only half an inch. Repeat this pattern each time the speaker changes. You can include stage directions in the quote if they appear in the original source.

Conclude with a parenthetical that explains where to find the excerpt in the source. Usually, the author and title of the source can be given in a signal phrase before quoting the excerpt, so the concluding parenthetical will often just contain location information like page numbers or act/scene indicators.

Here is an example from O'Neill's  The Iceman Cometh.

WILLIE. (Pleadingly) Give me a drink, Rocky. Harry said it was all right. God, I need a drink.

ROCKY. Den grab it. It's right under your nose.

WILLIE. (Avidly) Thanks. (He takes the bottle with both twitching hands and tilts it to his lips and gulps down the whiskey in big swallows.) (1.1)

Citing non-print or sources from the Internet

With more and more scholarly work published on the Internet, you may have to cite sources you found in digital environments. While many sources on the Internet should not be used for scholarly work (reference the OWL's  Evaluating Sources of Information  resource), some Web sources are perfectly acceptable for research. When creating in-text citations for electronic, film, or Internet sources, remember that your citation must reference the source on your Works Cited page.

Sometimes writers are confused with how to craft parenthetical citations for electronic sources because of the absence of page numbers. However, these sorts of entries often do not require a page number in the parenthetical citation. For electronic and Internet sources, follow the following guidelines:

• Include in the text the first item that appears in the Work Cited entry that corresponds to the citation (e.g. author name, article name, website name, film name).
• Do not provide paragraph numbers or page numbers based on your Web browser’s print preview function.
• Unless you must list the Web site name in the signal phrase in order to get the reader to the appropriate entry, do not include URLs in-text. Only provide partial URLs such as when the name of the site includes, for example, a domain name, like  CNN.com  or  Forbes.com,  as opposed to writing out http://www.cnn.com or http://www.forbes.com.

Miscellaneous non-print sources

Two types of non-print sources you may encounter are films and lectures/presentations:

In the two examples above “Herzog” (a film’s director) and “Yates” (a presentor) lead the reader to the first item in each citation’s respective entry on the Works Cited page:

Herzog, Werner, dir. Fitzcarraldo . Perf. Klaus Kinski. Filmverlag der Autoren, 1982.

Yates, Jane. "Invention in Rhetoric and Composition." Gaps Addressed: Future Work in Rhetoric and Composition, CCCC, Palmer House Hilton, 2002. Address.

Electronic sources

Electronic sources may include web pages and online news or magazine articles:

In the first example (an online magazine article), the writer has chosen not to include the author name in-text; however, two entries from the same author appear in the Works Cited. Thus, the writer includes both the author’s last name and the article title in the parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader to the appropriate entry on the Works Cited page (see below).

In the second example (a web page), a parenthetical citation is not necessary because the page does not list an author, and the title of the article, “MLA Formatting and Style Guide,” is used as a signal phrase within the sentence. If the title of the article was not named in the sentence, an abbreviated version would appear in a parenthetical citation at the end of the sentence. Both corresponding Works Cited entries are as follows:

Taylor, Rumsey. "Fitzcarraldo." Slant , 13 Jun. 2003, www.slantmagazine.com/film/review/fitzcarraldo/. Accessed 29 Sep. 2009. 

"MLA Formatting and Style Guide." The Purdue OWL , 2 Aug. 2016, owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/. Accessed 2 April 2018.

Multiple citations

To cite multiple sources in the same parenthetical reference, separate the citations by a semi-colon:

Time-based media sources

When creating in-text citations for media that has a runtime, such as a movie or podcast, include the range of hours, minutes and seconds you plan to reference. For example: (00:02:15-00:02:35).

When a citation is not needed

Common sense and ethics should determine your need for documenting sources. You do not need to give sources for familiar proverbs, well-known quotations, or common knowledge (For example, it is expected that U.S. citizens know that George Washington was the first President.). Remember that citing sources is a rhetorical task, and, as such, can vary based on your audience. If you’re writing for an expert audience of a scholarly journal, for example, you may need to deal with expectations of what constitutes “common knowledge” that differ from common norms.

Other Sources

The MLA Handbook describes how to cite many different kinds of authors and content creators. However, you may occasionally encounter a source or author category that the handbook does not describe, making the best way to proceed can be unclear.

In these cases, it's typically acceptable to apply the general principles of MLA citation to the new kind of source in a way that's consistent and sensible. A good way to do this is to simply use the standard MLA directions for a type of source that resembles the source you want to cite.

You may also want to investigate whether a third-party organization has provided directions for how to cite this kind of source. For example, Norquest College provides guidelines for citing Indigenous Elders and Knowledge Keepers⁠ —an author category that does not appear in the MLA Handbook . In cases like this, however, it's a good idea to ask your instructor or supervisor whether using third-party citation guidelines might present problems.

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                          Specific purpose: To inform my audience how to create their own Web page and make it accessible through the Internet. Central idea: To create a Web page one needs to follow four major steps. Main Points: I. The first step is deciding what content you want your Web page to feature. II. The second step is selecting the layout and the design of your Web page. III. The third step is saving your Web page as an HTML file. IV. The fourth step is uploading your Web page onto the Internet. Introduction I. Web pages is a continuing and endless creation that can be found all over the Internet, which is why we call it the "World Wide Web. "A. This World Wide Web continues to grow everyday with individuals, such as yourselves, deciding to join the internet community. B. There are many ways to become a part of this community, and one of the most popular ways is to create your own Web page. 1. By creating a Web page you are joining the millions of people around the world who have already taken the step into the information age. C. A Web page gives you your own personal and unique identity, which can be accessed by anyone all over the world. D. I myself created my first web page when I was 12 years old and continue to work on different projects till this day. II. Now that you know some of the advantages of creating a Web page I will inform everyone the four major steps in creating one's own Web page. A. To create a Web page you need to follow four major steps. 1. The first step is deciding what content you want your Web page to feature. 2. The second step is selecting the layout and the design of your Web page. 3. The third step is saving your Web page as an HTML file. 4. The fourth step is uploading your Web page onto the Internet.(Transition: These are the four basic steps that one should follow when creating their own Web page.) {Pause} Body I. Now that you are ready to begin creating your Web page, you should begin with the first step, which is deciding on what content you want your Web page to feature.

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• Grade Level: High School

2. Teen Websites

Searching for websites that are appropriate for teenagers can be difficult in today's society. ... Some of the websites that target teenage girls are particularly influential. ... Articles highlighted on the websites focus almost solely on looks as well. Instead of discussing current controversial issues or the war that many people feel is inevitable, the biggest worry expressed by these websites is how to get rid of a zit before the big date. ... Almost every time, she would come up short, creating a lowered self-esteem. ...

• Word Count: 690
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

3. Control of Teacher Websites

The problem for the Court then became how to balance the government's interest in maintaining an efficient public workplace against the individual employee's interest in free expression. ... The website was created while Mr. ... The last update to the website was in September 2001. ... From the time the website was created in December of 1997, when Mr. ... Scarlett's website. ...

• Word Count: 1680
• Approx Pages: 7

4. School's Website Filters

Censoring websites is not the way to correct student's behavior. ... The purpose of filtering websites is to keep people on task. ... Filtering websites is a form of censorship. ... Harboring information creates closed minds and negatively affects society. ... It makes more sense to ease children and teens into real life situations at an early age, teaching them how to react to certain situations in a positive way. ...

• Word Count: 714

5. How to Build a Webpage

Creating the Prefect Web Site Today in a society of technology, knowing how to create and maintain a website is a helpful skill to know. ... Therefore with the world already as technical as it is and only getting more technical by the day, knowing how to build a website can be a truly significant ability. There is much to consider when building a website, but already knowing what your content will be is the first step into creating your site. ... For example if your website is about breeding parrots, your website should at least have the world parrots in the domain. ... However, b...

• Word Count: 825

6. How to create a website

Specific purpose: To inform my audience how to create their own Web page and make it accessible through the internet. ... In conclusion, I hope that everyone has a better understanding of how to create a Web page. ... Andrew Brown once said, "The Internet is so big, so powerful and pointless that for some people it is a complete substitute for life," now that you have become informed how to create your own Web page you can prove Mr. ... Steve Dynov Speech-113 Specific purpose: To inform my audience how to create their own Web page and make it accessible through the internet. ...

• Word Count: 1569

7. Promoting Professional Artists and Their Art

Introduction If, as a society, we are to comprehend how the arts contribute to our lives, it is important to understand how art is produced and what problems face those who produce it. ... This guide is directed toward improving early design decisions and toward the development of realistic, cost effective website Talented artists have created high quality products with an amazing diverse range of items. ... Programming Technology Programming technologies generally use one or more programming language to create end-to-end solutions for Web applications. ... The web allows us to introduce the ...

• Word Count: 1523

8. Concepts of Modern Typography

Many designers and typographers talked about the importance of typography and how it communicates thoughts information through human eyesight (Carter, 2002, p.11). ... First of all, the research s and collected massive information that resides in books, articles, journals and websites used desk research methodology. ... Also, presents some examples of typography practices in typefaces design, book design, website design, visual identity, packaging and poster design. ... This book shows us how to have the perfect design considering all the aspects of Design. ... He also described how colors and...

• Word Count: 3185
• Approx Pages: 13
• Has Bibliography

The risk of nuclear conflict is rising.

Nuclear nations are building up their arsenals, speeding toward the next arms race. Is anyone paying attention?

Today’s generation of weapons — many of which are fractions of the size of the bombs America dropped in 1945 but magnitudes more deadly than conventional ones — poses an unpredictable threat.

It hangs over battlefields in Ukraine as well as places where the next war might occur: the Persian Gulf, the Taiwan Strait, the Korean Peninsula.

This is one story of what’s at stake — if even one small nuclear weapon were used — based on modeling, research and hundreds of hours of interviews with people who have lived through an atomic detonation, dedicated their lives to studying nuclear war or are planning for its aftermath.

Nuclear war is often described as unimaginable. In fact, it’s not imagined enough.

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If it seems alarmist to anticipate the horrifying aftermath of a nuclear attack, consider this: The United States and Ukraine governments have been planning for this scenario for at least two years.

In the fall of 2022, a U.S. intelligence assessment put the odds at 50-50 that Russia would launch a nuclear strike to halt Ukrainian forces if they breached its defense of Crimea. Preparing for the worst, American officials rushed supplies to Europe. Ukraine has set up hundreds of radiation detectors around cities and power plants, along with more than 1,000 smaller hand-held monitors sent by the United States.

Nearly 200 hospitals in Ukraine have been identified as go-to facilities in the event of a nuclear attack. Thousands of doctors, nurses and other workers have been trained on how to respond and treat radiation exposure. And millions of potassium iodide tablets, which protect the thyroid from picking up radioactive material linked with cancer, are stockpiled around the country.

But well before that — just four days after Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, in fact — the Biden administration had directed a small group of experts and strategists, a “Tiger Team,” to devise a new nuclear “playbook” of contingency plans and responses. Pulling in experts from the intelligence, military and policy fields, they pored over years-old emergency preparedness plans, weapon-effects modeling and escalation scenarios, dusting off materials that in the age of counterterrorism and cyberwarfare were long believed to have faded into irrelevance.

The playbook, which was coordinated by the National Security Council, now sits in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, next to the West Wing of the White House. It has a newly updated, detailed menu of diplomatic and military options for President Biden — and any future president — to act upon if a nuclear attack occurs in Ukraine.

At the heart of all of this work is a chilling conclusion: The possibility of a nuclear strike, once inconceivable in modern conflict, is more likely now than at any other time since the Cold War. “We've had 30 pretty successful years keeping the genie in the bottle,” a senior administration official on the Tiger Team said. While both America and Russia have hugely reduced their nuclear arsenals since the height of the Cold War, the official said, “Right now is when nuclear risk is most at the forefront.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin reminded the world of this existential danger last week when he publicly warned of nuclear war if NATO deepened its involvement in Ukraine.

President Vladimir Putin, February 2024

The risk of nuclear escalation in Ukraine, while now low, has been a primary concern for the Biden administration throughout the conflict, details of which are being reported here for the first time. In a series of interviews over the past year, U.S. and Ukrainian officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal planning, diplomacy and ongoing security preparations.

And while it may cause sleepless nights in Washington and Kyiv, most of the world has barely registered the threat. Perhaps it’s because an entire generation came of age in a post-Cold War world, when the possibility of nuclear war was thought to be firmly behind us. It is time to remind ourselves of the consequences in order to avoid them.

Even after last week’s nuclear threat, few believe that Mr. Putin will wake up one day and decide to lob megaton warheads at Washington or European capitals in retaliation for supporting Ukraine. What Western allies see as more likely is that Russia will use a so-called tactical nuclear weapon, which is less destructive and designed to strike targets over short distances to devastate military units on the battlefield.

The strategic thinking behind those weapons is that they are far less damaging than city-destroying hydrogen bombs and therefore more “usable” in warfare. The United States estimates Russia has a stockpile of up to 2,000 tactical nuclear warheads, some small enough they fit in an artillery shell.

But the detonation of any tactical nuclear weapon would be an unprecedented test of the dogma of deterrence, a theory that has underwritten America’s military policy for the past 70 years. The idea stipulates that adversaries are deterred from launching a nuclear attack against the United States — or more than 30 of its treaty-covered allies — because by doing so they risk an overwhelming counterattack.

Possessing nuclear weapons isn’t about winning a nuclear war, the theory goes; it’s about preventing one. It hinges upon a carefully calibrated balance of terror among nuclear states.

Source: Federation of American Scientists

Figures and dates are based on estimates of the number of warheads for military use and may not mark when a nation's first nuclear test took place.

If Mr. Putin dropped a nuclear weapon on Ukraine — a nonnuclear nation that’s not covered by anyone’s nuclear umbrella — what then? If deterrence fails, how is it possible to reduce the risk of one attack escalating into a global catastrophe?

We might find an answer in the autumn of 2022, when fears of Russia’s nuclear use in Ukraine were most palpable. A lightning Ukrainian military counteroffensive had reclaimed territory from the Russians in the northeastern region of Kharkiv. The Ukrainians were on the cusp of breaching Russian defense lines at Kherson in the south, possibly causing a second Russian retreat that could signal an imminent broader military collapse.

U.S. intelligence estimated that if Ukraine’s fighters managed to break through Russian defenses — and were on the march to the occupied Crimean Peninsula, where the Russian Black Sea Fleet is based — it came down to a coin flip whether or not Russia would launch a tactical nuclear weapon to stop them, senior administration officials said.

Moscow has made implicit and explicit nuclear threats throughout the war to scare off Western intervention. Around this time, however, a series of frightening episodes took place.

On Oct. 23, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu of Russia made a flurry of phone calls to the defense chiefs of four NATO nations, including Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, to say Russia had indications that Ukrainian fighters could detonate a dirty bomb — a conventional explosive wrapped in radioactive material — on their own territory to frame Moscow.

American intelligence also intercepted chatter around then among Russian military leaders about using a tactical nuclear weapon, according to current and former Biden administration officials. General Austin and the Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman, Gen. Mark Milley, held three phone calls in four days with Russian counterparts during this tense period.

Believing the Russians were building an unfounded pretext for their own nuclear attack, the Biden administration quickly began a multilateral effort with allies, adversaries and nations in between to de-escalate the situation and try to talk Moscow out of it. For nearly a week, Biden aides pulled all-nighters at the White House, coordinating high-level conversations and planning for the worst: the detonation of a small nuclear device in Ukrainian territory that had the power of a few kilotons or less.

Many in the administration believed the Kremlin’s dirty bomb ploy posed the greatest risk of nuclear war since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis. State Department officials traveled to Poland to ensure that medical supplies and radiation equipment were rushed over the border. The Energy Department sent equipment to collect potential debris so that it could be later analyzed by American scientists for weapon design characteristics and the origin of the nuclear material. U.S. Strategic Command, which oversees nuclear operations, directed a team of experts (cheekily named The Writers’ Club, because their findings were written up daily for the Pentagon leadership) to assess the risk and determine which conditions would trigger Russia to go nuclear.

While cautions about the potential withering economic, diplomatic and military consequences were delivered in private to Moscow, administration officials also publicly sounded alarm bells.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, October 2022

The administration’s diplomatic push was coupled with efforts by leaders of several nations, including China, India and Turkey, to explain to Mr. Putin’s government the potential costs if he were to go through with a nuclear attack. That November, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, William J. Burns, met with his Russian counterpart in Turkey, where he conveyed a similar warning. On Nov. 16, the Group of 20 released a joint statement:

If the Russian leader was indeed inching toward the brink, he stepped back.

What took place to prevent a nuclear attack that fall was a rare moment of consensus on an issue on which world leaders seem to be moving farther apart. Russia is replacing its Soviet-era hardware with new jets, missiles and submarines. And the other eight nations that have nuclear weapons are believed to be enhancing their arsenals in parts of the world that are already on edge.

India, which has continuing tensions over its borders with China and Pakistan, is fielding longer-range weapons.

Pakistan is developing new ballistic missiles and expanding nuclear production facilities.

North Korea, which has an arsenal of several hundred missiles and dozens of nuclear warheads, regularly threatens to attack South Korea, where the U.S. keeps about 28,500 troops.

China, which has publicly expressed its desire to control the U.S.-allied island of Taiwan by force if necessary, is increasing its nuclear arsenal at a “scale and pace unseen since the U.S.-Soviet nuclear arms race that ended in the late 1980s,” the Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States concluded in October.

So while Washington has been helping Ukraine prepare for a nuclear attack, Taiwan or South Korea could be next. The National Security Council has already coordinated contingency playbooks for possible conflicts that could turn nuclear in Taiwan, the Korean Peninsula and the Middle East. Iran, which has continued its nuclear program amid Israel’s war on Hamas in Gaza, has amassed enough enriched uranium to build several weapons if and when it chooses.

During this time of widening conflict, the rising nuclear threat is especially destabilizing: A nuclear explosion in Ukraine or Gaza, where tens of thousands of civilians have already been killed or injured, would sizeably escalate either conflict and its humanitarian toll.

The world has been through a version of this moment before. The last nuclear standoff during the Cold War was cooled in part because of numerous nonproliferation efforts and arms control agreements between the United States and the former Soviet Union. The two nations, recognizing the terrifying situation they were in, worked to identify weapons that were mutually menacing and simply agreed to eliminate them. Nuclear warhead numbers plummeted to 12,500 today from roughly 70,400 in 1986.

Now that shared safety net of treaties and agreements is nearly gone. After a decade of diplomatic breakdown and military antagonism, only one major arms treaty between the United States and Russia remains — New START, which Mr. Putin suspended Russia’s participation in last year. The treaty is set to expire in February 2026.

President Vladimir Putin, February 2023

That means we are just two years away from a world in which there are no major treaty limits on the number of strategic nuclear weapons the United States and Russia deploy. Already today, because of the New START suspension, the two nations disclose little information about their arsenals to each other and do not engage in talks for further agreements. If nuclear deterrence — however flawed a concept it may be — is to work, transparency about nations’ capabilities is critical. Without better communication, the risk of rapid escalation and miscalculation will grow.

The danger of nuclear use in Ukraine fluctuates. It waned after Ukraine’s drive to recapture territory and sever Russia’s supply lines to Crimea was stopped short. But if the momentum swings back in Ukraine’s favor, or if Mr. Putin feels threatened by increased Western intervention, it could rise again. A U.S. intelligence report declassified late last year estimated Russia had lost around 315,000 troops to death or injury in Ukraine since 2022. That’s nearly 90 percent of its prewar force, along with at least 20 warships, thousands of battle tanks and heavy weapons — all major losses that could create more dependency on its tactical nuclear arsenal.

This isn’t an easy time for adversaries to be making big leaps of faith, but history shows it’s not impossible to forge deals amid international crises.

The Limited Test Ban Treaty, which prohibits nuclear tests in the atmosphere, in space and underwater, was signed by the United States, Britain and the former Soviet Union in 1963, less than a year after the Cuban missile crisis. Negotiations over the first Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, which froze the number of American and Soviet long-range, nuclear-capable missiles, were concluded less than two months after the United States bombed Haiphong Harbor in Vietnam in 1972, damaging some Soviet ships. Several close calls in Europe during the Cold War contributed to a sweeping collection of agreements between Washington and Moscow that capped the number of each nation’s strategic weapons, opened communication channels and amplified monitoring and verification measures.

China’s aggressive nuclear buildup has complicated the strategic balance of the Cold War, raising questions in the United States about how to handle a three-way competition. In June, Jake Sullivan, President Biden’s national security adviser, publicly offered to hold nuclear arms control negotiations with Russia and China — one-on-one or multilaterally — without preconditions. The proposal has resulted in only preliminary discussions with the Chinese and was met with outright dismissal from the Russians, according to administration officials.

Nuclear arms treaties typically take months or years to negotiate. And while the agreements don’t solve everything, they do allow governments to gain insights and assurances about an adversary’s stockpile that they otherwise wouldn’t have. Left in the dark, governments are forced to plan for the worst, building offensive and defensive capabilities.

The United States is now preparing to build new nuclear warheads for the first time since 1991, part of a decades-long program to overhaul its nuclear forces that’s estimated to cost up to $2 trillion. The outline of that plan was drawn up in 2010 — in a much different security environment than what the country faces today. This administration, or the next one, could make the political case that even more weapons need to be built in response to the expansion and modernization of other nations’ arsenals, particularly Russia’s and China’s.

Behind a nondescript door on the fifth floor of the State Department building in Washington, down the hall from the former offices of the director of the Manhattan Project, a windowless control room provides a direct channel between the world’s two biggest nuclear powers.

The National and Nuclear Risk Reduction Center was established in 1988 as a 24-hour watch station to facilitate the information exchange required by various arms control treaties and security-building agreements, mostly between the United States and Russia.

With a Russian translator always on the floor, the center once buzzed with more than 1,000 messages a year regarding the testing, movement and maintenance of Russia’s weapons, missiles and bombers. Last year, after the abandonment of New START, the center received fewer than a dozen of those messages.

W.J. Hennigan writes about national security issues for Opinion from Washington, D.C. He has reported from more than two dozen countries, covering war, the arms trade and the lives of U.S. service members. Additional reporting by Spencer Cohen. A selection of sources consulted in reporting this project can be found here .

National and Nuclear Risk Reduction Center photographed by An-My Lê for The New York Times. Illustrations by Tim McDonagh. Animation by Jil Tai. Phone call: Robert L. Knudsen/U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (test ban). Treaty photos: Corbis/Getty Images (SALT); Bettmann/Getty Images (INF); Joe Klamar/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images (NEW START). Videos: The Union Herald, via YouTube; RTVI News, via YouTube; CGTN, via YouTube; Global News, via YouTube; Pakistan Armed Forces, via YouTube; AFP, via YouTube .

Edited by Krista Mahr, Kathleen Kingsbury and Meeta Agrawal. Produced by Jessia Ma, Kate Elazegui, Shoshana Schultz, Quoctrung Bui, Jacqueline Bates and Ana Becker.

This Times Opinion series is funded through philanthropic grants from the Carnegie Corporation of New York , Outrider Foundation and the Prospect Hill Foundation . Funders have no control over the selection or focus of articles or the editing process and do not review articles before publication. The Times retains full editorial control.

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The best AI chatbots: ChatGPT isn't the only one worth trying

Since the launch of ChatGPT , AI chatbots have been all of the rave because of their ability to do such a wide range of tasks which can help you with both your personal and work life. At your command, AI chatbots can write code , compose emails, draft a report,  generate art ,  write Excel formulas for you , and much more. 

However, because ChatGPT  reached worldwide recognition , competitors were motivated to make their own versions, and, as a result, there are so many options on the market to choose from with different strengths, use cases, difficulty levels, and other nuances.

Also: The best AI image generators: Tested and reviewed

For the last year and a half, I have taken a deep dive into the world of AI, testing as many AI tools as I could get my hands on--including dozens of AI chatbots. Using my findings, as well as those of other ZDNET AI experts, I put together a list of the best AI chatbots and AI writers on the market. 

The list details everything you need to know before choosing your next AI assistant, including what it's best for, pros, cons, cost, its large language model (LLM), and more. So whether you are entirely new to AI chatbots, or have used plenty before, this list should help you discover a new chatbot you haven't used before. 

What is the best AI chatbot right now?

Thanks to its sourcing abilities, free internet access, and advanced LLM model, Microsoft Copilot is my first choice for the best AI chatbot. Keep reading to see how its features compare to others like ChatGPT, You.com, and more. 

The best AI chatbots of 2024

Microsoft copilot, best ai chatbot overall.

• Access to the internet
• Links back to sources
• Uses OpenAI's most advanced LLM
• Grounded in Bing

Copilot f eatures:  OpenAI's most advanced LLM, GPT-4 Turbo | Has access to the internet | Works like a search engine with information on current events | Free

In February last year, Microsoft unveiled a new AI-improved Bing, now known as Copilot, which runs on GPT-4  Turbo, the newest version of OpenAI's language model systems. As of May 4 of last year, Copilot moved from limited preview to open preview, meaning that now everyone can access it for free.  

Also: What is Copilot (formerly Bing Chat)? Here's everything you need to know

When I use a chatbot, I typically reach for Copilot because I found that it solved two major issues with ChatGPT, including access to current events and linking back to the sources it retrieved its answer for free. It is also the only way to access OpenAI's most advanced LLM--GPT-4 Turbo--for free. 

Copilot is free to use and offers a series of other features that make it an attractive alternative, including multi-modal inputs, image generation within the chatbot, and a standalone app. 

Best original AI chatbot

• Writing skills
• STEM knowledge
• Conversational
• Not always available
• Not connected to the internet

ChatGPT features:  Uses OpenAI's GPT-3.5 or GPT-4 (if subscribed) | Can generate text, solve math problems, and code | Impressive conversation capabilities | Free to the public right now

ChatGPT is a conversational AI chatbot  by OpenAI that can produce text for you based on any prompt you input, generating emails, essays, poems, grocery lists, letters, and much more.

In addition to writing for you, ChatGPT can chat with you about simple or complex topics such as "What are colors?" or "What is the meaning of life?" If you want other technical assistance, ChatGPT is also proficient in STEM and can write and debug code , and even solve complex math equations. 

Also:  How to use ChatGPT

ChatGPT was released November 2022, and because of its  massive success , it became the blueprint for many other chatbots to enter the scene, with many being found on the list now. Therefore, if you are interested in AI chatbots, you'll likely want to try the original that began the craze -- ChatGPT. 

The downsides of the chatbot include that it is sometimes at capacity due to its immense popularity, doesn't have access to the internet, and has a knowledge cutoff. 

I still reach for ChatGPT as, despite its limitations, it is an incredibly capable chatbot. However, when I do, I make sure that my queries do not rely on the most recent information to be accurate. For example, some good use cases to use ChatGPT for are brainstorming text or coding.

Anthrophic's Claude

Best ai chatbot for summarizing documents.

• Upload document support
• Chat controls
• Light and dark mode
• Unclear usage cap
• Knowledge cutoff

Claude features:   Powered by Claude 3 model family | Accepts document uploads | Trained with information up to early 2023 |  Free

Anthropic launched its first AI assistant, Claude, in February 2023, and in less than a year, it has secured a spot as one of the best chatbots in the space. Like the other leading competitors, Anthropic can conversationally answer prompts with anything you need assistance with, including coding, math, writing, research, and more. 

Also: 4 things Claude AI can do that ChatGPT can't

Personally, the biggest advantage of this chatbot is that it can accept document uploads to help read, analyze, and summarize uploaded files. To upload a file, all I had to do was click on the paper clip icon next to the text box and click on the document I wanted to upload. Then, I was able to conversationally ask for the help I wanted with the document, including document summaries or clarifications on specific topics found within the document. 

Also: This free tool from Anthropic helps you create better prompts for your AI chatbot

Claude is in free open beta, and, as a result, has context window and daily message limits which can vary based on demand, so if you are looking to use the chatbot regularly, upgrading to Claude Pro may be a better option, as it offers at least five times the usage limits compared to the free version for $20 a month. 

Perplexity.ai

The best ai chatbot for prompt ideation.

• Links to sources
• Access to internet
• Paid subscription required for GPT-4 access
• some irrelevant suggestions

Perplexity AI features: OpenAI GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 for subscribers | Has access to the internet and current events | Provides prompt suggestions to get chats started | Free

Perplexity AI is a free AI chatbot that is connected to the internet, provides sources, and has a very enjoyable UI. As soon as you visit the site , using the chatbot is straightforward. All you have to do is type your prompt into the "ask anything" box to get started. The first time I ever visited this chatbot, I was able to get started within seconds.

On top of the text box, the chatbot states, "Where knowledge begins," and the title could not be more fitting. 

Also: ChatGPT vs. Microsoft Copilot vs. Gemini: Which is the best AI chatbot?

As soon as you click on the textbox, it has a series of suggested prompts which are all mostly rooted in news. It also has suggested prompts underneath the box on a variety of evergreen topics. All you have to do is click on any of the suggestions to learn more about the topic and chat about it. Additionally, Perplexity provides related topic questions you can click on to keep the conversation going. 

Because of the extensive prompts it gives users to try, this is a great chatbot for taking deep dives into topics that you wouldn't have necessarily thought of before, encouraging discovery and experimentation. I personally deep dove into a couple of random topics myself, including the history of birthday cakes, and I enjoyed every second of it. 

Other perks include that there is an app for both iOS and Android, allowing you to also tinker with the chatbot while you're on the go, footnotes are provided after every answer with sources you can visit and the answers nearly always include photos and graphics. 

Best AI chatbot for businesses and marketers

• 50 different writing templates
• Copyediting features
• Plagiarism checker
• Need a subscription to try

Jasper features:  Uses different LLMs, including GPT-4 | Summarizes texts and generates paragraphs and product descriptions | Checks for plagiarism and grammar | Starts at $39 per month with an annual subscription

Jasper is a tool exclusively meant for users who are looking to incorporate an AI chatbot into their workflow because there is no free plan, and you can't access the chatbot otherwise. For example, when I tried using it myself, I was met with dead ends unless I subscribed. The least expensive option, the Creator plan, is geared towards freelancers and solo-preneurs and is $49 a month. However, if you rely on an AI chatbot to generate copy for your business, the investment may be worth it. 

Also: ChatGPT vs. Copilot: Which AI chatbot is better for you?

With Jasper, you can input a prompt for what you want to be written, and it will write it for you, just like ChatGPT would. The major difference with Jasper is that it has an extensive amount of tools to produce better copy. Jasper can check for grammar and plagiarism and write in over 50 different templates, including blog posts, Twitter threads, video scripts, and more. It also offers SEO insights and can even remember your brand voice, facilitating the creation of copy. 

Whether you are an individual, small team, or larger business looking into optimizing your workflow, before you take the plunge, you can access a trial or demo. 

Best AI chatbot that functions as a search engine

• Readily available
• Source Citing
• Some answers stronger than others
• Subscription required for GPT-4 access

You.com features: GPT-4 with subscription | Lists sources for the text it generates | Unlike most other Chatbots, uses Google sources | Free

You.com (previously known as YouChat) is an AI assistant that functions similarly to the way a search engine would. Like Google, you can enter any question, or topic you'd like to learn information on, and immediately be met with real-time web results, in addition to a conversational response.  

For example, when I asked, "Can you share some pictures of adorable dog breeds?" the chatbot provided six different web links, as well as the seven different pictures it pulled from the web, a conversational answer and related news, as seen in the photo. 

The chatbot can also provide technical assistance, with answers to anything you input, including math, coding, translating, and writing prompts. A huge pro for this chatbot is that, because it lacks popularity, you can hop on at any time and ask away.  

Chatsonic by Writesonic

Best ai chatbot for article writers.

• Variety of use cases
• Need to sign-in
• A bit of a lag

Chatsonic features:   Powered by GPT-3.5. or GPT-4 depending on subscription | Aware of current events, whereas ChatGPT is trained up to 2021 | Extensive feature suite, including voice dictation and image generation | Starts at $12 per month

Chatsonic is a dependable AI chatbot, with a function as an AI writing tool. It functions much like ChatGPT, allowing users to input prompts for assistance on a variety of tasks. However, it includes the ability to web search, generate images, and access PDF assistance, which ChatGPT lacks. 

The Writesonic platform offers tools that are specifically meant to help generate stories, including Instant Article Writer, which generates an article from a single click; Article Rewriter, which rephrases existing content; and Article Writer 5, which generates articles using ranking competitors. 

Other tools that facilitate the creation of articles include SEO Checker and Optimizer, AI Editor, Content Rephraser, Paragraph Writer, and more. There is a free version, which gets you access to some of the features; however, there is a 50 generations per day limit. The monthly cost starts at $12 per month but goes all the way up to $250 per month depending on the number of words and amount of users needed.

Gemini (formerly Google Bard)

Best ai chatbot if you're a loyal google user.

• Access to Google
• Good text editing skills
• Can't help much with code

Gemini features:  Powered by a finetuned version of Gemini Pro | Includes a "Google it" feature | Generates clear text and images quickly | Free

Gemini is Google's conversational AI chatbot that functions the most similarly to Copilot, sourcing its answers from the web, providing footnotes, and even generating images within its chatbot. Since its initial release in March 2023, the chatbot has undergone several upgrades, with the latest version being the most optimized it has ever been. 

Also: What is Google's Gemini AI tool (formerly Bard)? Everything you need to know

The highlight of this chatbot is that it is rooted in Google technology, search engines, and applications, and if you are a loyal Google user, you will feel familiar with the chatbot's UI and its offerings. For example, unlike most of the chatbots on this list, Google does not use an LLM in the GPT series but instead uses a model made by Google. 

"Gemini is slowly becoming a full Google experience thanks to Extensions folding the wide range of Google applications into Gemini," said ZDNET writer Maria Diaz when reviewing the chatbot. "Gemini users can add extensions for Google Workspace, YouTube, Google Maps, Google Flights, and Google Hotels, giving them a more personalized and extensive experience."

If you subscribe to Google's new 'AI Premium Plan,' you not only get access to the most advanced Google models in Gemini, such as Ultra 1.0, but you also get access to Gemini for Workspace, previously known as  Duet AI,  which infuses Google's AI assistance throughout its productivity apps, including Gmail, Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Meet. 

Socratic by Google

Best ai chatbot for kids and students.

• Educational
• Easy to use
• Doesn't write text
• No desktop version

Socratic features:  From Google | Type in any question to generate a response | Includes fun graphics | Supports scanning worksheets to get a specially curated answer | Free

If you want your child to also take advantage of AI to lighten their workload, but still have some limits, Socratic is for you. With Socratic, children can type in any question they may have about what they are learning in school, and Socratic will generate a conversational, human-like response with fun, unique graphics to help break down the concept. 

"It's a powerful studying tool that could help students double-check their homework, or get across the last hurdle if a question or formula just isn't making sense. And using the app is as easy as using  Snapchat  or talking to Siri," said former ZDNET contributor Jason Cipriani, when reviewing the app. 

The app, available on the App Store and the Google App Store, also has a feature that lets your kid scan their worksheet to get a specially curated answer. The app does have some limitations; for example, it will not just write an essay or story when prompted. However, this could be a positive thing because it curbs your child's temptation to get a chatbot, like ChatGPT, to write their essay for them. 

HuggingChat

Best open-source chatbot.

• Cutomizable
• Intermediate/advanced skills requires
• Required to create an account

Socratic features:  Clean, Chat-GPT inspired interface | entirely customizable | great for developers or AI fanatics | secure alternative | Free

As seen by the list above, plenty of great chatbot options are on the market. However, if you are on the search for a chatbot that serves your use case specifically, you can always build an entirely customizable new one. HuggingChat is an open-source chatbot developed by Hugging Face that can be used as a regular chatbot or customized for your needs.  

Also :  Want to build your own AI chatbot? Say hello to open-source HuggingChat

As ZDNET's David Gewirtz unpacked in his hands-on article , you may not want to depend on HuggingChat as your go-to primary chatbot. However, it is a good interface to build your own chatbot on. As Gewirtz said himself: "If you want something that you control, you can use HuggingChat to build a chatbot where you have visibility into every aspect of its functioning. You can choose to make that chatbot available online to other users and provide transparency to all users."

What is the best AI chatbot?

The best overall AI chatbot is Copilot due to its exceptional performance, versatility, and free availability. It uses OpenAI's cutting-edge GPT-4 language model, making it highly proficient in various language tasks, including writing, summarization, translation, and conversation. Moreover, it works like a search engine with information on current events.

Another advantage of Copilot is its availability to the public at no cost. Despite its immense popularity, Copilot remains free, making it an incredible resource for students, writers, and professionals who need a reliable and free AI chatbot. 

Although there are occasional capacity blocks, OpenAI is working on releasing a professional version of ChatGPT that will be quicker and always accessible at a monthly cost.

Which AI chatbot is right for you?

While Copliot is my personal favorite, your use case may be hyper-specific or have certain demands. If you need a constant, reliable AI chatbot, other alternatives might be better suited for you. If you just want an AI chatbot that produces clean, reliable, business-ready copy, for example, then Jasper is for you. If you want to play around with an AI chatbot that isn't always at capacity, YouChat might be the best option. 

Lastly, if there is a child in your life, Socratic might be worth checking out. See our breakdown below:

Factors to consider when choosing a chatbot

Since there are so many chatbots on the market, picking the right one can get confusing. Some factors to consider to help narrow down those options are: 

• Large Language Model (LLM) 
• Knowledge cutoff 
• Access to the internet 
• Linking to sources 
• Best use cases 

How did I choose these AI chatbots?

In order to curate the list of best AI chatbots and AI writers, I looked at the capabilities of each individual program including the individual uses each program would excel at. As an AI reporter, I was also sure to test each one myself. Other factors I looked at were reliability, availability, and cost. 

• Individual use case: AI chatbots have many use cases, often acting as a tool for productivity and easier workflow. I included a variety that can serve as ideation, education, and content creation tools. 
• Reliability: I kept information accuracy a priority during my testing. 
• Availability : ChatGPT is popular, but not always available. I selected alternatives that don't have a user limit and are available at all times. 
• Cost: Many of these AI programs are free, but some require monthly memberships. I included a mix of both, keeping budget-friendliness in mind. 

What is an AI chatbot?

An AI chatbot (also called AI writer) refers to a type of artificial intelligence-powered program that is capable of generating written content from a user's input prompt. AI chatbots are capable of writing anything from a rap song to an essay upon a user's request. The extent of what each chatbot is specifically able to write about depends on its individual capabilities including whether it is connected to a search engine or not. 

How do AI chatbots work?

AI chatbots use language models to train the AI to produce human-like responses. Some are connected to the web and that is how they have up-to-date information, while others depend solely on the information they are trained with. 

How much do AI chatbots cost?

AI chatbot programs vary in cost with some being entirely free and others costing as much as $600 a month. Many like ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini and YouChat are entirely free to use. 

What is the difference between an AI chatbot and an AI writer?

The main difference between an AI chatbot and an AI writer is the type of output they generate and their primary function.

In the past, an AI writer was used specifically to generate written content, such as articles, stories, or poetry, based on a given prompt or input. An AI writer's output is in the form of written text that mimics human-like language and structure. On the other hand, an AI chatbot is designed to conduct real-time conversations with users in text or voice-based interactions. The primary function of an AI chatbot is to answer questions, provide recommendations, or even perform simple tasks, and its output is in the form of text-based conversations.

While the terms AI chatbot and AI writer are now used interchangeably by some, the original distinction was that an AI writer was used for generating written content, while an AI chatbot was used for conversational purposes. However, with the introduction of more advanced AI technology, such as ChatGPT, the line between the two has become increasingly blurred. Some AI chatbots are now capable of generating text-based responses that mimic human-like language and structure, similar to an AI writer.

Read more about the best tools for your business and the right tools when building your business !

Artificial Intelligence

This free tool from anthropic helps you create better prompts for your ai chatbot, you can now make your own custom copilot gpt. here's how, ai, chatbots, and augmented reality lead the top tech trends of the week.

How to Complete the CSS Profile®

Apply with css profile®.

Each year College Board’s CSS Profile® unlocks access to billions of dollars in grants and scholarships for thousands of students. CSS Profile is an online application that collects information used by hundreds of colleges, universities, professional schools, and scholarship programs to award financial aid from sources outside of the federal government. After you submit your application, the College Board sends it to the colleges and scholarship programs you have chosen.

Who Should Complete

Not all colleges and scholarship programs require the CSS Profile. Check with the ones you’re interested in to see if they require it.

When to Complete

Start your CSS Profile by visiting cssprofile.org at least two weeks before the earliest college or scholarship priority application date you need to meet. This date is the college or program’s deadline for submitting a completed CSS Profile application.

How Much It Costs

CSS Profile is free for families who make up to $100,000 a year. First-year domestic undergraduate students may submit CSS Profile for free if your family adjusted gross income is up to $100,000 or you qualify for an SAT fee waiver, or you are an orphan or ward of the court under the age of 24. CSS Profile fee waivers cover all application and reporting fees. If you do not qualify for a fee waiver submitting your CSS Profile to one college or scholarship program costs $25. Additional reports are $16 each. To qualify for the SAT-based fee waiver, students must log in to CSS Profile using the same College Board account used for the SAT. Providing eligible students with fee waivers for College Board programs and services is integral to our mission of connecting students to college success and opportunity.

The Process: How to Complete the Application

Before you start.

• Visit cssprofile.org.
• Prepare by reviewing the helpful application resources found in the “Getting Started” section of the website.
• The CSS Profile Overview answers many common application questions and takes just a few minutes to review.
• Ready to begin? Select the “Sign In” link and follow the instructions.

Completing the Application

• Have tax records and financial documents handy.
• Enter the required information about you and your family.
• Help is only one click away within the application through live chat, email, or phone.

Here’s what you can expect:

• The application dashboard is a helpful tool that provides a quick status of your progress and important messages from colleges. Questions are personalized based on your situation.
• Expect to be asked about income, assets, and expenses.
• If your parents are divorced or separated, review the Divorced or Separated Parents section to learn more about what to expect.
• Your application is saved along the way. Return at any time to complete the application.
• You’ll receive alerts to missing or incorrect information.
• Secure data—your information is encrypted and stored with firewall protection.

Submit the Application

To complete your application select a college or scholarship program and enter your payment information. Once you have submitted your application, college-specific messages and a payment confirmation are available in the application dashboard. Your application can be saved or printed from the application dashboard. This includes the data you entered on your application and your college and scholarship list. Note: At any time, you may add a college or program to your CSS Profile application from this dashboard.

The data on your CSS Profile is analyzed and reported to the colleges and scholarship programs you have specified. They then use the report to help determine your financial aid award.

CSS Profile®

• Go to CSS Profile

FAFSA Application

• Go to FAFSA

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Devin AI: World’s First AI Software Engineer

Cognition, a leading tech company, has introduced Devin AI, the world’s first AI software engineer. This innovation promises to speed development by using the power of AI-powered coding and machine learning. Devin AI goes beyond just assistance; it’s a full-fledged teammate, exerting the magic of intelligent coding automation and autonomous AI coding to automate complex tasks and empower developers to achieve more.

In Short Devin AI is revolutionising the software development industry with its advanced capabilities. It offers a unique blend of machine learning and artificial intelligence to automate coding tasks. The platform is designed to enhance productivity and efficiency in the software development process.

What is Devin AI ?

Devin AI is a game-changer in software development. It’s not just an assistant; it’s a full-fledged AI engineer. Imagine a super-powered coder working independently. Devin tackles entire projects, from concept to code, freeing up human developers for creative problem-solving and innovation. This AI has the potential to make software development faster, smarter, and accessible to more people.

How Does Devin AI Work?

Devin AI works like a virtual software engineer with its toolbox. It doesn’t just suggest code; it operates in a secure environment with a code editor, web browser, and its unique system. Within this space, Devin can independently plan, design, and build software projects. This autonomy allows it to handle complex tasks using advanced reasoning and long-term planning capabilities, much like a skilled human developer would.

Devin AI’s SWE-bench Coding

Here’s how Devin AI shines on the SWE-Bench:

• Accuracy:  Devin boasts an impressive success rate in solving these problems, significantly surpassing previous models, both with and without assistance.
• Independent Problem-Solving:  Unlike other LLMs that might require human intervention, Devin tackles these challenges independently. This highlights its ability to think critically and plan complex tasks.
• A New Benchmark:  Devin’s performance has pushed the boundaries of what’s possible with LLMs in software development. It sets a new standard for future models to strive for.

The success on SWE-Bench showcases Devin AI’s potential to be a powerful tool for developers.

How to Use Devin Ai

Step 1: apply for access.

You might need to submit a request through Cognition’s website or designated channels.

Step 2: Integration

Once approved, you’ll likely integrate Devin AI with your existing development workflow.

Step 3: Define Project

Provide Devin with clear instructions about the software you want to build, outlining its functionalities.

Step 4: Let Devin Work

Devin will take the reins, access resources, and independently write the code for your project.

Step 5: Review and Refine

Once complete, you can review Devin’s generated code and make any necessary adjustments.

Step 6: Deployment

With your final approval, Devin might even assist in deploying the finished software.

This is a simplified overview based on available information.

The actual steps might vary depending on Devin AI’s final release and functionalities.

How Will Devin AI Impact Software Development?

Devin promises to transform the development landscape by leveraging the power of high-accuracy AI coding and reliable software development automation. Here are some key areas where Devin will make a difference:

• Supercharged Developer Productivity:  Repetitive tasks like debugging, boilerplate code generation, and even some aspects of software design will be tackled by Devin AI. This frees up human developers to focus on the big picture – strategic thinking, innovation, and complex problem-solving. With Devin handling the routine, developers can achieve significantly increased developer productivity.
• Faster Time to Market:  Automate coding tasks with Devin, and witness a dramatic reduction in development timelines. This allows companies to capitalize on emerging trends more effectively by accelerating software development. With faster development cycles, businesses can bring innovative products to market quickly, gaining a competitive edge.
• Streamlined Development Workflow:  Imagine a development workflow where tedious tasks are handled seamlessly by an AI partner. Devin integrates with existing workflows, improving software development workflow and eliminating inefficiencies. This allows developers to focus on their core strengths and collaborate with Devin to achieve optimal results.
• Reduced Development Costs:  Reliable software development automation by Devin translates to significant cost savings. By automating repetitive tasks and increasing overall development efficiency, Devin has the potential to lower the overall costs associated with software development. This unlocks new possibilities for businesses, allowing them to invest more in cutting-edge features and innovation.
• Democratizing Software Development:  Devin’s ability to handle routine tasks opens doors for individuals who are new to coding or lack extensive programming experience. With Devin taking care of the basics, the barrier to entry for software development is lowered, paving the way for a more diverse developer pool. This fosters a more inclusive development landscape where new talent can emerge and contribute to the future of software creation.

Devin AI represents the culmination of advancements in AI development tools and software engineering.

Difference Between Devin AI and Existing AI Coding Assistants

Devin AI represents a significant step forward in AI-powered coding. Its ability to handle entire projects, opens doors for increased developer productivity and faster development cycles.

Devin AI marks a new chapter in the software development saga. This groundbreaking technology holds immense potential to improve efficiency, accelerate innovation, and make software development more accessible. As Devin continues to evolve and integrate with existing workflows, the future of software development promises to be faster, smarter, and more collaborative than ever before.

Frequently Asked Questions – Devin AI

Who created devin ai.

Devin AI was created by Cognition, a leading tech company focused on applied AI and reasoning.

Is Devin AI free?

Pricing details for Devin AI haven’t been officially released yet. Existing AI coding assistants often have free and paid tiers, so Devin might follow a similar approach.

Will Devin AI replace coders?

No, Devin is unlikely to completely replace human coders. Instead, it’s designed to be a powerful collaborator.

Is Devin AI safe to use?

Data security is crucial for Devin AI since it might have access to sensitive information during development. Cognition is likely to implement robust security measures to ensure safe usage.

What Devin can do?

Devin AI acts as a full-fledged AI software engineer. It can handle entire projects, from conceptualizing ideas to writing code and potentially even deploying the finished software.

Can Devin AI replace human developers?

No, Devin is unlikely to replace human developers entirely. Instead, it’s designed to be a powerful collaborator, automating routine tasks and freeing up developers for higher-level thinking and creative problem-solving.

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• How to write an essay introduction | 4 steps & examples

How to Write an Essay Introduction | 4 Steps & Examples

Published on February 4, 2019 by Shona McCombes . Revised on July 23, 2023.

A good introduction paragraph is an essential part of any academic essay . It sets up your argument and tells the reader what to expect.

The main goals of an introduction are to:

• Catch your reader’s attention.
• Give background on your topic.
• Present your thesis statement —the central point of your essay.

This introduction example is taken from our interactive essay example on the history of Braille.

The invention of Braille was a major turning point in the history of disability. The writing system of raised dots used by visually impaired people was developed by Louis Braille in nineteenth-century France. In a society that did not value disabled people in general, blindness was particularly stigmatized, and lack of access to reading and writing was a significant barrier to social participation. The idea of tactile reading was not entirely new, but existing methods based on sighted systems were difficult to learn and use. As the first writing system designed for blind people’s needs, Braille was a groundbreaking new accessibility tool. It not only provided practical benefits, but also helped change the cultural status of blindness. This essay begins by discussing the situation of blind people in nineteenth-century Europe. It then describes the invention of Braille and the gradual process of its acceptance within blind education. Subsequently, it explores the wide-ranging effects of this invention on blind people’s social and cultural lives.

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Table of contents

Step 1: hook your reader, step 2: give background information, step 3: present your thesis statement, step 4: map your essay’s structure, step 5: check and revise, more examples of essay introductions, other interesting articles, frequently asked questions about the essay introduction.

Your first sentence sets the tone for the whole essay, so spend some time on writing an effective hook.

Avoid long, dense sentences—start with something clear, concise and catchy that will spark your reader’s curiosity.

The hook should lead the reader into your essay, giving a sense of the topic you’re writing about and why it’s interesting. Avoid overly broad claims or plain statements of fact.

Examples: Writing a good hook

Take a look at these examples of weak hooks and learn how to improve them.

• Braille was an extremely important invention.
• The invention of Braille was a major turning point in the history of disability.

The first sentence is a dry fact; the second sentence is more interesting, making a bold claim about exactly  why the topic is important.

• The internet is defined as “a global computer network providing a variety of information and communication facilities.”
• The spread of the internet has had a world-changing effect, not least on the world of education.

Avoid using a dictionary definition as your hook, especially if it’s an obvious term that everyone knows. The improved example here is still broad, but it gives us a much clearer sense of what the essay will be about.

• Mary Shelley’s  Frankenstein is a famous book from the nineteenth century.
• Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale about the dangers of scientific advancement.

Instead of just stating a fact that the reader already knows, the improved hook here tells us about the mainstream interpretation of the book, implying that this essay will offer a different interpretation.

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Next, give your reader the context they need to understand your topic and argument. Depending on the subject of your essay, this might include:

• Historical, geographical, or social context
• An outline of the debate you’re addressing
• A summary of relevant theories or research about the topic
• Definitions of key terms

The information here should be broad but clearly focused and relevant to your argument. Don’t give too much detail—you can mention points that you will return to later, but save your evidence and interpretation for the main body of the essay.

How much space you need for background depends on your topic and the scope of your essay. In our Braille example, we take a few sentences to introduce the topic and sketch the social context that the essay will address:

Now it’s time to narrow your focus and show exactly what you want to say about the topic. This is your thesis statement —a sentence or two that sums up your overall argument.

This is the most important part of your introduction. A  good thesis isn’t just a statement of fact, but a claim that requires evidence and explanation.

The goal is to clearly convey your own position in a debate or your central point about a topic.

Particularly in longer essays, it’s helpful to end the introduction by signposting what will be covered in each part. Keep it concise and give your reader a clear sense of the direction your argument will take.

Receive feedback on language, structure, and formatting

Professional editors proofread and edit your paper by focusing on:

• Academic style
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See an example

As you research and write, your argument might change focus or direction as you learn more.

For this reason, it’s often a good idea to wait until later in the writing process before you write the introduction paragraph—it can even be the very last thing you write.

When you’ve finished writing the essay body and conclusion , you should return to the introduction and check that it matches the content of the essay.

It’s especially important to make sure your thesis statement accurately represents what you do in the essay. If your argument has gone in a different direction than planned, tweak your thesis statement to match what you actually say.

To polish your writing, you can use something like a paraphrasing tool .

You can use the checklist below to make sure your introduction does everything it’s supposed to.

Checklist: Essay introduction

My first sentence is engaging and relevant.

I have introduced the topic with necessary background information.

I have defined any important terms.

My thesis statement clearly presents my main point or argument.

Everything in the introduction is relevant to the main body of the essay.

You have a strong introduction - now make sure the rest of your essay is just as good.

• Argumentative
• Literary analysis

This introduction to an argumentative essay sets up the debate about the internet and education, and then clearly states the position the essay will argue for.

The spread of the internet has had a world-changing effect, not least on the world of education. The use of the internet in academic contexts is on the rise, and its role in learning is hotly debated. For many teachers who did not grow up with this technology, its effects seem alarming and potentially harmful. This concern, while understandable, is misguided. The negatives of internet use are outweighed by its critical benefits for students and educators—as a uniquely comprehensive and accessible information source; a means of exposure to and engagement with different perspectives; and a highly flexible learning environment.

This introduction to a short expository essay leads into the topic (the invention of the printing press) and states the main point the essay will explain (the effect of this invention on European society).

In many ways, the invention of the printing press marked the end of the Middle Ages. The medieval period in Europe is often remembered as a time of intellectual and political stagnation. Prior to the Renaissance, the average person had very limited access to books and was unlikely to be literate. The invention of the printing press in the 15th century allowed for much less restricted circulation of information in Europe, paving the way for the Reformation.

This introduction to a literary analysis essay , about Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein , starts by describing a simplistic popular view of the story, and then states how the author will give a more complex analysis of the text’s literary devices.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale. Arguably the first science fiction novel, its plot can be read as a warning about the dangers of scientific advancement unrestrained by ethical considerations. In this reading, and in popular culture representations of the character as a “mad scientist”, Victor Frankenstein represents the callous, arrogant ambition of modern science. However, far from providing a stable image of the character, Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to gradually transform our impression of Frankenstein, portraying him in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as.

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

• Ad hominem fallacy
• Post hoc fallacy
• Appeal to authority fallacy
• False cause fallacy
• Sunk cost fallacy

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Your essay introduction should include three main things, in this order:

• An opening hook to catch the reader’s attention.
• Relevant background information that the reader needs to know.
• A thesis statement that presents your main point or argument.

The length of each part depends on the length and complexity of your essay .

The “hook” is the first sentence of your essay introduction . It should lead the reader into your essay, giving a sense of why it’s interesting.

To write a good hook, avoid overly broad statements or long, dense sentences. Try to start with something clear, concise and catchy that will spark your reader’s curiosity.

A thesis statement is a sentence that sums up the central point of your paper or essay . Everything else you write should relate to this key idea.

The thesis statement is essential in any academic essay or research paper for two main reasons:

• It gives your writing direction and focus.
• It gives the reader a concise summary of your main point.

Without a clear thesis statement, an essay can end up rambling and unfocused, leaving your reader unsure of exactly what you want to say.

The structure of an essay is divided into an introduction that presents your topic and thesis statement , a body containing your in-depth analysis and arguments, and a conclusion wrapping up your ideas.

The structure of the body is flexible, but you should always spend some time thinking about how you can organize your essay to best serve your ideas.

Cite this Scribbr article

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McCombes, S. (2023, July 23). How to Write an Essay Introduction | 4 Steps & Examples. Scribbr. Retrieved March 20, 2024, from https://www.scribbr.com/academic-essay/introduction/

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