For those starting out in Arduino, there are tons of resources to get better acquainted with the community and the types of projects you can tinker with.

Tronixstuff has a borderline insane tutorial series going, and as of now, 27 chapters have been published. It's essentially the Arduino Bible, but the two most recent additions in particular have ...

Before opening the Arduino software, wire up the Arduino according to the circuits page using the 8MHz minimalist breadboard circuit but with a 10k pull-up resistor on the reset pin (physical pin 1).