So there's been a bit of a flutter about Blogger deciding to "upgrade" their user interface again. I'm sure there's a reason for it, and I'm sure it has made life easier for somebody, but like any change, it has had plenty of downsides, too.
For instance, while it runs tickety-boo on my shiny new Win 7 laptop, here on creaky old VFTP Command Central ("Single core processors are for low-end cell phones now," as Marko pointed out,) it wheezes.
And if I were doing my blogging on my little Eee PC, I'd have had to just quit; the new interface is just not compatible with the combination of Eeebuntu and Firefox on that machine, as I discovered to my chagrin in the airport last month.
While I don't mind the new interface in general, it's given lots of people fits. My roomie hates it. Joel loathes it. Frank James gave up in disgust.
I see Frank's point, too. Blogging is not something I am willing to pay to do. I enjoy it and it is fun but I have no desire to spend money to register Tamara'sEgoSite.com, so spare me the evangelism in the comments section. And when it stops being fun and turns into work, then I'm not going to pay to keep doing it, either.
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21 comments:
There are a couple other free options, not a fan of wordpress.com right now, but Typepad has a freebie verison too, never tried so I cant' swear as to the ease of use...
I think Blogger (Google) has software engineers hanging around just liked General Motors USED to have a design team. Build something new, or GTFO. New and better would be nice, but if comes down to it... just plain 'new' beats unemployment. 'Better' becomes optional.
Me, I'm thinking more seriously about my own site, with all the headaches that go with it... and all the pluses. Not willing to lose all the time I have invested into 'Carteach0', so migrating to my own website is becoming more attractive.
This feels like an opportunity for Robb's Ansible code.
Big WordPress fan here.
They have freebies available, but if push came to shove, I'd offer you a spot on the server I pay for, just to keep you running around loose.
MC
Not a fan of WordPress, but I'm told it does run lighter...
I would gladly host this blog on Ansible on my servers at no cost to Tam, but Ansible (which spell check sees as Lesbian), being written primarily to entertain me, doesn't even have an admin interface.
I use Windows Live Writer for my posts and generally putz with the data in the database if I need to edit stuff.
So, as long as everything is working, it's a breeze to use. If not? Yeesh.
I have been using the new interface for several months. Yes, I was cranky about it for a day or two, but now it's just Blogger.
I use WordPress for another blog that I host, and it has more features, but for the price, Blogger is OK.
As Carteach said, some change is probably just for the sake of change though. Look busy!
I moved to WP on my first anniversary. It too, has it's issues.
We get what we pay for - but, I'm generally happier having left BLOGGER.
gfa
I checked out TypePad when this crap first started, and it's only free for two weeks. So far as I can tell, there is no permanent free option.
I found an option that lets me use the OLD Blogger interface, so my Asus EEE 1000HA is able to keep up.
It's a bummer when the maker of the Free Ice Cream machine starts messing with stuff. Wish they wouldn't. Fail to see the advantage to anyone of them doing so. As you and Bobbi and Frank said, I have no desire to or intention of paying to blog, and, as Frank pointed again, as long as Word Press feels that anything published there is theirs, not the writer's, I'm not interested.
When I launched my big-kid blog, I went with Wordpress because I like comments, and I always found the comment interface better on WP Blogs.
So far no complaints. Its a little wonky on my phone...but I also just blog through the Android browser, not the wordpress ap.
What holds me back is that if I had my own server and software, I'd feel compelled to keep up with the patches. And Wordpress has a bunch of nasty embed malware, so I'd feel compelled to become a Wordpress app security geek to keep my readers safe.
As you point out, I have better things to do with my time.
Love them or hate them, the Google team does a decent job of keeping the cloud patched.
If you ever decided to jump ship from blogger, I'll toss out an offer for free hosting. You don't know me from adam, but not having you to read would suck :D
NOTE to Robb: So create the necessary front-end, and offer it to us for a price. I don't blog, because I don't want to depend on other, politically-influenced, hosts. But if I had Ansible running on MY machines, well then . . .
huh, just looking at typepad's site, they used to have a "micro" blog which was a free version, but I don't see it all now, wonder if they did away with it.
Huh, it appears to be totally gone, I'll have to pester the couple people I know who were using it and see if they're still on it or if they were forced to pay.
There are other free blogging sites, but I've NO idea as to quaility...
SquareSpace.com is where its at. Easy to set up an maintain.
Yes, yes, its not free. But I'm sure you can get enough donations around here to run it for a long time. Hell, I'll donate for a year just to keep you around.
@Borepatch: After getting hit twice last year, I actually hired a security firm to come in and check my WP install four times a day. I don't blame you for being slightly distrustful of the platform.
Seconding recommendations for Wordpress in general. I've also tried Tumblr very briefly, and I was impressed. If I did the blogging thing, that's probably what I'd use if I didn't host my own (in which case, I would again recommend either Wordpress or Drupal).
I imagine that you're tied to this address, though. There are a number of desktop blog publishing clients that exist. For Windows, there's Windows Live Writer. For Linux, there's stuff like Blogilo or BloGTK (the former I've had issues with, haven't tried the latter).
If you use Firefox, there's also the 'ScribeFire Next' extension. It seems to work just fine from what I've seen, and is probably cross-platform -- I use Linux myself, and I had no issues.
So far everyone recommending WordPress is ignoring the copyright issue if you use what you wrote while blogging in a commercial or professional for pay manner.
I guess to many this isn't an issue because they don't sell their words, some of us do and it's a serious issue.
It's one reason why alternatives have to be explored with great care and in depth research as to the usage rules about who 'owns' the material being published with that particular service...
All The Best,
Frank W. James
Win7 Microcephalic (Starter) is a sub-genius what runs on my newer Asus EE-something in Maui, and it runs without a lot of useless overhead. I might consider it for the home machine.
I'll have to say - I rarely look at the blogger admin interface (though it appears to really have stopped working on android browsers...)
I post using Live Writer, and generally find out who linked to me by reading their post in which they did it.
In fact, I may have to go check out the admin interface now...
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