Sunday, January 17, 2010

Switching to WordPress?

Dana at Common Sense Political Thought often nudges me to switch to WordPress. I'm not so much against it as I'm not that unsatisfied with Blogger. Sure, folks say migrating over to WordPress is superior, and most of the biggest blogs on the web use it (Dana Loesch, Hot Air, Instapundit at Pajamas, Jules Crittenden, Michelle Malkin, and RightWingNews, for some random examples). But I recall Ann Althouse writing about Blogger migration issues sometime back. She said she had no intention of leaving Blogger, mainly because of free hosting (and general dependability). It's not that she was being cheap or anything. It was that she had lots of stuff online. I recall she mentioned her podcasts at the time. They were just sitting there, not being used, and she was paying for it. With Blogger, as long as the company's in business your blog is parked, for free. I like that. (This is my second blog, and my first one's still over there, ready to raid as a resource from time to time.) My issue now is photo-hosting. It's the only thing I pay for, at Photobucket. I works pretty good, although Stogie got pissed with 'em for false promotional claims (they have this screwy "bandwidth" limit every month, and in fact that's why I went pro at the time). If I switch from Photobucket, my older pics now at American Power will deactivate. Still, it's something I'm thinking about. How's Flickr working out for folks?

Anyway, though,
Smitty at The Other McCain was talking trash on how hot the WordPress makeover at Robert's blog has been, and he notes:

On a technical note, the power of WordPress to support these FMJRAs is astounding .... Two points: we should have gone to the WordPress platform sooner, and people still in the Blogger ghetto should consider switching to a WordPress site, if only for the joy of better trackback/pingback coverage. My, don’t we sound just a tad bit uppity now that we’ve got our own domain and stuff?
"FMJRA" is "Full-Metal Jacket Reach-Around" for those not familiar with "How to Get a Million Hits on Your Blog in Less Than a Year." But I think Smitty spoke a little too early (and I'm just ribbing him a bit), even though he was mostly kidding around. I was checking over there last night for some on-the-ground reporting from Massachusetts, where Robert's working the Scott Brown freelance beat, and I got this error message:

It says "If you can see this page, the people who manage this server have installed ..."

In other words, our server's crashed right now. Check back later. I haven't talked to Robert since he was covering the BCS championship, but this isn't the first time their blog's gone down. So, while it's hot and all that -- WordPress is working better as a technical platform -- it's kind of a bummer for regular readers and fellow bloggers when one can't get on the site. (That's a hosting issue, not WordPress per se, but still ...) That's of course hardly ever a problem on Blogger, although it's happened a couple of times. Since they redid the Blogger template a couple of years back, the program has been super dependable. I can only remember one or two times when I couldn't get on my dashboard, and the whole service has gone out maybe once. That, along with the pricing, is attractive for folks, and of course Blogger is EASY!! I'm still figuring out how to do stuff. So, yeah, one of these days I too will migrate to WordPress. I'd enjoy something with a way more professional look, especially if my blogging keeps going well and getting popular (as it has this last year or so). In the meanwhile, I'm cool on Blogger. But if anyone's got some ideas for photo-hosting I'm all ears!

9 comments:

SR said...

I like Squarespace myself. I have a Worpress blog and I ain't all that keen with them.

The Griper said...

photo hosting? how about photo hosrting yourself by getting one of those free web pages? that way you cam import just about anything into blogger.

Serr8d said...

There's some top-notch bloggers still working Blogspot. Yourself of course; and look no further than Dr. Helen. She is married to Insty, he could easily set her up anywhere, but she's sticking with Blogger. And there's Rusty over at the Jawa Report.

Photo hosting with the newer Blogger platform is much improved. I too use (and pay) Photobucket for yearly hosting, but I find myself uploading pics to Blogger because of the convenience. When photo clarity is important, I'll use Photobucket (Blogger screws with the resolution when they resize). Oh, and Blogger won't host animated GIF's at all, they become cast in stone and freeze-frame if you try. Photobucket sometimes deletes photos their roaming busybodies deem 'inappropriate' (they killed a few of mine for no good reason, including one of the famous Mohammed bomb-head cartoon, and some others that might be considered 'nude' by a prudish sort).

Flickr is no good for photo hosting. I tried a few Flickr posts and didn't like the redirects: they require a link back to your Flickr account if you use them for hosting. But Flickr doesn't care if you put in some gentle nudity.

I see a lot of requests for cookie setting from Imageshack (which I deny of course) but I've not tried them for hosting. If they try to set a cookie with every single photo they host, there's much too much hassle involved somewhere.

Rusty Walker said...

My vote: The "grass is always greener...if it ain't broke..." Stay with what you're set up with until it no longer serves you well.

Left Coast Rebel said...

I am pleased with Flickr, I was using Zoomr but my acct was shut down and back posts were left hanging with pictures - all without an explanation. I would try Flickr! If you have a Yahoo account it's super easy to set up......

Dana said...

I am much happier with the way comments work on WordPress. As for using photos, my friend Jennifer, The Cotton Wife, uses flicker to embed her photos in a WordPress blog, which is very photo heavy.

Most of the photos on my site I have uploaded to my server, and embed from there.

Bloviating Zeppelin said...

I too have been pushed to move to WordPress. And, like you, I can't say I have been disappointed with Blogger.

Where else can you create a blog, manipulate it, garner a readership, post your thoughts, have people respond, and it COSTS YOU NOTHING??

I've been watching all those with Haloscan and other commenting systems getting screwed. Thanks but no thanks. I'll just stick to my very simple Blogger comments. I don't even use word verification or moderation. The simpler I can get it, the happier I am. Maybe I don't get near the hits you do -- or perhaps the spam -- but I can still post photos that enlarge up to full scale, load my blog up with MANY photos -- I mean, shoot, Blogger has treated me quite well, I must admit.

BZ

SR said...

SQUARESPACE!

If you'd like I could get you on as a publisher at Squarespace to get the feel of it.

smitty1e said...

Oh, I totally writhe, impaled on a pyrrhic sword of damocles.
All technical claims are of the family of Famous Last Wor