Last week, for some inexplicable reason, my corporate firewall/filter started making it insanely difficult to access Blogger. Reading posts is fine, but for authors, there’s a top-line toolbar that is blocked on the main page–the one with the “Create post” button. So, I’m forced to use the kludge of clicking “Blogger” from the Gmail “More…” button, and starting a post from the Dashboard. Aggravating is what it is.
And reading other blogs is just as bad: I sit and watch a blank window for up to a minute while one line is blocked, before the rest of the blog appears.
So on Friday I created a WordPress account. I also installed WordPress 2.2 to my guild server (which I pay for). So I have two WordPress blogs. Right now, I’m undecided as to which I will change. It’s going to depend on whether I can have the same flexibility on each–and that’s going to mean I need to get some time to play around with the self-hosted version (themes and such). Once I figure that out, I’ll post here and let those of you who have done me the honor of linking me on your blogs know our new address.
I’m also having a problem importing my Blogger posts & comments to WP. (If any of you WPers know of a workaround, I can promise mad props if you’ll pass it on!)
I do want to emphasize that I’m not unhappy with Google’s Blogspot–it’s very easy to use, fairly easy to modify, and I’m sure will only get better. But as I do a lot of my blogging from work (yeah, yeah…shame on me), I don’t need the frustration I’m currently encountering.
So again…stay tuned, and as soon as I have things resolved (or by the weekend, I hope, at the latest!) I’ll post the new address here.
I started Mania’s Arcania (under the name Petopia) as a WordPress.com blog, but I quickly found that I didn’t have nearly the flexibility I wanted with the look and feel — not without paying a monthly subscription.
Also, I couldn’t run ads at all on WordPress.com. I would prefer if I didn’t need to run ads on the blog, but the tiny amount they bring in helps offset the money I spend on hosting and whatnot — which is important to me since I am currently “self-employed” and not making any money. :>
So I moved the blog to my own hosted domain where I could fiddle with the CSS endlessly. And then I fiddled with the CSS endlessly, which made me quite happy! I haven’t had any issues with the self-hosted blog (except the other day when the host box collapsed due to a hardware problem, but that wasn’t the blog’s fault).
So that’s my experience.
Thanks for the info, Mania. I’m pretty sure I’ll use my self-hosted blog. My only trepidation is that I’m not that familiar (or comfortable?) about messing with CSS. OTOH, I’ve been able to muddle through quite a bit of stuff I didn’t think I could handle. (I’ve noticed that a LOT of documentation online is fairly presumptive of a level of knowledge or experience that I–and, I’m sure others–don’t have.)
Also, the idea of recouping some of my costs (I pay for the hosting of the guild website, and because it’s such a low-traffic area, I don’t charge the guild–yet) through ads has some appeal. Of course, I doubt I’ll ever have the exposure Petopia has, either.
Hope you don’t mind if I occasionally try to tap your expertise, either!
I see you’ve moved! Hopefully you’ll still get this, though … :> I just wanted to say that if you have any questions about CSS or WordPress, feel free to ping me. If I can’t help I can generally at least point you in the right direction. :>
Oh yeah…we’re still open here until I can get the content here moved to the new site.
Thanks again for the offer of help!