Pretty self-explanatory. Why wouldn’t I just use my trusty WSYWIG editor to open up a page, type the day’s events, put in the links/photos, etc. and upload it to my site? Why go through the trouble of Movable Type, etc?
It appears that in some cases people don’t actually have a web site of their own and their blog on MT or LJ or whatever will host the site for them as well. I understand that.
What am I missing? I assume that one has to log on and etc. just like you would if you were FTPing for a regular html site, so I don’t think it can be that much more convienent. Email it in perhaps. Maybe I missed something in the MT home page.
Most blogging software has integrated comments; using it is easier than setting up your own commenting system. “Trackback” functionality is also becoming popular, so readers of one blog can see other blogs who have linked to that entry. Blogging software makes it easy to organize and archive entries; entries can be archived into weekly sets. Blogging software makes it easier to manage the entries on the blog’s main page. Most blogs have multiple entries displayed on the main page. With blogging software, the bottom entry can be knocked into the archives when a new entry is added. Blogging software will also automatically give each entry its own page, for easier linking. You can also easily have extended entries, with a brief summary on the main page and the full article linked. Movable Type has a built in search system for the blog’s readers.
So, basically, blogging software makes common functions like archiving entries, searching, commenting, and linking easier than doing everything by hand.
Damn, it does sound like the blogging companies make it well worth your while. One of these days I might get around to starting up one of those…
Thanks for the info.
I suppose I could throw out, “what’s the best one?” MT seems to be the most prominent, I recall LJ is popular with folks around here and there’s another open-source one that I can’t think of right now. Tweeker or something similarly misspelled?
Blogger is free and simple. You get an easy-to-remember URL (in the format of [yourblog].blogspot.com), plus they just recently did a major update. It’s now got built-in commenting, extremely easy-to-use templates, posting, archiving, and so on.
Also, they’re frequently teaming up with other companies to add cool stuff, like Hello, a simple little Instant Messenger-type app that lets you put photos on your blog. There are all kinds of cool little features to it now.
I’ve been on Blogger for just over a year. It’s not as comprehensive as a LiveJournal, but that’s fine with me; I don’t want my whole life on there.
I use pmachine. I checked into Moveable Type, which looks neat, but was put off by the extensive work you have to do to install it. Pmachine was much simplier.
For a year or so, I did a M-F column on my Web site, like Lilek’s Bleat (only not as funny). It was pretty easy, but linking to other articles would have been a bear to impliment. With pmachine, I have bookmarked my entry page and they also provide a way to put a button on your tool bar that will open up the entry page when you’re at someone elses site. Type in what you want, hit the OK key, and it’s up. I can even do it from work (which I couldn’t do with Dreamweaver).
Woah, that audioblogger thing looks cool (from blogger). Man, think of all the mischief one could use that for. Does anyone know if it’s a toll-free number to call? Blogger’s site is surprisingly unhelpful for people who don’t actually want to set up a blog to deteremine what it can do.
I don’t think that all people have WSYWIG editors, and not everyone knows how to use them. I occaisionally use Composer, but the code it produces sucks, so I’d rather write it myself. That way it’s easier for me to modify later because I don’t have to plow through all the extra crap it puts out. As for my blog, like a lot of others have said here, it’s just easier to use their skins, type in my info and click. After all, it’s separate from my Web site, which is something I use more for professional reasons rather than bitching, which is basically what I do on my blog, so I’m less likely to expend so much effort on my blog versus my site. Anyway, I use Bloghorn. They have several communities of bloggers (mine is St. Louis Bloggers. It works really well. I haven’t bothered to upgrade my blog to the paid version yet because, so far, I only post text on it rather than photos or anything.
The exact problem with using blogging software as opposed to just updating HTML is the amount of time it takes to manage everything, much like the difference between using website-management software or a plain WYSIWYG editor or even (God help your tortured soul) Notepad.
When you only have a small amount of content, you can do it all by hand and it’s easiest, but as the amount of content and features grows, you save HUGE amounts of time using software that does various cross-checking and organizing for you. Typical website-management software can check all of the cross-links, image and file sources on a website with 100 or more different pages pretty much instantly as you work, as well as update any links if you need to move any of the content files around. The circumstances in blogging are similar.
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Oh man, there goes my dream. Ah well. I’m still thinking of putting a blog up. It just seems that there’s no need for me to go about saying nothing in particular, although given the amount of blogs up there that apparently get hits, I suppose I could make a go of it. And make some cash if the huge lists of Amazon wish lists are any indication. What’s up with that? I just throw up a list of shit I want my loyal readers/sugar daddies to buy and they, feeling sorry for me, or perhaps in some sort of creepy-old-man way decide that I really need to preorder the Savage Tales of Solomon Kane? Does this actually work? I think if I were some fifteen year old girl writing about my first experiences with sexuality, I could clean the fuck up (no pun intended), especially if I blew the extra $10/mo. and put some damn pictures up.
Speaking of which, while perusing the LJ sites, I came across something that is just about the most disgusting thing I could think of - Harry Potter slash.
What the fuck? Isn’t that shit illegal?
Anyway, how’s blogger? I understand that it’s entirely free and, despite the fact that they make it hard as hell to find a blog that’s actually hosted on it, the templates seem pretty decent. The LJ ones I checked out (no, I didn’t look at the Harry Potter one) seemed pretty ugly, but I think that choosing a templates’ the least of one’s concerns.
Is there even an audience for 9/10ths of these things? Not that anyone stopped by my web site when I threw it up, but hell.
I’ve been on Blogger for a little over a year; it’s the only one I’ve tried, so I can’t really compare it, but it’s really, really simple to use. It’s completely free (or else I wouldn’t be doing it). You can set up an e-mail address that’s your “posting e-mail”; you send an e-mail to that address and it gets posted to your blog immediately. You can do the audioblogging thing for free (haven’t tried it; in fact I just now signed up for it). You can tweak your template however you want; a very small amount of HTML knowledge is useful if you want to change your template, but there’s nothing too complicated about it.
They’ve recently added a built-in commenting system, which is much appreciated; you used to have to sign up with an outside outfit like Haloscan or something to set up commenting.
I get about 20 hits a day; there are maybe five or ten people I know personally who read it, and the rest I have no idea. I don’t really advertise it, though; it’s not in my SDMB profile, and most of my friends don’t know about it. I do get visitors from Google, people who do a search for something I’ve written about and come surfing in. (You can set up a hit-counter pretty easily; I use RetroStats.)
Basically it’s a pleasant diversion, and since my current employer prohibits me from writing freelance, it helps me keep my fingers flexing.