I have really enjoyed the whole blogging experience thus far and decided I wanted to take things a little further. That is when I realized there is a whole new world to be discovered when it comes to blog platforms! There is actually a war going on between the two major blog hosts, Blogger and Word Press and the opinions on which to use vary as much as the writers that use them.
I liken this dramatic battle to that of the social network giants My Space and Face Book.
While My Space still has more traffic, the tables are turning rapidly as droves of people switch over to Face Book everyday.
My Space has a lots of options for customizing your page, with Face Book on the other hand, there are no skins, no codes, no templates. You get what you get.
My Space is wildly popular with the youth, and Face Book is appreciated among the more "mature" audiences.
If blog hosts were social networks then Blogger would be My Space and Word Press would be Face Book. Of course I have made all of these blanket statements based off of mere observation and some online articles, but there are always exceptions to any of these assessments.
I read one blog after the other comparing Blogger and Word Press in full detail, and I still felt unsure about which one to go with. So I sought help from a Fellow blogger. The Thrifty Mama blog started around the same time as The Messy Mom and her little niche blog about saving money has since then sky rocketed to a new level of success and I knew she would be just the one to talk to about my dilemma. She was emphatic about her choice of blogging platform. Her exact words were "I am not with blogger anymore. I actually transferred to wordpress and I am SOOOOO happy!!"
At this point I was ready to jump ship from Blogger to Word Press after hearing and reading tons of evidence showing it to be superior. Not so fast though, while I have one leg over the fence and I am getting ready to sign on the dotted line, I read this on the Word Press website:
"To support the service we may occasionally show Google text ads on your blog, however we do this very rarely. You can remove ads from your blog for a low yearly fee. In the future you’ll be able to show your own ads and make money from your blog."
WHAT!? On Blogger not only do I not have to pay "a low yearly fee" to keep unwanted adds off, but I have the option of posting adds that I do want and earning revenue from them without paying a dime.
With Word Press you can have a premium account with self hosting and endless possibilities, but it costs and I am just not ready to pay money to blog at this point. I am also not ready to give up my advertisements either. While my total earnings of $15 may not be much, it's still $15 that I wouldn't have with the free version of Word Press. I do plan on having my own self hosted website someday, but until further notice, I will stick it out here in the blogger world.
For more on the blog war go to pulsed.blogspot.com
or
search for blogging.com
2 comments:
No no no no!! That's not it at all. If you self-host like I do (which you definitely need to) you don't have to deal with any of that. That is only for people that self-host with wordpress (like you are doing with blogger now). It's $30 for the year on WP, and you can eliminate all those ads. OR , you can self-host and not have to pay WP and DON't have to deal with the ads.
I saw that fine print two when I was considering transferring, and it made me second guess. It was only after I spoke with my hosting agent, that I found out that was just for the people who hosted with WP, which I do NOT suggest doing. Okay, I hope that helps. Let me know if that confused you at all :). WP rocks!! My life is so much easier, and better now!
Yeah, I understood that, but I just worded it wrong. What I meant was I agree that Word Press is the way to go for self hosting, but right now what I want is free hosting. Both platforms offer free hosting, but I chose blogger so that I can display ads, which by the way are only on hiatus until I get all this sorted out. I do look forward to joining in the rankings of self hosting in Word Press maybe next year. Thanks for the tips.
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