Wise decision. Over the years, did medium, squarespace, microblog, ghost. Wordpress is the best alternative, hosted or self-hosted.
Send us the domain, so we can visit the new premises. 
Iāve used WordPress extensively, but I canāt say I love the interface and my blogging needs are more microblogging. Iām done with Twitter.
Blot looks amazing - Iām not concerned too much about designā¦ but two years on is anyone still using it or have any feedback? @ryanjamurphy ā¦ have you moved onto something new?
Yeah, still happy! Recent experience underscored your concerns, though. David took some well-deserved time off, but as a consequence there was no one to answer support requests for a little while. Tradeoffs of indie hosting I guess.
Iām considering a switch to Obsidian Publish at the moment. Not out of dissatisfaction with Blot, but because my stuff is in Obsidian anyway and Publish would provide native support of some neat features. Problem is, Publish doesnāt have a blog solution right now. I.e., thereās no RSS or feed feature. So, Iām not in any rush to change over.
Right. I am paying for it so I can keep early bird pricing but havenāt used it for anything yet. Would love to use it for that.
Also thinking about ghost. Just a question of whether I have the patience to deal with the server junk to spin it up on digital ocean.
And then I have to decide how much I care about keeping everything Iāve posted since 2005 live or if Iām ready for a clean start.
Then other times I think, yeah, medium is bad for reasons 1-40, but itās also easy and has an audience and being a āown your stuffā purist is exhausting and maybe not really as practically important as it is ideologically important.
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I didnāt, which is a primary reason I switched to Blot (that Blot was less expensive was a bonus).
One tip, if you go the Ghost/DO route: Donāt upgrade Ubuntu once you have Ghost installed. I did that, and it broke the database Ghost relies on.
Edited to add: If I ever need or want to move away from Blot, well, all my content is just Markdown and image files living in my Dropbox, so moving the content should be a simple enough matter.
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I just this week decided to quit my five-month microblogging on Tumblr experiment, and return to Wordpress. The Tumblr writing interface is too painful. Also, microblogging and blogging on separate platforms requires too many decisions.
Wordpress is also painful, but I can use an alternate client. Currently I use Drafts.
Wordpress is lousy for microblogging. My solution is to do a daily digest of microblog posts.
I also microblog and blog on twitter and Facebook. Unlike Wordpress, people actually read and interact with those. I have gotten very friendly with cut-and-paste over the years.
The experience described here with blot reinforces my caution about platforms run by one or two people, like microblog.
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Iāve had good experiences with both Pika.page and Posthaven. I can absolutely see Posthaven working as a microblog. Both are Markdown first, and barebones but serviceable in terms of features. Both are actively develped and not brand new. Both support export.
I also have good things to say about omg.lol, which is very geeky and has a lot of potential for basic microblogging.
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Great thread, even if a little dated.
Does anyone want to update their advice? Iām looking to start a blog.
Any comments about Substack?
I do have a subscription for blot. I noticed @ryanjamurphy is now on Hugo?
Iām looking for a simple platform for a weekly post that people can subscribe to.
Edit: due to todayās user it should really be mobile first for viewing.
Blot is still best-in-class in everything IMO.
I wanted more control for tinkering in code as a hobby so I switched to Quartz. My site is currently running on Quartz 3; hopefully maybe someday this summer Iāll update it to Quartz 4.
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My blog is built with 11ty and deployed on Netlify. If want to own your own site and not be tied to platform you might want to check this out.
If you are comfortable with JavaScript, check out Astro.
Blot is super easy. Just pull up a text file and write. A little customization/different themes available. I havenāt messed around w/it too much.
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I have my own hosted Wordpress site, and import every post into Medium. I also publish links to Facebook, X, Mastodon, LinkedIn, and Threads.
Wordpress is the least expensive and most flexible solution available. Yes, unless you pay someone to set your site up for you, there is a learning curve and it takes some time to get off the ground. But if a web dullard like me can figure it out, I have no worries about you! And, at the end, you will have new skills you can apply to other projects.
I used a Wordpress-for-Dummies type of book, that gave me step-by-step instructions. Itās called āWordpress for Beginners (with the most recent year)ā by Dr. Andy Williams.
I value owning my own site and not having to depend on someone elseās maintenance and continuation.
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These days, I think Ghost is the best solution for most people who want a blog where folks subscribe via email and get the posts via email. I like it much more than Substack, which feels like a pretty gross corporation.
Ghost isnāt cheap, but you can self-host for free if thatās your bag. And you can charge for newsletter access.
Ghost is great. I was previously on Blot, but needed a bit more.
Iām running on PikaPods for < $4/month. Iāve been pleased with it.
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Funny, but I currently pay for ghost, and Iām switching to substack, which seems to have a lot of the features (now) that I want.
PikaPods seems interesting. How is the performance of the Ghost website for visitors?
I donāt get many, so I really have no idea. But I never have any issues accessing it myself, even if Iām not logged in.
Different strokes! I think Substack is less long-term friendly to authors, given that they are incentivized to protect their platform more than their writers, but I canāt deny their obvious marketing appeal.
Long term, itās easier to move away from substack than, say, twitter or facebook. You still own your email list.
Iāve switched newsletter provider several times, and itās easy to do, and my readers donāt care.