Oh. My. Goodness….!
I didn’t anticipate the outrage I’d hear when I asked a simple question….
Do you think the masterminds at Blogger dot com had ANY idea the fury they’d arouse when they disabled non-Blogger bloggers’ ability to register comments with a link back to their own blogs? And, what about those poor bloggers whose blogs ARE Blogger blogs? 1) They’re finding out non-Blogger bloggers are beginning to boycott Blogger blogs in protest ("nothing personal"), and 2) according to Candid Karina, it’s adversely affecting Blogger bloggers’ ability to follow comments back to the commenter’s blog.
(If Willowtree anyone is counting, that’s 15 uses of the word "blogger" or some derivative in one paragraph. Apparently, I’m gunning for a mention in Guinness Book :/.)
Let’s start with the positives: Blogger is F.R.E.E., people. Personally, I think it was a great chew-toy to cut your blogging teeth on–user friendly and a variety of templates (theirs and other
freebies on the net). It’s the host I stayed with for over a year.
Positives aside, it DOES appear that Blogger’s direction is towards exclusivity and making it MORE difficult if you aren’t in the family. Hmmm, inbreeding? Nepotism? A quest to RULE THE BLOGGING UNIVERSE??? 
Ah HA! I’ve got it!! Lex Luthor and Doctor Evil are running the Blogger show!!
Now I understand p e r f e c t l y.
(Muuuuwwwaahahahah!)
Because I felt like I was getting what I paid for with Blogger, I moved to Typepad in January. Blogging is one of my favorite hobbies, so it was worth it to pay a little. When it occurred to me how much I enjoy blogging, coupled with the amount of time I spend doing it, the price of a DVD rental (or two) each month was a fair exchange for an easier, more reliable blogging format. Typepad isn’t perfect, but NO format is, and it fairly well approximates all I’m looking for.
Have you written a post, rant, diatribe or rodomontade (is that a great word or what?!) about the new commenting identity crisis–con or PRO (haven’t seen one in support of Blogger yet, but I’d sure like to…)? Have you read others around the b’sphere? Lemme know in comments and I’ll add links to this growing list (inclusion is not an endorsement of opinions expressed by each blogger, I’m just finding it fascinating so many seem to be in an uproar…AND MOSTLY, I’m curious to see how Blogger will respond. Blogger, ARE YOU LISTENING?):
First, an explanation of sorts by Blogger (thanks, Karina)
…and, then those who aren’t too happy:
Suburban Oblivion
The Hunter’s Wife
Lifecruiser
Patrick
atLindas.com
The Junk Drawer (a few posts and some solutions)
O Ceallaigh
The Blog Hog
Canned Laughter
Mom Gadget
Randa Clay Design
Windyridge (she offers her solution)
Queen of Shake-Shake (reminding us to keep it in perspective, lol, it’s NOT world hunger after all!)
The Random Forest (a few posts and some additional insight into Open ID)
Lengthy thread at BlogCatalog (ht: The Junk Drawer)
Just Thinkin’
Matts Nutts
What’s Wrong Around Us
A Rubber Door
The lone Blogger defender I’ve read so far: Cagey @ Rancid Raves
To my existing Blogger buddies–no worries, I’m not gonna abandon you…but it’s doubtful I’ll be commenting to any new Blogger blogs.
Hi there. I don’t mind at all (regarding the question in comments at my blog) Thanks for including me.
For what it’s worth, I started with blogger… moved to wordpress.com hosted… realized they don’t allow commercial content on their free blogs… moved to typepad… then realized how much more I could do with a self hosted wordpress install.
Now I tell my clients that self hosted WP is my recommended choice. Yay plugins!
I did post about this in defense of Blogger. Hello, folks! It is FREE ( as you said). I think what tickles me most is how furious folks are over it. The Rage – it cracks me up.
http://rancidraves.blogspot.com/2007/12/care-to-comment.html
I’m not happy with it either. And how come evry time I go to a blogger blog I have to log into my Google account (which I only got to comment on AFF’s blog!) EVERY TIME!
I have stopped some comments because it’s such a pain, sorry everyone!
Inbreeding indeed.
Great post. As others have stated, I started using blogger to get my feet wet. Then switched to wordpress.com then to wordpress.org. Blogger is free and it is a great source for some until you want to expand your wings, then it is very limited.
So to our blogger friends…make the switch.
It’s fair to say that yes, it is a free service. If somebody doesn’t like it, they are free to leave.
It is also, however, fair to say that I should have been given a choice about how I want to handle my visitors’ comments. First it was nofollow, and now they can’t leave their URL at all. It’s simply not the way I want to treat my visitors.
Wordpress, here I come!
Hi! Great post! Thanks for commenting on The Blog Hog. I just wanted to let you know that the link above for The Blog Hog directs you to the Canned Laughter website.
Thanks for the link to MomGadget… To the many who are pointing out the obvious, that Blogger is FREE – I realize that much – BUT nearly every blogger that signs up, signs up for other Google services like Adsense.
Wouldn’t it make more ‘business’ sense to encourage higher traffic activity – if for no other reason than that?
I can’t help but think Google is cutting off it’s nose to spite it’s face.
I’m glad I’m not on Blogger anymore!
I had never tried blogger until a few months ago. I had an account because so many Fun Monday people use blogger and decided to give it a whirl with my second blog. I’ve been with blog-city for about 3 years now and have been generally happy. I take that back, always been happy but got curious and tried typepad for a few months. I found typepad too limiting for me so went back to blog-city. just love them, easy to use, one fee for the year, I think it’s about $40 for the year. Just decided why pay for my second blog when I only post there a couple of times a month so it’s at blogger now. Like you say, it’s perfect for the price.
I guess as I’m with blogger I will loose a lot of friends because of the way they have changed the comments. I will be sad but fully understand and I’m not sure I will change~ well not just yet anyway!
I haven’t actually heard anything about this until now but then again even though I post and read daily I have been a little pre-occupied (ya know shoveling snow and all that fun winter stuff).
Stop by and say HI every now and then 🙂
Hi Robin,
Thanks for the link BTW. 😀
Personally, I can’t fathom why Blogger did this. There’s simply no reason for it. Not one, despite the “explanation of sorts”. Blogger conducts too much “behind the scenes” changes without obvious prior announcements to their users and when it comes down to it, does not allow any options for effective feedback. To my knowledge, no other hosted blogging platform conducts business in this way. Same kind of conduct that drove me away from Blogger two years ago and went to my own WP install.
WOOHOO! You Go Girl!
When it first happened, I was a little miffed, but just started putting in my link in the comment section. It works.
I’m glad to see, though, that I’m not the only person who was baffled by Blogger again.
Thanks for the coverage. And to those who are harassassing us for being outraged, we have a right to promote and network among blogs we like. I’m sorry some of us aren’t in an apathetic coma.
Hey I just tried to comment on a blogger blog, look what it said, “BBlogger
Blogger and Blog*Spot are unavailable
Blogger and Blog*Spot are unavailable right now. We apologize for this interruption in service.
Details
Blogger is undergoing brief maintenance and will return in a few minutes.”
ARE THEY FIXING IT? You DO have clout!
I just can’t switch right now. If I had to I just would quit and I do not want to quit. I guess I will just have to cry through the lack of comments, and possibly a small turnout Monday 🙁
i have NO clue what is going on….guess this means i’ll have to actually figure out what all the brouhaha is about today….
but i started at livejournal and moved to blogger. i have a wordpress but it’s got so much i can’t take the time to figure it out (yet).
every time these places add fluff, bad stuff happens….
I’m glad you brought this up as a problem for non-Blogger bloggers, Robin. I wouldn’t have known otherwise. Honestly, I don’t pay attention to who uses what platform.
I followed Karina’s links and intend to use her “fix” for TypePad readers like YOU. (No I’m not leaving Blogger!)
You might be interested to know the results of ProBlogger’s latest poll:
“Last week I asked readers to submit to our poll the blog platform that they use.
The results were similar to last time we ran it with WordPress.org (36%) a clear winner, Blogger.com (25%) coming in second and WordPress.com (15%) coming in third.
That these three platforms take up 76% of responses says something in and of itself with the two varieties of WordPress being used by 51% of ProBlogger readers.”
ProBlogger (Darren Rowse) is the granddaddy of all blogger-for-profit bloggers. If you (or your readers) want to monetize, he’s the one to follow.
Darren’s cool graphs are here:
http://www.problogger.net/archives/2007/12/03/what-blogging-platform-do-you-use-poll-results/
Actually I’m quite curious to see what Blogger comes up with regarding their OpenID option. Sounds like it’s exactly what you’re looking for as a non-Blogger blogger.
“Blogger has removed the URL field for unauthenticated comments. Instead, we’re rolling out support for OpenID, a technology for ‘signing’ your comments with your own URL. OpenID lets you comment with the URL you want, while preventing others from impersonating you. Blog admins can turn on OpenID now on Blogger in Draft.— latest update on Monday, December 03, 2007”
More info is here: http://bloggerindraft.blogspot.com/2007/11/new-feature-openid-commenting.html
Blessings! e-Mom
Thanks for the Linky Love – will definitely be checking out the rest.
I think we need to all remember that this is not life or death.
oh, please, robin! don’t abandon me! you’re one of my first blogging buddies!
keep the faith.
i’m working on getting a website up, and when i do, i’ll be blogging straight from that site. hang on! and you’ll be able to comment on my blog without the hang-ups!
Wow, so much information, so little brain here to comprehend it all. I guess it’s kinda good I started on typepad (though I did try blogger last year but after hours of frustration, gave up the ghost). NLL
Well, if blog spot did this, my simple solution would be to move my blog. I am sure all of the free blog sites would not be stupid enough to follow blogger.com’s lead.
me thinks tis all ’bout control.
I too am pissed of and written a post to this effect on my blog. I want the “other” option back! Anyone listening?
Thanks for the link. My feeling is that Blogger could have….nay SHOULD have at the very least, informed their bloggers of the change. That was wrong.
I hate the new system. Particularly because it only gives me a spot to put “my website” on my profile page and well, I have two.
Hate.
Hmm. I just read all the comments and still have no idea what’s going on. I guess blogger is for stupid people like me. 🙁
i know i’m days late to this party, and you probably will never even see my comment, but…
i started blogging because i went to blogger and thought i’d just give it a try. i had nobody to teach me anything. blogger turned out to be easy to use, intuitive, and viola! i had a blog! i was amazed.
there are plenty of things wrong with it–for some reason i can sometimes load photos and videos ONLY when i’m in firefox, not safari, and yet i can’t always view my blog in firefox (it puts weird big gray squares in the middle of my copy, like some hostile editor).
and i can’t always do cool things that other people can do.
but it’s easy, it’s convenient, it’s free, and it’s familiar to me. it lets me do pretty much what i want, which is to write every day, and post a lot of photos.
if they’re now involved in some competition/nefarious scheme against other blog sites, i guess i don’t really know, nor do i care.
but it’s only because i don’t get very involved in most of the trappings. just write and post photos, write and post photos…..
It’s NEVER too late to weigh in on comments–I get email notices on all of ’em, even if I wrote ’em a year ago :).
On the run right now, but thanks to all of you for sharing your (ahem) “humble” and passive opinions…(giggles…snorts…).
I ranted about it today as an aside to a WordPress post.
If Blogger/Blogspot are down for maintenance, I only hope it is to reinstate outside links, but seeing is believing. I’m thinking they will eliminate links in the actual comment box, which is what I have been doing from time to time.
I still comment, but sheesh, no new ones til this is resolved.
You can add me to the growing list of the discontent. I just posted my diatribe. This whole thing is so sad because it is so against what blogging should hope to encourage. And what bothers me most is that they have said NOTHING in response to the growing anger. GRRR!
Here’s my post about it:
http://www.iamspencer.com/2007/12/11/reason-2362-why-blogger-sucks-the-big-one/
Hmm. Didn’t know as I’m a Blogger account. But, it’s similar to me having to re-enter my information into some Typepad blogs, isn’t it? I don’t have to re-do it every time, but with every new Typepad blog I need to reenter my info. Also, some blogs don’t save my information very well, so I’ll type a brilliant post and then have to re-link myself in the info section.
But, as said before, it’s free. People need to get a grip.
Looks like Blogger fixed the issue although you need an OpenID – I put details over on my site:
Blogger corrects their idiocy
very interesting.
i’m adding in RSS Reader