Jason Journals Back On Blogger

Jason Journals lives...on Blogger! Going steady since 1999 (!), it hasn't changed in years, so what caused me to leave my newfound host, Pika, and rejoin ye ol' Blogspot? Good question.

The fact that Blogger hasn't changed in years is kind of a reason why I'm back on it. Yes, nostalgia is a strong factor. The way Blogger looks and works has been steady - and if it isn't broken, don't fix it.

The basic reasons why I switched hosts and chose Blogger:

• Nostalgia - Blogger was my first host ever, about 20 years ago. It's classic now. This emotional or sentimental factor is almost an unfair advantage that modern blog hosts can't compete against.
• Simplicity - Blogger remains super simple, like Pika, but has enough extra features that I have missed. The overall balance looks and works great for me. It's not nearly as complex as WordPress. Its relative simplicity was the key; in fact with Jason Journals, I first chose Blogger in early 2017...but at the last minute flipped to WordPress.
• Free - Blogger is free to use. My frugal side loves pinching a few bucks a month. (Yes, it's "free" with a catch...Google...).

My previous host, Pika, nails the simplicity factor with aplomb, but it doesn't match the nostalgia of Blogger and it costs money to use Pika Pro. I was hosted there for just over a year. Pika is great; I still highly recommend it for basic writing on the web - its strongest trait is simplicity or minimalism. The service is rock-solid reliable too. I like Pika a lot, and it wouldn't be surprising if I were to switch back in the future. Note: nothing bad or wrong occurred at Pika that drove a wedge or pushed me away.

I was minding my own blogging business. But Blogger, due to my immersion in the Google ecosystem, was whispering in my ear for a while. It pulled, it tugged. I guess it tempted. Then I tinkered with it, like old times.

My entire blog archive was still hosted on my previous blogspot, up until early 2023. So it was missing only about 1.5 years of my posts. It was easy to bring that up to date. The process proved again how easy and reliable Blogger is to use, even after years of what looks like neglect from Google.

Trying out Blogger again also reminded me of several features that I had missed, ones that Pika might someday add and potentially pull me back. The main ones are:

• Widgets
• Sidebar
• Comments

Widgets and a Sidebar are both design or theme related. While I like the minimalism of Pika, with its centered single column of text, I really like a sidebar with meta info. And I love how easy Blogger makes it to customize my theme colors, fonts, layout, and widgets. Tinkering with my blog is fun.

Comments are a social thing. I like being able to interact with readers, fellow bloggers, and netizens. On Pika, in lieu of a built-in comment system, I had previously relied on two supplements: social media and email.

Social media was where I could get comments on blog post links I shared there. But I recently (once again) paused any usage of social media, so no more interaction there.

With email (via Letterbird), I sometimes got genuine interaction. But to me, it's not the same as having multiple people comment directly on a single blog post. Most emails I received on my Pika blog did not link or mention the particular related blog post, which was off-putting. (Aside: I added a required subject line to my Letterbird email contact form. It's now found here on Blogger.)

Wrap-up

Hopefully, the above explains my basic reasons for switching blog hosts and why, of all platforms, I chose Blogger. I've used others (Micro.blog, WordPress, Neocities) and I've been interested in other contenders (Bear, Scribbles, Blot). But only Blogger has both the power of nostalgia and zero-cost.

What if Google kills Blogger? I think that, by now, Google would have already killed it. The fact that it hasn't makes me think it won't, not for a long time at least. And checking stats and info online, it seems that many people still use Blogger (despite some decline). That said, if Blogger ends up in the Google graveyard, it is what it is. I'll be fine one way or another. It's a risk I'll take.

Isn't Google big bad tech? Sure, just like Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, and just about every other tech in our lives. Even WordPress disappoints. I use YouTube, owned by Google (Alphabet), every day. Likewise, I think using Blogger is fine.

What about A.I. content stealing? I'm sure Google or Blogger slurped up my entire posts-archive that was previously dormant on blogspot. And it's likely that a dozen other A.I. companies did too. And with my previous blog(s) on the open web, chances are pretty fair that its content was slurped up too, despite technical efforts to prevent it. A.I. crawled the web; there's no putting the toothpaste back in the tube.

Call to action

Use the tool the best helps you "get the job done." Believe it or not, Blogger, despite some fair misgivings, still works great today - since 1999! For now, as long as it keeps on keeping on, I'm gonna blog on Blogger.