How to Start Your Blog in 2023
molodtsov.me
How to Start Your Blog in 2023
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Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#2Running your own blog in 2023 is still needlessly complicated, especially if you have any kind of taste. Social apps and networks are obviously the easiest options, but they’re geared toward vastly different things, and I just don’t trust their longevity. There are many options out there, ranging from WordPress and Ghost to static blogs to managed online platforms and Micro.blog. In fact, none of the options out there seem ideal to me – they range from mediocre to acceptable.
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#3Totally agree on the seemingly unnecessary overhead. Just recently I was looking into platforms for starting a blog and was overwhelmed with the choices of which none really had a complete set of offerings. Having a feature comparison table or a guide for choosing the best service/platform for individual use cases would be nice.
In the end, I chose Ghost's lowest tier. While it is limited regarding the theme choices, I've found that you can customize the free standard themes via their code injection feature[1].
[1]: https://www.shmostert.com/customize-standard-ghost-themes/ (disclaimer: the guide is from my blog)
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#4> Running your own blog in 2023 is still needlessly complicated, especially if you have any kind of taste.
Aside from taste being subjective, most of the tools mentioned are customizable. That is, you can tweak the markup and CSS to your own taste.
The post starts being concerned about aesthetics but then finishes with:
"Having the right tool certainly helps, but at the end of the day, what matters is what you write there. Focus more on the content and just ensure the process of writing and posting is simple enough."
Finally, time is money. Spending an added hour (or two) with a build process (or whatever) isn't savings at all. If Goal #1 is to publish then anything that gets in the way should be avoided.
There are some solid points made, but the argument is inconsistent.
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#5I started my website and blog in 2021. I used Jekyll + github pages with custom domain. I didn't want to setup everything by myself, so I bought a Jekyll theme that I liked and customized it. I did it lazily, so it took me around 1 month to complete the whole process, including copying my old blogposts from Medium.
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#6I just publish via blogger. In the past I have checked other options but I always spend more time looking for interesting ways to deploy content than writing content
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#7I honestly think starting a blog in 2023 is exactly as easy as it was 2004 (the year he references), if you take the easiest route:
1. You pick a cheap shared hoster
2. You buy a domain and connect it
3. You download a PHP blog system, like Wordpress
4. You unpack the files into the webroot, configure the database (or use a blog system that supports sqlite, like Serendipity [which I develop for])
5. Pick a theme, install a minimal amount of plugins. Optionally customize the theme a bit.
6. Done.
Sure, going with a hosted offering looks easier, but you still have to manage things like your domain, interoperability and backups, so hosting it on your own gets easier very fast.
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#81. What you use or wherever you host, make sure that you can export your content in either plain text or a universal format that can be used by another tool or host it yourself. In short, own the content and use whatever tool it fits your current situations and limitations.
2. Possibly, try to get a domain of your own, and preferably a `.com`. Point that to whichever server you use (if they don't allow you to point, that is a net negative). Keep pointing to the services that you keep moving as they keep dying. One day, you might just end up writing in plain HTML and (s)FTP into a folder.
3. If you are going to use images/audio/video quite a tad more than usual -- start using a CDN (pretty cheap and some are free these days). If those are hosted on https://cdn.mydomain.com, you can move your content wherever you want and those images, audio, video just works. I was able to change WordPress hosting providers in minutes because I don't have to move the static assets.
edit: added the 3rd point.
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#9There’s also the option to ask someone with skills and expertise to set something up for you.
Which is almost never taken into consideration as an option in this kind of posts.
I don’t think it’s hard to start a blog in 2023. It’s hard to start a blog if you have very strict requirements AND you want to do everything on your own without being a developer/designer.
Re: How to Start Your Blog in 2023
#10I've been running a blog since '99. Started on phpslash, then slashcode, then Drupal for a loonnnnng time. I just recently moved everything to WordPress and I'm finding it mostly ok. It's not designed to do small, simple, easy, plain, but it gets the job done. I agree with this
"The most popular CMS in the world, and yet I just can’t stand its admin page."