This episode is brought to you by the letter D

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Don't think that it's escaped my notice that lots of folks lately seem to be switching over to WordPress to manage their blogs. I've managed the spam pretty easily through a combination of Blacklist and MT-Close, and I've been thinking about adding a keystroke captcha as well, or as a substitute. Bottom line, though, is that I think it's just a matter of stalling the inevitable--maybe someone who knows more about than I can tell me if it's just that WP has flown under the radar of the sp4mm3rs thus far, or if there's something genuinely better about it? If the former, then the very quality that is drawing people will ultimately draw the fungus too.

Dissertations: I would be remiss if I didn't send a shout towards Mary Queen, who successfully Defended her Dissertation toDay. CongraDulations, Mary!

Dat's gonna get olD fast.

I have other things I could report: I haven't been Dreaming much lately, I got to see former colleague Dana at the Defense, I've been a little Depressed, the site will soon undergo a reDesign, etc., but perhaps I'll just close with the observation that D is 500 in Roman numerals. Which should be explanation enough for all you clever people.

That's all.

10 Comments

I guess I'm lucky enough to have only undergone a few unfortunate attacks--and those have been on other blogs that I maintain on the school server.

For the department's larger use of blogs (courses, student-blogs, other), I'm thinking that MT is still a good bet since those sorts of blogs don't *last" more than 15 weeks?

And there's the whole fracas over at WP with Hot Nacho (that's WP why users don't have to deal with as much spam; Matt's spamming everyone behind the scenes). Yeah, I know I'm oversimplifying; yeah, I know it might not really count as spam. But still.

And last: DuDe! Has it been that many already?? You're getting olD. :)

I use MT for Arete and WordPress for my reading notes, and I really like MT better. WordPress feels ... clunky. It may just be me, but it seems to take 3 steps to do things that take 1 in MT. And I notice that quite a few WP folks have problems with non-spam comments being eaten by the spamcatcher. And then there's the whole Hot Nacho thing.

Frankly, I'm thinking of moving everything back to MT sometime this summer.

See: http://photomatt.net/2005/04/01/a-response/

I'm pretty prepared to like WP. MT was fine, but I was getting tired of it for several reasons, not just the spam. The spammers will eventually get to WP. (Pieces of crap!!!) Unlike Krista, I actually find MT very clunky. I much prefer the WP interface. But maybe I'm just now subconsciously associating MT with porn, poker, and pills. Must be. Even *thinking* about MT makes me angry. I f***ing HATE SPAM!

Jenny, could you either set me a temporary password or let me use yours to take a look at the interface?

I doubt I'll switch, mainly for the reason that Mad notes: I end up vanguarding Blacklist for all of the other blogs on our installation, since mine is one of the oldest, and I don't mind doing that. For every spoomer that gets through, I've probably stopped 10, and if I were to switch, I'd most likely end up having to deal with each of those blogs individually, helping their owners despam.

I don't think it's really a question of spam -- WP and MT have roughly equivalent sets of tools to help you manage it; I've had spamfloods with both platforms, and I've eliminated those spamfloods with both platforms. And while WP felt clunky to me at first, it's MT that now feels clunky -- just a question of getting used to the tools, maybe?

There is one significant difference, of course, in that WP doesn't let you do multiple blogs from one install: the advantage is very much to MT there, as you note, Collin. But having used both tools extensively, I think they're pretty much equivalent in terms of quality -- although you can't beat WP's ease of installation. It really is as easy to install as they say, and far, far easier than MT.

For me, the difference is in that WP is offered under the GPL. For a long time, I didn't "get" why Charlie Lowe and Clancy Ratliff and others were so het up over open source issues. Now I do. And I'm glad to be using WP.

I've had no real experience with setting up MT or WP sites from scratch, but when I guestblogged on a WP site, I have to say that I liked the interface a whole lot better than I do the MT interface.

Try blogger. I know, I know, it lacks many of the features of MT and WP, but it has one (maybe 2) strengths.

1. No Spam. Ever. Never. None. Nadda.

2. Blogger is so uncool it has a chance of becoming the new cool. (Okay, I made up that last one, but I'm trying to start something here).

C,
I'll send you my password and stuff. You can post a blog to see how you like it!

The major weakness with Blogger is that it doesn't have categories.

Speaking of the letter "D," cough!-Drupal!-cough!

that's a lot of blogging, man--er, dude.

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This page contains a single entry by cgbrooke published on April 22, 2005 11:56 PM.

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