Best Blogging Software

The blogging platform wars are getting reallyGreymatter, Blogger, and b2. Wordpress recently
interesting and much of the discussion I find myself inupped the ante when Yahoo recently included them
lately revolves around what is happening with variouson their hosting packages, in addition to MT. I have
CMS systems. The market can essentially be definedto admit I am finding myself more and more digging
into 3 major camps: remotely hosted, self hosted,WP and will likely convert Profitpapers to WP as I
and community based systems. I have used prettyget time (it can be a biznitch). Wordpress is
much every blogging platform available and each offree.Movable TypeAside from maybe Greymatter
them has its ups and downs. In this article I will cover(the original open source blogging tool), Movabletype
the best options for each area taking into accountdominated the blogging market share in 2002-2004.
price, usability, market share and of course SEOReleased in late 2001, Perl based Movable Type by
potential.All of these products are either open source,Sixapart has maintained a large portion of the
completely free or have a functional free version.blogging market share, due mainly to the fact that
Links were stripped from this article so you maythere is a free version (supporting up to 3 weblogs)
want to check out the original best blogging softwareand that it is incredibly powerful, intuitive and easy to
article at ProfitPapers.Remotely Hosted Bloggingcustomize. Template driven Movable Type also sports
Softwareone of the largest communities of developers and
(Note: I cannot really recommend any of these fromblogging enthusiasts around, meaning lots of support,
an SEO stand point as optimizing a domain you doidea sharing, and of course plugins. Movable Type can
not own or control is obviously not a good marketingbe configured to dynamically generate HTML, PHP or
plan.) BloggerBlogger is completely free and currentlyany other kind of pages you like, meaning it is
owns the majority of the remotely hosted userincredibly scalable, fast, and loved by spiders. It is
base, but not by a land slide . Bought out by Googleperhaps the most well known blogging software for
in 1999, Blogger essentially fired up the blogging trendSEO purposes and it what currently powers
we see today. It is by far the easiest overall solutionProfitpapers and several of my other projects.
to use and if you are a novice user looking to throwMoveabletype is either Free with 3 authors, 1 weblog,
up some recipes or poetry, this is for you. Blogger isand no support or $69.95 with unlimited weblogs,
completely free and includes some great features likeauthors and full support.TextpatternTextpattern is
comments, photo blogging, and a basic communitythe brainchild of Dean Allen and was written to ease
feel with user profiles. Because it is so dumbed downpublishing of content for those not inclined to learn
there are some features you may not find withHTML. Like WP and MT Textpattern runs on PHP and
Blogger that are only available through 3rd partymySQL for easy administration, backups, and power.
add-ons. As a side note Blogger weblogs do quiteWhat really sets textpattern apart from the others is
well in the search engines and this was recentlythe integration of Textile. Textile is a tool for easily
exploited with it being the first choice for spam blogsformatting content for those who do not know
or splogs. A splog is a weblog used for the soleHTML. WP & MT have modules for textile as well but
purpose of gaining inbound links or generatingit is native to the Textpattern system. Another
thousands of keyword stuffed pages with Adsensebonus of the app is its superior handling of comment
and the like. The recent Google Jagger updatespam due to its smaller market share. On a blogs I
cleared a large portion of this up.maintain running WP and MT I often find myself
Free.TypepadReleased in 2003 Typepad is a productclearing out spam every day, whereas on some very
of Sixapart, the makers of Movable Type. it is largelybusy textpattern sites I receive only manual
based on MT but there are some majorcomment spam (not bot driven). TP is open
enhancements and differences. Your blog cansource.Mentions: Blosxom, LifeType,
accomodate one or more photo albums with autoSerendipity.Community based Blogging
thumbnail generation. You can easily add music,SoftwareSlashWaaaaay back in 1997, Rob
books, and other media to Typelists, which grab a"CmdrTaco" Malda launched a website known as
thumbnail from Amazon and other retailers for easilyChips & Dips, supplied via his student account at
displaying in your sidebar. Typepad is also a great dealHope College in Michigan. In 1999 Andover.net
more technical than Blogger so a bit of HTML knowacquired Slashdot. Shortly after, the underlying code
how is recommended. On that note editing your blogwas released as open source software called Slash.
to look the way you want it also quite easy andLike Movable Type and Greymatter, Slash runs on
Typepad blogs are known for being very eyePerl, but it also has established hooks into MySQL and
pleasing, intuitive and easy to navigate. In Sixapart'sa very strong track record of scaling to enormous
business model Typepad is aimed at regular hometraffic levels. To give you an idea, the term
and small business users while Movable Type is'slashdotted' originated from acquiring a link on this
targeted at larger businesses or for internal intranets.now infamous and very popular tech news website -
Price: Basic, $4.95 a month; premium, $8.95 to $14.95and consequently watching your servers melt. If you
a month.XangaThese guys originated back in 1999 ashave never messed around with Slash, you really
a site for sharing book, music and movie reviews.should as it is quite a powerful platform. Slash is open
Although it quickly morphed into a full blown bloggingsource.ScoopAnother well known Perl based
tool Xanga still maintains the ability to run a powerfulcommunity blogging software is Scoop. Scoop is the
review site. Xanga pulls data from several retailerssoftware that powers Kuro5shin, DailyKos and many
like including thumbnails, pricing and a cover. Theother busy community weblogs. Scoop took the
software also is very usable by novices with aSlashdot idea and expanded on it, making the
powerful WYSIWYG editor allowing for easy HTMLdiscussion rather than the news the focus of the
editing, adding smilies, links, and other symbols. Byapplication. Where Slashdot entries tend to have a
using Blog rings it is also easy to interface withlink with added commentary pointing readers off the
Xanga's other 3 million users to share interests, ideas,site, Scoop points to stories written by members of
and of course traffic. Xanga comes in a free and $25the community keeping the reader within your own
flavor.Mentions: Blogsome, Blogster, MindSay,weblog. Scoop is also well known for handling large
Multiply,Self Hosted Bloggingvolumes of traffic and a large very technical
SoftwareWordPressWordPress originally began as acommunity. Scoop is free .DrupalDrupal is a well
mod of an older open source package known as B2.known open source community blogging platform
WP is MT's biggest competition and is often the bainwith a very large community of users and
of endless Wordpress vs Movabletype style threadsdevelopers. Not only is Drupal free but it is damn
around the internet. Although launched just over apowerful. Instead of Perl, which is quite hard to
year or so ago WP has really taken the blogospheredecode at times, even if you are a fluent coder,
by storm. And with good reason - Wordpress isDrupal uses a PHP/mySQL platform. Drupal is also a
completely free under GNU licensing and is packedvery community focused application with a built in
with many featured you will not find anywhere else.forum, download area, and hundreds of other home
It is also much easier to install and get blogging forbrewed mods and hacks. If you are looking for a lot
novice users and has a very large and helpfulof functionality give Drupal a check - the project has
community. WP runs on PHP/mySQL and is quitebecome quite mature. It is also much easier to use
scalable judging from some of the very large andand customize than either Scoop or Slash. Drupal is
trafficked sites I see using it. It also sports utilities toalso another open source project.Mentions:
import files from Movable Type, Textpattern,LiveJournal, PHP Nuke.