Ingredients of a Blog
It’s amazing how blogging technology has changed over the course of the last 5-7 years. Back in 2002 when I first started blogging about the only thing available was Blogger (which at that time was a small independent company). I started posting some news before that but I was using news script that utilized flat file storage (I think Stomped.com used to use it when they were a news site).
Back then if you wanted to implement your own blog it took a little creativity to install, some MySQL knowledge possibly, and a few cans of caffeine to get it working right. Now it’s a piece of cake. Wordpress installs in less than 5 minutes. and Blogspot/Blogger is a piece of cake to use with all their built-in tools.
I like using Wordpress due to it’s simplicity and functionality. I have a personal blog on Blogger and I used to use Movable Type a long time ago but changed when they got rid of their free license. What makes Wordpress even better is the amount of plug-ins available to customize and tweak your blog.
Here’s a rundown on what I’m using at the moment -
- Wordpress 2.3.3
- Akismet for comment spam
- Peter’s Custom Anti-Spam plug-in for comment authentication
- ProSense Blue Theme by DoshDosh.com
- Wordpress.com Stats plug-in
- Google AdSense affiliate program
- TTZ Media affiliate program
- ShareThis plug-in
- MyBlogLog stats and plug-in
I’m sure I’ll be adding more as I discover what’s good and what’s not good and as this site grows and matures. So if you’re a beginning blogger check out some of those tools. Might save you a few hours of searching!
