Breaking up is hard to do
May 5, 2008 by Bob
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a post about Wordpress, and the fact that there were just way too many updates, plug-ins that needed updates, etc. Honestly, I have been doing some searching, looking for the right client to move to. There are literally dozens of blogging and CMS (Content Management System) clients out there to choose from. Some of them are pretty good, others are not so good. No piece of software is perfect, no doubt about that.
I do want to leave Wordpress and move on to something that is more stable, in terms of not having to do constant upgrades. For a person who has one blog, or a couple, it’s probably not a big deal to do an upgrade a few times per month, as is often the case with Wordpress. However, I have dozens of blogs, and those upgrades can be quite a time waster. If there is a problem with an upgrade causing a site crash, you can throw away a full day or more. Throw in the fact that plug-ins need constant upgrades too, and you’ve got a full time job there!
There is a problem, though, with leaving Wordpress. Switching to a different platform means problems. First, you have to migrate everything from your Wordpress installation to the new client. This is not always an easy or seamless thing to do. Sometimes it can’t even be done. For example, I have one blog that has nearly 10,000 comments on it. Moving comments is not easy all the time. Almost all of my Wordpress sites have custom themes that I have either built myself or paid to have done. Those themes won’t work with other software, they will have to be abandoned, or ported over to the new platform. That won’t be easy, it will take time, or money, or both.
Thinking about this whole thing gets some ideas flowing in my head. Is it healthy for so many people to be tied in to a single platform? I am talking about the health of the Web here. I mean, if you build up a site with thousands of posts, lots of content and such, you are kind of locked in, as I have pointed out above.
With all of this thinking, I have come to only one conclusion so far… Leaving Wordpress isn’t easy! As with other aspects of life, I guess… breaking up is hard to do!
Yep. as we have talked about it certainly isn’t easy. However, the good thing about these discussions is that it makes you do some re-thinking that goes beyond what blogging platform to use. Such as, is blogging really worth much in the MMO world any more. I know that no matter what you write about your various enterprises, and what i write, and what many others bloggers write about ways to make money on line, I still see a continuous stream of comments with the gist of” I’m going to start me a blog and make money like you guys do”
I’m doing a lot of restructuring planning myself .. and with or without WordPress, blogging plays a _lot_ less role in my thoughts than it did even a year ago.
Hi Dave Starr - very interesting comments. They are especially interesting because in the last 24 hours or so, I have been doing some re-evaluation of what I make money on, what I do that I don’t make anything (or very little) on, and kind of thinking of doing some re-alignment of those activities. One thing that is surprising is that this blog makes a decent amount of money, given the amount of traffic that it gets.
That said, my realignment ideas would be to focus more on things that I enjoy, and things that make money. The stuff that I don’t enjoy that much anyway, and also don’t make much money are somewhat of a waste of time!
Isn’t it a nice thing when the things you don’t enjoy happen not to make enough money to make them worth doing?
Thankfully, that has mostly been my experience. I have had a few writing jobs that I absolutely hated (but which paid cold, hard cash that I needed).
I think for business people you really have to regularly look at what you do and whether it is worth it. I had a website, collegeadvocates.com, that got decent traffic, which I enjoyed doing, but which just didn’t make enough money to justify the time involved. I decided it was best to move on.
Hi Tom - Yes, I agree with what you say. Focusing on things that fit two criteria is the best:
1. You enjoy it
2. It makes you money
Things that only fit one of the criteria are still OK, but if you can focus in on the things that fit both criteria, you will be comfortable and happy!