Wednesday, September 12, 2007

EFX2 vs Blogger

Since EFX crashed several days ago, quite a few bloggers have made their way to Blogger and other places to start new blogs. Most have done so with great reluctance and hesitation, approaching their new blogs as a temporary thing until EFX is revived.

Some have lamented the fact that Blogger isn't as easy to use as EFX was, and of how they miss their favorite features from their old blogs: comment tracking alerts, recent visitors track, extra pages, the community feel, and so on.

I acknowledge Blogger's shortcomings and I also miss these features from EFX. But Blogger has one very important feature that EFX did not have -- it is a stable site that is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. As far as I'm concerned that's the most important feature a blog hosting site can have. If the site isn't up and you can't access your blog or those of others, then all the fancy user-friendly features don't amount to a hill of beans.

And if Keith manages to cobble EFX back together again, I don't hold out much hope for it being any more stable in the future. Pointing this out is in no way meant as a dig to Keith. But let's face facts. Keith is just one guy who has other responsibilities in his life and can only work on EFX on a part time basis, as his schedule permits. There's only so much one person can do under the circumstances and it would be unfair to expect more out of him.

Blogger, on the other hand, has been around for eight years, and it has several people employed full time devoted to maintaining this site. We can trust Blogger to be reliable, if not the simplest site in the world to use. Upgrades have been made over the years, and this is something that will no doubt continue. And, best of all, it's free.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I have invested a lot of myself into my writing in the three years I've been blogging, and I'd hate to lose all my work. Unlike many fellow EFXers, I had another shadow blog at Blog City, so I didn't lose anything.

Despite the unexpected loss of our EFX home, those of us who have created new blogs managed to find each other fairly quickly and, as it stands now, we've all linked together in the effort to maintain the community feeling. Likewise, despite the fact that Blogger is more difficult to use, most of us have also constructed attractive looking sites in fairly short order. I set up this site about two weeks ahead of the EFX crash, with Chica-X helping me to construct an attractive template. I know that she's subsequently been of help to others in setting up their sites.

We can recreate the community feel here if we are so motivated. If the previous week has been any indication, I'd say it's already well under way. We'll get used to how Blogger works, even though it can be a challenge now and will take some patience and time.

I don't know when or if EFX will return. If it does, I'll return there along with others to post there again. But I'm not going to focus on EFX, nor pin my hopes on it. I've got a damned fine looking blog right here, that I intend to use fully, and will continue to maintain, even if EFX returns. I would hope that others here will make the best of their new blogs also, regardless of what they intend to do in the event of an EFX revival.

Thoughts?

20 comments:

LauriesAsylum said...

I know for sure I will keep this one. It's hard to get use to anything new, at least it is for me. But, you do what you have to do and after spending all day on this site trying to figure things out, I finally feel like I've accomplished something. The only reason I've been able to accept being here is because I've found so many others from efx2. I don't think I would like it as well if not for that. Until I found others, it felt like I was all alone in this vast area of space.

kinnigurl said...

I have had my photo blog here for quite some time now, and will probably start another site for my writing if efx2 doesn't come back up. It isn't quite a user friendly and I do miss the sense of community, but we all seem to be drifting together yet again.

Ted said...

I couldn't agree with you more. I'm just kicking myself that I didn't keep my blogger updated when I made the move back to efx a few months ago.

I am impressed with how quickly we have all managed to find each other given that there was no warning this time around.

Anonymous said...

I miss efx, particularly the alerts. However, i have to say blogger has vastly improved and become far more user-friendly than when I first started my erotic writing site here.

there is a whole different "feel" to this site- not the same as efx and if poor Keith manages to get it up and going I'll go back too - but like a lot of others here, will probably have a "mirror" site here..

Cyn said...

i've made a few posts about how easy it is to set up a blogger blog. how customizable it is. how many built in features there are. how integrated blogger is w/ gmail and Google products like their feed reader. w/ the reader i don't miss any new posts. i've installed a 3rd party addon to track comments..info at my blog. really the only thing i miss are smilies. also using Patrick's comments module. so i really don't have any complaints about blogger. i have never lost an entry. i can recall only a few times in the last year that there were unexplained downtimes. never more than a few minutes. they always announce scheduled down times well in advance. keep in mind the number of corporate blogs that are here. bloggers real money makers. they damn well better be stable! as for community...if you want to establish a community you can. you are only limited by your own actions and by your own willingness to communicate. there are several built in options w/ blogger on setting up completely private self contained 'communities' too. just takes a little poking around and reading. of all the bloghosts out there...i keep coming back to blogger. so i'm here to stay.
and its prolly best i keep my thoughts to myself about EFx2.

KingOfAnkh said...

The thing I miss most is the alerts.

I find it a pain having to go from blog to blog looking for new posts, and since I was subscribed to around 70 blogs, it just takes far too much time to visit everybody on a daily basis.

Anonymous said...

As Cyn has said, you can install Google reader into your start up page, or have it as a link, or in your book marks. Here is the link for that.
http://googlereader.blogspot.com/

Also, by using blogflux, I can track every comment I want even if I did not comment there myself. it takes a few minutes to set up, but after that, there are two links to click, the reader and the comments. The browser even turns green when there are new comments you are tracking.
Here is that link...
http://www.blogflux.com/

And, if you like, I have a community chat central box that you can install and use. It is password protected to keep the spam bots out, but everyone here will know the password. Just install it and you will receive it.

Cyn said...

i've always heard repetition is the key to learning. *grins*

LMC said...

You've only been blogging 3 years? I must have stumbled on to you from the start. I think that is how long I have been doing this. Most of my posts where not that important. The story of my life I backed up on my hard drive so it is safe in my computer. Another copy is printed out and in a fire proof safe. If I ever find a reputable publisher...who knows...The one I contacted wanted to publish it, but I got scared....I'm not ready to have the story put with the "real" person. I'll hide behind "LMC" for a while. Most of what I know about computers has been self taught so all this HTML stuff is Greek to me. I push buttons, cross my fingers and hope some how the blog turns out.....So far so good.

I do miss the comment tracking thing. I feel like I am missing half the conversations!

lisalisabobisa said...

I'll keep mine here even if EFX does come back up, for a back up if nothing else. I'm learning how to use it, but the think I'm going to miss is blog alerts. The comment and tracking alerts I can live without, but without the blog or post alerts, I feel like I'm in a corner not knowing what's going on out there. I'm adding you to my links.:)

cherreh said...

I'm on the same page. I lost so much work that I really don't want to take that risk again.


And I've NEVER heard the "hill of beans" expression before. Hilarious! I must find an excuse to use it at work today...

Cyn said...

http://commentful.blogflux.com/

What is Commentful?

Commentful is a service that tracks blog posts and more and notifies you whenever a new comment has been added.

http://www.google.com/reader/

RSS feed reader

http://www.google.com/intl/en/help/reader/help.html

i know i am once again wasting my breath. but for those rare souls who actually read comments...as i've said here and at my blog. as Patrick has said. there is absolutely no reason to miss new entries or new comments. but...i realize no one is reading this so....

Melissa said...

Thanks Cyn for the link to google reader. My Mom and Dad are also using this feature. It's very easy to use and like Cyn said I won't be missing any new alerts. Pretty handy little tool to know about. Thanks!

Cyn said...

ah!
you're welcome. blogger and Google really are not so hard once you start poking around and finding stuff, eh?

Dee Jay said...

I have to bookmark these comments so I can come back later and download these things. LOL I simply don't have time to even think about it now.

Like others, I mostly am missing the various alerts. So far, I've put together a blog I like and so many people I love reading are within the click of a mouse.

EFX may come back, but I will keep dual sites either way. : )

Eclectablog said...

*waves*

Eclectablog, the lonely blogless blogger...

*sigh*

Libertine said...

You need to revive that blog or start a new one and start blogging again. I miss your posts.

Dulci said...

I think I'm staying also. I will probably mirror on Efx2, but I really want a blog that is available when I have time to use it.

Jelene said...

i agree... if efx2 comes back, i will be posting, but probably not nearly as much as before. i'd be worried it would just fail again. thank goodness i had my vox and my blogger back up. but it would be nice to have my posts on efx2 that were left behind. i didn't make copies of those..

Libertine said...

EFX is back -- and Keith has been able to salvage our old post, though he's not been able to bring the comments with them.