Pen-Elayne on the Web

Unmovable

I've talked before about how I'm not really big on coding, how I need folks to talk me through things. The sidebar looks the way it does (and BTW I've added some more cool buttons) mostly because folks have helped me out and I've been able to copy and paste the proper coding to achieve the effects I wanted. And I'm still not all that happy with the layout of the blogroll portion. But be that as it may, I'm also not really big on paying money for something I can get for free. I'm really happy that Jeanne D'Orleans and Anne Zook and others blogrolled on my sidebar have moved to TypePad or Movable Type or whatever other Blogger competitors are out there and are satisfied with the change (and don't their sites look gorgeous!). I'm the first person to agree that Blogger is far from perfect, particularly when it comes to permalinks or archives; "bloggered" seems to be the new verb for "effed up" in many circles. But I've almost always shrugged it off as "you get what you pay for."

So I'm not going to throw too many hissy fits over something that doesn't cost me a penny to use or maintain, and I doubt I'll ever make a big deal about my PayPal tip jar (heck, I don't even know if my PayPal account works!) the way some others do, because I don't have to. I like my blogging not being dependent on the kindness of others, or on my varying disposable income. And while Blogger's free program does give you the option of hosting your blog on your own site (and I think you get that with TypePad too?), I'm very reluctant to do so, as space and bandwidth considerations would still probably mean paying more for our site than we do now, and I'd rather reserve that space and bandwidth for Robin's art stuff and my old Pen-Elayne reviews anyway. Until the latter are finally all uploaded (and it's a tedious process, to which I may actually be returning now that the WDC baton has been passed) I don't want to do anything new with my side of the site aside from the occasional update of my intro/bio page.

Now, all this doesn't mean I won't change my mind in the future - for instance, I'm finding Anil Dash (link at sidebar) a charming correspondent, and that sort of personal interaction goes a long way towards changing my mind in favor of actually considering paying for a service that I can get elsewhere for free. But for now, particularly with the economy in the state it's in, I'd rather save my money if I can or spend it on frivolities like bills and rent.