I’m finally DONE with WordPress, and I’m moving the blog to Substack.
Everything has been transferred over, but of course it will look a bit different. No biggie.
https://divvercity.substack.com

I’ve disabled comments on this post. Another email will come from Substack, and if you like, please comment there.

If you don’t care why I’m doing this, then you don’t have to read any further.
But for those who are curious:

For many years, I’ve been vexed by WordPress. It’s really intended for people who work frequently on their web sites, and don’t mind a LOT of maintenance. BUT… as often as I get around to writing a blog (months apart), I lose “fluency”, and struggle with the subtle and arcane aspects of WordPress authorship.

Yes, it’s a powerful and flexible platform — in fact, far more than I need for my style of writing. Pictures and text, that’s me. I spend a lot of time crafting both my photographs and my words, and I enjoy it. But warring with the nuances of my platform — not so much.

Here’s a list of my biggest gripes:

SLOW — for unknown reasons, divver-city.com has always been glacially slow. More than 10-20 seconds to load or change pages. Same for previewing a post. Or switching site-management functions. So slow, in fact, that other sites often time-out when they’re trying to coordinate. I’ve worked with my domain host endlessly, with sometimes a slight improvement… but usually none.

UNRELIABLE — I’ve cut way back on my plug-ins, because the authors don’t always maintain them. A WordPress change/update comes along (frequently), and DOINK, something breaks. And I don’t always realize it for a while. Sometimes it breaks something I’m currently writing; sometimes it breaks something I’ve already written/published.

COST — Virtually EVERYTHING is subject to a fee. Hosting of course. Security, yup. Backup? Pay up. Diversity is not a revenue web site, it’s a freely shared travel journal. Paying literally hundreds of dollars to be able to share with friends, family, and a few hundred subscribers… not appealing.

OFFLINE — for a couple of years now, WordPress divver-city goes offline, randomly and for no reason. Sometimes for an hour, sometimes for days. I’ve worked with the host until I want to scream, and I receive assurances that they’re working on it… and then it comes back, for a while. Days or weeks, even longer. Then it breaks again.

EMAILING — WordPress has a really poor email manager; it doesn’t even allow me access to my own subscriber list. So a while back, I selected Mailchimp for my email manager. It’s a huge presence in the industry, and widely hailed as one of the best. But here again, since I use it only rarely, I get “rusty” and struggle with how to get things done. Substack, by contrast, has a simple and useful built-in email manager.

FREQUENT CHANGES — WordPress keeps “improving” things, especially their editing interface, and it seems that every time I come back to write another post, nothing works quite the same as before.

There are other, more minor issues, but the bottom line is that I am through with paying out a fair sum, in exchange for problems that get in the way of simply writing and publishing a blog.

Recently, I “discovered” Substack, and I’ve seen that it has grown into a substantial presence. For a non-monetized blog like mine, it’s zero-cost. It’s a lot simpler than WordPress, and consequently has less flexibility and capability. But that’s fine with me, and a LOT easier to remember when I’m only working on it four or five times a year. Also, I do expect Substack to be around for a long time, and I hope we’ll be happy together.

PREVIOUS POSTS

I’ve imported all previous posts over to my Substack domain. The transfer did not go perfectly, and I’ve lost some of the photo quality. But my stats show that not many people go back to re-visit old posts, and in any case nothing is missing, it’s just that the photos are not as sharp or crisp.

SO THAT’S IT — This should be my last post on this platform (barring any major unforeseen issues). Thanks for reading, and see you over on Substack.
(NOTE that eventually, I’ll abandon this domain, and there will no longer be access here.)