Articles: Free vs Paid Blogs

Paid software that includes the price of hosting

In this option you will pay an ongoing subscription fee that will include both the software and hosting fees.

CONCESSIONS:

Cost - Because this is a subscription service, there will be ongoing costs involved in this option. For basic service you can expect to pay at least $6 per month and for more advanced features this may rise as high as $15 per month. The more features you want to have, the more you will have to pay. These costs can build up (up to almost $200 per year) so that the subscription-based options can become the most expensive over time.

Features - Depending on your budget there may be concessions to the features you are able to have. Unless you are willing to pay $15 per month, you will likely have to forgo certain features. The features you will have to do without will vary depending on the package you choose.

Subdomain - A domain name is a unique name on the Internet that usually ends with .com, .net or .org. The domain name of this site is blogbasics.com. If your name is Bill Smith, it might be nice to have your own blog at the address www.billsmith.com. Unfortunately with free software and free hosting, this will not be possible. You will need have a name that is part of another domain, perhaps www.billsmith.typepad.com. This is known as a subdomain. So your first concession is that your site will be part of the free hosting service's domain. In the case of our example this is TypePad.

ADVANTAGES:

With this system you will be able to do certain things you are not able if you go the entirely free route. For example, you will probably be able to customize the look of your site and you will have the ability to post photographs. This option also has certain advantages over free software with paid hosting. Depending on how much you are willing to pay for your subscription, you will likely be able to use a software package that offers more features than the free options. You also avoid having to deal with installing software on a server.

WE SAY:

We recommend this option for people who do not wish to be bothered with their own hosting and software installation. If you are willing to pay for blogging but are looking for the easiest possible solution, this option is for you. Subscription-based services offer great features, but they can come at a high price.

YOUR OPTIONS:

Due to the popularity of subscription-based blogging, there are several companies that offer this service. Some of them have different packages which provide more features as the monthly cost increases. The options are:

Typepad (Basic, Plus and Pro)
BlogIt
LiveJournal Paid
Squarespace (Basic, Plus and Pro)
Radio Userland

Of these options we recommend TypePad. Built around the extremely popular Movabletype software, Typepad offers excellent features at a reasonable cost.

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