Starting the journey…

What goes where?

I have been blogging for some years using the Tumblr platform, mainly covering cycling based content and events which have caught my eye. It’s been a wonderful learning opportunity with the platform’s (rather basic) analytics allowing me to track the steadily growing Tumblr based viewership.

The Tumblr platform operate in the middle ground between social network and blogging, with the reblog and like being key functionality. Whilst there are examples of people using Tumblr for more longform style content, this is very much the exception in a stream of content that tends to privilege the visual.

Shortlist of blogging platforms I have been looking at has been is Wordpress, Squarespace and Medium (there are others with The Next Web providing a good run through). The Wordpress platform provides for an almost infinite array of customisations, but can prove a blackhole for users not particularly comfortable with the platform. Squarespace has done a great job of positioning itself as the ‘Apple’ of the blogging world with great design and usability. Unfortunately, like Apple, this comes at a price. Medium provides a more grown up Tumblr, with the same ease of use but also sacrificing much of the customisation and analytics provided by Medium and Squarespace — although the ease of exporting your content does make it a less frightening choice

I am going to run Squarespace and Medium blogs for the next couple of weeks and will choose teams based on which comes out on top.