One of the questions a new blogger or blogging organization has to make is whether to use a hosted service (like blogger.com, typepad.com, etc.) or to rent server space and host the blog yourself. Perhaps the most accurate way to describe this is to call the options a. hosted blogging software and b. unhosted blogging software. Here are some pros and cons both directions, based on my experience and thoughts.

Hosting it yourself:

Putting up any website on server space you own or rent has some advantages. It’s what I do for this site and for my purposes here I wouldn’t want it any other way. I pay about $100/year for space with BlueHost, a great company with fast, quality customer service and a built in service for installing Word Press, the blogging software I use.

I can throw up any type of files I want to on my space very easily with their simple uploading interface, including files I post elsewhere about and want to have control of myself.

Since I have full access to the software that I put up (Word Press) I can easily make changes to my template or install any of a gazilion plug-ins like my recent comments feature in my sidebar. So far I have not run into any limitations of what my hosting service can provide. A “hosted blogging service” is often far less flexible and new features you may want to add to your own blog are just not an option.

It’s easy to start new sites by buying new domain names and putting the files on my web space.

Since I can buy any domain name I want, the URL is mine and mine alone. This sometimes looks more professional than, for example, my old blog’s URL http://marshallk.blogspot.com

On the rare occasion the server hosting my site has problems, my hosting service has nothing else to focus on (no software maintenance as far as I’m concerned) so the problem gets solved very quickly.

Hosted Blogging Services

There are many, many blog hosting services available to chose from. Less technically inclined people are often tempted to use one, and it’s sometimes a good idea. Here are some of the advantages of such a system:

If uploading files in any but the simplest ways is intimidating to you, then using a hosted software could be the way to go.

Many of these services are free, if you don’t mind dealing with ads on your site that make money for the host. This isn’t ideal, but for a quick and dirty blog it can work.

Your URL doesn’t have to be ugly. Typepad, for example, will host your blog on a domain like mycompany.blogs.com. I think that looks just fine, myself. Or, for their higher cost service levels ($9 to $15 per month) they support something called domain mapping, or pointing your URL to theirs. I haven’t used this and I’m not sure how different it is from a simple redirect, but I’ll bet it works pretty darned well.

Service interruptions. You can bet that if your blog goes down on a hosted service, there will at least be lots and lots of other bloggers freaking out about it. None the less, the recent Typepad implosions have left me pretty wary about having a blog anywhere but on my own rented server space. This might be silly, but it’s how I feel right now. In reality I imagine that the company is going to great lengths to avoid another major failure, which would be a third strike for many users. Similarly, though, I read the Blogger.com company blog and know that they have far more frequent service interruptions than my general purpose host does.

Conclusion:

Right now I would make the following recommendation. If blogging is what you do, if it’s one of your primary gigs, then I would not recommend depending on a service that hosts your blogging software. I would recommend Bluehost.com, which came recommended to me and has been great. I would put the open source and highly usable Word Press on it and enjoy.

That being said, if blogging makes up less than 60% of your work, it might make sense to just go through a hosted service and leave the bulk of the set up and maintenance to them. Chose very carefully and make sure you have access to your code templates. I think this can be doable and sufficient for many, many people. We’re supposed to focus our energies on the activities that differentiate our work from that of others and out-source the basics to some one who does those particularly well, right? That makes sense to me.

If you are a nonprofit and want a full featured Content Management System and Customer Relationship Management service, check out CivicSpace, now with hosted and unhosted options.

Please feel free to add your thoughts in comments below.

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