Going Dark and Some Other Random Blog Changes

I know my blog has been going through a lot of changes recently. And the latest one is especially dramatic. I have moved from a predominantly white/light theme with dark text to a predominantly dark theme with lighter text.

So, I am curious, how do you feel about the change? Like it? Is it easy to read, does it display well on your browsers?

This theme also highlights the various categories up front at the top of the page – something I quite like because it highlights the variety of topics covered in this blog.

Another change is the addition of a new WordPress plog. Couple of weeks back, the folks at WordPress introduced a new “Import from Posterous” feature that I used to import my Posterous plog into WordPress. Well, the Import feature worked well, and now I have two WordPress blogs linked together :).

While doing all these hi-jinks, I realized that WordPress photoblogging themes could use a lot of improvement. They are just not as easy as Posterous. Although Posterous does not have many customization features, the basic Gallery display is excellent and does not require any manipulation at all. With WordPress, I loved the Monotone and Duotone photoblogging themes. They display the photos really beautifully but really they are not suitable for Gallery style of pictures at all. I eventually settled for the Steira theme, just because it displays Gallery photos quite neatly. If you are not very sure by what I mean when I say Gallery, see this.

By now, you must be wondering why I am moving my blog from Posterous to WordPress if I am happy with Posterous. Well, the simple answer is I was just curious as to how my photos would display in WordPress; and just wanted to play around and experiment with the Import feature :).

Some other rough edges I saw during the Posterous import process:

  • Videos embedded in Posterous appear as attachments in WordPress. This sucks big-time because I then need to manually edit the posts and embed the video, which kind of defeats the purpose. I definitely would not recommend importing a Posterous blog to WordPress if you have a lot of video/audio content.
  • Posterous has a lovely option that allows users to download all the images in a post as a single zip file. WordPress does not have this option. It only provides a link that allows you to download them through Posterous, which makes me suspect that deleting my Posterous blog would result in a bunch of broken links in my WordPress blog – not something I want, which is why I am ending up retaining dual blogs with the same content.

I am sure there are probably many other gotchas that I haven’t spotted just as yet. In short, if you are considering moving your blog from Posterous to WordPress, do not delete your Posterous blog. Also, play around with a variety of themes. The traditional photoblogging themes provided by WordPress may not always suit everyone’s needs.

How about you guys? Has anyone attempted the move from Posterous to WordPress? If so, how did it go for you?

9 comments

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  1. Casey

    heyy.. I totally lowe ur new look. In fact, I almost picked the same one b4 I realized tht U were using the exact same one. I have become soo nit-picky – if even a single item is altered and not the way I want it – I drop the theme. I almost gave up till I got the new look. I am lovin in.. Ta da pa papam!

  2. Mohan

    This theme is looking vibrant now! I tried once to integrate with disqus, but it was pathetic form of integration… too many issues. Hence called it off. Happy with the way it is now 🙂

  3. Shilpa Garg

    Liked the new look of your blog.
    You change the look of your blog at amazing speed. Impressive! 🙂
    I wanna do some changes on my blog too, but am skeptical. I like the comment format in wordpress. So, don’t know whether to shift to WordPress or add Disqus etc.
    No, haven’t tried Posterous!

  4. Josette

    Hey there!

    Wow, I’m liking your blog’s new look especially the sidebar. 🙂 Erm, I haven’t heard of Posterous before. Just did some research on Wikipedia and found out that it’s a microblogging platform? Wow again.

    I’m using Google Chrome now and yeah, your blog displays nice!

    BTW, I have an award for you on my blog. Check it out here. 🙂

  5. veens

    this one looks good too. I think it looks really good 🙂

    I really am not into wordpress now.. blogger is where i belong 🙂
    easy peesy life 😉

  6. sumanam

    Well, I love wordpress, as I like clean and neat lines, wordpress blogs kind of has that feel… I have 2 blogs at wordpress, one the book blog and the other is here : https://foodcolours.wordpress.com/ (it’s Monochrome, go visit)
    Then I have another one at posterous, but I only write there , no pics, so works fine for me, it kind of looks like Iam writing letters but that’s fine, but I don’t think if I would have added pics or uploaded a lot , I would have to use wordpress…here is the link :http://lakeelsinore.posterous.com/, it’s kind of boring, I only update once a week…
    The blogger blog is my oldest one, which is my very first blog, I write almost everyday, it’s here :http://masalabowl.blogspot.com/, I always think of moving it to wordpress, but it’s like my firstborn, I have a softcorner for it, so haven’t gotten into it yet, but I know someday I will..

    • Nish

      Wow, Sumana, I didn’t know you had so many blogs.How do you manage to maintain them all? I will definitely go and take a look at them 🙂

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