Forgive me for turning what should be a news post into personal opinion, but when the news is that the founders significant representatives of two of the world’s leading blogging platforms have resorted to personal attacks, I think it’s only fair that — as a consumer of both products in near equal measure — I have my say. You too, of course.
According to TechCrunch, it started with a blog post from Anil Dash, Chief Evangelist for Six Apart, encouraging WordPress users to “upgrade” to Movable Type because MT is a better platform.
Fair enough. Pepsi wants you to switch from Coke. Apple wants you to switch from Windows. Every car manufacturer wants you to trade in your existing model for one of theirs. It’s how business works.
What shouldn’t happen — but does in the blogging world all too frequently (and, yes, I’ve done it too) — is the start of a name-calling fest (or a mini flame war). (In fact, Anil has stated in his comment that it didn’t descend into personal name-calling — apologies for insinuating that)
Actually, like the original blog post calling for defection from WP to MT, it was all pretty lame. Photomatt twittered that “six apart is getting desperate, and dirty” while anildash retorted “desperation is resorting to name-calling and slander instead of substance — if there’s a factual error, i’m glad to fix it.”
OK, it’s hardly war of the century.
Dash even uses one of Lorelle’s Blog Herald articles to somehow prove that upgrading to Movable Type is easier than to WordPress.
Actually, that’s just good upgrade procedure. You don’t have to backup your Mac operating system to upgrade it, but it’s good practice to.
Anyway…
As someone who has used both platforms, I can categorically state that neither is without fault. Movable Type is a paid-for platform (at least, if you want the best features it is). I’d almost expect its support service to be better than a free service. It isn’t necessarily so.
Update: It’s worth noting that both Movable Type and WordPress are open source platforms, and both offer some forms of paid-for services should users require them.
MT3 was horrible (IMO). MT4 has some nice features, but they’re hardly game changers. WordPress 2.5 is, as yet, an unknown quantity, but I’ve high hopes for it.
Several MT4 blogs I work on have been having problems since we upgraded a week or so again. I can’t say that’s entirely down to the platform itself — it could be server issues — but the fact remains that neither platform is perfect, and for many bloggers, neither is significantly better than the other.
I know which platform I prefer, but a lot of that is down to familiarity and my own reliability issues. As usual, your mileage will vary.
There are bloggers moving from WordPress to Movable Type. And vice versa. And those using both. And neither. And completely different platforms.
I’ve got no problem with companies encouraging users of other products to take a look at their own, and none with open, honest debate on the pros and cons of various platforms, but perhaps it’s better to spend more time improving your own software, and letting the features speak for themselves, rather than tearing down the competition.
Like that’s going to happen?
(Via TechCrunch)
