Blogger

The vast majority of blogs I read are hosted by Blogger.

Yet, most people treat Blogger like the ugly, redheaded step-child of blogging platforms.

I tried to switch over the WordPress a while back but they are not as flexible or useful unless you plan to host your site outside of the free WP site.  I couldn’t get flash to work unless I was willing to pay for it.  Screw that.  Blogger let's me do that for FREE.

Anywhooooo.  I popped over to the Blogger Dashboard today to make some modifications to my template when a message popped up notifying me that Blogger Beta (if you haven’t check it out you totally should) now offers a Mobile Template (Beta).  I turned that feature on and was able to see a preview:

I don’t know about you guys, but my phone is what I rely on to keep me entertained when I am stuck waiting somewhere. 

It was always annoying to try to read blogs on the phone because they just weren’t phone friendly – although, it is much better now with my Android phone than it was with my old Blackberry and WinMo phones.

One of the reasons I prefer to read blogs on my Google Reader is that I don’t have to try to block out all the formatting people do.  Not that y’all have fugly blogs, but let’s face it, I’m pretty sure none of you are web designers (and that includes me).  Just saying.

Speaking of design, if you are a Blogger user and haven’t checked out the new Template Designer you are totally missing out.  It offers so many options to make your blog look spiffy and not the least bit, erm, trashy. NTTAWT.

There is a huge selection of backgrounds many with customizable color options.  The designer makes it so easy to change column widths, headers, fonts, colors.  It is incredibly easy to use and the results are noticeably NOT STOCK BLOGGER TEMPLATE.

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One of the best parts is the live preview.  Change anything and it is reflected in the preview.  No more saving and viewing only to find out that something didn’t turn out quite right AND it is live until you fix it. 

If you have grown tired of your blog template, or, if you think your readers have gotten tired of it just pop over the the Blogger Beta and have some fun.