Hi!
Another rare news update about the blog itself – though given that it’s from a couple of weeks ago now, whether it’s really ‘news’ at this point at all is a fair question. Long story short, the blog’s gone through the most significant and largest changes in its history over the last few weeks, including a change to a new domain.
So, the last few weeks have been quite a bit of fun for me – picking out and organising a domain, migrating the site, setting up redirect links for the old blog addresses, and so on. My previous post was already published directly to this new website, as a kind of soft launch…it all seemed to go pretty smoothly, so I guess it’s ok. I’ve even, shockingly, done a little bit of actual real coding in the last couple of weeks, to get the formatting just right and clean up a few little problems that lingered from or were created by the export from one host to another.
I’ve actually been delighted with the old /blogspot.com domain since I started this silly project two years ago. It’s free, it’s easy to use, and it’s well-built. I’m kinda sorry to leave it behind – but, at the same time, it has served as it needs to for me. And the new webpage (www.theblogofmazarbul.com – not that you need it, you’re already on it!) has a lot of new options that Blogspot just didn’t offer, and that I’ve been hankering over for a little while now. A lot of it is behind the hood, but I think the actual themes and options are also much cleaner and easier to use, too, and hopefully that translates to a nicer reading experience. It’s not perfect – I’m still working on trying to get the loading times to be as quick as possible, for one – but I’m pretty happy with it overall. And, best of all for you, there’s no need to do anything – all my old links should lead to their new homes, and the mailing list and all that remains intact.
You’d think changing domains and servers would be enough news for this year, but I assure you, it is not! In addition to also cleaning up the web page, adding some functionality, making it all easier to navigate and move around, I’ve also dipped my toes in a couple of frightening new worlds.
The newest and frighteningest of these worlds is Twitter – yes, I’m now on Twitter. No, don’t expect anything good to come of it – or anything bad. Or anything at all, to be honest. I’ve never ever had a personal Twitter account, and now that there is one for the blog page…I don’t feel like I’ve missed out on that much. But, if it is your medium of choice, then please do like and follow and whatever else, if you fancy – I will at least share new blog posts there, and may even engage more fully with the medium and replytweet to the tweets of other tweeters.
…if I am honest, the last part is unlikely. But you and I can both dream!
Finally, I’ve also decided to set up a Paypal page (which can be found here) for anyone who wants to help support the blog, who wants to show some support, or even just buy me a coffee (I cannot imagine greater support than being bought a coffee).
This blog is, first and foremost, meant to be a way for me to practice my writing and my critical thinking, and is not really meant to be anything more than that – I certainly do not expect to make a living, or even any significant amount, from it. At the same time, though, I do put some amount of work into the damn thing, and occasionally even receive some very kind feedback about it. There’s no actual expectation for anyone to actually give me anything for what I do here, I’m determined to keep on writing, and I’m never going to force people to give me money for it, either. But, y’know, at the same time – if you did want to show some support through any nominal donation that you would not miss, I would be very grateful, and shocked, and also grateful.
So, new website, new look, new social options, and new toys for me to make this blog as good as it can be. But beyond a (hopefully) better experience for my readers, there’s not much that’s changed for you guys on the other side of the screen. And, since I don’t want this fairly meaningless update to hog the banner spot on my page for too long, and because there’s been a frankly obscene amount of Tolkien content lately, there’ll be a new post in the next couple of days, on one of my favourite films ever.
Looking forward to it, and til soon!