Permanent vs Easy

Permanent vs Easy

The ideal website is static and hosted on a simple service like Amazon S3 or a cheap VPS. As long as someone keeps paying the bill, a static website will be around forever. There’s no need to worry about software upgrades or CMS vulnerabilities. A static website is fast and permanent.

But for the editor(s), a static site isn’t very easy to manage.

My blog has run on just about every platform ever created. I love when I switch to a completely static build. It’s just raw HTML files in a folder, what could be better? Many things could be better.

I want to post from Ulysses or MarsEdit or whatever other tool comes along to make the process more pleasant. I want to automatically post book reviews from GoodReads. I want better integration with other services. I want to play with a wider range of templates and widgets. I want to easily post from my iPad.

What I don’t want is to deal with keeping WordPress updated and running smoothly. I don’t want to worry about security issues. I don’t want to worry about making sure everything is backed up safely. I don’t want to worry about cache invalidation. I don’t want to worry about keeping a server updated and secure.

I love playing with my site. WordPress may not be simple or permanent, but it makes almost everything about blogging easy. If I want permanence, I can run httrack a few times a year and mirror everything.

One thing I do know, is that a blogging platforms like Medium or Tumblr are never permanent.

It’s a tough call, and one that I (re)make regularly.