New Blog Design. w00t!
Robert and Josh accumulated enough photos/emails of me to extort me to get me to get off my butt and join their little WordPress revolution. So I’ve been working with Scott Patterson (designer) and Veronica (my very own personal project manager) to switch over from my TypePad account to a “company” developed/hosted site. Practice what we preach we say…
I’ve been on TypePad since 2004 — having upgraded from a failed experiement with Blogger in 2003. Let me just say to Anil Dash and Mena Trott (founder of SixApart): TypePad rocks! I still love it…and will miss it greatly for this site. TypePad was soooper easy to use and made this widget addict very happy.
Unfortunately, that’s where I ran aground. To make something “sooper easy” means ultimately having some restrictions in some areas of design. While as esoteric as they may have been, ultimately I’ve found myself desiring the flexibility that WordPress offers (such as my desire to have translucent table backgrounds) . That…and I can’t help but try everything! My personal theme song: I like it all, man!
So here I am relearning CSS, and the vi editor, and all these horrid developer tools that I never had to mess with when TypePad’ng along. I’ll still use TypePad for lots of personal/family/friends blogs. Thinking of using VOX for Cub Scouts. But now — and at least for the next year — davidlaplante.com is powered by Twelve Horses and on WordPress. I ope you enjoy the design. It’s a work in progress – trust me 
Comments
By Scott on March 13th, 2007 at 6:07 pm
w00t w00t… have fun with all them tables, *cough* I mean divs….
Congrats on everything!
By Ryan Jerz on March 13th, 2007 at 6:43 pm
Dave and all,
Great new look. I like it. You guys did a nice job on this puppy.
By Anil on March 13th, 2007 at 8:06 pm
Hey David, thanks for the kind words! Just outta curiosity, as we’re always working to improve, especially for our new work — did you consider Movable Type for your blog at all? We’re always looking for feedback on making a great tool for power users, and of course it’s brought to you by the same team.
Either way, good luck with your site!
By David LaPlante on March 14th, 2007 at 7:40 pm
Ryan – thanks for the compli-mentos. I couldn’t just steal your mrjerz.org design…wouldn’t be right of me
By David LaPlante on March 14th, 2007 at 7:48 pm
Anil, I did look at Movable Type. It’s a great product as well and I think we’ll use it for the “enterprise customer”. For little ‘ol me blog WP just seemed right.
Beginning to think blog software is like choosing skis. Just like there’s just no perfect “all-around” ski, there’s no perfect all-around solution to blogging. You’ve got to have a quiver of them. Short softies to butter with, stiff carvers for the grooms, fatties for the powder. And a pair of Spatulas just ’cause…anyway this analogy is falling down now
Awww…I’ll just have to do a blog post on this now. Anyway, I’ll still be using my TypePad account for family and other personal blogs. Gonna give VOX a spin too. Plenty of other blogs to start.