Blogger, perhaps the most famous free blog provider, pretty much kick-started the blog phenomenon. Though Blogger doesn’t measure up with a self-hosted WordPress installation, it’s a heck of a lot better than LiveJournal and WordPress.com.
October 12, 1999
Not much, is it? This is blogger when it first started. Back then there was no Blog*Spot hosting service. You had to host the files on your own web space. Too bad the Wayback Machine can’t get at the administration pages, it would be cool to see what the write post page used to look like. Oh well.
October 18, 2000
Well, it’s a major improvement. Still, I’m glad most major websites look better than this these days… I like the big “B” logo, introduced with this design, though I prefer it in it’s modern less-square state.
January 5, 2005 to Present
Can you believe those maniacs at Pyra Labs kept that “October 2000″ design for five years, until Google bought Blogger? The new design is pretty darn good. It doesn’t scroll at all at 1024×768 resolution, everything is nicely layed-out, and it convinces you to register with simple pictographs (perfect for some of the cavemen who use Blogger…). The logo is prominently displayed (more rounded than in 2000-2004) , with the login form beside it. My only real complaint design-wise is that some really useful links dwell way down at the bottom, where they surely go unnoticed on lower-resolution displays. If they could just move them up a bit somehow. Blogger.com has a truly well-made design, though I wish I could say the same for some of its users’ blogs…
Well, that’s all for now. Can you believe it though? Blogger has only had three designs in eight years of existence.
