No Blogger App on iOS App Store

Yes, this disappointment gave me more than good enough reason for me to pick the pen sorry phone sorry the good old laptop to express my horror at finding this out this morning!

I had deleted the Blogger App to make space for some music, assuming I could always download it again, as I usually do with several apps, to overcome the "16 GB woes" of my dear little iPhone 5, a gift, I have no mind to part with. 

Oh on that note check out this one if you don't already know - http://www.mophie.com/ - which is now available through the Apple website as well.

This morning having the initial symptoms of a writing urge (thanks to some inspiring writings such as http://www.sindhusankar.blogspot.com and http://www.raudri.blogspot.com that I read and re-read after a long time) I cleared up other clutter from my phone and went looking for the Blogger App via the Search on the App store.

Not finding it there I was confused and tried to find it in my "Purchased Apps ----> Not on this Phone section" list. I drew a blank when I could not find it there either and re-tried both ways before it stuck me as worryingly odd.

Googling the problem, actually brought this link up - https://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/blogger/DHXxVoEzMPU;context-place=topicsearchin/blogger/category$3Aios%7Csort:relevance%7Cspell:false

Apparently it's been out since Feb this year and I had not noticed it! (roll eyes: of course since I obviously did not look for an App that I already had).  I would have appreciated some form of notification via email or such from their users list!! (Ya I know I am traditional like that, expecting email notifications!!!)

There are NO GOOD FREE BLOGGER APPS on the iOS at the moment.  A big gap in the market and I am surprised there was no official announcement.  I understand the blogger user base, mostly personal bloggers, has waned and IS quite small in the face of worthy competitors such as Wordpress but it's always hard to face the truth as a nasty surprise!! (I could hear google and Apple going "You belong to a group of people that is so small that it is negligible.")

THIS got me back to the predicament of moving away from BLOGGER and even the whole argument of how (Personal) Blogging is dead, now that everyone prefers to go back to FB to like or comment where every blogpost is auto-shared to begin with, announcing to their "readers"!! 

Having successfully avoided or not seeing any new value in the Tycoons of the new age of always connected world, has contributed to me being a Tumblr (really any social network other than FB) retard and somehow denying the existence of the well established Wordpress!! 

I know! I know! I have considered Wordpress several times in the last so many years since BLOGGER started its slow decay but what can I say, the loyalist in me always reproached me into quietude!  Not really the AdSense loyalist, mind you, for I have made, not a single dollar from it yet, in all of my almost 7 years with it!  Ha! Beat that! :)

I even tried GHOST a few months ago and somehow did not think I blog enough to be paying for a blogspace.  May be I will make the move to Wordpress or a new Blog space.  Or not at all, coming across some new way to write/post that is not Blogging. No I am not talking about the microblogging platforms made for short attention spanns and word misers,  I am quite (unbearably sometimes) generous and find it hard as it is to cut short, thank you!

What do you think, have you found any other new ways of doing things around here? What BLOGGER Apps do you use on your iOS devices?









 

What pad??

I do not remember how I got introduced to this new friend but I did.

And we have been thin and thick over time... WATTPAD

I am pretty sure there are scores of Apps out there that does the same thing, may be some better and some worse.

This one does enough for me... For now.. Thought I should write about it before I tire and move on to something else...

It's been both good and bad. Bad being I don't read or finish the 'hard' books anymore and I get quite distracted with this when I am supposed to be doing other things... Like work for a living...

But well...even with 'hard' books I did that so this is only making it easier to do... The frequency of the crime is the only thing increasing not the crime or the gravity of it ;)

Now going for the good things:

I am usually slow in exploring things say an app. I don't just go in and try every feature on the day 1, just because...

My enthusiasm to explore is usually overtaken with a fascinating feature and there it stops till something bores me of it or if I feel like taking a break.

So the point is if you are looking for a review of the App and all its features then  I'm sorry this will be a disappointment.

Now there, that said...

WATTPAD has scores of people like you and me writing on it.  Anything and everything they feel like, stories, poems, shorties of any sort, series, read soaps where they publish the story in parts every week or every two days or any which way they prefer.

And then people like you and me read them, rate, 'fan' as the wattpadians call, even comment at any point in the story giving it good and bad feedback then and there!  

When you think about it, it's quite the same formula.  Writer's and readers social media.  Really.

You post, we read, follow, comment, vote etc.., But the opportunity like never before for budding writers to get live feedback, giving them a chance to change things to suit the mood.  And for established writers to gauge the reaction of the crowd.

Yes in a way I was debating with myself if this was truly good.  If you think about that was the beauty of writing, you write what you imagined and people either accept or reject. That makes you a true competitor or candidate.  Not knowing the judges preferences even as you are competing.  Oh well, I know, I am an idealist sometimes!!!

But what I noticed is all these 12 and 14 year olders writing! I just absolutely love that idea. A platform for children to cultivate an interest in writing.  

I've read several books on this App, the good, the bad and the ugly.

As far as I've checked the writing part of the app seems to be quite basic but again I have not really forayed into this yet.

This is more from me as a reader...

I think there could be more work on the writing part as well as privacy settings.

An app that is certainly keeping me more than just company! :)

P.S:

I almost forgot that it also allows other languages apart from English to be written in and read in.  I couldn't find any written in Tamil yet though.

Oh and it has loads of free ebooks and classics available too!