I'm back, leaving Ghost.org, and going back to Substack
Because you can't resist the allure of free hosting.
After an absence of eight months and 27 days — but, who's counting? — I'm returning to The Buendia Post. I'm also moving back to Substack and will be leaving the Ghost.org platform by October 10.
You don't have to do anything during this transition. Your subscription will migrate along with my posts. You will only notice a design change to the standard Substack look for a while. That's all.
Before I complete the move, I'll likely double-post on Ghost.org and Substack. I'll try to spare you from receiving double email updates until I take Ghost.org offline. If for any reason you receive an email from Substack and another one from the current platform with the same post, blame the goblins of tech. Or my forgetfulness.
Now, I'm going to explain why I'm leaving Ghost.org and moving back to Substack, but you don't have to keep reading unless you're interested in the workings of content management platforms. Otherwise, what I have to say may be of little interest to you.
Why the move
I'm leaving Ghost.org and moving back to Substack because I don't want to pay to keep my content alive. If I were willing to pay, I would stay. But I'm not. That's it.
I like Ghost.org. It allows you to change your site theme or upload your own design, if you have the budget, the knowledge, and the time. It's less cumbersome than WordPress, has a more pleasant dashboard, and offers a more streamlined experience for blogging and newsletters. It offers SEO out of the box and, purportedly, more control over how the SEO bots find and rank your site. It can also look better out of the box.
Now, unless you want — and know how — to go to the trouble of self-hosting your site, you have to pay Ghost.org for the hosting. And if you don't pay, Ghost.org will — like any other paid hosting platform — remove your site, delete your data, and toss your digital work into the bottomless pit of forgotten ideas.
I understand the commercial rationale for this arrangement, but the relationship you have with a hosting company ends up feeling like the one you'd have with a storage space for putting away the stuff you refuse to let go of. Like you must pay to keep a hostage you care about — or at least tolerate because they're somehow related to you — alive.
I did find one thing I didn't like about Ghost.org when it came time to renew my subscription. I tried to downgrade it from an annual Creator to a monthly Starter plan in order to save money, but while the dashboard allowed me to complete the downgrade — with the accompanying reduction in features — my credit card was still charged for the more expensive subscription. I emailed them requesting a refund for the difference and letting them know in simple and direct terms how angry I was ready to be if they refused. I quote here three sections of their reply:
1. There isn't a way to turn off auto-renew, unfortunately… Once your plan is canceled, everything is stopped immediately and your data is erased — so we leave it up to you on when you'd like to take your site offline. This also ensures that your data is kept intact and protected.
2. …If the requested change will cost more than what you've already paid, we'll charge your card for the difference. If the change costs less, we'll apply the difference to your Ghost account as a credit towards future renewals…
3. As we mention on both our pricing page and terms of service, we don't offer refunds for the services we provide, but we're happy to make a one-time exception in this case for a refund of your remaining credit balance.
I didn't like it. Not at all. Did they realize how nonsensical it was to state that they'd erase your data to ensure it “is kept intact and protected"? (They must have. I copied and pasted this language from their initial reply, but I can no longer find it on their terms and conditions page. It was replaced with better language.) Why would you, as a hosting company, decide to force your customers to renew or cancel without an option to downgrade? And the "credit towards future renewals"... Really?
In any case, I was able to downgrade my subscription, and I got a refund. Still, I decided I don't want to pay at all. Why pay to keep your content alive when you can just go back to Substack? Whatever you write will stay there as long as Substack exists. My current cost-cutting frame of mind is telling me that it just makes sense not to pay.
I "left" Substack (I didn't leave; I just stopped publishing there) because I objected to some moves by their owners; I stated my objections elsewhere, so I won't beat that dead horse anymore. Tail, please go between my legs while I walk back to Substack. My era of nit-picking about it is over.
The truth is that now I feel indifferent towards which platform to use, as long as I can publish. I just want to treat my writing as Umberto Eco once suggested he and other European intellectuals treated their newspaper columns in the pre-internet era, "the way private diaries and personal letters were once used," as a way to "quickly check the ideas that come into my head" about unfolding current events1.
"How do you know what you're thinking if you don't write it down?" said someone whose name I cannot remember. My experience tells me that when you clarify your thinking, or at least make a good-faith effort to do so, you might be able to help others clarify theirs. I can't think of a better reward.
Preface, Travels in Hyperreality. American edition, 1986.