Yesterday, 10 years ago I started this blog and I’ve never thought it would remain so long!At that time, a project I was managing with co-workers and suppliers from Sydney, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, Paris, London, and Poland ended. As the communication language was English, I acquired some proficiency I was kind of proud of. At the same time, I came up with the idea to be able to show some of my photos to a broader audience. While discussing the second topic with a co-worker, he recommended giving blogging a try and I did. But, instead of blogging in German, I combined it with keeping my English skills active and started writing in English from the beginning. When looking back to the early posts, I really wonder how much my English skills increased since that time.
I wrote nearly 2000 posts, nearly 7000 comments were made, nearly 1000 followers alone here at WordPress, and on average 100 visitors coming over each day. (OK, there were times with more than 200 visitors a day, but it seems to me, many people gave up blogging for Instagram and Facebook as I see many blogs, I follow or used to follow, are abandoned or even closed).
A big thanks to me for writing all this and a huge thank you to all of you out there, for reading, liking, reblogging, pingbacking, following, and commenting. You kept this blog running!
On the other hand, I’m not sure, how long this blog will remain. The recent changes in the backend, especially the force to use the block-editor, are horrible. Up to now, I was able to ignore the block-editor and work with the so-called classic editor, which works well for me and is IMHO even better than the block-editor. In the interface of the classic editor, I have everything right at hand. The interface is very well designed and fast. The block editor as well as the recent admin interface are ugly and slow. The block-editor forces me to use design elements like a page designer. But, I only want to write and not design each post. I’m a photographer and not a web-page designer. So, I’m quite unsure about my future of being a blogger.
I know the new admin interface and the block-editor for a long and still hate it. Many things are so complicated when having to use them or even impossible. Newly created WordPress blogs it is even impossible to use the classic-editor. So, I feel forced-out by Automatix and wordpress.com.
Another option for me could be, moving away from WordPress. Either using a different service or moving the whole blog to my own webspace, where I have another blog running for many years and everything works still fine. But, who guarantees that the self-hosted blog will remain to be able to use the classic-editor withing the wp-admin interface.
MyBlog - solaner 
Congratulations! Well done.
Thanks, Léa 😊
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I have enjoyed following your blog. I am right with you on how long I will continue my blog. It’s become more of a chore than an enjoyment. 🥴
Thank you, Carolyn, you’re welcome 😊
Congratulation!!
Thank you, Leyla 🙂
I would be very sorry to lose you from WordPress but I understand. So far, I have been able to use the old editor…not sure why. Congratulations and I wouldn’t have guessed that English wasn’t your first language.
Thank you soooo much, Kerry. 😊 I‘ feeling flattered. I guess, one can see easily I‘m not a native speaker. Nevertheless, thank you for the compliment. And in order to calm you, currently there is no precise plan to shut my blog down 😊
You should hear my badly accented Spanish…😁 My Arabic is just as bad!
🙂 I’m trying to learn French (again) – Learning a language is always hard and needs a lot of training, especially when the roots of languages are quite distinct (the one you’re learning and your native language). At around 12-14 we were often in Spain for our summer vacation. At that time my Spanish was better than my French, which I had to learn at school for 1 year. A couple of years ago I also tried to restart with Spanish, but the course was frustrating. The course was in English and even the mistakes in English were counted in. After 5 mistakes in a lesson, the session was over. So, I made no progress. Even, when they made the course available in German a few years later, I wasn’t encouraged to restart. I hope I’ll be able to read and understand French as well as English. At that time, I’d try speaking again. Currently, I’m hosting a monthly English conversation group via Zoom to practice with non-business related topics, and twice I was hosting a zoom conference with some members of another photographer group from different parts of the world (mostly based in the US).
I am not really literate in other languages but if I am fully immersed I will learn the basics quickly. I worked at the airport before Covid and that helped my Spanish particularly. In Egypt I couldn’t get any groceries unless I spoke some Arabic!! I admire your intention to study French – I can read it after many years of French at school but struggle to communicate. Brava!!
Yes, learning languages needs much effort. And, in some countries, you can’t even do anything without using their language. I wish, we were able to develop two or three general languages for the whole world as the languages keep us apart from each other and are the source of “we and you”, one origin of wars.
Congrats! And I do hope you will hang on – you have such a beautiful blog! I agree with you wholeheartedly about the editor…I still think about giving up blogging because of it. Though I will try to hang on as long as the corona virus is holding its grip.
Thank you so much Leya. I guess, as long as the Classic editor is available, my blog will survive 😊
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Happy Anniversary Andre. I agree the Classic editor is easy to navigate and the new Block editor is basically crap. With a site like Monochromia where I manage multiple contributors including your posts I might have to make a decision to shut the site down if they ever totally eliminate the Classic editor.
Thank you, Joe. I hope, someone important will bring this to Automatic‘s attention
I am happy to see that someone else hates the block editor. I didn’t like it from the getgo and I am not happy about a forced situation either. I’ve been with WP for many years..I don’t understand their intent on changing things that worked so well and easy..it’s beyond me. I am in your dilemma too. It remains to be seen what I do for the future.. I hope all works out for all of us. Should we do a write-in campaign complaint or something? Take care and stay safe!
starting a write-in-campaign could be a first step. But, how can we reach Automattic? Simply use the support forum? In either case, we should publish the campaign in our blogs to make more people aware of the complaint and hope for them to join and support the grassroots movement.
Yes, let’s all try to get WP to rethink their strategies and revert back to the well written application. Upgrades are fine if they intelligent. I am not as prolific as you on posting..hopefully you are able to reach more folks within your followers. I’m all for getting to a dialogue with WP on our complaints. The ‘how’ is indeed the big question. 🙂
Yep, let’s think about it for a couple of minutes. I‘m checking their site later
Cool!! 🙂
Congratulation!!!
Thanks, Andi 😊
I hope you continue your blog. I soon got used to the new editor. I hope you give it a good try. You can get help if need.
hmmm, thanks for your encouraging words, Sherry. Up to now, I have no exact plan to stop blogging here.
Congratulations! Hoping that the blogging world won’t lose you because of the new editor ..
Thanks, Julie. For now, there’s no exact plan to stop 😊
Good to know! 🙂👏
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