“Whether ’tis Nobler in the Mind to Un-Dotcom….”

~ Bookstooge

…..The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?
`Hamstoogelet, Act III, Scene I

As I reported in my post Apparently I Hate Me I’ve been unfollowing myself multiple times since I went dotcom. I’ve contacted WP and they finally admitted it was an ongoing issue with other users as well. They didn’t say, but I’m sure it is due directly to those inept idiots who pretend to be “code monkeys” playing around under the hood of WP and breaking crap.

I told them that if it continued I’d be cancelling my paid account as I wasn’t going to pay for worse service. Well, since that email I’ve unfollowed myself at least 6 times, if not more. Since that has happened, I’ve decided to pull a Hamlet and oppose the evil that calls itself WordPress. Tomorrow I’ll be going back to a dotwordpressdotcom address. It really pisses me off, as that means that ads and native sponsored posts are going to be back. It also means that about 7 months worth of links aren’t going to be accurate and I’m not going to go back and correct them all.

Bugger all.

I don’t know how this will affect any of you. WP automatically moved all of you as followers when I went dotcom and I’m hoping the reverse will be true. But please keep this in mind if you don’t see any posts from me. I’ve got posts schedule almost every day so that should be a dead giveaway that things didn’t go well. WP did tell me that when I downgrade everyone should follow the new site automatically, but considering their track record of making things work, I’ll believe it when I see it.

I’m just annoyed because I have to admit, I really enjoyed being a dotcom. But for all the complaints I have against the free plans, at least I don’t pay money for those problems.

See you tomorrow at Bookstooge.wordpress.com, hopefully!

48 thoughts on ““Whether ’tis Nobler in the Mind to Un-Dotcom….””

  1. That sounds unfortunate. I haven’t noticed the same problem, but I don’t know if that’s because it’s not happening or if I just haven’t been aware of it. I don’t follow anything so I might not pick up on it.

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    1. The other issue, that’s almost as big, is that i have also unfollowed 1 or 2 other people regularly and I have to keep an eye on my list of people I follow to make sure I’m actually follow them.
      I’ve had to re-follow Re-Enchantment of the World at least twice, if not thrice in the last month alone.

      The whole reason I chose WP was for the social side of the platform. And that really let me down 😦

      I know we’ve talked about your sites, and I seem to remember you do some sort of weird mapping/whatever thingamajig instead of a straight up dotcom hosting through wordpress. Or am I mis-remembering?

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    1. Paid plans have ads and nsp (native sponsored posts, ie, ads the size of a post) removed by default.
      Most new browsers have some sort of adblocker incorporated so “most” people will never notice the ads, but the nsp’s will come through and WP is creative about adding stuff to get around adblockers. Plus, I just don’t like the idea of anyone reading my blog being subjected to such stuff.

      But really, it comes down to me paying and having problems. I’ll still complain if I have problems with the free plan, but that’s on principle. If I’m paying, I expect a problemless environment. And if they’re so incompetent as to mess around under the skirts and affect paying customers, well, thats not acceptable.

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      1. Anything that gets between me and your prose is a red flag for me, and if WP try it, they’ll be sorry. Your brilliantly written stuff makes Shakespeare look sloppy, and should be avaliable to everyone around the world as a basic human right.

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        1. And that is the problem. With the block editor WP is no longer about the writing, but the “look” of the post.

          And I don’t think Shakespeare was sloppy. We ALL know he wasn’t real 😉

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    1. I gotta admit, I’m tired of platforms devolving on me. It’s discouraging and makes me not want to do this for a hobby 😦

      I just don’t know what else can compete with WP at the moment…

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        2. Wix is nicer and allows way more customisation but the interaction not so great + WordPress still has the numbers….
          Anyone planning on taking over from WordPressdotcom should greatly pay attention to how to WordPress has built around community its primed functions like a social media network than just a blog hosting site 🤔

          ~B

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  4. Maybe go self-hosted after all? There are many platforms out there that make it very easy — basically, just sign up and continue using WP for editing (minus the block editor if you don‘t want it), pay your new hosting service instead of WP — ten to one, your plan is going to cost you less, or in any rate not more than WP‘s paid plans — and deal with your hosting service‘s customer service department instead of WP‘s, which if they‘re like mine, really does mean customer service …

    I‘d been dragging my feet — for weeks, as you know — about contacting them about the commenting issue on my blog, partly because I really did have other issues I needed to deal with more urgently at the time, but partly also because I was expecting a WP style non-answer and a protracted „blame the victim“ exchange, or worse, being sent straight to WP for the solution anyway, and I needed to be in the right mood to deal with that kind of attitude. Imagine my surprise when, the day after my late-night problem report — on a weekend — I received a technician‘s brief, matter-of-fact email telling me „we‘ve solved your problem, here‘s what caused it and here‘s what we did to solve it — and btw, this is a well-known WP plug-in issue.“ I felt both like a fool and also very relieved. I‘ve contacted them with another (not WP-related) issue since and the response was exactly the same.

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    1. This type of behavior from WP is definitely making me consider self-hosting.

      The problem is, I am done with messing around with things. They either work and I use them, or if it doesn’t work, I stop using it. I don’t have the “oomph” to play around with anything.

      Not going to rule it out though. Ive been pretty happy with WP hosting until this began to happen. But the fact that it even happened means WP is starting to crack and become a lowest common denominator host instead of a good customer service.

      I swear, if I ever win the lottery, I’m buying Booklikes pronto….

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  5. Don’t the links fix themselves? When I switched back and forth, I let them be and assumed they worked out. 😂

    I’ve had this same issue with unfollowing. I just had to contact two people to let them know that I was sorry I’ve missed their posts because they haven’t been in the reader, and that’s because WP took me off their followers list. I refollowed, but who knows how long it’ll be before they knock me off again.

    I hate WP, and I’m ready to leave it again. Every time I contact them they have no legitimate reason to offer why things are consistently screwed up. I’m always having to get into manage comments because it sends people to spam, my posts don’t go into the reader, and I’m consistently knocked off blog sites that I’ve been following for five years. It’s ridiculous. I hope you’re able to get your issues worked by removing the .com.

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    1. I assumed the dotcom links didn’t get parsed to wordpress.com links because of an experience a fellow WP user (now gone because of the bloody block editor) had. She stated that when she went back her links remained dotcom. I guess I’ll found out tomorrow!

      Yeah, that unfollowing other people has started to happen to me too. But only for a couple of dotcom sites. no issues with wordpress.com sites. If I had hair, I’d be pulling it out.

      I’m totally with you about being ready to leave. I didn’t want to be too negative with this post, but this experience with WP has not been good. I just can’t go to a dedicated book site though, as you can’t blog and you don’t have the control over comments, etc like you do at a blog.

      Thank you. I’ll be writing another post once I go back and see if the issues continue. So far, the only people I’ve heard who have had issues are those who are paying for a dotcom address from WP. Talk about ridiculous 😦

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      1. You know, you’re probably right. The WordPress.com links are the ones that auto-fix I bet.

        Trying to figure out who you’ve been unfollowed by or those who you’ve unfollowed is impossible for me; I follow too many blogs for that business. I 100% rely on the reader working properly.

        I try not to be negative as well. It’s social media, and it is what it is. On bitchy days like today I have no problem complaining. 😂 I just don’t have the patience to deal with it! When I spend time writing up a review and a post, I expect it to go into the reader. If it doesn’t—people don’t read it. I’ll get maybe a few likes, but those are from those who either take the time to see if I posted (few and far between) or those who follow by email only.

        It’s frustrating. I feel like it’s a love hate relationship because WP is an easy platform with an excellent book community.

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        1. Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure it’s a one way deal with the links 😦

          I only follow under 50 and even that is tough. I can’t imagine the people who do a lot more than that.

          I totally rely on the reader for people’s posts. If I have to visit their actual website, I might as well use some other RSS reader and ditch WP altogether.

          The community is what drew me here and has kept me here. Great people for sure!

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            1. I can confirm that they don’t change them back. So everything from January until yesterday with links still refer to bookstooge.com.
              I have a feeling that will be my next project once I’m done cataloging all my old reviews.

              I’ll probably write up a post this coming Saturday going over how the whole experience went from beginning to end.

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  8. And the trigger has been pulled. Back to a free plan
    Now I just have to deal with months and months and months worth of dead links. Way to go WP, you continue to impress me greatly
    /sarcasm

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  10. Bummer. I haven’t noticed any problems with the change back.
    And I never really notice the ads because I nearly always read your posts through the WP app on my phone or laptop (but I totally agree with you about not wanting your readers to be subjected to them – on the odd occasion that I do visit your site when not logged in, and when I view my own site the same way, those ads are a pain in the behind).

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    1. Glad the change back worked just fine for you. Was it a big job to change the links back or did you just ignore it?

      I’m hoping most people visit through the reader or some other rss feed too, so the ads and nsp’s will never be seen.

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  11. Welp that stinks. And I imagine there’s no way for you to know if that issue will ever get fixed or WHEN. So… you’ll just have to live on with WordPress dot com for a while, at least until something more enticing is offered for dot com users! Good luck with that reroll!

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    1. They did put up a git hub thingy where they tracked progress, but the mere fact that it happened at all was enough for me. Plus, the whole victim blaming when they KNEW it was on going issue. Telling me it was me clicking on something accidentally, not cool.

      Thanks. I’ll stick with the free plan for a while and see what happens next year 🙂

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  12. Man, that sucks. Hope it will work out for you. I feel like WP is sucking in money but doing nothing in return – a slow devolution of the platform in the hopes that existing clients won’t notice or couldn’t be bothered to find an alternative.

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  13. Sorry it did not work out man. Nothing changed on my side it seems as i still get notifications on my phone when a post goes up. I dont always read it though as i might be at work or doing a 16 hour game marathon…

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