I own a domain (andypiper.co.uk – couldn’t get the .com), which I registered several years ago via UK2.net. It did already redirect here, via some stuff hosted on the UK2 servers.
I just flipped the DNS settings to enable the domain to be registered on the wordpress.com servers. Hopefully readers won’t notice the change. You can continue to get here via andypiper.wordpress.com, or you can use andypiper.co.uk if you prefer. Just don’t try the .com version, it isn’t mine 🙁
Hi, I just came across you site at VOX via Hiedi’s neighborhood. I followed her lead from Typepad to BlogHarbor and now I, too, am going to pull the plug there. I like WordPress, and like you have chosen the Cutline template by Pearson. I see you can buy an option to tweek your CSS now too.
Hi Art, thanks for the visit. I think WP.com is great – very easy to use, plenty of features. Drop me a line if you need a hand, although it looks like you’ve been here longer than I have, just not full-time 😉
Andy, I’ve just bought andrewferrier.com, so am considering doing the same thing with my blog. Looks like you have to pay $10/year to wordpress.com for this service though. Is it worth it; does it seem to be working OK for you?
Well done on getting the .com – I’ve been unable to get my equivalent, and it sits unused.
It is working fine for me. To be fair, it was also working fine when I had the redirection on UK2, and that was (effectively) free.
WP.com gives you the option of either having your new domain redirect to you .wordpress.com address, i.e. you come in on your new domain, and end up at the .wp.com address; or the other way around, i.e. visitors to .wp.com see your real domain instead. I haven’t made the latter switch yet, as it can affect your Googlejuice. Either way, no problems from the WP.com side of things.
I bought kellypuffs.com in November from WordPress, but seem to recall some fine print around the transaction that, of course, I can’t remember the details of.
Hmm, thinking twice about this, as I’ve realised I won’t be able to use my own plugins (e.g. random Gallery picture). I’ll consider it again in the future though.
Understand. The range of plugins and customisation offered by WP.com is a bit limited… right now I’m a bit disappointed that I can’t embed my Mugshot profile into the sidebar. On the other hand, it’s convenient; and I just never need to worry about “administration”, as such. Each to their own. I might move on in the future, but right now this works for me.
Since I switched from wordpress.com to my own domain before this new “domain” feature, I learned something from your experience.
I took at look at the “New Feature: Domains” description at http://wordpress.com/forums/topic.php?id=4766 . Unfortunately for me, it looks as though it would cost me $10 to get the blog for http://daviding.wordpress.com to point to http://daviding.com , and even then, there may be a complication because my blog isn’t in the root directory, but at http://daviding.com/blog . (It also doesn’t solve my split personality issue, whereby my professional content is over at http://coevolving.com .
I started off on wordpress.com to learn about blogging, but am relatively conscious about “owning my own words”. (I have another domain where I have have my 19-year son blogging from Beijing, and I’ve been telling him that I want to ensure that his grandchildren have an opportunity to read about his experiences. I’m so cautious about that blog that I’m suspicious of the longevity of MySQL, so I’m using PivotLog, which writes plain text files).
I’ve been helping out friend by suggesting that they consider hosting their own domains (as I do) on http://site5.com , where the current fee is $5USD per month. (I should start getting reseller benefits!) Since you already own your own domain, it would be a snap for you to migrate … if you decided that you really did want to “own your own words”.
Thanks for the comment, David.
When I started playing around with blogging some time ago – several years ago – I was using Project Steve Gutenberg, which used plain text files as well – at the time I didn’t want to be bothered with MySQL. Eventually I migrated to WordPress on my own server, but it wasn’t a regular blogging thing so I pretty much gave up (you can read all the old content here, now – anything before Aug 05). And now, here I am.
I haven’t actually switched to using my domain as the “main” one. You get a choice of having .wordpress.com redirect to your domain, or the other way round… right now I’m still with andypiper.wordpress.com as the real domain as I was worried about my Googlejuice, but given that they seem to have delisted me, maybe I should just switch over now.
[…] been interested in getting the andypiper.com domain but it never seems to be available, and thus I have the .co.uk alternative, which redirects here. I also noted that I picked up pipr.me.uk as a bit of a joke […]