Movable Type and and the Evolution of Online Magazines

I use MoveableType (MT) for two semi-distinct websites. The main one is Nonviolence.org, which I alternately describe as either: 1) a "New Media" news and opinion publication, or 2) an unpaid ministry peace (it's both simultaneously of course). Donations are welcome but infrequent and I often have to pay each month's web space rental out of my own pocket (I've stopped dreaming of donations cover my cable dial-up bill, my equipment. I laugh at my dawn-of-the-internet naivete back in 1995 when I thought I might find enough donations to get paid for this work!). My other site is Martin Kelley Quaker Ranter, which is even more unlikely to be funded any time soon.

I am the primary "user" for both sites. The other main user is my wife Julie. She doesn't post anything herself. She's just good at finding my typos and fractured grammer. After she sent her twentieth email about some problem, I just made her a user so she could edit the pieces directly. It's been very helpful (I also hope it makes her more comfortable with the software if she ever wants to start something like this).

But both sites also have the potential to become group blogs. I'd like to see my role morphing into a combination techie/editor. I would like to spend more time identifying and encouraging new writers as the sites take on the role of magazines. I see more and more people turning to the internet for news and opinion, for the kind of information they used to get from newspapers and magazines. Most institutionally-sponsored magazines in the Quaker and peace world have a rapidly aging readership and have been unable to attract many under forty writers or readers. My Nonviolence.org site now has more readers than any peace magazine I know of. There's room for group blogs to function as magazines "for us." Institutions aren't very good at identifying or nurturing new talent these days and a lot of good writers are cutting their teeth on smart blogs. (See also: How Insiders and Seekers Use the Quaker Net).

So what's this got with a new MovableType pricing scheme? I can scrape together the $69 for a single-user MT license but I really can't find the money to pay for additional licenses for new users. Most new users will be risks, as many of them will probably post for a few weeks or months and then disappear. Because I don't have institutional backing (I've tried, believe me), the cost of these ministries come largely out of my own pocket. They're effectively "hobbies" which I already can't afford on my non-profit salary (a friend of mine recently calculated I could buy and maintain a car with the money I spend annually on these sites, but I'll keep with my bike commute if it means keeping them going).

I started what today would be called a blog back in 1996, using a handmade HTML converter that was build out of a MS Word macro. I officially started blogging with Blogger.com's free service and moved up to MovableType because it was put together really well and was easy to expand and alter. Late last summer, I started putting all of my Nonviolence.org site into Movable Type, even the static pages (technically speaking there are seven distinct blogs on Nonviolence.org, all integrated to produce the pages you see).

I will have to find different blogging software if Movable Type doesn't find some way of allowing "hobbyist" group blogs continue at a low price. That would be a shame, as I love MT and all the wonderful plug-ins that have been created for it. I want to keep on this platform! And I appreciate that the authors want to earn a living. But like a lot of non-commercial users out there I will have to find another solution if MT gets too expensive to run non-commercial blogs with multiple users.

PS: I've very limitedly introduced blogs to my coworkers at Friends General Conference, where I serve as webmaster. A few key pages are now set-up using MoveableType set as a static template. One is the upcoming events page, which an administrative secretary is starting to edit directly herself using MT. I don't know if she'll really take to it, but updates will go online much more quickly if they they can be done directly by the person who maintains the print calendar. Again, this MT installation is experimental. I have no idea whether my fellow staff will want to do these sorts of direct edits and I couldn't really justify a MT fee to our "Tech Committee" at this point. Being able to sharing blogging responsibilities with co-workers without charge and without risk is the way I'll introduce them to MT.