Windows Live Spaces Doubles WordPress.com Signups
Two months ago, we announced together with our friends at Windows Live that bloggers on the Windows Live Spaces service were being offered the opportunity to move their existing blogs over here to WordPress.com to join the best blogging community on the planet.
Since then, we’ve seen an explosion in the number of sites joining WordPress.com every day. With the addition of Windows Live Spaces sites moving to WordPress.com, Windows Live users who are new to blogging coming here, and word-of-mouth from our current and very passionate users, the number of people joining WordPress.com has doubled to over 900,000 per month (up from around 400,000 per month before the migration). We’re thrilled to see this explosion and to be introducing so many people to publishing with WordPress. With the recent releases of many new features and several new themes, and more of each on the way, it’s a great time to be on WordPress.com.
Throughout the transition, we Happiness Engineers have had the privilege of helping many new users adjust to a new platform and learn to take advantage of the amazing features and capabilities unique to WordPress.com. If you’ve moved from Windows Live Spaces and feel that you’re still having trouble getting up to speed, or are about to join us on WordPress.com, we’d like to take a moment to talk about a few of the speed bumps you might run into as part of that transfer process.
Photos
The number one question we receive after a move to WordPress.com is “where are my photos?” Because uploaded photos are part of a different service—Windows Live SkyDrive—they aren’t always brought over with your blog posts to WordPress.com.
If you had inserted some of those images into your blog posts, we’ll bring those over for you automatically as part of the upgrade process. However, if you were using the Photos module to display your albums, you won’t find your images when you get to your new site. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that you can move your images over to WordPress.com galleries very easily. In fact, a user who moved here from Windows Live Spaces has written an excellent step-by-step tutorial and posted it on her site to help other Windows Live Spaces users make the move with their photos.
Drafts, Modules, and Lists
After your move to WordPress.com, you’ll notice that some parts of your Windows Live Spaces site won’t have moved with you. The upgrade to WordPress.com automatically moves your published posts and your comments to your new site.
Draft posts are just one such item, so you’ll need to make sure that you either copy them into a separate document or publish them prior to starting the migration process. Any posts left in draft will no longer be accessible once you’ve completed the migration process.
Information you had in modules won’t make the move to WordPress.com, either. Not to worry, though! You just need to make a note of the information you wish to transfer prior to migrating. Here at WordPress.com things are a bit different. Instead of modules, we use widgets to place content into your site’s sidebar. We have many available widgets which can display text, an image, your Gravatar, a tag cloud, or any one of a number of additions to help your readers find content and learn about you.
There’s one notable exception: if you’re looking for your Lists from Windows Live Spaces, we’ve worked out with the Windows Live Spaces team to find a way to retrieve that content once you’ve migrated. It won’t be moved to your new site, but you can get the info and then copy it into a new widget whenever you like.
Where to Get Help
Change isn’t always easy. Although we think WordPress.com is the best publishing service in the world, if you’ve just come from using another platform for the last few years, it can be difficult to learn new tricks and wrap your brain around new concepts. Thankfully, we have lots of great support resources here to help you get rocking and back up to speed creating great content.
If you’re brand-new, you should of course start with the excellent Learn WordPress.com, which will introduce you to the basics.
Support
For more specific questions, move on to our Support documentation. Click around and learn more details on how to use WordPress.com, or search for your question and find an answer in one of the hundreds of pages in our knowledgebase.
Forums
Do you have a more specific question? Or would you rather talk about it with your fellow WordPress.com users and get to know others? The WordPress.com Forums are a great place to ask. Our Happiness Engineers patrol the forums, and there are a lot of very knowledgeable volunteers around who will be happy to answer your question or point you in the right place.
There are support forums available in multiple languages, also filled with great volunteers and users from the WordPress.com community. We have support forums available in Arabic, Dutch, Farsi, Finnish,French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Portuguese (Brazilian),Spanish, Swedish, Thai, and Turkish.
Contact Support
If you have a question about your user account on WordPress.com, or have a problem that can’t be solved using the documentation or asking a volunteer, you can of course contact our resident team of Happiness Engineers for assistance. We’re online and answering your questions twenty-four hours a day, and nothing makes us happier than helping you to make the most of your WordPress.com experience. Don’t forget: we’re here to help.
- November 29, 2010
- Import, Support, WordPress.com
I want to be a Happiness Engineer!
Seriously, though…love the changes. And the forums! Thank you…
🙂
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Great thing. WordPress is my first online platform and I like it and do not have to think about publishing or how to use some features 😉
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I wasn’t aware that this took place. I think this happened before I became part of the community. A friend of mine recommended WordPress to me and I am really impressed with it. I visit a lot of other blogs and when I see some of the set-ups, features etc. from other publishing sites I am thankful I started with WP!
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Nice! 🙂 WP is the best!
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An explosion in the number of users is probably good news, especially for the future of WordPress.
At the present this might be the reason for the web site’s not so good responsiveness. Nice features though…
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Sweet! 9 hundred thousand new users per month!
What is a Happiness Engineer?
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Happiness Engineer is what we call a member of our dedicated Support team—we’re focused on improving the happiness of WordPress.com users like you guys. 🙂
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WordPress is indeed the best 😉
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Aloha and cool. Although I’ve been here since April 2010, I’ve learned two more things I want to check out from this article. That’s one thing more I like about WP – every time I turn around I find great info that helps. Way cool and thanks, WP people…
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wordpress has always been my favorite.:)
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This is great, I love WP!
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I wish there was a way for current WordPress users to greet and meet and welcome new users when they come over in bulk like Windows Live users. It’s a great way for them to get to know us and for us to get new visitors and friends.
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My first ever blog was housed in Windows Live Spaces. I’ve had it ever since 2005. I loved it for the controllable privacy it offered. I thought I wouldn’t be able to find better…
Then I relocated to WordPress early this year, and have been nothing but happy with the service. The WP people work round the clock to churn out the best updates and themes and features. I get the controllable privacy here too which I would be willing to pay a premium for.
So to all my fellow WL Spaces bloggers, welcome home! It’s the best time to be part of our community! 🙂
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Mega congrats to WP for this incredible explosion! And a big welcome to all the new WP bloggers! It’s a great community and there are constant innovations which make it more and more user friendly! All the best and happy holidays to all!
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I have written elsewhere, and I love WordPress. There is nothing I don’t like about it.
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I love more people on WordPress! Welcome new users 🙂
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May I say, congratulations on this explosion. And thank you for all the features and such, as well as the bits of help I have asked for and gotten very quickly. Never had anyone else respond to questions that quick. 😀
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My Live Spaces was practically ‘dead’ but moving it to WordPress brought it back to life! 🙂
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I’ve been using WordPress and love it but still use Live Writer sometimes and publish it thru WordPress. Does anyone else do this? Sometimes the editing seems easier. I guess I better get some happiness engineers to help me!
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You can definitely use Windows Live Writer with WordPress.com; it’s one of the best offline editors available for Windows. If you have any questions, feel free to check the Support pages for help or ask us!
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Good!
This is a nice collaboration between WordPress and Windows Live. 🙂
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I have been a wordpresser for quite sometime, and I must say this is by far the best hosted service. Yes, some of the features are premium and we need to pay for them unlike with Google’s Blogger, but what the heck, I am ready to pay if the service is that great! I always suggest friend and family new to blogging to give wordpress a shot. I have contemplated moving to my own hosting but the great community is what holds me back. I am here to stay, GO WORDPRESS!!!!
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It’s no wonder – about time WordPress has gotten a rush of users. Packed with all the features it has – it’s like comparing Gmail to other providers that charge money for many of the services Google provides free. WordPress = unbeatable.
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Would like to see more themes and be able to earn referral money by referring readers to amazon.com via book and video links.
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We’re adding more themes to WordPress.com all the time; to keep up with the latest releases, you can use the Subscribe button in the admin bar at the top of your browser to subscribe to this blog.
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I shifted to word press but i am not very happy for some reasons ! You cannot teach an old dog new tricks ! Why not make it as easy as the Live Spaces as regards the insertion of the music media player and a few photo albums that slide automatically ?
Many friends are asking me a lot of questions “How to “. As i used to help them at the beginning around 2006.
So, please make it easier to insert a music media player and photo albums that slide automatically. Not many can conceive how to write html. Just think of the average Joe !
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You can already add a player for an uploaded sound file if you have a Space Upgrade, which permits you to upload sound files to WordPress.com.
Also, we do have a slideshow option built-in to WordPress.com. It works with images you’ve uploaded to a post or page on your site, and you can read more about it here.
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Does WordPress support Google Affiliate Network links?
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We do not; please see our support page on advertising for more details.
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I especially liked the way you hyperlinked. 😀
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YEAH! I had live spaces for a while before joining WordPress. Anyone got tips on how to use this?
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Thumbs up for WordPress! :]
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This is great news.
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WordPress is pretty simple to learn.
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I am so glad that you bods at WordPress are reaping all the benefits from the move here by ex Spacers. Yes its a different environment over here compared to the features we were all used to on Spaces but WordPress has some wonderful features that were lacking on Spaces as well such as Pages and Menus.
I am sure that all ex Spacers who have moved here and settled into their new blogging home have found it a wrench (we did not request the closing down of Spaces after all is said and done!) will agree that you guys really care about this blogging site and all of your blogging residents, it shows in the constant new features being added and the wonderful themes!
Thanks as well for the ‘heads up’ on my tutorial about moving your photos over here.
TG
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Oh and Tom, I have begun an ex Spacers roll call at http://spacergran.wordpress.com/ where you can add the address of your new home on here so that other Spacers can find you when they move over here. Please feel free to add yourself to the list of ex Spacers.
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The Docs our Support team have put together are really excellent and the quickest way to find anything a new user needs to know is by using the Search box there. Not only does it bring back the most relevant results from the Support Docs themselves, but also the most recent forum posts on the same topic. Really an excellent resource worthwhile getting familiar with. Rock on, WordPress.com!
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Go WordPress!
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Nice. 🙂
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I used to have a Windows Live Spaces blog before moving over to WordPress.com. I am really glad I did switch over. Keep up the good work!
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That’s cool! WordPress for life!
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I came over to WordPress from WLS before the migration was announced because WLS was drilling more holes in to an already sinking boat. When they offered to transfer my content over from WLS I was happy with that! The helpful links that were offered also helped in learning WP.
Now the only things I ask is from the good people at WordPress is to NOT pull a Windows Live Spaces and My [_____] and completely ignore Its user base and carry out unpopular changes in the name of mimicing the competition and making more money. If that starts happening I’m off, and I’m sure a few others will be too!
Another thing I’d like to ask for is more power for customisation of themes or the ablity to create my own theme without having to upgrade. That would be good.
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We’re always listening to find the best ways possible to improve WordPress.com.
If you’re looking for greater customizability with themes, you should check out some of the newest themes we’ve released on WordPress.com and look at the settings in Appearance > Theme Options. Our themes team has been working to provide extra customization options for each theme whenever possible.
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Very good. Still WP performance is good. I never felt any outage/slow issues due to this double-ing of user load. WP Great!
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There should be some way for WordPress users to interact with each other.
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There are quite a few ways you can do so!
You can comment, like, and reblog each others’ posts, answer blog posts on other sites with posts of your own, and talk to each other on the forums.
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“Don’t forget: we’re here to help.”
I think that this sentence explain why WordPress.com is “the best blogging community on the planet”.
Go ahead, amaze us again, and again, and again… 🙂
Thank you!
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Keep up the momentum WP!
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i love that you’re helping out the newbies and I’m so glad our family is getting bigger and bigger everyday!!
Good job WordPress!
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WP rocks!
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I am glad to receive this arrangement as I had blogged from April on spaces with my venture in Agriculture Cooperative Mixed Produce Farming and it would have taken me sometime to put it up in on another blog site. I thank both the teams of Spaces & WordPress for this arrangement. I am confident of having a good experience on the WordPress website over my project for the people & with the people.
THANK YOU ONCE AGAIN.
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I’ve really learned a lot tonight. Thanks! I really enjoyed the “learn wordpress.com” link.
However, I have one question? How do you get the snow widget? 🙂
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Be on the lookout for a blog post regarding the snow very, very soon. 🙂
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I’ve been a Windows Live Spaces user since 2005 and switched to WordPress as soon as it was available. I love it and blog more than ever now. It’s flexible and I can do just about anything with this platform. I enjoy the WordPress community, and I like the selection of themes and plugins. I also really like the different postings on Freshly Pressed and the WordPress Weblogs.
Keep up the good work!
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Excellent job to the team at WordPress! We depend on you to share our experiences, thoughts, ideas and so much more.
WordPress is the Gutenberg Press of this century!
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We heart wordpress!
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“…it’s a great time to be on WordPress.com.”
It is. Definitely.
Cheers. 🙂
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I love WordPress.
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I just signed up and I’m looking forward to talking about things that interest me.. I’ll be posting and replying to other comments as soon as I learn how. I’m new to all this but I’m fairly intelligent so I should be able to figure it out. Looking forward to this..
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WP rocks indeed.
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Great! More people to network with.
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Great! I like to use Photo gallery.
But, when the photo gallery on WordPress will be setting like photos Album on Facebook, that I can found “Previous” and “Next” if I see the photo one by one?
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When you have more than one image in a Gallery, if you click through to one of those images, you should see links on that page that can send you either to the previous image in the gallery or the next image in the gallery.
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I just arrived to WordPress.
I just have to say it’s fantastically easy to start with, but also very flexible!
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I moved from Windows Live Spaces to WordPress, and I have not regretted it at all. Windows Live couldn’t have chosen a better blogging partner.
Thanks WordPress and Windows Live!
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With all these new sign-ups the backup costs must be going thru the roof. What is being done to ensure that the existing blogs are safe?
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All of the new sites being started on WordPress.com are given the same awesome service and safeguards as every other WordPress.com site. Our dedication to keeping your data safe hasn’t changed.
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WordPress has given me the opportunity to share my photographs of my beautiful island. And yes, it is the best place for blogging. Greetings from Greece!
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This blogging site really is something, I signed up after opening the Windows Live Writer program, and I really enjoy reading other peoples blogs.
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I’m just getting started with blogging and WP, and I’m also interested in the snow feature, since it’s snowing here in Gambier, Ohio!
Where I’m writing from, geographically is part of my theme, as I am in Amish country, and I’d like to write about tech trends – so the snow is not only cool, it’s germaine.
In the “getting started” user assistance sequence, there was a quote from Doctorow – a Kenyon (Gambier) writer, so that’s two synchronous events in my getting started with WP.
Looking forward to next steps.
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I am very happy with WordPress…you guys do great work.
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I was sad to see that WL was shutting down it’s blogging feature, but I was very pleased to see that the old blogs would be transferred over to WordPress. There are a lot more features here, though I do miss being able to edit my site name and tagline from the front page. I had been hearing a lot about WP and the automatic migration made it easy to try it out. I’m currently using WordPress.org on my website. 🙂
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It all sounds good… Thanks much!
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I am new to blogging, but so far, I am loving WordPress!
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I like the redirect from my old Spaces address and my new silly name.
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For once Microsoft does something good.
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I’ve been totally happy with WordPress from day one, and just keep getting MORE happy. I have personally recommended it to many people and some of them have made the move or the jump.
WordPress rocks! 🙂
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I used Windows Live Spaces before and I recently joined here and i like it so far… 🙂
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For all those who are new: the WordPress team is really concerned about your role as a blogger. The do want to make the experience for you as a blogger as good and smooth as possible.
I had a time where I could not access my site (geographical restrictions, beyond control of WordPress); however, their team looked at the problem, examined it, and advised me a work around.
The response time to my call for help was short, within a day. Isn’t that unbelievable, given the fact that the entire set of basic functionality which they offer is free?
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I also see ‘new’ posts in the dashboard-listing that are over 6 months old, blogs with only one post, or try outs, that never were continued…..so there is a lot of pollution I fear. But WP rocks, that’s for sure.
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Wonderful! I look forward to meeting them!
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This is great news. ‘Windows Live Spaces’ offered this migration as an upgrade. Statistics are proving that the migration is a successful upgrade for the majority of individuals that wanted to blog.
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Yayy! Expanding our network 🙂
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Cool; now that’s gonna be a real platform!
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That’s because we love WordPress. 🙂
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I recently setup my laptop on Windows 7. I think the Live Writer application is cool and shockingly user-friendly for Microsoft. More blogs are a good thing so my thanks to the folks at WordPress for working with Microsoft.
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Hi Ryan, thanks for your answer.
I just try to change the photo gallery on “Gallery Setting”, from “Image file” to “Attachment Page”, and then I look at the latest gallery to see the photo one by one, there are “Previous image” and “Next Image” button under the picture..:)
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fentastic….nice n easy to start.but one problem with me.i cannot put more than one post on other page i add.nor i can put any link for such related posts in the same page.is there any idea?
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Thanks for letting us know you’re having trouble. A Happiness Engineer from WordPress.com support will be contacting you to help solve the problem.
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Help me out,please.Can A wordpress blog be deleted permanently.I have by mistake deleted my blog.When i go to that link,It shows the authors have deleted this blog.Now I want to create a new blog with the same name which I am not able to do.
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Hello Aruun,
We are unable to restore WordPress.com blogs once they are deleted. To create a new WordPress.com blog, visit: http://wordpress.com/signup
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I had a Windows Live Spaces site, that’s how I got to wordpress, and I’m really glad I did!!! I think it was a great improvement and I’m really enjoying it. Thank you guys :D.
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It’s good to know being part of a tremendously growing community that could have the power of building a staircase from earth to moon in order to walk on it!
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I loved my Windows Live Space. Now you have forced me to close it and come on WordPress. I hate the themes that can’t allows me to change the background, and that with the custom background are very ugly….and can I have a photo gallery? I think not.
I hope that the service will improve.
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It’s quite easy to have an image gallery on WordPress.com: https://wordpress.com/support/images/gallery/
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I love WordPress I love WordPress I love WordPress, but I’ve been having some very serious problems with the BlackBerry app and the new WPTouch Mobile Theme from Brave New Code. Ever since the new Mobile Theme started, I cannot read blog on my BlackBerry anymore.
And, for some reason, the BlackBerry Mobile App for WordPress is not working at all for me. I have been wanting to blog on my BlackBerry for quite some time, but I’ve installed and reinstalled and reintalled the App time and again, all to no avail. And I feel so lost without being able to read WordPress blogs on my BlackBerry.
For more details: http://thenoreaster.wordpress.com/2010/12/10/a-note-to-wordpress-techies/
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WordPress was recommended to me by my daughter, who also blogs here, after I experienced extreme frustration with another site. Really like it, and have to say the support when it is needed is AWESOME!
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4 months old to WordPress…working through the kinks but loving it (Learn WordPress.com is wonderful!). Great user friendly blog host!
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I declined the migration as I wanted to start fresh without my old windows live posts.
I really like WordPress. I only have one small peeve and that’s the default media player is slow to load. While my mixes are within the size load limit it takes several minutes to open.
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