After reading Fandango’s recent posts about changes to WordPress plans, I went along to the forum to see if it were true, or, as I hoped, an April Fool’s Day gag. Well, if it is a gag, it is a very elaborate one as I read several posts from bloggers asking where the other plans had disappeared to. Every single answer was the same. “As of yesterday (1 April) we have changed our plans.” They really are now only offering the free one and the Pro one. The free one has so little storage, 500mb that any blogger who does photography would quickly run out of room. This is for new bloggers I should add. Existing free plan members keep their 3GB although apparently there have been some glitches with that.

As we have two blogs, I was concerned about the price rise if I had to upgrade to Business even though that plan is supposed to have dropped in price from $25 to $15 a month. Why do they tell us the monthly charge when we are not allowed to pay it monthly? $180 a year would be about $A240 a year for each blog. That’s a lot to find in one hit.

I immediately went to check when my plans run out as the information Fandango had was that when your current personal or premium plan ran out if would revert to the free one. Luckily, one of mine was renewed in February. The other, this one, was due in three days. I looked at the Plans page and it was still showing all the old plans so I quickly renewed it at the old price of $US96. Still a big chunk of money for me but at least I should have some breathing space to decide what to do.

I already have more than 3GB of media on each blog and if stuff has to be deleted, I don’t want it done randomly by the so called “Happiness Engineers”. I like to think of the doll blog as a resource for collectors to help them identify dolls and outfits so I don’t want to lose my older photos from it.

A WordPress representative on the Forum said that the idea of changing the plans was to make WP accessible to more people at a lower price. I don’t see how it will do that. Many users will probably leave rather than pay more. I have to think it is a sneaky way of forcing the hobby bloggers out. They do say that more options will be added later but I kind of feel that they will be more expensive options, not cheaper ones.

I honestly don’t know if there is anything that can be done about this. WP have been heading this way for a few years now. We’ve all complained about it to no avail. WP does not really engage with us any more except via the Forum. I don’t usually go there and only did today because of this issue. I recall when they used to post about subjects of interest and set challenges but those days are long gone. However, I am prepared to make a noise about it if anyone can suggest who to address correspondence to.

I do suggest that bloggers check their plans and if they are due to expire soon and the old plans are still showing on your page renew it now and buy some time to think about where to go from here.

If it is a giant April Fool’s Day gag then I have to say to the Happiness Engineers it is not very funny.

Last one out of the door please turn off the lights.