Hacker News Reader

Comment by jermaink | Hacker News Reader

What would you say is the biggest difference compared to Svbtle and Medium?

From a first glimpse:

Plus: - Good design, simple to use, friendly colors. - MIT license. - Well done support forum.

Minus: - Features should be more clear. - I might be mean but when I read "Just a blogging platform", I automatically read "Just a(nother) blogging platform." - Better replace the laptop+wodden table+moleskine+coffee stock image with something better. Everyone is using that stuff right now. If you want to be different, better look different. - Why the name "Ghost"? Maybe it has some meaning? - Git Link way too hidden.

Good job!

View on HN

"What would you say is the biggest difference compared to Svbtle and Medium?"

Svbtle and Medium are hosted (and as a result, controlled-by) a 3rd party. You host Ghost yourself, giving you complete control over the platform. I think a better comparison would be probably be to Wordpress.

You can host Ghost yourself. You can also use their hosted service, which funds the non-profit that develops Ghost.

I'm choosing between this and Medium, and the user-facing design (at least the theme demo'd on their blog) looks similar.

I'd like to hear a comparison (though happy to throw wordpress in the consideration pool too)

That's not comparing apples-to-apples. Ghost is to Wordpress what Medium is to Facebook.

Medium is 'locked in.' Basically, if you want to make money from your articles or get decent analytics you're stuffed.

If you're choosing between Ghost and Medium, and would like something that is hosted, I recently released Silvrback (https://www.silvrback.com). It has the simplicity of Medium, while giving you control over your own brand.

Ugg. I really like where you were going with that, but you lost me at this: "People shouldn't spend any time configuring a server for a blog."

Maybe some people shouldn't be spending any time configuring a server for a blog, but I have been increasingly working to take back control of my data and it's related services. That means I want to be able to install things on a server of my choosing. This also means FOSS wherever I can possibly put it. I would even happily pay for the FOSS, but the thing I hate the most about medium, svbtle, and the others, is that I can't use the platform where I want to and I don't see gpl/mit anywhere.

I understand that your intention is the hosted segment, but I really think you could gain a lot more traction by going to a one time price, FOSing the code, and still offering a paid hosting service for those that want it.

Maybe it's just because the older I get the more I am aligning with RMS.

Yeah, you're right. There's always going to be a group of people that want to configure everything themselves and setup their own servers. I'm not really targeting this group with silvrback. Open source ghost would be the best route for you.

However, there are a number of people looking for hosted solutions so they don't have to waste any time with config issues. This is where Silvrback comes in. Also, Silvrback should really only be compared to the hosted version of Ghost (which isn't out yet). Comparing it to open source isn't really possible.

"Comparing it to open source isn't really possible."

I don't really understand this line of reasoning. You are running code on your servers, are you not? Your code is either closed or open. (closed) How is comparing it to open source not possible?

Just not possible in the sense that a hosted solution has the expectation that everything is managed for you. An open-source solution requires you to do the work of setting it up, configuring, handling traffic spikes, backups, etc...

I see your intention now, but you are using the words in the wrong context with the wrong definition. There are plenty of hosted open source products that require little to no setup.

If you are targeting people who don't want to configure anything why are you using markdown?

I would have expected you to use something like TinyMCE. Markdown is like coding for non-programmers.

You should respond to your emails ;)

I apologize if I've missed an email. The last couple of weeks have been really hectic for me. Please send it to me again.

Got it.

> Why the name "Ghost"?

(BLO)Ghost?

'Why the name "Ghost"?'

I'm speculating wildly here, but maybe because the blogging platform becomes invisible, like a ghost. A similar approach to LaTeX for word processing. And also perhaps because of the writing theme, as in ghost writing.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com