In the wake of the Squarespace 6 launch this week, a couple of items struck me as interesting.
From BetaBeat.com‘s article:
Square space Takes a Swing at WordPress and Tumblr with a Heartbreakingly Easy New Interface
The company’s intention is to push for artists and others who’d respond to the portfolio offering, as well as bloggers and simple websites. “That’s really what Squarespace version five targeted really well, so we’re just starting with that as a baseline,” he said. He also explained that, when they showed the demo to the CEO of Getty Images, who is one of their board members [emphasis added], he told them that his photographers pay $25,000 for equivalent sites.
I know many in the developer forums have been inquiring and waiting for a more feature rich content management system. The focus on Portfolio templates suited primarily for photographers is definitely no secret, but this article adds a bit of perspective as to why there has been so much effort directed to this niche of potential new Squarespace users.
I also found this little tidbit amusing. After checking out some of his previous video interviews, I suspect Mr. Casalena would rather be doing anything else but marketing and promotion. Good to see him get a little “fiesty”. But seriously, what does that even mean?!
Pressed on the issue, Mr. Casalena got a little fiesty: “If you really wanted to do a custom template on WordPress, you have to go to WordPress VIP, which puts ridiculous restrictions on what you can actually do.”
Jedi Mind Tricks. You want a chicken burrito.
And if you haven’t read Chris Armstrong’s review of Squarespace 6 on The Industry website, he does a really good analysis. Unlike many of the big tech sites that obviously spent less than an hour actually using the blogging platform, he has experience as an actual Squarespace subscriber. He makes an especially good point about the whole Tumblr vs Squarespace comparisons that I so often hear about.
Squarespace 6: The Review
However, there is a problem. Tumblr is free — the only way to give Tumblr money is to pin a post to the dashboard. Tumblr’s future revenue plans will involve advertising. I feel much more confident using a service I know is supported entirely by its users. That way, the users are the customers, not the advertisers. Moves the company make should be beneficial to the customers. This distinction is clear when looking at some of the moves Twitter has been making recently: the advertisers are Twitter’s customers, not us users. It’s an unfortunate truth.
With the recent Posterous acquisition by Twitter, many of its users are scrambling to move their blog history to another platform. Could the same thing happen with Tumblr? Who knows, but there is something to be said for choosing a hosting platform where by paying for the service, you are ensured at least a reasonable amount of support. Fortunately, outstanding customer support is an area where Squarespace excels.
Squarespace 6 has built-in import capabilities. However, if you are interested in using Squarespace 5 instead, check out this quick and easy workaround – Squarespace to Tumblr in 5 Minutes.
Oh, and before I forget. I haven’t checked all the Squarespace 6 templates, but I have folder options available in jirick that I don’t think were there a couple of days ago. So if this is a feature you are waiting for, check your settings as it might be available.
