Enjoy!

That said, I didn’t want to be all doom and gloom, so here are a few of the huge benefits of migrating to a new server:

Custom Themes.  The theme I’m using has a lot of functionality.  Right there on the home page you’re greeted by a scrolling panel of featured articles.   I can choose from one of five home page orientations, 2- or 3-column, and can also choose the look of my post and archive pages.

Plug-ins.  Plug-ins are huge.  There is practically nothing you can’t do with a plug-in.  Internally, a plug-in helps me redirect permalinks.  Externally, I’m using plug-ins for the following:

• Sphere, which generates links to related web news and blog articles on whatever’s in your post (try it out here, the link is at the bottom of the post)
• Automatic Social Bookmarking link generation (you’ll see it at the bottom of each post and page)
• Contact Email Form generation, Categories Cloud generation, and a lot of small stuff that WordPress.com had built-in
• In Series, which lets me easily index a series of posts

I’m still learning about the hundreds of available plug-ins so I’ll be adding them constantly for the new few weeks.

Amazon Affiliate Program.  Since I’ve been including links to my favorite books in the ‘Library’ section, I decided to take advantage of the Amazon program.   The Library is now called “Recommended Reading” and displays everything in a neat widget.   I’m also experimenting with a few other Amazon widgets – one that generates a ‘title cloud’ of related book titles (currently sitting in the right side column) and another that associates keywords in each post and page with a related book title (not sure if I like that one yet).

Myers Briggs Section.  There will be a whole section of the site devoted to Myers Briggs information and services.  I will have designated URLs for individuals, teams, and innovation-related services.

I’d say that the new blog will be open for business by the end of the month.

1. I am running WordPress on the new server.  However, the import function leaves a bit to be desired.  It does not fix your internally-directed links.  I link a great deal to previous posts, but the import doesn’t redo the links to reflect the fact that the previous posts have moved to a new domain and permalink structure.  So if you click on a link to a previous article, it redirects here.  That means every internal link I’ve ever posted will have to be edited manually.  Hoorah.
2. Speaking of permalinks – there is no ‘permalink redirect’ function in WordPress.com that would automatically forward my old article links to the new blog.  This means that (unless I figure out a better way) I will have to redirect EVERY POST manually by putting a message in each that the post has moved to the new blog.  Then eventually Google will catch up.  This means I will likely trim away some of my less-read posts.
3. WordPress.com has an email function that allows you to easily put an email box in any post or page.  Readers can send you emails this way.  The WordPress.org software apparently doesn’t have this function, or it executes it differently, because the old code doesn’t work.

If you want to check it out so far, the new site is at www.open-source-innovation.com (please excuse the boxes, we’re still moving in).

1. First off, as soon as I figure out the best way to do so, I am going to transition this blog to a pay-for server with a pay-for WordPress theme that gives me a lot more functionality. I’ve picked the new theme and it’s dynamite.

WordPress.com is great for so many reasons, but having your own server running WordPress.org software opens up tons of new opportunities for creativity. WordPress.com makes exporting my current posts and pages to a new blog pretty easy. But one of the biggest problems I will have is to get my Google traffic diverted to the new blog. One way I might do that is to keep this blog going for a while and systematically replace each post and page with a link redirecting traffic to the new blog.

2. The new blog will have a new thrust. Along with innovation and creativity, I am adding Myers-Briggs and KAI to the mix. I will be qualified to administer Myers-Briggs by March so I will be offering that as a service for individuals and groups, along with KAI. There will be a whole section of the blog devoted to Myers-Briggs, with lots of information on its meaning and use, and I’ll be making Myers-Briggs-centered posts on a regular basis. I will offer a wide variety of services:

• Myers-Briggs for individuals
• Myers-Briggs for groups
• Myers-Briggs and Innovation for groups (including KAI and innovation tools)
• Myers-Briggs and Creativity for groups (including KAI)
• Innovation Services like problem finding and ideation, by the hour

Myers-Briggs for individuals will be a complete service offering both Form M and Form Q, along with all other available forms, via an online tool. The group offerings may or may not be limited to the Baltimore-Washington-Philadelphia area, for the time being.

3. As far as the name goes, I own open-source-innovation.com so I will probably use that. I might come up with something different. I will also use additional domains for pages devoted to individual and group Myers-Briggs services.

My next post on the subject will be to announce the location of our new blog home.