Here’s What I Know So Far About Flipping My Site From WordPress.com to WordPress.org

So hopefully you guys see this post. As of yesterday morning my switch from wordpress.com to wordpress.org made me loose EVERY SINGLE FOLLOWER. Devastated, I sent an e-mail off to one of their “happiness engineers” and she responded back that she can restore all my followerers but I don’t think she hasn’t done it yet. I have a running list of other things that need fixed such as I do not want people to have to log in to post comments.

As I sit here and listen to my children fight over Call of Duty on this Easter Day (Happy Easter btw), I want to let you guys know what I’ve been dealing with to switch my site from wordpress.com to wordpress.org so you can decide if it’s worth to come over to the dark side…..I mean….the .org side.

1. Although you would think it’s wordpress.com that wears the pants in the relationship due to the .com ending, it’s actually .org.
2. WordPress.com is owned by the company Autommatic. Autommatic’s CEO is the same dude that created WordPress.org. Again, why aren’t we combining these 2 companies for the sake of our sanity?
3. I switched my site from wordpress.com to wordpress.org so I can customize my blog. You can customize your blog on wordpress.com but it will cost you the price of one of those enhanced themes. I will eventually get to customize once I can GET ALL MY FOLLOWERS BACK! Ahem….
4. If you decide to transfer your site from WP.com to WP.org, plan on the experience being somewhat on par to going into labor and giving birth…..for triplets.
5. You wouldn’t think that a site like Go Daddy would offer enough customer service to get you through this train wreck, but aside from one loser, they were AMAZING. I found myself on the phone with them, 1/2 drunk, attempting to get my site transferred over.
6. So yes, you have to pick whats known as a hosting site first. Additionally, I had bought my name off of wordpress.com so hotmessmemoir.com “lived” over at wordpress.com. I could continue to allow it to live in wordpress’s basement like an adult but I decided to kick her out and make her move in with godaddy.com. So now, hot mess is living with go daddy.
7. One of the first steps to moving your site is downloading all of your content from your blog to your computer. It’s supposed to download into an XML file. Mine continually downloaded as a PDF file. Frustrated I uploaded the pdf file into my new hosting site which caused me to loose every post I had had for the entire month of March. After loosing my shit and rolling around on the floor in an adult meltdown, I e-mailed a “happiness engineer” and got Gracie. Gracie has been wonderful btw. After we determined it was a setting on my computer causing the file to download as a PDF and was fixed, I was pleased to find one of my recent postings about Joe Manganiello. 🙂 All posts restored.
8. I have NO IDEA how, as a self hosted blog, how I am to use wordpress.org and wordpress.com together. I say that because as of now I can’t access the reader to read everyone else’s blogs on WP.org, I have to go to WP.com. Additionally, I have to go back over to wordpress.com to see if I have a notification that there has been interactions with you guys on my blog. Ugh!

So guys, I have no idea what you guys are seeing. I have a list of things that need fixed and I am confident I’m slowly being restored. I told my Therapist yesterday that loosing all my followers/friends felt like my house burnt down and I have no insurance. I felt like ‘Oh my God, what if I can’t find them again?’ Until Gracie fixes this, I still kinda’ have that feeling and it blows.

Well, I have to go now. I need to get ready and go into my mother in law’s for dinner. What are you guys doing for Easter? We’ve already polished off a combined total of 9 miniature chocolate rabbits.