May 24, 2018 / News

To the Daily Post Community: Thank You!

Saying goodbye is hard. Celebrating years of community and great blogging is anything but.

Almost seven and a half years ago The Daily Post opened its virtual doors to the WordPress.com blogging community. It’s been an incredible ride, and incredible rides, too, sometimes come to an end. As of the end of this month (and 2,000 Daily Prompts, 380 Photo Challenges, 260 Community Pools, and 100 First Fridays later), we will no longer publish new posts, prompts, or challenges on this site.

Where are we going?

The decision no longer to publish on The Daily Post wasn’t an easy one. We’re enormously proud of what we put out here — and of the hundreds of thousands of stories, essays, photos, and poems members of this community have shared with us over the years. The team behind The Daily Post isn’t going anywhere; we’ll be focusing our attention on other projects that help WordPress.com remain the best place on the web to publish, build an audience, and find a community. We hope to cross paths with many of you on other sites we run, including Longreads and Discover.

Will this site stay online?

Yes. The Daily Post will be around for as long as our servers keep chugging along, which we predict to be roughly 14,320,078 years (give or take). All your conversations, pingbacks, and favorite writing prompts and Blogging U. courses will still be available, and we hope you’ll keep exploring — and enjoying — our deep archive of resources, from beginners’ tips to writing advice to blogging etiquette.

Where can Daily Post bloggers connect with each other and find inspiration?

One thing we know many of you will miss is, well, you. This is a place where many bloggers — including many who were just starting out — found like-minded people to be part of their blogging adventure. We hope you continue to develop friendships and seek out the advice and support of others in the WordPress.com community. Here are some resources to explore:

What happens between now and May 31?

We’ll publish the last First Friday thread this week, as well as a Community Pool post and a Photo Challenge next week. (Daily Prompts will continue through May 31.) We hope you decide to participate in these final posts, and also encourage you to use their respective comment sections to make plans for keeping in touch with all your Daily Post friends.

One last note…

Our mission has always been to inspire others to blog more and to blog better, even if “blogging better” means something quite different in 2018 than it did back in 2010. The editors and contributors who’ve tended to this site have all changed, grown, and evolved, and so have the members of this community. What has stayed consistent — almost miraculously so — is the spirit of openness, respect, and camaraderie of the people who’ve made this place a part of their online journey. Yes, that’s you.

From those of us on the WordPress.com team who’ve contributed to The Daily Post over the years, thank you for being the best blogging community on the web, bar none. It’s been a total joy.

Joen Asmussen, Sheri Bigelow, Brie Anne Demkiw, John Godley, Jeff Golenski, Jen Hooks, Daryl L. L. Houston, Ben Huberman, Marcus Kazmierczak, Cheri Lucas Rowlands, Anne McCarthy, Donncha Ó Caoimh, Kathryn Presner, Kjell Reigstad, Zandy Ring, Sara Rosso, Wendy Scott, Chris Smith, Krista Stevens, Erica Varlese, David Watkis, Michelle Weber, and Xiao Yu.

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  1. Thank you Ben and the rest of the WP. Most of my followers I got from interacting in the pool. I looked forward to Mondays because of it. I plan to do a blog for this last Monday thanking the people I’ve followed and those who followed me. 💕 from the Cayman Islands. http://comewithg.blog

    Liked by 3 people

  2. This kind of sucks. I literally just got back to blogging (hours ago) after a long hiatus and find that WP has become a little more irritating and a little less focused on community. The Daily Post and finding other users this way was one of the things that tempted me to get blogging again…because it was so encouraging and fun. It made up for the flaws that I’ve seen creeping onto the site for at least five years.

    The self hosted arm is a bit of a nightmare to keep updated and find -good- support, so I gave up on that, too. Boo to this.

    Liked by 4 people

    1. The effort for them to do this had to literally be minutes a day, tops. Have you noticed a flood of “Privacy Updates” in your email box for every website you’ve ever been to in the last week? I have a feeling that as things change on the Internet, WP as a company may be leaving themselves open for liability issues. There’s clearly more going on than they want to let on because, let’s face it, we live in a world where telling customers the truth just doesn’t play anymore.

      Liked by 3 people

    1. Thank you for your concern, but the team and the company at large aren’t going anywhere! We’re excited about our future endeavors, and are always inspired by the power of this community.

      Liked by 3 people

      1. So WHY are you shutting it down, then? I read the earlier article and still don’t understand why this is happening. Was it really too much work??

        Like

  6. So…why is the Community Pool ending? Because it’s too rough to cut and paste the same thing into a post every Monday and let the rest of us do the work? You’ve built something bigger than yourselves and, like it or not, should feel some sense of duty to maintain, or at least give more than a week’s notice it’s going away for others to properly organize alternatives.

    Liked by 2 people

  7. Am I leaving? No. Do I question the logic in that? Yes. Do I question whether WP will really be able to fill this void? Most certainly. It started with the free courses. I literally made solid friends out of the only course I took, including the person I’m lucky to call my best friend. That is community. I’m skeptical and frankly pissed off increasingly with WordPress. This is one of the worst you have and frankly are likely to make. I’m certain this will receive no commentary, no explanation, and no validation from WP either, which also disappoints me greatly. The lame ‘things change’ explanation with no solid substitute of a rollout for the new is disheartening. WP-you have made me sad

    Liked by 2 people

  9. This is indeed a sad news. The prompts and photo challenges really inspired me to write more and work on my writing and photography skills.

    I would love to connect with more experienced writers and bloggers as I’m new to blogging. I’d love to hear your comments and suggestions as to how I can improve as a writer.

    Here’s a link to my profile: https://hanzhen71317.wordpress.com/

    Hope to see you soon! 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

  10. I started a blogging meetup about six months ago. Almost everyone had started their blogs long time well before then but stuttered to a stop because no one visited their blogs. I introduced them to Daily Post and suddenly people got their first likes/comments. It is an incredible positive reinforcement. Several of them decided to start a second blog and a few bought a blog plan instead of the freebie — all because they got positive reinforcement and it made them realize they had another hobby they wanted to blog about too. I get you’re quitting the DP even thought it helps to grow your business becuase you want to do something else now. However, I think you all should put this same theme up for free where pingbacks show on a grid on one page so that a community around daily prompts can be created somewhere else. People need that positive reinforcement or 80% of blogs stutters and dies. They need that sense of community. You don’t know how excited people were to get their first like on a blog that was more than two years old. I found a linky system but th blocks don’t show on the main page unless you have a blogspot site. Having all the pingbacks set out in a grid on the page like that made it really easy to click on them. I would click 10-20 at a time; on occasions even more than 100 (for the photo challenge). When you have to scroll down to view pingbacks in the regular one-line comment paradigm, I click at most 10 because I have to parse through the extra lines and if the group gets big enough, the pingbacks roll over to another page. I never go to the next page and I am betting most don’t make that jump so those pingbacks on the next page lose out on readership. Having that grid theme with pingbacks on one page in a grid available for free will fix the problem because we can try to start a prompt community for new and regular bloggers somewhere else. We’ll be spread out for awhile but eventually one or two prompt spots will become popular enough that people will learn how to find them. There are daily word prompt sites but they don’t have the community — the grid made creating a community much easier because it encouraged people to read other posts and like/comment them. I get you’re quitting but please give us the theme to do one-page pingback grids so our communities can continue without you.

    Liked by 2 people

  12. I’m a big fan of WordPress and my fandom is rooted in The Daily Post. It helped set WordPress apart. It’s been ambitious, kind, inclusive and fun. It made a human connection between employees and bloggers unequalled in the world of tech. That’s down to the humanity, generosity and good nature of the people who managed it, and the thousands of people who took part in it, or who read and responded thoughtfully to other’s posts.

    “What has stayed consistent — almost miraculously so — is the spirit of openness, respect, and camaraderie of the people who’ve made this place a part of their online journey.”

    I get what you’re saying, Ben, but it isn’t miraculous. You and the team have actively guided the community through this inspirational, helpful meet up place, often, I’d guess, if the Blogging U courses are anything to go by, in your own time. You don’t see this on any other platform.

    You’ve worked so much harder to keep this a safe and positive space than if you’d just thrown out a word, then run for the hills. You must all be proud of what you’ve achieved.

    Of course I get that people are feeling their blogging carpet has been pulled from under them. I’ll really miss the photo prompts too. I loved how the prompt made me share pictures and write about things I would never have done otherwise. It was fun to read the different responses. I’ve loved it.

    Sharing posts is the easy, ego-driven part of blogging. The Daily Post worked so well because it encouraged the other side – folks who quietly, thoughtfully read and support other bloggers.

    I’d agree with MNL it could be fun to be able to host one page pingback grids for challenges. We need a way to find and engage with community spirited people, because it’s those who make our experience here special.

    Perhaps you could consider hosting a new pingback grid page on Discover, with links to events and challenges hosted by WordPress bloggers.

    Whatever you decide, thank you to all, and good luck with whatever comes next.

    Liked by 1 person

  14. It was so helpful to all the bloggers, and now we’ll no longer have support to extend our blogs.
    Thank you The Daily Post for being for us till now.
    I’m wondering how will I connect with everyone now.
    I’m leaving my link below, just let me know what do you think of my blog.
    https://lovebeyondinfinity03.wordpress.com/
    Happy Blogging to all!!! 😉

    Like

  15. Oh…this is so sad. I love Daily Post! I met a lot of people here and my follower have grown because of DP. I’ll definitely miss this…

    Like

  16. Awww…..that’s too bad. I’ve only just found you and joined in these past few weeks. I do, however, respect the decision and trust that there will be other avenues for sharing our photos and blogs.

    Liked by 1 person

  21. Well done for providing us to all that provided us stellar services on a daily basis. Thank you is not enough. I am very grateful for all prompts and ideas to keep us blogging. Feeling nostalgic. Here’s a song for the memories

    Liked by 1 person

  25. I have really enjoyed the Weekly Photo Challenge prompts, the first of which I responded to in October 2016. I don’t think I missed one since. It has really been a fun way to look back at photos I’ve taken and to share them on my blog. And it’s been wonderful to see the incredible photos shared by others! Good luck going forward, all! 🙂

    Liked by 1 person

  26. OMG, Well, this sucks. I love the prompts… not to mention I gained a ton of new followers here and followed some great blogs myself. Even formed some WordPress friendships as well as Facebook pals. Now, what the heck am I gonna do?

    Liked by 2 people

  27. Mixture of deep sadness and loss with gratitude for the goodness the WP team always made and shared.

    It kind of hurts a little but that’s because you all meant something cool and humane to me.

    Best wishes to all the WP folk. I reckon I’ll continue what I was doing.

    Tremendous thanks everyone for showing me how to be a better blogger, just pretty good, but that was enough. Cheers!

    Liked by 1 person

  28. So sad to see this go. I found many of my people through the photo challenges. Although I have been MIA for a few weeks, I always look(ed) forward to the weekly prompts. They inspired me to view my everyday world in a new light.

    May I suggest you post a list of other bloggers’ prompts and challenges? I would love for new and future bloggers to have the same wonderful resource that I had, and perhaps I’ll find my new inspirations as well.

    Best of luck, Daily Post staff, and thanks for the weekly nudges.

    Liked by 1 person

  29. OM! I was looking around and trying to find an answer to my WHY or did I just mistakenly read the final edition for WPC? Then I just read this, and I am still ‘shook.’

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Aren’t we all S. And I love your use of the word ‘shook’ which I thought was confined to Ireland. But seemingly not. Even as the Daily Posts draws its last gasps I am finding gems!

      MB

      Liked by 1 person