I’ve been reading a very old book on blogging. For normal purposes, a 2006 copyright isn’t that old, but apparently when it comes to the blogosphere, it’s so old as to be . . . well, not worthless, but outdated. The only mention of WordPress in the book was the .org version. The .com version (the one most of us have come to rely on) wasn’t even mentioned. Is WordPress.com that new? I don’t know — I’ve only been blogging for two years, so anything before September 2007 is prehistoric to me.
Anyway, the author of the book suggests backing up your blog to make sure that your don’t lose your content in case the host’s computer crashes or the host goes out of business, as did someone who hosted 3,000 blogs many, many blogyears ago. (Apparently a blogyear is akin to a dogyear.) So I hied myself to the WordPress forum to find out the best way to back up my 351 posts, 4 pages, 33 categories, 1,350 tags, and 1,865 valuable (and much appreciated) comments. According to WordPress, however, the blogs are already backed up. I found this on a FAQ page:
If your blog is hosted here at WordPress.com, we handle all necessary backups. If a very large meteor were to hit all of the WordPress.com servers and destroy them beyond repair, all of your data would still be safe and we could have your blog online within a couple of days (after the meteor situation dies down, of course).
I also found this in a discussion forum:
Right now there are 3 copies of your blog in 3 different parts of the USA.
If California drops into the Pacific, your blog is still safe.
If California drops into the Pacific AND Texas gets hit by a meteor storm which destroys it you can still blog all about it.
If all 3 go down then there is something very serious going on …
There isn’t really a need to backup.
Unless, of course, you want to, in which case you go to your dashboard, scroll down to tools, click on export, and send your blog files to . . . wherever.
I feel safe now, don’t you? I won’t think about California dropping into the Pacific, Texas getting hit by a meteor storm, that unspecified meteor situation, or that even more unspecified “something very serious going on”. Not much, anyway.
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Bertram's Blog 
August 26, 2009 at 8:34 pm
Good post, Pat!
August 26, 2009 at 8:53 pm
I think if all of those bad things are happening I probably wouldn’t be thinking about my blog – lol. But, it is nice to know that it would still be there.
August 27, 2009 at 2:48 am
These days, storage is so cheap that everyone takes it for granted. I remember when I first signed up for Yahoo my mailbox had a six megabyte capacity!
August 27, 2009 at 8:28 am
Hey, thanks for this post – it’s really helpful! It is reassuring to know our posts will be safe except in cataclysmic events of mayhem!
August 29, 2009 at 9:54 pm
They’re safe even in most cataclysmic events of mayhem. Safer than us, anyway! Someday someone will find a way to back us up, too. Hmmm. Could be a story in that.
August 27, 2009 at 10:34 am
In the past I’ve posted duplicates to Gather, but you’ve got me thinking. What would it hurt to even print out a copy? Hmm. Or maybe I should check to see if Blogspot back up? Sounds easier than all that printing and paper and toner.
August 29, 2009 at 9:53 pm
I didn’t know you were on gather. Are we friends? I’ll have to check it out!
August 27, 2009 at 11:31 am
Wow. I’d never even thought of backing it up. I’ve got some catching up to do. Wonder what happens if Gather goes down?
August 29, 2009 at 9:52 pm
I’m gradually posting my gather articles elsewhere. But now you’ve got me worrying about the ones I haven’t yet duplicated. Eek!