BlogyMate, a new blogging platform based in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), takes its cue from existing platforms LiveJournal and Tumblr, to create something of a hybrid. The team behind BlogyMate is an international group of UAE residents, all of whom are active users on the platform themselves.
Part social network, part blog, BlogyMate is probably one of the easiest blogging platforms out there. There is no elaborate set up – simply sign up for a free account and you’re ready to start sharing your thoughts with the BlogyMate community, and the world.
The Blogging Platform
Once you’ve signed up for the service, you can instantly create blog posts based on the type of content, much like Tumblr. So, you can create a long post, a micro post, or share a video, photo or link. It also provides a handy bookmarklet to help with the sharing of pages from your bookmarks bar.
When creating a long blog post, you can upload images, audio, and even files, as well as share embedded videos from services like YouTube and Vimeo.
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With all blog posts, the content creator has a lot of reach. Not only can you enter a title and select a category, you can also make use of the in-built resources which allow you to perform searches on Google, Bing, YouTube and more, without ever leaving the page. Other tools include a native photo-editor, spell check, duplicate content checker and access to Google Docs.
Once your blog post is up, other members can leave comments, or easily share the post on social networks. They can also add the blog post to their favourites, or recommend it to your BlogyMate friends.
Your personal profile page will feature snippets of your latest blog posts, as well as recent comments, friends and followers.
BlogyMate also provides RSS feeds for all blogs on the platform, so even if your friends don’t use the service, they can still keep up with your blog using their RSS readers.
The Social Network Platform
The community aspect of BlogyMate is similar to social networks. You can follow and comment on other people’s blogs, and the service also offers a private messaging system. You can also invite users to contribute to your blog by making them co-writers. Like Tumblr and LiveJournal, BlogyMate gives you instant access to a large community, ensuring that your blog posts reach a wide audience, in essence, helping to market the blog for you.
If you have the know-how you can also develop your own unique blog using BlogyMate’s API.
Extra Features
BlogyMate has some unique features in its favor too. It has a list of so-called Exclusive Pages, with content from around the web. The source of these Exclusive Pages can be anything from the BBC, the New York Times or Glamour Magazine, to websites such as BoingBoing and All Facebook. The content is displayed as it is on the original website, except it’s contained within a BlogyMate frame.
It seems that the content is added simply using the RSS feeds of the websites, and with this feature, BlogyMate makes it easy to follow your favourite blogs and sites, alongside user generated content on the platform.
BlogyMate is accessible on the go from its mobile site too, and there is also a free Android app. While you can follow the latest content posted on the site, there is no way to log in to your account or update your blog using the mobile version.
In addition, a Facebook application allows BlogyMate users to keep up with articles directly within Facebook.
Conclusion
BlogyMate has some really great features which will appeal to someone who is still trying to decide which platform to use, but if you’re already firmly plugged into popular platforms like Tumblr, WordPress or Blogger, we’re not sure if it has enough of a pull to get users to cross over.
While the community aspect adds a great dimension to the the blogging platform, the fact that you can’t easily personalize your blog’s appearance is a major drawback. That said, BlogyMate has a lot of must-have blogging features built in to the system, such as tracking visitor statistics, and backing up your blog. These features are available at the click of a button, and don’t require you to tinker with settings or install plugins.
With that in mind, BlogyMate can be seen as the ideal platform for someone who is new to the blogging world, and needs something that works ‘out of the box’. If you’re looking for more elaborate features and greater control over how your blog appears and how it operates at the backend, you would be better sticking to WordPress or Tumblr.
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