As you can see at the bottom of this page, I am now powered by BlogEngine.NET 1.4

If you are still using some standard blogging provider, I recommend you get you own hosting and install this blogging engine, nothing beats having absolute control over everything... yes world, you are next!

Some of the new features include (from the official site):

New database provider
BlogEngine.NET now works with most commercial and open source databases such as MySQL, SQL Server, VistaDB and many others. This allow you to use practically any database supported by your hosting provider. You can still use XML files if you don't want to use a database.

Drag 'n drop widgets
Widgets are the pieces of content most often located at the sidebar. It could be a list of recent posts, latest tweets from Twitter or anything else. You can drag and drop the widgets around in your sidebar and modify the content of them directly on the front-page. The widget works independently of the theme you are using as long as it is implemented in the theme. In BlogEngine.NET it is implemented in the Standard and Indigo themes and many more themes with widgets will be available for download very soon at the BlogEngine.NET website.

Extension settings
The new settings model for extensions have been upgraded to give you a much better experience using third-party extensions. For extension developers, it has never been easier to store your settings and let the user change them from the admin section. The same settings model is used by the widgets as well.

Web 3.0 improvements
BlogEngine.NET 1.4 makes full use of many semantic formats and technologies such as FOAF, SIOC and APML. It means that the content stored in your BlogEngine.NET installation will be fully portable and auto-discoverable. It is possible to filter the RSS feeds based on the visitor's interest defined in her APML file or do a site search with it as well. Read more the APML filtering in BlogEngine.NET.

Author profiles
By utilizing the ASP.NET profile provider it is now possible to let all authors maintain their own profile. This is used in the FOAF document and widget/extension developers can take full advantage of the profiles to provide new exciting visualizations and functionality.

Other new features
We've listened to what you - the user - wanted in BlogEngine.NET 1.4 and here is a list of some of those features that made it.

• Tag selector when adding new posts
• Subcategories
• Password encryption
• Improved live comment preview
• Hierarchical pages in the control panel
• Smarter comment spam protection
• Link collection widget
• Various performance improvements
• and much more...