Constructive Criticism

There are three products that I'm using that are in Beta...other than Gmail which I've decided will always be beta.  I'm currently typing this in Windows LiveWriter.  I think it's a pretty slick interface and it definitely makes it easier to type posts and imagine how they're going to look, but...am I too stupid to put a picture in a post?  When I try to use the function to insert a picture it goes, but then when I go to publish, it tells me that it can't upload the photo.  I understand I could throw the photo on my web server and then write html code pointing to that picture, but 2 things...I thought tools like LiveWriter were supposed to eliminate any necessity to know html and secondly, I'm not that smart.  Not to mention the fact that IE won't let me upload pictures and Firefox won't let me edit posts, so I have to make sure if I'm gonna have a picture in my post it better be in there on the first try.

I'm also testing out Blogger's beta.  I think some of the features are cool, definitely an upgrade, but here's something I don't like.  It utilizes a Google login (Google owns Blogger) which is fine because I have one, but it isn't the same login as my Blogger login.  I wasn't using gmail in November of 2004 when I started my first blog.  So every time I go to the Blogger dashboard I have to tell it I want to sign in with a different user name and then sign in with my Blogger username.  You may think I'm being trivial, but when instantly my Gnotifier doesn't know if I have email and when I go to gmail I have to sign in with my gmail login.  If they were the same login, I wouldn't have a problem, but they're purposely not the same.  And you would think that as Blogger lets users play with the beta they would welcome feedback with open arms, which they do...if it's one of the 6 FAQ issues that the form allows you to select to send a feedback form to Blogger.  It's pretty frustrating.

The third thing I'm testing is the Office 2007 beta.  I haven't used it at all yet, because the disk they sent me was a DVD-ROM and I only have DVD ROM on my laptop.  I don't use any office products on my laptop often enough that I haven't opened a single Office program since I installed 2007.  I'll have to make a concerted effort to do some Excel and Word stuff outside over the weekend on WiFi and see how it is.  There are also some new products included in the Office Suite that I'll see if I have any use for.