@Scott certainly I understand that point– once you have lots of folks on a particular subscription option you want to be VERY careful making changes. The listserv that Bell South used to maintain for videoconferencing (and AT&T folks now maintain) took a HUGE membership hit when it moved to a yahoo group, from what I understand. So I definitely understand the benefits of sticking with Typepad. Typepad is NOT self-hosted too, which is a big benefit I’d guess from a technical support standpoint. If your site gets hacked, you have someone to call for help. That is true with EduBlogs as well I think. There have been times in the past when I’ve wanted more assistance with WordPress tech stuff. I just learned yesterday we have a WordPress user’s group in OKC, and I’m enthused to plug-in with that group. Not everyone is going to want to go the self-hosted route, however, and the technical support side of this is something I probably should have elaborated on more in the post. So– folks should definitely check out options like Typepad and Squarespace. Doug Johnson moved to Squarespace awhile back, I noticed.

@Brad I think you actually can insert images on a Google Site now without going to the HTML view. Choose INSERT – IMAGE and then click to add a direct link. I think they’ve made this easier/better since the earlier iterations of Google Sites:

I did hear about Wetpaint ending their no-ad offer for education, that is unfortunate. I hadn’t heard about Jeff’s work for them as an education advocate ending– bummer. I’m sure we’ll continue to see lots of change in this landscape. That’s another reason I think Google Sites is a good option to invest in (time and energy wise.) Google COULD discontinue sites like they did with Notebook, but I really doubt they will. I think it’s a tool that’s going to be around quite a while.

@Sue – I have thought about dabbling in WordPress MU but don’t have a context for doing so right now – this may be something we explore down the road for Storychasers, I’m not sure. I certainly have heard Scott Floyd sing the praises of Edublogs support for their school implementation of WordPress MU! Thanks for the offer. I am going to tweet you a question on how you all support video embedding on WordPress.

I’m going to comment on a few recent posts here… First of all, congrats on completing the Google Teacher Academy. That is definitely on my short list of professional goals as I enter my 3rd year of teaching. I enjoyed the session notes.

One thing about Google Sites that my wife and I discovered today is that you cannot easily link images to an outside website, only by editing the HTML. This is certainly not something she is keen on doing, and even myself being more experienced with web design would stay away from if at all possible. We are spoiled with WYSIWYG editing, not sure why Google does not integrate this simple feature. (We use an image linked to a website a lot to send students to sites via a screenshot)

One more thing on the Web Hosting topic…. what is your reaction to Wetpaint discontinuing it’s support of Ad Free Education sites as well as Jeff Utecht as an “education ambassador”, citing budget constraints? (http://wikisineducation.wetpaint.com/page/Ad-Free+Education+Wikis) Luckily for me, my class website will remain ad-free since I am already on board, but I will no longer be able to recommend it as a wiki website host for education as it now costs $20 a month to have ads removed. I find this very disheartening since Wetpaint has such great tools for teachers.

Google Sites is certainly the most user friendly of all of the products that you highlighted, the only downside is the lack of customization in terms of layout, theme, branding, etc.

I also have been impressed by Wikispaces, especially since they give add-free accounts to educators. I started a wiki for my school this year. I have a few other teachers using it.

All in all your post is very insightful and spot-on!