Which would you recommend for a new blogger, considering ease of use, ability to customize, quality of built-in analytics or ability to link to analytics engines?

@malachandra I would definitely go with WordPress. It’s far and away the better platform. I’ve got a handful of blogs on WP, Blogger, Posterous, Tumblr, and WordPress is the best one.

Plus if you ever decide to go with self-hosted WordPress (i.e. on your own server), migrating from WP.com to the self-hosted version is much easier than any of the other platforms.

Wordpress stats give you a good feel of what content your visitors like. Like analytics it gives you the data of where the visitor comes from ( not geographic) what links they click on and how maany people visit. I think you’ll like Wordpres. Give it a shot…it’s free…I have one.. that’s just for fun…come visit…..photo blog..http//treebranchdesign.wordpress.com

@malachandra I would recommend WordPress.com – that way, if you decide to move on to a self-hosted blog using WordPress, it will be easier to migrate your content.

@jaylee Normally I would suggest WordPress the full version over WordPress.com, but his question was specifically between WordPress.com and Blogger.  Between those two, WordPress.com wins hands down.  :)

Kristi and Erik both mentioned that it is easy to migrate from WP.com to a self-hosted blog. In the interim, can you use WP.com hosting but have it connect to a separate domain name? That is, if you want to avoid the wordpress.com domain tag, can you use a domain you get from GO Daddy, etc. as the blog’s address but have traffic forwarded to the actual WP hosted blog?

@malachandra In a nutshell I always tell people that WP has better SEO, Blogger is the easiest platform to use.  So some of my customers actually don’t want to be found on the web, and just sharing a blog with family or friends and prefer Blogger. However, most people you ask will say “wordpress” whether wordpress.com or a hosted WP blog.

Heather

I will move to wp.org when I have the financing to back it up. It seems it’s expensive. 

@blogsbyheather are there any cases where TypePad is the best choice?

@richardmclaughlin Hi Mac!
I have lots of clients who use TypePad and I’m quite familiar with it as my main business blog is a TypePad blog (long story).  But if you are going to pay for a blog platform, then WordPress is the better choice.
But again, if you have a Typepad blog and need help with something, just give a holler. Heather
P.S. Sorry I’ve been MIA.

I might have to even offer you a third option and here say Tumblr seems to rank very well on search engines lately. Very easy to use and set up a new blog and do just about anything you want plus a great community.
Between wordpress and blogger though I recommend wordpress. More widely used so as he/she expands their blogging in the future they will have a better grasp of it then if they where to use blogger..adslot-overlay {position: absolute; font-family: arial, sans-serif; background-color: rgba(0,0,0,0.65); border: 2px solid rgba(0,0,0,0.65); color: white !important; margin: 0; z-index: 2147483647; text-decoration: none; box-sizing: border-box; text-align: left;}.adslot-overlay-iframed {top: 0; left: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0;}.slotname {position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; right: 0; font-size: 13px; font-weight: bold; padding: 3px 0 3px 6px; vertical-align: middle; background-color: rgba(0,0,0,0.45); text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap; overflow: hidden;}.slotname span {text-align: left; text-decoration: none; text-transform: capitalize;}.revenue {position: absolute; bottom: 0; left: 0; right: 0; font-size: 11px; padding: 3px 0 3px 6px; vertial-align: middle; text-align: left; background-color: rgba(0,0,0,0.45); font-weight: bold; text-overflow: ellipsis; overflow: hidden; white-space: nowrap;}.revenue .name {color: #ccc;}.revenue .horizontal .metric {display: inline-block; padding-right: 1.5em;}.revenue .horizontal .name {padding-right: 0.5em;}.revenue .vertical .metric {display: block; line-height: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 0.5em;}.revenue .vertical .name, .revenue .vertical .value {display: block;}.revenue .square .metric, .revenue .button .metric {display: table-row;}.revenue .square .metric {line-height: 1.5em;}.revenue .square .name, .revenue .square .value, .revenue .button .value {display: table-cell;}.revenue .square .name {padding-right: 1.5em;}.revenue .button .name {display: block; margin-right: 0.5em; width: 1em; overflow: hidden; text-overflow: clip;}.revenue .button .name:first-letter {margin-right: 1.5em;}a.adslot-overlay:hover {border: 2px solid rgba(58,106,173,0.9);}a.adslot-overlay:hover .slotname {border-bottom: 1px solid rgba(81,132,210,0.9); background-color: rgba(58,106,173,0.9);}a.adslot-overlay:hover .revenue {border-top: 1px solid rgba(81,132,210,0.9); background-color: rgba(58,106,173,0.9);}div.adslot-overlay:hover {cursor: not-allowed; border: 2px solid rgba(64,64,64,0.9);}div.adslot-overlay:hover .slotname {border-bottom: 1px solid rgba(128,128,128,0.9); background-color: rgba(64,64,64,0.9);}div.adslot-overlay:hover .revenue {border-top: 1px solid rgba(128,128,128,0.9); background-color: rgba(64,64,64,0.9);}