On May 13, Movable
Type announced that with version 3.0 they would be "Getting Their Pricing
Right." The new licensing scheme--which only makes MT available for free
for 1 author and up to 3 websites--is, as Mark
Pilgrim has pointed out, a demonstration that "free enough" does
not guarantee any freedoms in the long term. And so many current MT users are
now searching for copyleft and/or open source blogging software alternatives.

Anyone following the many trackback links from MT's announcement will notice
that WordPress is the most popular GPL'd alternative considered by most MT bloggers.
Drupal gets plenty of mention, but often in the context of being described as
too difficult to install or a too feature heavy system for basic bloggers. Indeed,
for many individual users who keep one blogsite and are happy enough with the
features they have now, WP may be the best choice.

But also within those conversation threads across the blogosphere is a common
critique: MT's 3.0 release is feature light, with comment spam control being
the only new addition. Many MT users had looked forward to increased capabilities
in MT 3.0, only to find increased price. Many MT plugin developers now feel
that MT development is first about making money and community second.

For those people wanting more, Drupal has a lot to offer than might be seen
at first glance. It's not without reason that Drupal has the nickname of "community
plumbing" and is often described as innovative and unique. Take a careful
look at the standard Drupal features
and contributed modules ('plugins'
in MT parlance), understand where Drupal will be by the 4.5 release in just
a few months, project the feature rich environment that could be within the
next year, and realize that Drupal will continue to grow in new and interesting
ways, making it one of the best choices for those interested in blogging as
social software.

For example, consider the following items which should address concerns of
some potential MT to Drupal converts:

• Distributed Authentication. While MT has implemented their TypeKey
  centralized registration system as a solution to the comment spam issue,
  each Drupal site not only has onsite registration and comment moderation,
  but also has a distributed authentication system with drupal.module. Any user
  registered on Drupal site X which has drupal.module enabled, can login to
  any other Drupal site Y using drupal.module with their username and password.
  For example, a registered member "user" at drupal.org can login
  in elsewhere with username "user@drupal.org." Someone with the username
  "user" at mysite.com can log onto drupal.org with "user@mysite.com."
  Drupal.module can also ping drupal.org via XML-RPC; to see many sites that
  support Drupal distributed login, visit Sites
  that use Drupal.

  Privacy and dependency issues of centralized authentication aside--and let's
  not forget price since TypeKey, too, could one day be a paid service-- distributed
  authentication represents Drupal's commitment toward increased social networking
  and social software capabilities as also evidenced by discussions
  of implementing FOAF, peopleaggregator's
  adoption of Drupal as their primary platform, Deanspace,
  and Dries's recent modifications
  to the profile module on drupal.org.

• MT-to-Drupal conversion. The MT licensing scheme announcement immediately
  stimulated discussion on the drupal-devel list, resulting in an initiative
  to create a better, more user-friendly method of converting MT sites over
  to Drupal. While the Template for
  MT entry and comment export and Drupal import can easily do the job for
  those that are a little tech savvy, the drupal developers have committed to
  both
  • Improving the import/export script, addressing the issue of importing
    MT comments (the current script imports them as anonymous).
  • Combining the best of the import.module in contrib with the current
    aggregator module to easily enable RSS import of MT blogs, much as WP
    does MT conversions, as well as importing any other website running RSS.
• Install Wizard and Site Profiles. One of the most common complaints
  about Drupal is that it's difficult to install and setup for a given site
  configuration. The Install Wizard to be included in Drupal 4.5 (screenshot),
  will make easy the installation of one or many Drupal sites. Furthermore,
  after completing the installation, the wizard will allow the user to select
  from among preconfigured site installations such as individual weblogs, community
  weblogs, or discussion board communities, significantly reducing the amount
  of time necessary to get a Drupal site up and running.
• Drupal for (MT) Bloggers.  James Seng, a long time MT user,
  has recently started a Drupal
  for Bloggers project. His goal is to make Drupal more MT like. Four
  releases, all over the last week, have already made Drupal even more blogger
  friendly. Like the influence that Deanspace has had on Drupal development,
  many of these changes could eventually make it into the Drupal core or
  a Drupal Install Wizard profile.
• MT-Style Comments. Personally, I prefer the standard Drupal commenting
  system which supports threaded comments. But Drupal site administrators will
  now have a wider range of choice in commenting styles. MT bloggers will appreciate
  the new enhancements to Drupal comments which implements simple
  and anonymous comments.

So before making a decision about which blog software to use, learn more about
Drupal. Realize that it's much more that WP and MT, and an alternative worth
serious consideration. And the price of the licensing scheme will always be
right.