So, yeah, blog*spot is up and running. It's a free (ad-supported) hosting service for Blogger blogs. We really should have done this a long, long time ago. It was part of the original idea when we launched Blogger and has come up lots of time since. The reason we hadn't done it, though, is because we didn't really want to get into the hosting business. That's a crowded market, and we can work with most hosts already. Why not just partner with someone(s)? Well, we're working on some partnerships (if you're in the hosting business, email me at ev at pyra.com), but decided we just needed to get something up and running. You wouldn't believe how many times I've talked to journalists, CEO's of potential partner companies, investors, etc. and find out they've been to Blogger but never gotten past the "enter your FTP server" field. No telling how much that's cost us. Not that that's the only motivation. As Matt says, it's nice that Blogger now can help anyone communicate -- not just the geeks who know how to set it up. :)