Blogger Is Unfair - To Would Be Blog Thieves

Blog owners continue to forget the account name and / or password of their Blogger accounts, then demand alternate recovery options.

Every week, we see the reports in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue, claiming that changing their email - or getting a new phone - caused somebody to unfairly lose access to her / his blog. Too many blog owners refuse to understand that the email address and phone number are simply backdoor accesses to their Blogger accounts.

When given advice to use Blogger: Forgot your username or password?, or Blogger Help: Having trouble signing in or viewing your blog?, we frequently see demurrer.

Neither tool helps me. Can I please contact a real person?

The implication, when demanding human real time contact, is that the blog owner (or would be blog thief) can provide secret details - which when supplied, will convince a real Google security employee that the Blogger account / blog is the legal property of the complainant.

Secret details, which are jointly effective for Blogger / Google and the would be blog owner, are quite limited.

Account / blog recovery details have standards, to be useful.

Any account / blog recovery has to be based upon details which have three requirements.

1. The would be owner knows, and can use.
2. Blogger / Google can verify, within their own databases.
3. No third person can discover, using enough search time (Google or competitor) - or manufacture, using PhotoShop or a similar product.

Any details, which do not fulfill all 3 requirements, are either useless or unsafe. If unwisely accepted by Blogger / Google, they simply allow theft of someone else's properly secured Blogger account and blogs.

Verification can only use Blogger / Google maintained details.

Verification has to be based on Blogger / Google databases. Blogger cannot accept FaceBoook, Twitter, or WordPress personal pages or profiles, as proof of identity or ownership.

Blogger has a responsibility to active blog owners, to not permit theft.

Many complainants claim that Blogger is being unfair, in denying them access to their blogs. They overlook the fact that unwisely accepting publicly known or unverifiable details, as proof of blog ownership / identity, would be unfair to the millions of blog owners, who remember their login details - and are actively maintaining and publishing their blogs.

The purpose of account recovery is not to simply allow every blog owner access to their blogs, even if they casually neglected to remember required identification tokens (account name, email address, password, etc.). The purpose is to allow as many blog owners as possible access to their blogs - while preventing malicious blog theft by hackers able to misuse the provided recovery tools.

Active blog owners want their blogs to remain theirs.

People who carefully maintain access to their accounts and blogs do so, based on the presumption that Blogger / Google will not unwisely give someone else access. These people appreciate the Blogger promise that our blogs will remain ours, forever - as long as we exercise common sense and courtesy.

The many blog owners, who maintain both front door and back door access - and actively maintain and publish their blogs - do not really care about the few who need "their" long dormant blogs recovered - or who want to delete "their" blogs, so they can move their activity to FaceBook or WordPress. They appreciate that Blogger will not give up login details, without observing appropriate caution.

How To Not Get Content For Your Blog

One of the oddest displays of naivete we see, from some blog owners, asking in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I?, would be

How do I let anybody post to my blog?

These owners have no idea how popular they would be, with spammers, were this to happen.

If you have a blog, and you want to let up to 99 of your closest friends publish their thoughts to your blog, you can setup a team blog, and have fun. Beyond that limit, you cannot - nor should you - go.

Occasionally, in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? we see the anguish

Where did the spam, on my blog, come from?

These queries come from people whose blogs have been successfully attacked, by hackers or spammers, and who now see content which they do not appreciate, being posted in their blog.

Leaving blog open to public authorship will make your blog spammer friendly.

If you were to voluntarily let anybody post in your blog, without requiring that anybody hack to gain control surreptitiously, your blog will become very popular with spammers.

After spammers saturate your blog content, your genuine friends will find elsewhere to post - and your remaining friends will be spammers. And your new friends (spammers) will tell their friends (more spammers), about a blog which accepts ads (posts) from everybody.

Your blog will be late classified as a spam host.

Shortly after this happens, your blog will be - righteously - classified as a spam host, and taken offline. And if you cannot show any non spam content, it will likely stay offline.

We're sorry, but your blog cannot be restored. It was recently confirmed as spam. Blogger suggests that you read the TOS.

You are responsible for content distributed by your "guest authors".

Another thing to consider, as the owner of a "host" blog, where "guests" post contributed material, is that you will be responsible for the content posted by your guests - whether you let the world post - or designated members.

• If you allow guest posts in your blog, you, as the blog owner, are responsible for the content of those posts.
• If your "guest" posts the same material elsewhere (as in his own blog, or a third person's blog), and search engines index both blogs, both blogs may receive "duplicated content" penalties.
• Nobody benefits, from duplicated content.

Unfortunately, you have to develop your blog content, yourself. Don't expect the public to provide your content for you - and plan to keep your blog online for long.

Blog Membership Is The Responsibility Of The Blog Administrators

We see occasional confusion in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? about gaining (or re gaining) access to a given blog.

I made my buddy an administrator - and now, I can't control the blog. Who do I contact to get this corrected?

and

I was reader of a blog which is now private. Can Blogger provide me contact to the blog owner?

Not everybody realises that Blogger does not provide blog access / membership control.

Though Blogger / Google is theoretically responsible (to a very limited degree) for content of the blogs which they host, access and membership control of any blog is the responsibility of the blog administrators / owners. And control is ownership.

If you provide your friend control of your blog, and your friend removes your control, the blog is now your (former) friend's responsibility. Blogger will not help you regain control, either.

If you want access to a private blog, Blogger won't help you there, either. Blogger supports our desire to publish a blog anonymously and in complete privacy - and if we (or anybody else) publishes a blog privately, they are responsible for proving contact information.

If you lose control of your blog, by forgetting the owning account name / password, and losing access to any backup tokens, you have lost control of your blog. Hoping that a responsible owner still exists, Blogger will retain the blog in question, until a responsible owner shows up. Threatening a lawsuit, because Blogger has stolen your blog, is frivolous misuse of court time.

In neither case, will you do anything but waste time, by posting in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? and demanding personal attention, from a real person in Google.

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What Is The Mysterious 90 Day Period, After Blog Deletion?

We see periodic evidence of confusion, in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I?, about deletion of our blogs.

I deleted my blog last year - can I get it back?

and

I deleted my blog last month - when will I be able to use it with my new Blogger account?

and

I deleted my blog, but it's still visible, on the Internet!

Not everybody is fully able to understand the "90 day" deletion policy.

Confusion about blog deletion, blog recovery, URL availability, and ongoing visibility have been a problem for many years.

The uncertainty started in 2011, when Blogger gave us the ability to restore our deleted blogs. That year, Blogger gave us the "90 day" provision.

From what we know, the "90 day" provision simply says that blogs deleted over 90 days ago, by the owner, cannot be un deleted. Blogger has yet to advise us, definitively, that a blog (URL), deleted over 90 days ago, would produce any secondary result.

• The URL won't be available, for use by you (under another Blogger account) - or by someone else.
• Any removal from search engine cache will happen only if you plan the deletion, before hitting "Delete blog".
• The blog will simply be un recoverable, by us, since Blogger does not archive deleted blogs for un deletion by us, over 90 days.

Further uncertainties:

• If the URL becomes available, it will be equally available to you, and to everybody else, at the same time.
• If you did not delete the blog, you may not know exactly when the 90 days clock started.
• We are not, with 100% certainty, able to predict that all blogs become available, even after the 90 days.

So don't tell your friends of the date when you will have the blog, re published under the URL - if you are depending upon deletion to make the URL available.

The 90 day period may apply only to blogs deleted by the owner. A blog deleted / locked for suspected spam hosting, by Blogger, may remain in that status indefinitely, until reviewed.

When reviewed as a suspected spam host, a blog will be either removed permanently (for righteous spam deletions), or restored (for spurious spam deletions), at the decision of Blogger Support. In neither case will this, reliably, make the URL available to the public.

Whether the blog is visible on our dashboards (or not), and recoverable by us (or not), unless we make preparation for updating services outside Blogger - for instance, Google Webmaster Tools - a deleted blog will be visible in search engine cache, for a long time.

Please Blogger, Restore My Deleted Blog!! #2

In 2009, Blogger Support became weary from handling too many problem reports from blog owners who had made such a simple mistake.

I hit the wrong key, and deleted my blog! Help Me!!

They started archiving deleted blogs, and gave us a wizard to un delete a newly deleted blog, from the archive. Unfortunately, that ability to un delete a blog has two major limitations.

1. A deleted blog can be un deleted within 90 days.
2. A deleted blog can be un deleted by a blog administrator.

Some blog owners find out the relevance of the second limitation the hard way - after they delete their blog, then find out that they have two (or more) Blogger accounts.

From a cursory examination, two similar symptoms

I hit the wrong key, and deleted my blog!

and

I can't find my blog on the dashboard!

would result from the same problem, and have the same solution - un delete the deleted blog. However, the second symptom has an equally common diagnosis

You are logged in with the wrong Blogger account.

This diagnosis is generally derived from ownership analysis, of the missing blog.

Unfortunately, ownership can only be determined when the blog in question is online. And that is the problem seen, too many times, when people try to un delete their deleted blog.

If you just deleted your blog, there are two diagnostic procedures, commonly used in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, that you'll not find useful.

• Account recovery. The Blogger "Forgot your username or password?" wizard is useless, for a deleted blog.
• Ownership analysis. You cannot determine the owner, without examining live blog content.

If you just deleted your blog, and you don't have access to an owning Blogger account, you're going to have to brute force your way back to control. For each possible email address (GMail or non GMail), you must

1. Clear cache, cookies, and sessions (yes, all 3!), and restart the browser.
2. Use the Blogger "Forgot your username or password?" wizard, and plug in an email address.
3. See if you get email and can recover access to a Blogger account.
4. See if you can un delete anything from the dashboard, for that account.

This is going to be a frustrating exercise - but it's probably your only solution possible. There are only two ways to avoid this exercise.

• Don't delete your blog, by mistake.
• Always maintain access to your blog.

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Blogger Is Not Blocking Access To Your Blog

I've explained the issues about Blogger account maintenance, and blog access, so many times.

I've described it as possession being the law, or as reading between the lines, or even as responsible practice - and some people just don't understand these issues. Some people try to describe their problem, when they have a problem, as Blogger unlawfully stealing their possession.

Blogger won't give me access to my blog - do I need a court order to get access to my blog, and to my content?

At first glance, they have a point - Blogger has to give us access to our blogs, or they cease being our blogs. If you look closer though, there's a flaw in that reasoning.

Blogger lets you publish a blog, without identifying yourself legally to them, as long as you retain control of the blog.

To retain control, you have to access a Blogger account that owns the blog. You have two methods of access, to any Blogger account - a front door, and a back door.

1. The front door: The account name (email address when setup originally), and the current password.
2. The back door: The email address currently associated with the account, and access to that email address.

If you lose both the front door and the back door, you can't access the Blogger account, and you can't control the blog. If you lose access, don't blame Blogger for your loss of access.

Blogger is not preventing you from accessing your blog, and doing whatever you wish, with your blog - as long as you can prove that it's your blog. Blogger will assist you, when possible, to access your Blogger account, and your blog.

When you make it impossible, as when you lose both the front door and the back door, they can't assist you. If they can't assist you now, they will still hold the blog, patiently, until you are able to prove that it's your blog.

Your blog is still there, waiting for you to access it. It will remain there, waiting for you to access it. Blogger is not preventing you from accessing your blog.

There Will Always Be Multiple Blogs, For Any Popular Subject

Anyone is free to publish a Blogger blog, discussing any subject.

The Blogosphere is full of many blogs, some discussing the same subject as others. A blog on any subject can have any title desired by the owner - and the title can be identical to the subject, or it may differ from the subject, as desired. This leads to many blogs having the same title - and this is OK.

Unfortunately, though many blogs may have the same subject and title, each blog must have a unique URL. Some blog owners have a problem with this policy, since they believe that their subject, title, and URL must match. Not every blog owner understands why not every blog, ever written, can have a matching subject, title, and URL.

Since anybody can publish a blog on any subject desired, there will be many blogs discussing the more popular subjects.

Blogger has a clear and undisputable URL allocation policy.

Like disputes over vanity license plates, this leads to harsh feelings - because once a URL is taken by somebody, that URL is not available to anybody else. Blogger has a clear and definitive policy on the subject of URL allocation.

Blogger accounts and Blog*Spot addresses do not expire.

Some would be blog owners ignore the reality of the Blogger policy.

Some prospective blog owners, seeing the URL of their dreams already in use, spend some time examining the blogs published to the URLs which they deem worthy of their blog.

Finding one or more blogs being inactively published, by their standards, they conclude that Blogger has a problem with URL allocation, and with their stated policy. They then publish a complaint in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken.

I would like to suggest that after a period of years where a blog that has less than some number of posts, the current owner of the blog is sent notice declaring that unless they respond within some number of days, their URL will be taken from them, so it may be reassigned to another, more worthy blog owner.

These envious blog owners seem to overlook several details.

• Any blog owner is free to publish a blog, and to discuss any subject of interest.
• Relevant to any subject, the owner may publish any number of posts as desired.
• Relevant to any subject, the owner may publish as often (or as rarely) as desired.
• The more popular blog subjects will have more blogs published, discussing that subject - and most likely, using the more relevant URLs.

To make the suggestion work, Blogger would need to establish a URL retention policy, and judge each URL whenever necessary - possibly relevant to the current popularity of the blog subject. The more popular subjects (and URLs) will have more applicants for that URL, and will be judged more often. If you want a URL that's not available, what are the chances that you are alone, in wanting that URL?

Everybody cannot have the URL of their dreams.

The bottom line is simple.

The more popular the blog subject, the less likely that you will get the URL of your dreams, to use with your blog.

If you have a blog to start, start it today, and pick an available URL. Don't waste time trying to convince Blogger to give you someone else's URL. Consider alternate choices.

• Make a different spelling or punctuated version of your desired URL (as available).
• Publish a Blogger blog to a non BlogSpot URL (as available).
• Find another blog host, and publish your dream URL using their service (again, as available).

A Blog Will Always Have At Least One Administrator

Almost daily, we see a confused query in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken

I lost ownership access to my blog. Can Blogger restore my access?

Not every blog owner realises that the Permissions wizard has a safeguard, ensuring that every blog will always have at least one administrator. Anybody who is the former owner is now a member of a team blog - and at least one other team member is an administrator.

The ownership transfer process involves 4 steps, out of necessity.

1. Invite a new member (if necessary).
2. Wait while the new member accepts the invitation (again, if necessary).
3. Make the new member an administrator.
4. Remove the old administrator (if necessary).

Each step can be executed immediately, or with any amount of elapsed time after the previous step, at your convenience.

Look at the Permissions wizard for your blog, some time. If you are the only administrator, you will see your name, with no ability to delete or demote yourself.

A team blog will have author status selectors.

If you own a team blog, you'll have a selector for each of the team members who are authors, allowing that member to be promoted to administrator status.

A team blog with multiple administrators will have administrator status selectors.

If the team blog has at least 2 administrators, each administrator will have a selector, allowing any administrator to delete or demote any administrator. As an administrator demotes any administrator to an author, the entry for that new author will have the ability for that author to be again promoted to administrator.

A blog with only one administrator will have no administrator status selector.

Whenever you are the only administrator, your member entry will have no ability to delete or demote. This prevents you from having a blog with no administrator.

Of course, as noted elsewhere, when the blog has at least 2 administrators, any administrator can be deleted or demoted at the decision of any other administrator. Also, team status is not checked when accounts are deleted.

If you are demoted, only an administrator can promote you.

The bottom line here is, if you suddenly find yourself without administrative access to your blog, the advice that you will get will be to

Ask one of the blog administrators to restore your status.

To prevent blog theft, only another administrator can restore your status.

Blogger Provides Blog Access Using Two Factor Authentication

Many bloggers are confused about how to protect their blogs, both from unauthorised administrative access, and unauthorised viewing. An example of the confusion is the occasional question

How do I set a password in my blog, to prevent unwanted viewers?

and the correct answer here is simple.

You can't set a password. Blogger uses two factor authentication, to protect your blog.

If you own a house or a car, you may occasionally wish to provide guest access to your house or car. Maybe you have an extra key, which you lend to your guests, so they may use your house or car at their convenience. If you've done this, you may observe inconveniences caused by availability of a shared key.

• A key may be lost, necessitating re keying of the locks, and distribution of a new key to all who have access.
• You may not wish for your guests to have access to the entire house or car, at all times.
• You may not wish for your guests to have access to the entire house or car, permanently.
• Your guests may decide that carrying another key, on a separate key ring, may be too much trouble. They may wish to put your key on their key ring. This can cause more complications.
• Distributing, and maintaining, a key library to everybody may simply be a lot of work.

In higher priced houses or cars, people have discovered the advantages of using electronic locks, which can provide more choices than simply providing a single key, available identically to everybody.

Blogger uses two factor authentication, which is equivalent in sophistication to the electronic lock which you use (or may wish to use) on your house or car. This allows you, and your guests, convenient and protected access to your blog. Two factor authentication provides more convenience, and protection, to both of you.

• You identify your guest by their public email address, and send them an invitation to your blog.
• Your guest accepts the invitation, using the Blogger account of their choice, and using their own personal password.
• You are safe from your guest, and your guest is safe from you, from either of you knowing too much about each other.

If you wish to provide additional access to your blog - either another administrator, another author, or a designated reader, use the Settings - Permissions wizard, and add a member of the appropriate type. That's how you manage blog access.

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Blog Ownership - Possession Is The Law

Long ago, Blogger blogs had a very simple membership permissions policy.

Each blog had an owner, and members. The owner was the administrator of the blog, and ownership could not be transferred.

This simple policy was a problem, because some blog owners would eventually lose interest in a blog, and want to cede ownership to someone else. In other cases, people were known to die suddenly, leaving blogs with no live owners. In both cases, Blogger Support would become involved, and would manually transfer ownership.

Later, Blogger developed the Permissions wizard, and added a class of member called "Administrator". The original publisher of a blog becomes the first administrator, who may, at his / her discretion, designate additional administrators.

The ability to designate an "Administrator" solved the problem of nontransferable ownership, but introduced a second problem.

Any administrator could, at her / his discretion again, remove him / herself (or any other administrator) from the administrators list.

Initially, this improvement created two problems.

1. Some bloggers managed to remove all administrators from the list, creating blogs with no administrators.
2. Some bloggers, newly made administrator, would inappropriately remove other bloggers (including the original administrator aka "owner") from administrative status.

Blogger fixed the first problem, by adding a safeguard - making the Permissions wizard check for the presence of other administrators in the membership list, before removing administrator permission from any one member. However, there remain two problems, now.

1. The safeguard works only if you can guarantee that all administrators can perform as administrators.
2. This policy works only if you can guarantee that all administrators will perform honourably.

If blog membership is to be fully transferrable, all administrators to a blog have to have equal status. If you have an "owner" class of administrator, and a suddenly dead owner, you have a blog with no active owner. Or, you have blogs with non transferrable ownership status.

Right now, anybody who is a blog administrator is a blog owner. If you make someone an administrator, and that person removes you (and any other administrators) from administrator status, that person becomes the blog owner.

If you have an administrator who dies, you do not prune the administrator list, and you are able to remove yourself from administrator status, you may end up with a blog with no live owner.

The administrator(s) / owner - whoever she / he may be - has the right to decide over disposition of comments and posts - and of who to make a member, and to make an administrator. Blogger cannot, legally, "restore" anybody's previous rights.

If the "owner" deleted the blog, it's going to remain deleted. Contributors, and former "owners", have no say in the matter. If deleted content must be recovered, it may be possible to do this on a page by page (post by post) basis - possibly from blog cache or a blog posts newsfeed.

Possession is the law, for Blogger blogs. If you gave up control (voluntarily or even involuntarily), it's not your blog.

Putting A Post At The Top (A "Welcome" Post) - Part 2

Many people have asked how they can have a Welcome or Index message in their blog.

I have a Welcome message, at the top of Nitecruzr Buzz, or on this blog, for instance.

This blog uses a text gadget, positioned above the post gadget, which leaves a gadget that shows up on every page. On Nitecruzr Buzz, I used a future dated post, so my "Welcome" showed up only on the "Home" page. Neither solution was optimal.

• A true "Welcome" message should show up only on the "Home" (first) page. A text gadget shows up on every page.
• A future dated post shows up only on the "Home" page, but it shows up in the Archive index with a future date.

Today, I fixed my Buzz Welcome message, so it only shows up on the "Home" page, and it does not show up as a post, in an archive index.

What I now have is a Text gadget, that only displays on the "Home" page. Here's how you do that.

First, (you should have to ask?) backup the template. Then add a Text gadget to the page, and position the gadget just above the post gadget. Give it a snappy title, "Welcome To My Blog!".

Then tweak the new gadget.

1. Identify the gadget to be tweaked.
2. Add the Conditional Gadget CSS rule, using the Template Designer "Add CSS" wizard.

 
<b:if cond='data:blog.canonicalUrl != data:blog.homepageUrl'>
<style>
#Text1 {display: none !important;}
</style>
</b:if>

Remember to add a blank line, above or below the code block being added, if there is already code visible in "Add CSS".

Save the change. Edit the text gadget as displayed on the blog, and remove the "WelcomeMessage" title. And of course, backup the template, again. And, it's done.

Now, if you want a dynamic "Welcome" page - maybe one based on posts published to a given label, you can do that too, with just a bit more work. And there are several variations on the "if" statement, that will let you selectively display (or not display) your gadget on other specific pages.

An easy alternative solution for this need, more recently offered, would be to use a static page, and a redirected Home page.

The choices are multiple. Just consider your needs, and how easy the various alternatives may be.

Blog Membership Changes Won't Have Immediate Effect

We see these horror tales, occasionally.

I made my blog private, and only invited a few friends. The next day, I checked my visitor logs, and saw evidence of people that I did not invite, still viewing the blog.

or

My friend was a second administrator of my blog. I decided that I did not want him administering the blog, so I removed him from Permissions. To my dismay, the following day, he was still able to make changes.

With Blogger, membership / permission for any blog is checked only when someone initially accesses a blog. Ability to access a private blog, or to administer or post to any blog, is provided in a cookie based token. If someone does not clear cookies, or close the browser after clearing cache, access to the blog will continue, until the cookie expires. If someone tries to access the blog, and he has a cookie permitting him to do so, he will continue to get access - even if the access is revoked.

So once again, I urge you to grant access to your blog with care and discretion, and note that when you change your mind, your change may not be immediate.

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Recovering Your Account Information

Blogger promises us that our blogs will be ours, forever, and that we are free to publish our blogs in privacy, if we so desire.

They do this by protecting our Blogger accounts behind Two Factor Authentication. Both the name of our Blogger account, and the password used, are our secret to keep.

Since both the account name and the password are secrets, you can't just write to Blogger Support one day and say

I forgot my account name - can you tell me what it is?

When you setup a Blogger account, you provide an email address, which will be used for recovering forgotten account names and passwords.

If you forget the account name, or need to reset the password, you can use the Forgot your username or password? wizard.

"Forgot?" has two options, which you use depending upon what you know.

The "Forgot?" wizard gives you two options, and sends a recovery email message accordingly.

• Recover access to an account. Provide the account name (the email address that you provided when opening the Blogger account), and the email goes to to the primary email address for that account.
• Recover access to the blog. Provide the URL of the blog in question, and the email goes to the owning account(s) for that blog.

There are several interesting details, with the "Forgot?" wizard.

• The wizard works only for BlogSpot URLs. If the blog is published to a non BlogSpot URL (as a custom domain), you will need to provide the original BlogSpot URL.
• The wizard works for all BlogSpot URLs - regardless of the Country Code alias which affects the blog owner. Whether the owner is in Canada (and seeing "xxxxxxx.blogspot.ca"), in Mexico (and seeing "xxxxxxx.blogspot.mx"), or in the USA (and seeing either "xxxxxxx.blogspot.com" or "xxxxxxx.blogspot.us"), you use only the "xxxxxxx" BlogSpot name, in this wizard.
• The wizard works only for active URLs. If the blog is deleted, either by you or by Blogger, you won't be able to recover access.
• You will only get the recovery email, when you login to the recovery email account. You have to use an active email account, for recovering your login information.
• Blogger will not tell you the email address, since the account name / email address is kept a secret.
• Blogger cannot tell you anything, if you have intentionally obscured your identity.

In cases where the account was last used under Old (Pre 2006) Blogger, the Claim your blog wizard may be used - but note that Legacy accounts are no longer supported, in general.

"Having trouble?" complements "Forgot?".

A third possibility would be the Google Having trouble signing in? wizard. You may also find Google Accounts: Secondary Email Address to provide relevant - if not welcome - advice.

In any case, your personal identity is kept a secret from others - as other folks identities are kept a secret from you. If you don't have access to the email account that's associated with the Blogger account, you don't get the email. That restriction leads to interesting scenarios - such as mysterious email received from the Forgot Password wizard, caused by desperation.

Whether you use either "Forgot?" wizard, when you open the email and login to Blogger as part of the authentication process, be sure that you provide / use the right Blogger / Google account. Alternately, clear cache, cookies, and sessions - then restart the browser - before executing either wizard. Do not claim or recover the blog, to an unknown or unexpected account.

Recovery is easiest done, using two browsers.

Account recovery will involve accessing two accounts, simultaneously - and is best done using two browsers.

It's possible that understanding the relationships between Blogger accounts, email addresses, and Google accounts may reduce your need to continue. If your account is based on a non GMail email address, you may wish to consider the special relationships.

Your next possible solution is to try using the Blogger "Forgot your password?" wizard. If "Forgot?" does not provide you enough clues, you're entitled to ask Blogger Support for help - but you need to understand the limitations of their ability to help.

If you choose to ask for help, consider making an effort to recover access to your GMail account, or to your non GMail account, as necessary. And when you check your email accounts, GMail or non GMail, check carefully.

Having recovered the account, you should be able to find the blogs previously owned - and possibly un delete them - starting from the "Deleted blogs" dashboard list.


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Some blog owners lose access to their #Blogger accounts - either forgetting the account name / password, or letting the blog go dormant and requiring demographic authentication when trying to access later. They expect that Blogger will just send them an access token, without verifying that they are the rightful owner.

They fail to observe that Blogger wants them to continue publishing their blog - and does not intend to let unknown parties have control of it, through failure to require verification of identity.

Identifying Yourself, As The Owner Of Your Blog

Occasionally, somebody in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? wonders

Why don't I have a Layouts (or Template) link in my dashboard?

or

How do I setup additional team members, without the right link in Permissions?

and the first question is

Are you logged in as the blog administrator / owner?

It's not difficult to verify the owner of your blog, if you have a public profile, and a standard template.

In your browser, select View, then "Page Source" or "Source". Or, use an HTTP text proxy. Look at the code for this blog, heavily trimmed and broken, for 'link rel="me"'.

<head>

...

<link rel="service.post" type="application/atom+xml"
title="The Real Blogger Status - Atom"
href="http://www.blogger.com/feeds/24069595/posts/default" />
<link rel="EditURI" type="application/rsd+xml"
title="RSD" href="http://www.blogger.com/rsd.g?blogID=24069595" />
<link rel="me" href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/08069634565746003311" />

There it is!

https://www.blogger.com/profile/08069634565746003311

or maybe you'd see

https://plus.google.com/114025756997654559499

That's my profile. Click on either link.

Find the Profile URL, and follow the link - and look at the Profile.

So, look at the header code for your blog, locate the "me" link, extract the attached URL, and follow the link- either for a Blogger Profile, or for a Google+ Profile.

If there's no "me" link - which is normal, for blogs under team ownership - look carefully in the sidebar - if the blog has a Profile / "About Us" gadget, you may be able to find a "www.blogger.com/profile/ ..." or "plus.google.com/ ..." link there.

With some team blogs, you may find a list of each individual profile, for the whole team. Each individual profile should have a different Profile ID in the attached URL - again, "www.blogger.com/profile/ ..." or "plus.google.com/ ...".

Then, find the Profile URL from your dashboard - and compare the two.

Take each available "www.blogger.com/profile/ ..." or "plus.google.com/ ..." link, paste it into your browser, and take a look - or click on the link, if possible. Then, go to your dashboard, and find the Profile URL, from the dashboard. Compare the two profiles - are they the same?

If not, you probably inadvertently created a second (or third) Blogger account, possibly as you incorrectly transferred a blog from one Blogger account to another.

Learn to login to Blogger properly - and avoid multi account confusion.

When you login to Blogger, first clear cache, cookies, and active login sessions - then make sure that you login using the proper Blogger account. If necessary, recover the account information, and start over.

Remember that when you login, Blogger will not select the account for you. If you have FeedBurner, GMail, Picasa, or any of the other many Google services under another account, you'll need to use two different browsers - or a different computer.

Note the limitations of the procedure, when the owner wants privacy.

Note that this procedure works only for blogs and profiles that are properly made public. If a blogger has chosen to not make the profile public, or if the blog in question is published as private (with designated readers), you won't get the details needed here. And if the blog has multiple administrators, it probably won't have the "me" meta tag in the header.

In extreme cases, you'll need assistance from Blogger, using the Having trouble signing in? wizard. Now, you have to hope that your account isn't intentionally based on a bogus email address.

Transferring A Blog From One EMail Account To Another - An Alternate

I've written about the simple procedure of transferring a blog from one Blogger account to another, and how simple it should be.

Sometimes reality steps in - and the normal transfer procedure won't work.

• Maybe you don't want your EMail (GMail) address known by the current blog owner.
• Maybe the two EMail addresses are thoroughly tangled - you invite the second EMail address as a blog member but just don't get the email - even in "Bulk" or "Spam"! What to do?
• Maybe you opened the invitation email under one account, but were logged in to Blogger using the other account. This can happen if you execute the transfer, using just one browser.

Sometimes, having ignored one or two basic (to me) rules of Blogger account existence, you just can't send a membership invitation to a second Blogger account.

Here's where we think outside the box.

• Setup an extra email account, based upon any non GMail email address. I'll suggest Yahoo.com as an example here - but you can use whatever email service works for you.
• Go to Settings - Permissions, and add your new Yahoo email address as an invited member.
• For the Yahoo email part of the process, use a separate browser. If this browser has been used before, clear cache, cookies, and authenticated sessions, restart the browser, and login again to Yahoo. Start with a clean browser here.
• Go to your Yahoo email account, and open your email. Remember to look in your "Bulk" or "Spam" folder, if you don't see anything in "Inbox".
• Accept membership in the blog.
• When you're asked for an account / password, select "Use a different account"!
• Enter the second Blogger account name (address), and the correct password for that account.
• Go back to the Permissions display, and refresh.
• Verify that you have a new member in the Author list.
• Return to the normal procedure, and complete the transfer.

A little extra work, that. But if you need to transfer control of the blog, to make it possible to manage the blog from the other Blogger account, it's probably worth it.

And, next time you transfer blog ownership, you will (hopefully) use two browsers, in the transfer.

Want Your Blog Deleted Or The URL Freed Up? Do Not Delete Your Blogger Account

In March 2009, Blogger changed its blog deletion procedure, to let you recover a mistakenly deleted blog on your own, and to make a blog's URL available when the blog is deleted.

• When you use the "Delete blog" wizard in Settings - Basic, a deleted blog goes into a "Deleted But Recoverable" status.
• The blog is immediately visible on your dashboard, possibly behind the "View all blogs" link, and is displayed with an "Undelete this blog" link.
• 90 days after you use "Delete blog", the blog is truly deleted, and the URL is made available to the public, on a "first come, first served" basis.

However, this process applies only to deletions using "Delete blog".

• If you delete a Blogger or Google account, any blogs owned by that account are locked to that account. The URLs for those blogs will be permanently un available to the general public.
• If you want the blog URL to be immediately available to another individual Blogger account, you have to transfer control of the blog, properly.
• If you want the URL to be immediately publicly available, you have to rename the blog to publish to another URL.

Please, don't make the mistake of deleting the account that owns a blog, purely to transfer control of a blog to another account. If you do that, you'll have to

• Recover the owning account.
• Rebuild or undelete the blog.
• Transfer control of the blog, properly.

Do it right, the first time, please.

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Please Google, Restore My Deleted Account And Blog!

A frequently seen sign of confusion in Blogger Help Forum: How Do I? is the question

How soon after deletion can I reuse a blog?

And the answer is two part.

Immediately, if you can just undelete it using the same account. Never, if you are trying to transfer the blog.

Occasionally the response to that involves a complication.

But I deleted the account, to make sure that the blog gets freed up.

And now, the blogger gets no choice.

You have to reactivate the account, because the URL is locked to that account.

Now, the blogger has a four fold task ahead of him.

• If you just recreated the Google account, by creating a new account with the same email address, you have to delete the account just created.
• Re activate the original Google account, using Google Accounts: Contacting Support - I can't access my account. Select "No" for "Did this work?", and fill out the form that you see there.
• Alternately, re activate the earlier deleted Google account, using Google Accounts: Google Accounts: Forgot your password?. Enter your email address, then fill out the form that you see next.
• Re activate the blog, if necessary, by un deleting it.
• Finally, what he should have done in the first place.
  • Make a stub, then delete the blog properly.
  • Transfer control of the blog.

And next time, plan the change.

What Access Do You Have To Your Blog?

Occasionally, you see bloggers becoming confused about what access they have to their blog.

I can look at the Edit Posts menu, but there are no posts listed.

or

I can't access the Template Designer (edit the template, add users to the blog, ...).

These are bloggers who are confused over a blog where they are an Administrator, vs a blog where they are an Author.

Let's look at my dashboard, and at a pair of blogs which we see there.


Here's my dashboard. Among the many entries, you'll see one blog listed where I am an Author, and a second where I am an Administrator. Let's first look at a blog where I am an Author.


Let's look at "Edit Posts".

I'm an Author in this blog, and I haven't created any posts. There are plenty of posts in the blog, just none that I've created. I have no access to any posts that I haven't created.


Let's look at "Settings".

I'm an Author in this blog, so all of the Settings that I have are Email and Permissions.

The Email access gives you the ability to setup your own Mail-to-Blogger entry. The Permissions access lets people who have previously accepted Guest ("Author") membership in a blog to remove themselves, without having to contact the blog administrator.

Let's next look at a second blog, where I am an Administrator.


Let's look at "Edit Posts".

I'm an Administrator in this blog. Look at my Edit Posts menu.


Let's look at "Settings".

I'm an Administrator in this blog. Look at my Settings menu.


Let's look at "Design".

I'm an Administrator in this blog. I have a Design section (For a Classical blog, this would be "Template", but there would be lots less tabs under "Template".).



If you're not seeing either of the above, or you're seeing access as an Author, where you should be seeing Administrator, you lost access to your account or your blog.

• First, verify that you are the primary administrator / owner of the blog.
• You may have inadvertently created a second Blogger account.
• You may have tried to transfer control of the blog from one account to another, and made a mistake.
• You successfully transferred control to an administrator who should not have been trusted.
• You may have any of several different connectivity or security issues on your computer or network, which prevents you from accessing your account or your blog.

Unfortunately, these problems may be your responsibility to resolve, as you alone have the responsibility for retaining access to your blog, and for your own connectivity to the Internet.

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Blogger Accounts, Inadvertently Created

Occasionally, someone reports an odd problem with a Blogger account, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue.

I changed the email address on my account, and when I logged in again, it said that I had no blogs. Now, I can't manage my blogs. Help!

or

I have two blogs, but I can only see one in my dashboard! When I log onto the older one and click on the "dashboard" link, it takes me to my new blog.

These complaints come from blog owners who don't realise that your email address is part of your Blogger (Google) account in two ways.

1. As the account name.
2. As a contact mechanism.

This is only a potential problem - as long as the email address never changes.

There's no problem - as long as the account stays as it is when created, and as long as the email account associated with the account name stays active. Sometimes, a blog owner will get a new email address (new ISP, new job, new school).

We ask people to always update their Blogger email addresses, when they get new email. The blog owner will think right - and will change the email address in the Blogger (Google) account.

The contact email address (#2 above) will change, but the account name (#1 above) will not change. Alternately, the blog owner will click on the wrong link, when logging in. And occasionally, a cookie or other security setting will contribute to this problem.

Mistyping the email address, when accepting membership, is a problem.

Another problem is called a "typo". When the new member types the email address, sometimes he / she will get it wrong. And since no verification is sent - let alone verified - the new member now has a new Blogger account.

Fortunately, the blog owner who sent the invitation should get a mysterious email message.

The purpose of this message is to inform you that your invitation to xx...@gmail.com was accepted, but using a different email address.

And the different email address will be the new account name, created by the new blog member.

With a new email address, incorrectly changed, the problem becomes real.

Oblivious of the possible problems, the blog owner will try to login using his new email address as the account name, and will be told

The email you provided does not exist.

and below that

Don't have a Google Account?
Create an account now.

Here is where much confusion started, long ago. I'm not convinced that the new login process is any better.

If the blog owner gets the account name wrong, and sees "Create account", what do you think will happen?

And, here we are at "Create your Google Account", 2015.



Now, a new Blogger account is created - and maybe a new blog, too.

Now somewhat confused

I know this is the email address.

the unhappy blog owner selects "Create account", creates an account with the right email address (or whatever he's allowed), and logs in.

Now, he has what he should have done in the first place, except for one major detail.

The blog(s) are still owned by the old account.

Now, he sees an empty dashboard, with the advice

You are not a member of any blogs. Create one now to start posting!

and below that

Create Your Blog Now

Even more confused, the blog owner may even create a new blog, under his new account.

This can be resolved - with patience and understanding.

Now, he has become a very unhappy blog owner. This problem can be corrected, but a bit of work is required.

1. Understand the above scenario.
2. Use Blogger / Google tools, and identify all accounts that you've setup.
3. Ensure that the dashboard view that you see is up to date, by clearing cache, cookies, and active sessions, and restarting the browser.
4. Starting from the unwanted Blogger (Google) account (generally the one with the original email address), transfer ownership of the blog(s) to the wanted account (generally the newly created account with the new email address).

If you're here because you just deleted the blog - and you can't un delete because you have multiple Blogger accounts, you have a similar, and equally frustrating procedure in your immediate future.

The new (2014) Google "One account" login will continue the confusion.

As of July 2014, and with the New (2014) Google MultiLogin wizard, the confusion continues.

But the process of correcting the problems starts with understanding how the problems occurred, in the first place. That sometimes requires introspective thinking, and the lack of that is frequently why you end up reading this, and similar evidence of confusion.

Duplicate Blog? Delete The Duplicate, Carefully!

As Blogger makes it easier for us to use the Blogger wizards, occasionally we will do things that we don't need to do, simply by hitting one or two buttons that "didn't used to be there". Sometimes, we may even setup a new blog, without intentionally doing so.

So once you realise that you made a mistake, do you just go into Settings - Basic, and select "Delete This Blog"? Have you ever done that, and as you finger pushed down on the mouse button, looked at the settings and said to yourself

NO! Not that blog - the other one!

Too late. You just deleted your good blog.

Been there, done that.

And deleted blogs don't have a Recycle Bin (Trashcan for you Maccies).

Bet the second time, you'll do this with more care.

1. Go to Settings - Basic, and change the blog description.

   This blog is being deleted.

2. Look at the extra blog, and make sure that the description, in the header, says

   This blog is being deleted.

3. Go back to Settings - Basic, and look at the description again.

   This blog is being deleted.

4. Go to the bottom of that page, and hit "Delete This Blog".

That's a lot of work for nothing, isn't it? How much work might it eliminate? How quickly can you recover a mistakenly deleted blog?

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