OT: Best blogging software?

[Clinton MacDonald]

Friends:

This question is way, way off topic, but you are the smartest folks I 
know, so I thought I would float it here first:

What are your recommendations for blogging software and hosting services?

We have started a new and exciting project in our laboratory, and it is 
involving many of my students and post-docs as well as some 
collaborators. To keep everyone abreast of the latest findings (new 
findings are coming at an almost daily rate), I started sending out a 
mass e-mail to the seven or eight principle participants. It occurred to 
me that a diary of this project might be of greater interest, since it 
is a sort of flashlight on the discovery process as we make it, so I 
thought I might start up a blog. But I don't know what is best.

Here is what I *think* I want (perhaps you can explain to me why I might 
not want all of it). I probably cannot host my own blog, so I will need 
a reasonably priced third party hosting (but maybe you can explain to me 
why I *can* host my own blog). Most of my actual blog entries will be 
from Mac OS X, but I will likely be making posts from other locations, 
too, perhaps from a password-protected browser interface. A Linux client 
would be a plus, although the browser interface would work in a pinch.

[] easy to use Mac OS X blogging client (YDL-compatible client a plus!)

[] accessible from multiple locations (say from work and from home)

[] password-protected browser interface an option (gotta post from the 
Coffee Shop!)

[] local storage of individual posts as well as on the hosted site (for 
backup peace-of-mind)

[] ability to include simple formatting using some kind of markup 
language (for instance, our favorite gene has a Greek letter in its name)

[] automated RSS generation (do they all have this now?)

[] flexibility, so that I can move the posts to another host, if necessary

[] the possibility in the future of moving the blog to my own domain 
name ("www.macdonaldlab.net," or something similar)

[] a good support community if I encounter problems

There, does that cover everything?

I have heard of TypePad, Movable Type, Blogger.com, Radio Userland, and 
so on, but I am not sure which are applications, which are hosting 
services, which are both, what are the features of each, and so on.

Many, many thanks!

Best wishes,
Clint

-- 
Dr. Clinton C. MacDonald | <mailto:clint DOT macdonald AT sbcglobal DOT net>