I have had quite a few blogs and sometimes I totally forget about them, but I'm sticking to the one I have right now. I am using blogger which is an awesome service and I would highly recommend it for the novice and intermediate user. You need no knowledge of html (though it will definatly help) and they offer some good templates that can get you started. When I started the blog, I would use there costom templates but after a while i found it necessary to head out and find some new templates. You can edit the full html of your page which is a great feature if you really want to customize your page. There is also the little blogger toolbar at the top of the page that helps you get some hits since you can view the blogs just by clicking the view button. Anyway, for anyone who wants to start there own blog I would definatly recommend blogger or xanga.