Best free blog platform?

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What is the best free blog platform? I tried Blogger, their customer service is non-existent (I wrote them an email about a week ago and they haven't replied), they really force gmail (I've got nothing against gmail, but I don't like them to be so pushy about that) I'm currently experimenting with Wordpress.com, but I feel they are a bit too complicated (sidebar customization difficult). So which blog platform have you tried and would like to reccomend to a newbie blogger?