Site Stats or Jetpack-when development misses the mark

So, one of the things that has always bothered me about WordPress is the Site Stats plugin.  I understand Akismet and why it links off to a 3rd party database filled with spam fighting stuff, but why must Site Stats?

I mean, it’s data about MY site, right?  Why not simply track that internally?

I suppose it comes down to control and marketing.  If it’s hosted somewhere else, the developers can control it. They can also use the information being tracked similar to the way Google uses the information culled from Analytics.  Still, it irks me.

I am one of those folks who likes to login and click on the Site Stats link and see what’s been going on with traffic.  Yes, I also have the Google Analytics plugin but there’s just something about the site Stats plugin that is easier on the eyes and better at a glance, if that makes sense.

So imagine my dismay this weekend when I logged into atfmb.com this weekend and saw this:

Click for a larger view

I’d had a couple other times in recent weeks when Site Stats gave me messages saying it was down for maintenance, so I decided to let it go and see if it was working in the morning.  It wasn’t.  Then I got busy and it was out of sight/out of mind for a while until I logged in again yesterday (Sunday) and noticed the message was still up there.  This lead me to Google the message.

I found this thread on the WordPress.org forums discussing it.  Apparently the maker of Site Stats has a new product out called ‘JetPack’.  When I posted something about this on Twitter, I got a few replies telling me that other folks had received the same message and simply switched to JetPack – problem solved.  But the WordPress.org thread had people complaining that when they switched to JetPack, none of their legacy data was showing up (so, nothing from months or years past – only current information) and worse, some reported installation errors from the plug-in saying it wasn’t working at all.

Yikes.

Then I checked something else for grins – I opened up FunctionalNerds.com and clicked on Site Stats.  I saw this:

Click for a larger view

WTF?  They are both attached to the same account/key!  Why does one work and the other not?

As of right now – I’m not sure what to do.  Site Stats works on a couple of my sites but not on the other two.  It still works on the blog I run for work.  Jet Pack has it’s defenders and detractors so I’m not sure whether or not to trust it – and that’s really the problem here, Trust.

The makers of Jetpack (WordPress.com – plug-in site is here), have eroded my trust and confidence in them in a couple of ways.

1. Not telling me they were making a change.  Have they dropped Site Stats altogether?
2. Turning off the service for my site but not really turning off the service for my site since the account still works on other sites?  Sort of?
3. By not simply doing an upgrade to Site Stats. (maybe they can’t do it that way – I don’t know)

Why didn’t they just upgrade Site Stats – a plug-in everyone had installed and were using, to Jetpack if that’s the future?  Why make it a new installation?  Why break the old plugin forcing people like me to search Google for answers?  Is Akismet going to stop working now?  Without warning?

Just really frustrating.

~P