Harold,

I concur with your arguments. I made the same reflexion when I decided to start my own web site. I wanted a blog but i also wanted the possibility to extend it so I can offer other services in the future. I found some cheap hosting at GoDaddy, rgistered my own domain and used an open source CMS (Joomla!).

I have full control over my content, its presentation. Of course, it requires some more work than just using an hosted pre-built platform, but the advantages are well worth the efforts.