WordPress is five years old today! ..and although i haven’t even been using it five months I feel it only right to say not only congratulations, but also Thank You.
I was always a ‘Blogger‘ user and before that i just made my own random pages and stuck them out into the ‘tubes’ not knowing if anyone actually read anything until i upset them.
I do believe though that I am now hooked and unless something pretty drastic and/or amazing happens.. I will be here for a good time to come.
So why do i like WordPress so much?
I guess mainly it’s because there are so many people I have met through social media that use and understand the importance of such a powerful tool and enabler. Seeing others using this blog software as effectively as they were (and still are) drew me into having at first a peek.. and then jumping headlong into this bandwagon. A bandwagon (assuming this once was a reference to a vehicle of some kind) that at the click of a button can be a small pizza delivery boy on a bike.. or the next moment, a thundering juggernaught.
It is this flexibility and customisation that has hid from me the fact that, without knowing it, I seem to have always been drawn to sites using WordPress. Far more than sites incorporating other blogging platforms.
I love the flexibility to have a site in almost any shape or form, compatible with no end of open source plugins, costing as little as nothing, up to a nominal fee for something a little more in depth. All of this is easily accessible to people not at all versed in code and programing.
I threw myself in at the deep end with this ‘Revolution‘ theme and decided to splash out £40 even though I had never even tried to play with the free themes. Before i knew it, WordPress was installed and with the help of some online friends showing me the ropes and pushing a few buttons.. I had a site up and running that I had never dreamed of having just a week before.
We tend to bang on and on about how important content is but let’s not forget that it’s delivery is equally important. Thanks a lot WordPress and Happy Birthday!
Many thanks to Derek Mantle, Annie Boccio, Steve Purkiss and Phil Sorrell for their superior WordPress and CSS knowledge.
A moment ago I threw out a question onto Twitter asking who was using WordPress and got these links back..
Click on every one.. Go on.. I dare ya..
http://www.ethosmarketing.co.uk
http://jestercreative.com/wordpress/
http://geekgrls.wordpress.com/
http://thegirlinthez.wordpress.com/
http://heavensgame.wordpress.com/
http://www.thebillblog.com/billblog/
http://amedievalhand.wordpress.com
http://www.kittenfluff.wordpress.com/
http://www.bigtalkproductions.com/blog/
http://www.thealbumchartshow.com
http://www.claritypartnership.co.uk
http://www.blog.edgarwrighthere.com
http://www.normanscoachsoho.com
I see a theme forming..
OK guys.. I have linked you.. now link me back! 😉
Another WordPress user here, albeit a late convert – I’m so glad I moved my site over here last month. Was using MT before, which was great for hosting multiple blogs on one account, but wasn’t at all needed for me to do my site… the size of the wordpress community is amazing and the consistency of interface makes it easy to manage multiple sites with the same CMS.
..and I already link to you 🙂
Sx
This, my first blog, is about three months old. WordPress is the ultimate in scalability and “widgetability”, and seemed the best choice. And with folks like Annie Boccio answering questions and pointing to further online help nuggets, it’s even easier.
Missed the Tweet. Reality Me uses WordPress. Despite the advise I would give my clients about owning their own domain (not relying on tertiary domains yournamehere.someoneelseownsthis.com) and about being in control of your own content, I started blogging with Blogger. I spent 2003 lamenting that blog software was so easy to write that I could not justify using a package that I did not code myself. Finally, in January of 2004 I gave in and started using Blogger. One faithful December Blogger blocked my account due to their automatic robots detecting spam like activity. At that point I almost quit blogging but I was hooked. That’s when I switched to my own domain name and started using WordPress. I strongly recommend people be in control of their content be it WordPress or Drupal or django or whatever. Just don’t use Blogger.com!