I spent all day Saturday at WordCamp San Francisco. This was my first time, and I’m really glad I went. I met a few really cool people and heard some really inspiring and informative lectures. But more than anything, it made me so glad that I switched to WordPress for my blogging platform over 2.5 years ago. There were many reasons that led to my switching at the time, but I think there are even more now. And if you’re a blogger, web designer, web developer or King of the Internets, and thinking about switching platforms, here are my Top 10 Reasons to Switch to WordPress:
- Matt Mullenweg: Now, it’s not that Ma.tt is really the #1 reason you should use WordPress, but I was just very impressed with him this past weekend. Matt is one of the founders and creators of WordPress, and a real superstar in the open source community. He’s an incredibly humble and gracious person (not to mention he really pulls off wearing kick-ass Red Converse with a sportcoat) and it’s not hard to see why so many people have been willing to get behind his vision and work with him.
- The Support Forums: The WordPress Support Forums are awesome. If you are ever in need of a quick-fix, they really are a great place to converse with other users.
- The Thesis Framework: This website runs on the Thesis Framework. More and more, sites are choosing frameworks like Thesis or Thematic to run the code and structure of their sites. These frameworks provide a powerful way of designing, where you separate the code from the design, which saves a lot of time down the road.
- The Logo Works as a Tattoo: At WordCamp, I got a chance to see Ed, who is the person who got probably the first ever permanent WordPress tattoo. I just don’t think Typepad or Blogger’s logos would work as well! And besides, if someone has the commitment and loyalty to permanently tattoo the logo on their body – it must be a good product!
- WordPress.com: WordPress.com is an incredibly easy and powerful way to get started with WordPress. The design and variety of themes you’ll find available far surpass anything you’ll find at Blogger. I’m still surprised how many people just go to Blogger.com to start a new blog – while I think WordPress.com is probably the best free service available. They offer so much – and continue to make new things available through their .com service.
- WordPress.org: WordPress.org is the self-hosted version of WordPress which gives you even more power and ability to customize your WordPress installation. In the future, WordPress.org and WordPress.mu are going to be combined into the same product, so it will be even easier now to start up a network of blogs if you want.
- WordCamps: Where else can you go to a conference and hear amazing speakers who are on the tech/blogging/social media circuit (I heard top folks from Google, the CEO of Mozilla and so many others!), get a sweet American Apparel t-shirt and free lunch, and so much more for only $25? Probably nowhere but at a WordCamp. And WordPress is collaborating with people from around the world in putting on WordCamps.
- VideoPress: WordPress continues to be in collaboration with others and keeps coming out with cool new stuff. VideoPress is going to be an extremely elegant solution for embedding video into your WordPress.com (and eventually WordPress.org) blog or website. Watch the video and see some of the great new things coming your way with WordPress!
- WordPress.tv: WordPress has been working on putting together a great resource of video tutorials at WordPress.tv – not to mention getting to listen to a sweet English accent, but they are incredibly helpful and well-done tutorials.
- Themes & Plugins: With the vast amount of WordPress Themes and Plugins, you can make WordPress be and do almost anything you want! More and more, web designers and developers are realizing that WordPress is an extremely powerful and customizable Content Management System (CMS) and WordPress is becoming the software of choice! Any installing themes and plugins continues to become easier and easier.
These are just a few of the many reasons that you should switch to WordPress for your CMS/blogging software and I’m sure there are many other reasons. What do you love about WordPress?