There's something about Wordpress I love: it's free!  Matter of fact, many people love that, and because of that and all its powerful features, it's become one of the most popular blogging platforms (if not THE most popular) out there.  For those of you who use it (and maybe even those of you who don't), you'll probably be aware that Wordpress is open source software.  This means that the code that powers it all is freely available for anyone to modify and add to.  One great consequence of this is that an engaged community usually forms around the product, and tons of features get built for free.  Wordpress is essentially a product of the masses, formed and shaped by dozens and dozens of contributors.

But there are downsides.  One of these is that there are just too many options.  If any one of you has ever gone hunting for a plugin, you'll know what I mean.  There is a virtual sea of plugins, all claiming to do a variation of the functionality you seek, all claiming to do it better than the others, with often very little consensus.  How are you to know which plugin to get?

What's worse, sometimes things aren't as simple as you'd like them to be.  Open source can often mean a good amount of tinkering, especially if you want to do something that doesn't come with a vanilla install.  You're not much of a computer person, and you might have asked a friend to install Wordpress for you (or it already came installed by your host).  You can do the writing...  but adding a plugin, inserting the code in the appropriate place in your theme, setting the file permissions through FTP, making sure this new plugin is compatible with the other plugins, etc... all this takes a certain level of technical knowledge.

Even worse, it's sometimes necessary to upgrade Wordpress, which means access to FTP, deleting some files but not others, etc.  It's not hard, but you have to know how to do it.

In the end, having a Wordpress blog is great... but it requires maintenance.  Like a car.  And here's where I'd like to plug the services of Joel, the BlogTech Guy.  Just like you should take your car to the mechanic every time it requires servicing (although many people don't, and just fix it themselves), you should consider taking your blog to Joel Williams if you don't know how to maintain and service it yourself.  No, he's not free.  But I've used his services extensively on OhGizmo.com, and can assure you he's extremely competent.  He'll do pretty much anything you need him to do, from hunting down plugins, to making sure your theme won't look all funny once you upgrade.  His prices are reasonable, and his work ethic impeccable.

Yeah, I know.  Paying for this stuff kind of defeats the point of Wordpress being free in the first place.  I agree.  But once you've spent six straight hours looking for a solution to your problem (and asked the Wordpress community for help dozens of times, only to be ignored), you realize something: your own time is worth something.  Isn't it?  Your sanity has a price.  Joel helps you keep it.

Posted by dponce80 at 02:01 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)