How good is WordPress? Damn good!
Alright, I know we bang on and on about WordPress software, but it is seriously good.
The team here at Ripefruit Media recently completed our new web site (you’re looking at it) using WordPress and StudioPress Themes plus a bunch of Plugins. We hope you like it. We reckon it was time after our original design got to 12 years old, although many clients really liked it plus it was state-of-the-art at the time, just like WordPress is now.
We received this email from PHP Link Directory Support (below) which really made us laugh. It made us laugh because its plain wrong. WordPress doesn’t get hacked, free themes and plugins get hacked as well as the occasional bad server, but that could happen to any software, not just WordPress.
PHP Link Directory Support Email
When it comes to the cost of WordPress, “free” is not a very good description. There is such a history of WordPress sites getting hacked, and there being a need for paid plugins and continuous updating. Meanwhile, phpLD has a great track record. It doesn’t get hacked and there are still sites online from 2005 that didn’t have to be updated. Often people spent $30 and there sites is still online years later with an overall cost MUCH less than WordPress.
Comment
Besides the email sounding like it was written by a 6 year Albanian with little knowledge of the English language, it is full of inconsistencies.
We have our own Directories as well as a PHP Links Directory (Ripe-Directory), and discovered it was most likely PHP Links Directory software that caused Google to de-rank and consider 99% of directories to be worthless. For years our directories performed very well. All our directories are edited and reviewed by hand (human) and category specific, meaning Google considered them good resources.
Then along came PHP Link Directory. I’ll be the first to admit, we fell for their pitch. They call it a script and there are 2 versions, a $30 version (used to be free) which requires a link-back to them, or a $80 version which is unbranded.
In short, you could download, install and be up and running in a very short time. Added to that, you could categorise the directory, and import thousands of listings in minutes meaning every Tom, Dick and Harry were setting up thousands of these ‘directories’ before Google realised they were all full of shit. Now Google considers all directories bad until they prove otherwise, and that is hard.
Our PHPLD was hacked once, but the big issue we have with it (besides the Google issue) is the amount of spam it causes. Every morning there are hundreds of bounced emails from failed registrations. We implemented the registration process to curb the thousands of link applications we were receiving, but we turned one issue into another.
WordPress
WordPress is like any software, it requires attention to the detail. There are excellent security plugins (free and paid) depending on the amount of security you require. Yes, a clients web site was hacked into a couple of years ago, but we discovered it was through a backdoor of the free theme the customer had installed. We reinstalled the software and a new theme, and 10 minutes later they were up and running again.
Maybe I am wrong, but I don’t see that as a failing of WordPress. Its not WordPress that created the theme and should not be responsible for the thousands of associated themes and plugins, just as PHPLD is not responsible for the themes made for it.
Options
Maybe I’ll put it another way.. ask anyone, and I mean anyone.. have they heard of WordPress or PHP Links Directory?
From here you have two options;
- PHP Links Directory – at your peril
- WordPress – ahh that tastes good!