Other blogs should learn from Lorelle, and The Blog Herald, in regards to the WordPress Wednesday News segment. By having a returning column on a given day you’re signaling reliability, and that’s certainly a good thing, especially online, where sites and blogs come and go.

Something to think about for your blog, surely.

With that I bid you a happy Easter. I’ll be back on Tuesday next week. Another thing slated for next week is the new Wisdump design, in public beta. How about that, huh?

Weigh in, and win premium themes!

One of the new features in 2.5 is a revamped admin look, something that won’t sit well with every user of course. Not that today’s theme is perfect in any way, but change always makes users react, which is why there are some admin themes available.

BloggingPro points out that 2.5 users will be able to get a cleaner admin look with the Fluency admin theme, looking a lot more sober than the new admin for sure.

That got me thinking. WordPress blogs are being used for more and more things, as is other blog platforms for that matter. Sometimes these new ways of using the platform means that you’ll want user to register and edit their details, which sends them into the one part of your site that isn’t controlled by your theme: The admin.

For instance, videogaming247 is forcing me to register, and while the login form and such are tailored, the actual admin isn’t, which is a hideous break to the actual site design.

Some screenshots below. The customized register box (login box is similar) to the right is the one they’re using, which fits the style well enough I’d say.

Above: The website • Below: Logged in

If you’re going to let users register, style the admin to fit your site’s design! Common sense.

Does that mean that we’ll see premium admin themes released in the near future? Perhaps as addons to premium theme releases? What do you think?

And I said it first!

Time to install 35 WordPress blogs! Even if that 5 minute install was all that was needed, it would be around 3 hours of work, and that’s not counting setting up your databases, uploading WordPress files, and so on. Then you’ve got your average plugins, API keys to paste into Akismet’s settings, activating the right theme, fixing the permalinks…

Yes, I know. Who launches 35 blogs at once? No one of course, but you get the picture. Every blog takes some time to setup.

You can do all that just once, and then launch a new (basic) blog in a matter of seconds, with WordPress MU. It’s pretty easy too, as long as you use one domain for your blogging enterprises. Then again I’m sure there are hacks for multiple domains out there…

I recently used WordPress MU in a Swedish blog networkish project, called pakten.se. Check it out if you like, it’s in Swedish though, and the front page isn’t done (links in the top bar to dig deeper). That was an experience.

Which brings me to the point of this post. You really should investigate solutions to make things easier on yourself if you’re managing multiple blogs. WordPress MU might be one solution, but chances are you’ve got a bunch of domains and don’t want to hack around too much. There are other options though, like subversion, but that’s not exactly my expertise.

You need a technical strategy for managing multiple blogs. Sure, you can just update them all when a new point release is out, but that takes a lot of time. It might be the best solution for you, but make sure you’ve got your strategy clear to you from the beginning, otherwise you’ll have a hard time along the road.

After all, while you might not launch with 35 blogs, you might end up having the administrative responsibility of that number, or more. Updating them all is a bother to say the least.

Do you run multiple blogs, and do you have a technical strategy for how to handle them? My guess is no, most of us probably bites the bullet and take it as it comes. Even though it’s a bother every time we need to update, right?

I can tell you this though. Having WordPress MU to power my Swedish blog network, seven blogs strong at the moment, is a breeze, although the way there wasn’t.

But that’s another story, and it’s available over at Devlounge, so check it out.

However, Automattic also controls the opensource self-hosted version of WordPress, and that raises some questions:

• Are you comfortable with a company being the driving force behind the opensource platform you’re committed to?
• What would happen to WordPress if someone bought Automattic?
• Are all decisions being made for opensource WordPress with it’s best at heart, or does the company’s best come first?

Now, don’t get me wrong here, I’m a big WordPress fan, and Automattic have so far not done anything to piss me off. In fact, I think they’re doing a pretty good job, despite the whole sponsor links debacle, and the unfriendly designer credits talked about in the WordPress.com Theme Marketplace idea. And Akismet is great, free, and everything, so I’m committed to WordPress myself.

However, having a company running an opensource platform is scary stuff. How do you feel about this?

Personally, I don’t care about building pagerank with these design credits in the footer, but I could understand people wanting to do that as well. If a client requested a nofollow on my design credit I’d probably think he was a bit cheap, but fine, I’d probably be OK with it. Unless I took a principal stand for some reason… Anyway, the point is, I’m not putting those links in there to build Google juice, I have them there to prove that I did the design, and to possibly gain new clients.

In the post about the WordPress.com Theme Marketplace, I said that I would probably be on it, even though Automattic is claiming 50% of my revenue. That opinion will be seriously considered if I won’t get my name in my theme’s footer, linked to my site. A nofollow is OK, but just giving me credit in the metadata, that Matt’s talking about, isn’t an option for me.

I doubt any of my clients gained with online recognition (and that includes blog posts where my services are namedropped) would even think of looking for the designer’s name in the metadata, and some would probably not even be aware of the fact that there is such a thing as metadata, let alone know how to find it!

How do you value your link in the footer on designs you’ve sold, or released for free for that matter?

Well, yes and no. There are a few kinks.

• You’ll split the asked price for a theme license with Automattic, as in 50% goes into their pocket.
• You’ll have to GPL your theme and offer it free outside of WP.com, as in every WordPress user with their own install can get it for free.

Basically, this means that if I make a premium theme and sell it on the WordPress.com Theme Marketplace for $50, Automattic will take $25 for every sale I make, and I won’t be able to sell it for use on self-hosted WordPress blogs since they just can download and install it themselves.

Does that sound fair to you?

Tony Hung points out that this should be a great way for upcoming designers to reach a big audience, and I agree – it sure is. But for people like me, who’s used to charge quite a bit more, it isn’t exactly a no-brainer, right?

Wrong.

If I do a premium theme to be sold on WordPress.com Theme Marketplace, that means I’m reaching possible customers that I usually don’t otherwise (since I’m not the kind of guy who likes to mod the Sandbox theme). That means I get my name out there, and I’ll be able to sell the one theme I do several times. Sure, I’ll have to release it to the masses of WordPress users outside of WordPress.com, but I have no problem with that – at the very least it’s great PR (both kinds) for me.

Also, I don’t think I’ve gone this far by doing crappy work. Naturally, any theme I might release on the WordPress.com Theme Marketplace will be good and worth its price. That goes without saying.

So while it’s a natural choice for up and coming new designers, it’s also a pretty solid go for the established ones.

A small heads-up though. How many of these 1.7m+ blogs are run by people willing to spend a buck? Matt, are there any numbers on how many who are using premium services, for instance? What can designers expect, really? I mean, 1% of 1.7m is just 17 000, and they all won’t care for a premium theme, and certainly not just yours. What numbers do you base this venture on, throwing around 1.7m sounds good, but the number isn’t very interesting by itself. Cards on the table, please.

A sidenote. If this is hypocrisy or not on Matt’s behalf, given the whole sponsored themes debacle, I don’t know. It sure makes you think though.

Designers, would you offer your premium WordPress themes on a WordPress.com Theme Marketplace under these circumstances? Why, or why not?

I blame Kubrick.

If you’re thinking “The what now?” then you haven’t paid much attention to that default WordPress theme. It isn’t bad, it’s just old and in desperate need of a refreshing update. Or an honorable farewell, perhaps. It’s a bit stunning that they stick to it as the default theme really. Just look at the way it displays tags, as of WordPress 2.3 – a boring centered list below the post. It feels thrown in there, which it probably is.

While it might not be Kubrick that is responsible for all these rounded corner blog design today, it sure has been putting them in a limelight. Yes, it was new and cool, and rounded is the shape of Web 2.0 as well.

But enough is enough.

I’m not saying that you should go all blocky on me, dear designer reader, but maybe you should stop and think before you do yet another rounded box. Consider other forms, consider squares and uneven forms that might or might not bring lots of problems with your CSS coding, since there isn’t a billion tutorials covering that particular form out there.

Solve it. That’s the way we used to do. You see, when 28.8 kbps modems were king, we did table layouts and solved every weird little problem without Google. Without frameworks and CSS magic, Ajax and IE hacks.

Those weren’t the good times, don’t get me wrong here. They weren’t the lazy times either.

Screw the rounded corners in your next design. I dare you. Maybe that particular project will prove to be an eye-opener. Because you know as well as I, that it’s way too easy to just slap something together in Photoshop, rounded with gradients and big fonts, a bit of Helvetica and a touch of Georgia and you’re there.

That might be all right, but it won’t help you evolve as a designer.

Grow Grow Grow, wails PJ Harvey. Don’t mind if I do.