New WordPress Theme Directory
There is a new official WordPress theme directory over at the wordpress.org site. Naturally, it is hosted under the “extend” tab, where we already go to find our plugins, so it is a natural addition. As of now, there are only 3 themes available, but since this is brand new, you can expect more to be submitted and added soon enough.
If you would like your theme hosted in the official directory, you need to GPL it, make sure that there are no paid links or similar in it, and fill out the other (not too evil) requirements.
As of now, there are no API available, for version checking like we’ve got with plugins hosted in the extend plugin directory, but this is supposed to be added in the future.
This is a good thing, since the old themes directory is pretty much defunct. A central spot is also good, although the GPL limit will be keeping some themes out of the official limelight. There will be no paid themes either, which will turn off a lot of theme developers.
Check out the new themes directory, and tell me if this is a good idea or not!
Thord Daniel Hedengren is a designer, writer, and blogger, and also the former editor of The Blog Herald. He used to be a hotshot in the gaming industry in Sweden, but sold everything and went International. Most recently he wrote a book called Smashing WordPress: Beyond the Blog, and does loads of kickass design.
This is great news for all the free theme developers. I am looking forward to seeing what becomes available.
Good in theory, not so great in practice — the old theme directory at least categorized the themes into features that you could sort by, such as number of columns, widget-ready, etc. This new interface just dumps you everything at once, and even then you have to drill down into the themes in order to see their compatability, ratings, etc. Not user-friendly in any way.
I personal think that having articles on your blog thats are not writen by you is like walking on thin ice. When people read blogs they want to hear from the blogger him or herself and having 2, 3, and 4+ people blogging for you can give mixed messages. But, from a person writting the articles its a really good way to make some extra money. Ronald H. at http://www.revenueherald.com
@Spamboy,
I’m pretty sure they’ll use tags (if they aren’t already), just as they do with the plugins directory. But yeah, good points, we’ll see how it turns out.
@Ronald H,
I think you meant to post that on a different story, yeah?