Long drawn out history
I’ve been working inside HTML code since 1997. It all started with Notepad on Windows 95. After that, it was Pagemaker and Photoshop in high school. My experience with Pagemaker and Photoshop and Notepad HTML landed me a full-time job as “Assistant Web Manager” for Midwest Communications in 1999 – just 6 months out of high school.
After a couple years with Midwest Comm., I moved down south to Alabama where I worked as Chief Engineer for Gulf South Communications. My duties there included: maintaining transmitters, computers, and you guessed it – the radio station web sites. After 7 years, and a short stint as “Web Manager/Partner” at VeriQik Technology; I went out on my own as a freelancer. Not long after that (6 months, 3 days) my current employer: Bluewater Broadcasting hired me full-time as Chief Technology Officer and put me in charge of rolling out their digital platform.
Out of necessity
So for 10+ years I’ve been dealing with “the web” on a full-time basis. What started in Notepad moved to FrontPage. That soon changed to using Dreamweaver. Out of necessity (for my sanity), I’ve googled “Content Management Software”, and I found: Joomla!.
My life changed, I didn’t have to copy/paste snippets of code 432 times when I wanted to change a menu item. I learned right away that having a framework provided me with the freedom to focus on design and usability, rather than improving my keyboard skills with CTRL+C, CTRL+V.
3 years I spent married to Joomla!. It made VeriQik and I a bunch of money. I began to realize how powerful a community of developers was in creating usable software for not only myself, but for my clients. Because of the community I learned how to install Linux and L.A.M.P. I learned a great deal about server optimization, which lead to the realization that hundreds of Joomla! sites will beat the shit out of a server with limited resources.
Out of necessity AGAIN for streamlining a system, I found WordPress. It was leaner, easier for clients to “figure out” (want to create a page? click “add new page”), and the abundance of free themes was enough to “wow” clients for years!
That was short lived – the free themes part anyway. Most of them suck. There is no support, and every time there was an upgrade it broke. Ugh. Yet again, I was tired of an inefficient system.
Out of necessity [again], I googled: “WordPress Framework” and found the Thesis theme.
Total comfort and ease
Are you kidding me? I can create a web site, using WordPress, that DOESN’T break when I upgrade the theme? I dropped $187 right then and there!
Since then, have made over $75,000 skinning the Thesis Theme for clients. I became a Certified Thesis Designer, and became recognized as an authority in the community. I got on the forums, I help out on Twitter, I frag with Chris Pearson on Call of Duty: Modern Warefare 2, I get paid a salary to roll out Thesis sites for my employer. Life is great and I’m happy guy. It’s because of WordPress and Thesis, that I can pay my mortgage, child-support, and for a 17 foot bass boat.
Talk about a perfect fit.
With all the contributions to a community I feel like I’ve found my niche. I love the fellow devs, I enjoy the prestige of being considered an all around “awesome Thesis guy”.
Who do I have to thank? Matt Mullenweg and Chris Pearson. Two guys that helped me learn how to use a MORE EFFICIENT system!
July 14, 2010
Seeing Matt Mullenweg (creator of WordPress) order the boot of Bill Erickson from codepoet.com caught my attention on Twitter. Which then led to the-single-most-horrifying-day-ever.
- Watching Matt and Chris Pearson duke it out on Twitter was horrifying.
- Listening/watching to them during a video-cast was gut-wrenching.
- Seeing Matt give away free GPL based premium themes for those who switched from Thesis was – well heartbreaking.
Two guys who have allowed me to be my own boss and make a name for my brand – at war. My dear friend Cynthia LaLuna tweeted “It’s like watching mom and dad fight“. Exactly.
During the threats of lawsuits, the argument became a trending topic on Twitter AND two clients emailed wanting help switching from the Thesis Theme to the Genesis Framework.
My heart aches. I refuse to turn my back on the two pieces of software in which I make my living…
Once again, necessity is the mother of all paychecks
Out of necessity I have decided:
- Chris, you are wrong on your stance about the GPL, but right for wanting to protect your property
- Matt, you are wrong to act like a stark-crazy-lonely-housewife protecting your “baby”. Instead of giveaways and name calling via Twitter – handle it outside (and by outside, I mean court)
- WordPress + Thesis just WORKS. It’s fast, efficient, customizable, and easy to maintain. Plus it’s what clients WANT
- I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for community driven software: like WordPress
That being said, I’m going to make a business decision and no longer work solely with Thesis.
There are other WordPress Frameworks out there which have had my attention, and I need to help my clients (if they so choose) to switch to another WordPress theme.
It’s hard enough watching mommy and daddy fight. I don’t want to feel bad about being at daddy’s for the weekend while mommy tries to pay the bills.
After all, taking care of necessities is why I’m even here.
UPDATE: 7/22/10
It’s done. Chris Pearson and DIYthemes have made Thesis split-GPL. Which is 100% acceptable with Matt Mullenweg. Split-GPL means the proprietary Java-scripts, images, and CSS included with Thesis are still property of DIYthemes – and you cannot re-distribute without paying for them first. This gives DIYthemes enough president to go after you if you try to “rip them off”. However, the rest of the code is open-source and can be freely distributed.
I hope to see code contributions from the community to help make a great product even better. Maybe, just maybe the WordPress community will stop calling us Thesis devs “snobs, assholes, douchebags, leeches, posers, etc…”
You can read more about it on Mashable.
Now – back to my regularly scheduled programming. Pun intended. 
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{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
As a Thesis user – and some of it on a corporate URL – the whole thing has me nervous. While I like that CP broke down and did a split GPL, it still raises eyebrows at the office.
I’d love to hear what you think of the alternate frameworks you are considering. What works, what doesn’t, and why. Trying to compare Genesis & Thesis? So far, I have not had much luck.
I hope there is no divorce at the end of this. I am a huge Thesis-wordpress fan and I will feel at a loss if the parents divorce. This after all the trial and error of finding the perfect publishing platform and the perfect theme. I hope they find common ground to keep the perfect marriage going.
Great post Greg. I kind of feel the same way you do even though I’ve been working with Thesis for a shorter than you. You actually gave me a great lesson on Thesis and it was the start of my career with Thesis and WordPress. So now I too am looking for something different but not sure what to go with. Tried Headway but wasn’t crazy about it, any suggestions would be welcome.
I have been monitoring whole #thesiswp debate. Though being a Thesis skin dev. I still believe Matt was right till a point. Though the way he reacted on twitter was far away from professionalism and least expected from him. I will rather wait to see Matt filing a lawsuit against Thesis if he things he is also right legally.
Accepting GPL should not hurt Chris Pearson’s business. GPL is about the code that get’s included in the Wordpress install. The stylesheets, javascript, graphics files and support could be under any other licence Chris Pearson chooses.
What is important for a business is the support and assurance that the theme will still be developed and supported years from now. Serious businesses would not go for a theme that could possibly break with the next CMS upgrade, or possibly not be supported in two years.
Hey Greg,
Like you, I’ve gotten pretty comfortable in Thesis, but I would like to know what other frameworks your are going to consider. Please keep us posted.
Laura,
The GPL is a software license. It’s a really popular one that goes way beyond just WordPress. How this issue gets settled could have an impact on a large number of free software projects where extensibility (plugins, themes) is involved.
I’m not someone who is stuck on WordPress or Thesis as the only options out there. I still work with Movable Type and would like to see that get a lot more community behind it again. Anyway, I don’t know what GPL is. But it seems that anyone getting overly upset about WordPress and Thesis is just standing too close to the whole thing. Look at some alternatives. You don’t have to follow the pack.
In all honesty, you almost lost me after the first two sections. Fortunately, I stuck with your post and I’m glad I did.
I shared the same feeling of horror when witnessing the Twitter bashing. Chris’ ego was no big surprise, but I lost some respect for Matt M. for going out of his way to sabotage Thesis. It was very unprofessional.
Your 4 points towards the end are absolute gems.
I’m hoping that this one gets settled in court, so this kind of issue doesn’t happen again.
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