WordPress.com vs. WordPress.org
For those of you that are getting involved in blogging either as a separate website or as a marketing tool, one of the most popular (and my favorite) blogging platforms is WordPress. But sometimes people get confused about the difference between WordPress.com and Wordpress.org. So here’s a brief description:
WordPress.com
WordPress.com is the version of WordPress that will be hosted by them. Your address for your blog will be somthing like dan.wordpress.com rather than your own domain name. Yes, you can use it and forward it to your own domain, but the other thing about WordPress.com is that you can’t do as much with it in terms of customization like you can with the .org version. Also, last I checked you cannot do any AdSense on the .com version. But, if you’re just getting started in blogging and need a free platform to play around on, the .com version is still great!
WordPress.org
Ah, my favorite! WordPress.org is the full download of the WordPress platform. So, in order to run it you have to have the ability to host it. From there you can pretty much customize your blog however you need to by either changing the code yourself or getting plugins to make changes you need. This is one of the best things about WordPress.org is how customizable it is.
I know this isn’t a great detailed description of the difference between the two, but I hope it’s enough to clarify it a little bit.
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It’s my understanding that not only can’t you do adsense, but you can’t advertise anything on WordPress.com. Did I misunderstand this?
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Hi annl,
They allow very limited advertising on the free .com accounts. Here’s a summary: no paid posts (pay per post, review me, etc.), no adsense or other contextual ads (kontera, chitika, etc.), one discreet amazon link per post, not text ads, etc. Basically they don’t want people to create sites that are only focused on promoting affiliate programs all of the time. Thanks for pointing that out!
By the way, here’s the link to those terms in their FAQ: http://faq.wordpress.com/2005/12/08/adsense/
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Biggest tip on everyone’s site is to skip wordpress.com and just get your own domain. It’s hard to do at very first but you’ll regret it if you’ve built up a bunch of links to a wordpress.com account
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HDTV reviews,
I agree. If you’re going to start a blog on wordpress.com, plan on leaving it there. The .org version is by far superior.
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Thanks for explaining this. I have a blog on wordpress.com but until now did not understand about wordpress.org.
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Wordpress.com is good for someone who is starting out in the blog works
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Dan Reply:
November 14th, 2008 at 11:09 pm
I guess it depends on the purpose of your blog. In some situations I actually recommend people use Blogger.
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One of the major advantages of using wordpress.org is being able to hide dates when articles where posted
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Dan Reply:
December 30th, 2008 at 9:24 am
yeah, I take that off from time to time as well. Just the ability to completely change things like that is a huge benefit of hosting it yourself vs. using WordPress.com.
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Someone who is an experienced developer would create thier own blogging system just to get rid of the \”Powered By Wordpress link\”(laugh out loud). That is what puts me off. I feel as if it makes my site look unprofessional and doesn\’t have the ability to become a very very very successful website.
I prefer wordpress.org but i don\’t use it often!
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You write good articles，I really enjoyed your post. Thanks for your sharing.
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I really like your post, it was very helpful.
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