Well, this is GREAT news for me. Really, there site is falling apart and this is just another blow which will even further weaken the monopoly they currently have. The market just wants something better. I am partners in a new site www.themeoutlet.com It will be like themes.wordpress.net except the script will actually work, the mods won't be tools, and we will allow themes with sponsored links. Let's just list a couple of the features to help find quality themes: - Sort by most downloaded - Sort by highest rating - Sort by most comments Couple more to help out those uploading themes: - All themes will be under your name if you upload them - no more forgetting to edit the style.css and then you can't update your theme anymore! - Easy uploading - enter the title, browse and find the .zip, check the correct boxes and then it's done! Easy as pie What we need! Your support. This is costing alot to get developed - both money and TIME. So far we are in the $xxxx range, all out of our own pockets. Your ideas. This site will be able giving back to the community. We need your ideas and input to help us make this the best that it can be.
ROCHOW: excellent idea I hope it takes off! Give us and update when it's all ready. I'll be watching this, ready to post a blog post about it on my personal site I'm exciting! This will be for the best.
What we need is some ideas and features. The script is being coded right now so we can add it all in now for the release So come on guys, what would you want? What would make your life easier? Help us help you Here is one I just thought of: - Browse by sponsored themes and unsponsored themes. Good, bad?
What about an option where we can login and see all of our submissions? isn't necessary but it would be nice to have Maybe a market place for people to sell themes and designs? (i think this was suggested)
Every author will get a page where they get a bio, a link to their site (followed ), and all their submissions listed. The marketplace yep good idea.
Theme creators and wordpress blog users!! If you didn't know about it already - now you do! Sponsored themes can continue to be uploaded on my website Wordpress Themes Download and Submission website.
You bet your butt I do The site is just around 3months old, and the alexa rank is 160K, and dropping 100K+ per week! Get ready for the wpskins.org take over! I'v been in the process of setting up a marketplace, help and discussion forum for a little while now, just never thought it would be used... but since this hostile takeover of the official theme site... my forum will be opened this week. I'm looking for dedicated people who know wordpress to be moderators. If anyone here is interested... drop me a PM
If you need a part-time part-time MOD I can do the job I'm sure these sites will only post quality themes that's what we need now! (It takes forever to find a decent theme) an automatic system that lists it by ranking (like what rochow said) sounds ideal!
You've got a PM I have a top 10 downloads and top 10 rated... Like that? Or? I'm open to suggestions on the website and/or forum..... It's best to hear from people who use it! I have a coder doing some great work on the script as we speak... so anything I can get him to do, I will.
Remember guys, they said no sponsored themes. I'm pretty sure it would be fine to put "Free WP theme created by Yoursite"
Rochow, here are my ideas: - automatic info submission, which get the theme information (theme name, description, author, author url) from the .zip or .rar file - it is very easy and fast to upload then - ranking system - the easily find nice looking and quality themes - reporting system - for situations when someone submits some theme more then once - comments - feedback is very good for authors - online theme preview function - people would like to see how it really looks - donation system - to donate the theme authors ;-) - and so on, these was some just quick ideas. If you need some help, let me know.
Depi, I love you - Automatic Info. Yes will get all the info from the style.css, however, all themes will appear under your unique author account, even if you use different author names. This is incase you forget to update the style you can still update the theme. Also, you can't pretend to upload themes using someone else's name (say the original authors, but add some of your links on the bottom of it) - Ranking system. By this do you mean allowing rating out of 5 stars? - Reporting system. Yep, it's included aswell - Comments. Hell yes, even got smilies, bold, italics, underline, colours and everything! - Donation system. Very good idea. Every author has the option of adding their paypal. If so, a paypal donate button can be on the site and people can donate however much money they would like. One problem we are having is monetization. We don't want to have the same problems as themes.wordpress.net so we will need quality (and therefore expensive) hosting. We will have no google ads or the like, that is for sure. - Having premium membership (longer time on front page?, more features?) - Selling links Any other ideas which will not be obtrusive or annoying? It does not have to roll in the millions, just a couple hundred a month to cover costs and re-invest into the site
Rochow, I love you too ... but just like a friend Ranking - yes something like that, maybe 4 stars, because I've read somewhere that most people choose 3 stars which say nothing - it is neutral. (oh yes, here is the article from Jeffrey Zeldman: http://www.zeldman.com/2007/06/20/remove-maybe-from-invitation-systems/) Hmm the monetization is very hard question. In my head is currently something like credits system - buy 10 credits for $10 and upload 10 themes. It looks nice But this is not the best solution. Not everyone could afford to pay for uploading, because not everyone sells sponsored themes But maybe this system could be used for premium membership - where premium members will get some cool features
It would work best to be free for everyone. And I'll have to look into the 4 stars thing, it does have a valid point. It's just what features/content could we have for premium members
LISTS Guys i am compiling a list of sites/blogs/galleries that will post sponsored themes, i will post that list on my wordpress related blog, so i need YOUR help. If you have a site that does excatly what i'm looking for than please PM me and i will place your links in my compilation list. Thanks
I'm thinking having 10 sponsored links, with the requirements they are related to online stuff (fonts, wallpapers, directories, webmaster etc etc). This is broad enough, but narrow enough that all it should be relevant and and visitors will actually want to click on them. Good for us, good for advertisers, good for visitors.