WordPress is an open source content management system (CMS) used for blogging and websites which some people argue are one in the same – but I’m not one of those people. WordPress can be used for blogging by writing posts or webpages by writing pages.

WordPress is a state-of-the-art publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability. WordPress is both free and priceless at the same time. – wordpress.org

WordPress.com is currently boasting 3,813,067 blogs and Google is returning 37,300,000 results for the phrase powered by WordPress typically found at the bottom of WordPress installs.

I am not even going to try to regurgitate the pros and cons of wordpress.com vs wordpress.org so I’ve just pasted from their website, bolding what I agree with, while the rest, I don’t agree with because they are solvable problems, most with plugins:

WordPress.org Benefits

• Ability to upload themes and
• Ability to upload plugins
• Great community
• Complete control to change code if you’re technically minded

WordPress.org Cons

• You need a good web host, which generally costs $7-12 a month
• Requires more technical knowledge to set up and run
• You’re responsible for stopping spam
• You have to handle backups
• You must upgrade the software manually when a new version comes out
• If you get a huge spike in traffic (like Digg or Slashdot) you site will probably go down

WordPress.com Benefits

• It’s free and much easier
• Everything is taken care of: setup, upgrades, backups, security, etc
• Your blog is on dozens of servers, so it’s highly unlikely it will go down due to traffic
• Your posts are backed up hourly
• You get extra traffic from blogs of the day and tags
• You can find like-minded bloggers using tag and friend surfer
• Your login is secure (SSL) so no one can get into your account if you use wifi

WordPress.com Cons

• Limited customization of themes (though we’re adding more every day)
• You can’t hack the code behind your blog

Quoted from faq.wordpress.com

The underlying difference is that wordpress.com provides hosting while wordpress.org requires web hosting.

WordPress.com or WordPress.org? My recommendations:

• Hobby website, spend nothing, no (or little) income: host at wordpress.com
• Hobby website, spend little, make money: host at wordpress.com, register domain
• Website to make money: register a domain, reseller web hosting account

If you host at wordpress.com without a domain name, you can redirect your WordPress website in the future but this comes at the price of losing the authority your website has gained – that is, unless you have your own domain name mapped to your wordpress.com hosted website.

A websites authority is associated with the domain name which makes it advantageous to spend the money for the domain and domain mapping in case you need to move the website in the future. When you move web hosts, it’s kinda like swapping engines in a car – the body and interior are still the same, it’s just the power under the hood that changes; however, if you change the body of the car, people will no longer recognize it.

I have had my own web hosting since 2001. It took me a couple of years to find a reliable web hosting company and have since moved companies to one that provides VPS accounts. If you have the money and have multiple websites in your portfolio, I recommend a VPS account if not, minimally, a shared reseller web hosting account until your websites start picking up. I’ll dive more into why in future posts as well as how to move web hosts with no downtime and hopefully, less headaches.

You may notice I don’t touch on having to have the technical expertise to run your own website. That is what purpleorange.ca is for! (while technical support is for your web hoster) If you are wanting to create websites as a hobby, then it may or may not be worth the time and effort to learn how to run a website but if you are wanting to use websites for making money, then you should take the time to learn unless you are prepared to pay someone else to do it for you.