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Since its inception in 2003, WordPress has gone from being a simple blogging tool to a fully-fledged content management system (CMS). Used by millions of websites all over the world, including some of the biggest names in business and media, WordPress is the perfect platform for anyone looking to create a beautiful website or blog.
In this article, we’ll give you a crash course in everything WordPress. We’ll start with a brief history of the platform and then move on to explaining what WordPress is and how it works. We’ll also provide an overview of the main features that make WordPress so popular. By the end of this article, you should have a good understanding of what WordPress is and how it can be used to create amazing websites and blogs.
So, let’s get started!
A Brief History of WordPress
WordPress was first released in 2003 by two developers named Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little. At the time, Mullenweg was just 19 years old and Little was 24. The pair had met while working on another open source project called b2/cafelog which is where they first got the idea for WordPress.
B2/cafelog was a successful blogging tool but it had one big problem; it was difficult for non-technical users to install and use. Mullenweg and Little saw an opportunity to create a similar tool that would be much easier to use and thus, WordPress was born.
In the early days, WordPress was very much a side project for Mullenweg and Little. It wasn’t until 2005 that things really started to take off when Automattic, a company set up by Mullenweg, acquired the rights to the project. Automattic has since been responsible for developing and maintaining WordPress.org, the software behind most self-hosted WordPress websites.
The Rise of WordPress
Since its humble beginnings, WordPress has gone on to become the most popular website builder in the world. According to W3Techs, over 35% of all websites on the internet are powered by WordPress including 60% of all sites using a CMS. That’s an impressive feat for a platform that started out as just a simple blogging tool!
Much of WordPress’s success can be attributed to its ease of use. Unlike many other web platforms which can be daunting for beginners, WordPress is designed to be accessible for everyone regardless of their technical ability. This has made it the go-to choice for anybody looking to create a website or blog without having to learn how to code from scratch.
