Seriously, with a plus sign on every single number, will they actually get clients? i mean, i know i'm in the wrong profession for making money, but come on. on that note, there are certain blogs i need to unsubscribe from. they make me too snarky.

Post Script

• The Fanboys declare that matt is 'doing the right thing', despite the fact that the theme is still available on wp.com
• Garland developers ask wordpress.com users to stop using garland, since matt doesn't seem to be doing what he said/they asked.
• Matt disables garland for new blogs.  any of the 500,000+ users who already have accounts, however, can continue to switch to garland at their leasure.

Seriously, you already got a custom template, and the right to run ads on a service that no one else does, and you want more?

I mean, there are people asking for this stuff every day on the forums. but they didn't get a sweet deal from matt. they got face value, possibly before there was even so much as a TOS.

They don't have the ability to change their template files, but they can buy a CSS upgrade. Components from other web companies? did you mean like meebo? or like flickr? del.icio.us? or perhaps you have an RSS feed you'd like to display?

wordpress.com stops you short in one place, and one place only. javascript. (well, flash too, but i've seen few complaints about that). the only reason you think that javascript is a limitation is because the host of a million splogs lets you add them. And you see where that got them. It's not a new limitation to the million of mypace users. or livejournal users. or xanga users. or msn spaces users.

so, yes, robert, i'd choose wordpress.com for any blog for myself or any of my friends. it's got the horsepower under the hood, without the stigma of being a dramafest for teenage girls. But then, I know more CSS tricks than most folks. and the flexibility of the sandbox is lost on those who don't.

Unsleepable is wildly popular, and it should soon be even more popular.

but.

I should wait, i should just not post this now. but that wouldn't be me. i'm a snarky, self-serving asshole. so here's why my version is better than bryan's:

• mine's not bug-ridden
• mine doesn't have a k2 options page that doesn't do anything (remember that unsleepable styles asides the same as non-asides)[options panel removed]
• mine has a bottom block
• my bottom block has widgets[only 3 widgets can be added to the bottom block, otherwise the theme breaks]
• my header stays in line when you're logged in (when you have that top bar on your blog)[the header now stays in place. which i suppose is just as valid as moving the background image down 28px. just less attractive]
• my header uses the proper hover color for the title (it's meant to be black, not blue).
• [post link titles are not styled correctly]

Now, to be fair, there are two ways in which bryan's version is better than mine:

• The footer is full width.
• The title link is no longer an image, so it no longer requires user intervention.

(although that custom header image automattic is so proud of could make a header image quite easy).

On the plus side, this means that the k2 options panel (at least the k2 b2r167 options panel) has passed a wordpress.com security audit. so we should see k2 on wordpress.com in the near future, right?

right?

or did it only pass the security audit because it doesn't actually create an archive page, it doesn't actually use matt's asides, and the about blurp is never executed, so it couldn't actually harm anything on wordpress.com?

[/rant]

UPDATE:

this seems to be a live reboot of sorts. so i'm now ticking off the issues as they're corrected, or modifying them as new issues are added. [updates are in brackets]

UPDATE 2:

it appears i was only too right about k2. le sigh. i would post about how i really like asides, and not having an options panel in k2 really kills it for me, but i've been too much of a negative nancy lately. i can't even post about them linking to binary bonsai, rather than getk2.com without feeling like that asshole. le fucking sigh.

i'm now really bugged by pro-bloggers complaining about the lack of templates. if you're blogging for money, you should expect to need to hire a designer.  despite the shaky-at-best legality of canvas' non-comercial license, it makes sense for them to want to release it as such.  those guys are designers.  if they successfully make every template completely customizable, they'll  be working themselves out of a job.  it wouldn't surprise me if, should they be convinced that they can't distribute canvas without falling under the GPL, they stop distributing it.

clearly, i need to think about this more.