New WordPress 2.7 Paves the Way for WordPress Social Networks
The popular open source blogging software WordPress has officially released version 2.7, a significant upgrade that makes huge improvements to the user interface, and, more importantly, according to founder Matt Mullenweg, the new code lays the groundwork for WordPress to expand further into the social networking realm.
Automattic, WordPress’ parent company, has been working for to expand and integrate the social network features of the BuddyPress plugin ever since BuddyPress creator Andy Peatling joined Automattic earlier this year. While WordPress remains vague about its goals for BuddyPress, clearly, with competitor Movable Type already well on its way to creating an out-of-the-box social network tool, WordPress would like to offer something similar.
Matt Mullenweg
Matthew Charles Mullenweg (born January 11, 1984 in Houston, Texas) is an entrepreneur living in San Francisco, California.
He is the founding developer of the popular open-source blogging software WordPress and writes a popular blog Photo Matt. After quitting his job at CNET, he has devoted the majority of his time to developing a number of open source projects and is a frequent speaker at conferences. In late 2005, he founded Automattic, the business behind WordPress.com and Akismet. Mullenweg attended the High School for the Performing and Visual Arts where he studied jazz saxophone. Matt is also a Dvorak Keyboard user.