[New post] New Theme: Minimum

New Theme: Minimum Matías | August 31, 2011 at 4:59 pm | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-24N

Minimum, a stunning execution of "less is more," is a new premium theme developed by StudioPress and available for your WordPress.com blog today.

The Minimum Theme

Part of Minimum's charm is the option for customizing the look of your site. With many layouts to choose from, optional porfolio and featured sections, custom header, and custom background, you have plenty to create with.

Minimum is available for a lifetime subscription of $75. Read more about what this theme offers or preview it live on your blog from Appearance → Themes.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Express yourself. Start a blog.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] Giving the support site a refresh

Giving the support site a refresh Andrew Spittle | August 30, 2011 at 6:45 pm | Categories: Support | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-24p

Keeping WordPress.com's documentation up to date and accessible is one part of what the Happiness Team works on. We've long had lots of documentation, but we realized that the design and flow of the support site spoke more to us Happiness Engineers. How backward is that?

That all changes today. :) Before, you saw a long page filled with lists. Now you see eight content groupings on the homepage.

Before

After!

We looked at a lot of data about where people run into problems with WordPress.com. Using this we redesigned the site by weeding back overgrown lists, eliminating overly complicated jargon, and putting the answers to the questions you've asked most front and center.

If those new sections don't have the answers you seek, we prominently placed a very effective search option at the top right that is perfect for pinpointing an answer to an obscure issue.

There's more coming too so keep an eye out. We'll keep working hard to make it even easier to find the information you need.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Publish text, photos, music, and videos by email using our Post by Email feature.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] See How You Can Personalize Your Blog with Custom Fonts and CSS

See How You Can Personalize Your Blog with Custom Fonts and CSS Erica Johnson | August 25, 2011 at 11:31 pm | Categories: Customization, Design, Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-22d

You already know that you can choose from over 130 awesome themes here at WordPress.com, but did you know that you can create a theme that's entirely unique to you with the Custom Design upgrade?

To see just how powerful Custom Design is, take a look at this diverse collection of sites that are all using the exact same theme:

baramphotography.net

followushere.wordpress.com

 

traceycaponephotography.com

caveatautomattor.wordpress.com

 

myphotomaton.wordpress.com

kojikis.wordpress.com

 

danroundhill.com

thepracticalartworld.com

 

These all have a completely different look and feel because each site makes use of the many customization options that the Twenty Eleven theme offers. Adding the Custom Design upgrade, which is compatible with all WordPress.com themes, takes personalization to the next level by allowing you to choose from over 50 gorgeous Typekit fonts to use for your site's title, headings, and body text.

Additionally, if you're familiar with CSS, Custom Design enables you to customize your colors, borders, backgrounds, and even the layout of your blog.

Best of all, you can try before you buy. Head to Appearance → Custom Design in your dashboard to test out Custom Design right now.

Find details and CSS resources in the Custom Design support document.

So, how will you customize your blog's design?

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Publish text, photos, music, and videos by email using our Post by Email feature.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] New Theme: Chunk

New Theme: Chunk Matías | August 24, 2011 at 6:16 pm | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-23k

We are launching another theme for you which goes by the name of Chunk. It has a straightforward look, with bold typography and a well balanced layout. The theme also offers content variety with post formats.

A view of Chunk

Chunk was designed by Tran N. It comes with support for an optional custom header, background color, and a footer widget area that appears when you populate it with widgets. Check it out at the Theme Showcase or activate it right away in Appearance → Themes.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Reach out to your own subscribers with WordPress.com.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] New Theme: Skeptical

New Theme: Skeptical Takashi Irie | August 23, 2011 at 6:09 pm | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-237

Today we're pleased to introduce the latest addition to our themes, Skeptical. Originally released by WooThemes for self-hosted WordPress.org blogs, Skeptical has seen great popularity as a blog theme. Now, it is available on WordPress.com.

The Skeptical Theme

The WordPress.com version is designed with Post Formats in mind. Skeptical supports nine post formats - standard, quote, aside, image, gallery, chat, audio, link, and video. Just by looking at the screenshot above, however, you can't see all of the ingredients that make this theme sizzle. Now would be a good time to read all about Skeptical's features on the Theme Showcase.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Express yourself. Start a blog.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] Growth of WordPress

Growth of WordPress Matt | August 19, 2011 at 5:47 pm | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-223

Over on the WordPress.org blog, there's an interesting story about the growth of WordPress, the software that powers WP.com here, and the ecosystem around it.

WP.com is different from every other social platform out there because in addition to giving you ownership of your data you get ownership of the code running your data as well, you could run the same Open source software yourself, and in fact we'll even help you do it.

Open Source is like a Bill of Rights for software that protects your essential freedoms. When you bring a friend to WordPress you can do it without worry because we're building something to be around ten, twenty, thirty years from now.

If you'd like to learn more about what's happening and coming in the wider world of WordPress, check out this presentation I made:

Happy blogging. :)

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Reach out to your own subscribers with WordPress.com.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] Watch your traffic grow with Sparklines

Watch your traffic grow with Sparklines Andy Skelton | August 18, 2011 at 7:52 pm | Categories: Admin Bar, Privacy, Stats | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-21O

We have two quick announcements about new Stats features. The first one affects everyone with a WordPress.com blog. The second is just for those who have marked their blogs Private.

The WordPress.com Admin Bar (visible at the top of your screen if you are logged into WordPress.com) now shows a tiny stats chart called a sparkline. You will only see the sparkline on your own blogs. Here's a screenshot of my admin bar:

The chart consists of 48 upright bars representing the last 48 hours of page views for the current blog. Darker lines indicate nighttime according to the blog's time zone setting. This is just to give you a rough overview of recent activity. The chart is also a link to the Site Stats page so you're that much closer to the full picture. The sparkline has been available to self-hosted WordPress.org users through Jetpack for several months.

Private blogs, which can be viewed only by users chosen by the administrator, now track the page views of all of their users. Traditionally we have omitted the views attributed to a blog's own users because stats were meant to reflect the activity of the general public. However, this meant that private blogs had no useful stats reports. This change will be especially useful for private blogs that have many users.

How are your stats looking today? To get those numbers moving, check out Scott's recent post on How to Get More Traffic.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Express yourself. Start a blog.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] Making your posts more beautiful

Making your posts more beautiful Scott Berkun | August 11, 2011 at 10:17 pm | Categories: Design, Social | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-21h

Here at WordPress.com we care about making things look good. Automattic, Inc., our parent company, invests heavily in design: every engineering team has a full-time designer. We know making things look and feel great is important  and we love making things people love to use.

Over the last few weeks we've studied the most popular features people add to their blogs. Things like Sharing, Likes and Ratings. Previously when you turned them on it made your blog look cluttered, defeating the purpose of the features themselves. This made us sad.

After much research, prototyping and testing by Beau and Hugo, we've released a simplified, more attractive design. These features now appear as friends, lining up in orderly columns, sharing attractive styles and working together to get you the activity from your visitors you want to have.

You may notice the designs for individual buttons have changed. One specific difference is now the 'smart button' setting is now global (renamed "Official Buttons") and not per button.  If you had mixed buttons before, you'll now have them unified. This was a necessary tradeoff to make the larger design changes possible.

We think you and your visitors will appreciate this new design. If you haven't used features like Sharing before, now is a great time to turn them on.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Reach out to your own subscribers with WordPress.com.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] New Theme: Quintus

New Theme: Quintus Matías | August 10, 2011 at 5:15 pm | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-20q

We have created a brand new theme meant to carry on the spirit of an old timer with kindness, and we are launching it today. The theme has an air of old-style appeal, semi-academic graciousness with elegant typography, while also offering an overall fresh look with room for customization and the power of the latest WordPress features under the hood. It's called Quintus.

The Quintus Theme

Above all, whether you are creating a blog with plenty of pictures or a more text-centric blog, Quintus should suit you with elegance. It goes without saying, but it also comes with much of the newer functionality you are accustomed to, including custom backgrounds, custom menus, header images, and the option to publish short aside posts, among others.

If you like the focus to be on the content, you can even turn the blog design into a one column layout by removing all widgets from the sidebar in Appearance → Widgets. To learn more about Quintus go to its page on the Theme Showcase and check the demo blog.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Express yourself. Start a blog.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com

[New post] New Theme: Pink Touch 2

New Theme: Pink Touch 2 Takashi Irie | August 9, 2011 at 6:03 pm | Categories: Themes | URL: http://wp.me/pf2B5-20H

Today we're excited to introduce the latest addition to our themes — Pink Touch 2, a nicely designed theme that has a stellar mix of color, texture, and typography.

The Pink Touch 2 theme

Originally designed by Kcmr, Pink Touch 2 pays close attention to detail. The individual design effects are simple and subtle but together they make your blog look very attractive.

Pink Touch 2 was designed with Post Formats in mind. The theme supports nine post formats — standard, quote, aside, image, gallery, chat, audio, link, and video.

Read all about Pink Touch 2's features on the Theme Showcase.

Add a comment to this post

WordPress.com | Thanks for flying with WordPress! Manage Subscriptions | Unsubscribe | Express yourself. Start a blog.

Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: http://subscribe.wordpress.com