One of the most popular open-source content management systems, WordPress, is at the centre of controversy over the introduction of a new publishing experience called Gutenberg. This new approach to writing content is due to launch with version 5 of WordPress, scheduled in the next few months.
So what is this controversy? Simply put, Gutenberg moves the editing experience from a Word-like interface to a drag-and-drop page-builder. This idea isn’t new and it has been successfully implemented in a variety of popular plugins, including Beaver Builder, Elementor and Divi Builder.
However, at the time of writing, there are over 270 reported bugs with Gutenberg, and hundreds of negative reviews have been posted, stating that the page-builder is confusing to use and takes twice as long to create articles.
Again, this by itself isn’t worthy of controversy – bugs can be fixed and the user experience can be improved. The debate revolves around the fact that WordPress users may find themselves having to create content using Gutenberg while it’s still essentially a work in progress. The WordPress community has been vocal in asking WordPress to keep Gutenberg as an optional plugin until all the issues have been ironed out, but these requests have as yet fallen on deaf ears.
WordPress itself is an open-source piece of software, which means anybody can take the code and start their own version of the software, such as with ClassicPress, which aims to keep the experience as close as possible to the original. While WordPress may respond to the clamour from users and fix the errors, if you run a WordPress site, it might be time for you to learn more about Gutenberg and how it might affect your business… and potentially look at alternative content management systems such as Joomla or Drupal.
Disclaimer: Scott Bowler is the creator of ClassicPress.
Scott Bowler is a digital marketer and developer with over 12 years’ commercial experience. He works in conjunction with WW! to deliver digital solutions to businesses across Shropshire.
