“Today WordPress powers one of every 6 websites on the Internet, nearly 60 million in all, with 100,000 more popping up each day. Those run through its cloud-hosted service, which lets anybody create a free website online, attract 330 million visitors who view 3.4 billion pages every month.”
Given the ubiquity of WordPress, why isn’t [WordPress founder Matt] Mullenweg, now 28, a billionaire? Since its founding in 2005 Automattic has chosen scale over scratch, giving away much for free. Only 1% of WordPress.com devotees pay. Not among them: users of WordPress.org (the open-source version), who run servers and implement the software themselves. A small percentage has only recently been coaxed into paying for additional features like file backups. Automattic implemented an ad-sharing service–on a limited basis–just last year.
… a massive community of developers and consultants make a living directly off of WordPress. In a recent survey, the company found 20,000 people across the globe hosting blogs, designing websites and offering maintenance services for WordPress users.”
[Source: forbes.com]
