Feed your WordPress Demons!
I had a story about WP.Element’s Jason moving on to doing bigger and better things. Jason’s new theme shows that he hasn’t been wasting anytime developing new themes. His RevolutionTV theme is arguably the best video-blogging theme I have seen.
The Revolution TV allows you to host your own video show on the Internet. On the right side, there is a section for the latest video episodes, and also you can promote your highest rated videos right below it. You are also provided with the place to actually blog about your videos:
The theme is well-designed but would be most likely useful only to super video-bloggers (someone like the star of Ask the Ninja). You can get the Revolution TV theme for free on Revolution 2, but I strongly recommend signing up for their Pro program. Not only you get support for all their themes with their pro program, but they also provide you with help on how to customize these themes. It sure as heck beats paying $1000s to create a custom theme made from scratch.
Ratings: 5/5. The theme is perfect even based on my picky standards. Vloggers rejoice.
By going open source, Revolution has revolutionized the theme market in Wordpress industry. Revolution now offers many premium quality themes for free (fee required for support).
Office theme is the latest open source that has been released by Revolution. Revolution is a 2-column Widget-ready theme for Wordpress that comes with a image slider at the top.
Office is a really simple theme that can be used for corporate sites. It’s very good looking but at the same time it is convenient. You can’t get it cheaper than free. Very simple. Does the job.
Verdict: 4/5
Joomla has given us Wordpress crazy folks a run for our money. Joomla is a portal CMS that makes it easy to create membership communities. I personally prefer Wordpress to Joomla and often get tired of seeing folks claiming how great Joomla is in comparison to Wordpress. Well, with WP Membership, I really don’t see any advantage to using Joomla.
WP-Membership, which is going for $29.99 per domain, is a premium plug-in that makes it very easy to turn your Wordpress website into a fully-fledged membership site (very similar to amember). For instance, you can define what pages folks have access to, and what pages is part of your premium membership program:
The nice thing about this theme is that it allows you to use PayPal effectively to make money. You can also define user levels (gold, silver), and give them different rights. You can create and register pages under these tiers, making sure that folks get what they pay for. Overall, WP-Membership is a nice addition to the Wordpress community. WP-Membership may not be as advanced as amember, but it’s effective for small membership sites on Wordpress.
If you are a professional in the field of web design or photography, it always pay to have a portfolio of your latest work. There are actually a few top blogs that focus only on displaying stunning photos and artworks on a daily basis. Whatever your forte’, having a Wordpress theme to manage your gallery is a life-saver.
As someone who has had a few gallery sites up and running, I can tell you nothing is more important than having a theme that is attractive and easy to use. eGallery by Elegant Themes is just that. First of all, the theme is just stunning. The contract of colors with this theme is just amazing.
What I like about this theme is the ability to rank artworks on the fly with the pop-up star ranking system. The timestamp and the comment count are also pop-ups. You also get picture snap functionality in the sidebar which is a decent addition.
Overall, you want your gallery to be simple to use and good looking, and eGallery is just that. The theme is provided to you as part of your subscription to elegant themes. You also get life-time support and fixes. Best of all, you can remove the footer if you want, and you can keep the themes for free after your subscription has expired. I would give this theme 4.5/5 stars for the looks and functionality.
I have talked a lot about niche themes on WP Jedi. But one thing that I have probably not talked about is the mother of all niches – blogging. You have probably seen it by now. There are many folks around us who make decent living from teaching other how to blog or make money with blogging. I personally have no trouble with that as long as these guys actually make money from blogging before they started getting yours and my money.
But the truth is, many folks get into the blogging niche without actually making the millions first, and I don’t have a problem with that either. Pro blogging is a very hot niche these days, especially with the economy breaking down. Who wouldn’t want to be able to make a decent amount of money without the hassles of dressing up and going to work everyday?
Bob v3 is one theme that is just made for pro bloggers. As the name indicates, there are three version of this theme. The theme has evolved through the past couple of upgrades, and is now one SEO power house for pro bloggers. Bob v3 comes with the one feature that every pro blogger needs – “my favorite posts.” You get to promote posts that are the most popular on your blog. I also like the fact that you have an “about me” section to promote and sell your background.
The tabbed content is very useful. The content Ajaxified slider is “cool,” and you can use the tab feature to save real estate and show your readers more things. One thing I would change about this theme is the advertisement section. I believe it’s too low on the page, and I have not had success with my ads on that spot. It may work for you, but I am personally biased there.
Overall, Bob v3 is a very contemporary looking pro blogging theme. It’s very easy to navigate, and it’s easy on eyes. With a bit of modification, you can have your very own super blogging theme. One thing I would say is Bob v3 is a theme for serious bloggers. It is not a cheap theme as it comes with many premium features, so if you are not planning to have a serious blog, you should probably look at free theme. Good luck.
