Will a WordPress upgrade turn your theme into a pumpkin?

Remember the old tale of Cinderella? Her Godmother equipped her with a beautiful gown, glass slippers, footmen and a gleaming gold coach to carry her to the ball that would change her life—if she got home before the final strike of the clock. She didn’t quite make it, fleeing the ball, the arms of her prince and loosing her slipper in the process. Not only that, but her coach transformed to it’s original form: a pumpkin. You could be like Cinderella if you use a free WordPress website theme that will turn into a vegetable when the WordPress platform updates.

Free = you get what you pay for

There are many sources where you can get a free theme to which you add your content, colors, logo, and images. But you don’t own the theme—or in the parlance of Cinderella—you don’t own the coach that takes you to the ball—and you could be left with squash. That is if the developers of your site’s free theme didn’t code it in accordance with the WordPress platform’s codex. WordPress is updating it’s platform on an ongoing basis. If your free coach, ummm, theme, is not coded as it ought to be you’ll be left sitting in a mess when WordPress upgrades. If you’re ready for an upgrade, we’re ready to carry you to the ball, in a coach you own, which won’t “squash” out on you at midnight. Photo credit: flickr user Sam Howzit creative commons attribution license