The word’s been out for a long time now that WordPress websites make up over 25% of the websites on the world wide web. That’s including websites that have been collecting dust in the loneliest corners of the web since before the days of GeoCities and probably haven’t seen a visitor since sometime last century. In other words, we’re a much bigger chunk of active sites than even the 25% figure indicates.
Working support tickets for Ninja Forms, I’ve had the opportunity to see some of the coolest websites built on WordPress, from government and military sites to large corporations and small businesses alike. Just how popular WordPress has become still surprises even its most avid users, sometimes. I had just such a moment recently and wanted to share. Not only is this site built on WordPress, it’s spun up a page singing its praises and listing the reasons why. Let me introduce to you, the one and only…
NASA Glenn Research Center
(Sorry Billy Shears) Yep, NASA uses WordPress. Technically just the Glenn Research Center (GRC) branch of NASA, but that’s impressive enough as it stands. The GRC’s physical location is in Ohio. They conduct research on flight propulsion, spacecraft propulsion, and microgravity. They’re credited with completely sci-fi sounding technological achievements such as the liquid hydrogen rocket engine, the liquid hydrogen-burning portion of thew Atlas V rocket, the ion thruster engine for spaceflight, and a few other things that wouldn’t be out of place in the next Star Wars film.
Why WordPress?
GRC has a page dedicated to laying out the reasoning behind their decision. You can dig into the page itself for more detail, but these are the reasons they list:
- Only basic HTML experience required
- No additional software necessary
- Built-in Section 508 compliancy
- Search engine friendly
- Search engine notification
- Built-in search engine
- Content separate from design
- Automatic RSS feeds
- Low cost, lower maintenance, and widely supported
- Track annual site usage
- Dynamic site map
- Automatic link checking
- Automatic identification of external links
- Image manipulation versatility
- Categories/Tags archiving system
That’s quite a list!
WordPress is Awesome
The point of this is, WordPress has come a long way from the b2/cafelog blogging platform that Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little forked back in 2003. Though public perception of WordPress hasn’t completely caught up to reality in all cases, WordPress is indisputably the content management system of choice for some of the most successful and advanced organizations in the world (and out of it!).
No other CMS out there has the versatility to both be picked up by total beginners and used to create gorgeous personal websites, and at the same time have enough oomph under the hood to be used by an organization like NASA. If you’re using WordPress, you’re rocketing towards the future of the internet. If you’re not, what are you waiting on!?
craig turner says
I wonder who actually builds a website for Nasa!