Not sure what you mean by large scale, but if you’re referring to traffic or # of users, WordPress.com is a good counter-example to both, with over 3,000,000 users and serving 600+ million dynamic pageviews a month. If you’re below that size there’s a beaten path for how to scale.

Is this the new Apple-Windows debate? Does the rabidly defensive marginal community of Drupaliers verbally assault anyone who questions their imaginary hegemony?

Here’s the problem with your comment: you say my argument is hollow. But it’s not an “argument”; it’s a result of real-world experience with the extent to which the Drupal community has built something that works only for the Drupal community.

And as is clear from the piece, I’m not suggesting that WordPress and Drupal are interchangeable; instead that successful products, platforms, frameworks will always emerge from the kinds of community that WordPress is building vs. the kind that Drupal has built.

Both Drupal and WordPress have functionality extensions in the form of modules and plugins, respectively. WordPress comes with more features built-in to the core download which is good for some people, the people who want those features. And because those features are in the core product the main development team can spend time perfecting the user experience of all that functionality and interfaces. I am certain there are plugins for WordPress that have a horrible user experience just like there are Drupal modules that do.

Eclipse

If you read my piece you’ll see that it isn’t about saying WordPress and Drupal are interchangeable; rather that WordPress’s model has built a strong community of end users, while Drupal’s has created an inward-looking community of developers and dev shops.

Oh, and as for your suggestion that I be more positive and “balanced”… I’m not writing a term paper for a community college. If you want Drupal to succeed you’ll have to accept that it’s about responding to, not arguing with, the market’s reaction and perception.

Is one better than the other? No, they are two different applications in my opinion. They both have their appeal to different markets. For my personal blog or website, at least to me, Drupal is a little overkill. I just want to post some articles and have some photos for my flickr page. But on large scale sites, I couldn’t imaging creating it in wordpress. I am sure you can, but I feel Wordpress is more like Dreamweaver where Drupal is more like Textmate (sorry for the Mac comparison).

But again, I am sorry that you do not like Drupal, but to say that it is completely irrelevant is irresponsible of you. It obviously is a relevant force on the web. Instead of ranting against Drupal, write an article that is a little more positive in saying “I didn’t like Drupal, this is why because of X, Y, and Z”.

Steven

Respectfully, I would submit to you that your comments are again a little bit off the mark. This is sort of Lullabot’s field, but they spend quite a bit of time educating the field… this includes the big companies as well the smaller firms (in many cases, single developers). Sony BMG has one of the best drupal developers on the planet as an employee, and there are others on staff there who do drupal work as well.

I do find it so odd that you seem so focussed on startups. Businesses with a history seem a better litmus test to me, however, I’m sure there are others far more qualified that I am to comment on this particular dynamic.

As to Drupal being billed as a “CMS”… who can say? What I CAN tell you is that Drupal IS a rapid development framework… a huge portion of that is learning curve, and to discount it before experiencing it, is to mislabel Drupal before actually learning what it’s about. I can’t help you with that misconception because, even for an experienced programmer, the learning curve is pretty steep.

Finally, I think the reason it looks like we’re all drinking the same coolaid is because… largely, we are. The Drupal community communicates a lot, and largely I think we’re all on the same page as to where we’re heading and what we want to be doing. If you don’t like Drupal today… try it again next year about this time.

Eclipse