It’s May, and if the Automattic’s road map remains true, WordPress 3.0 is due out sometime this month. (As we wrote this, Beta 1 has just been made public.)

We are always reticent to implement zero point releases and aren’t recommending anyone update til 3.1 has been published. Here are our latest thoughts on this next version of WordPress.

5 Things We are Looking Forward to …

  1. A new default theme (Twenty Ten). It will be nice to look at something other than Kubrick upon installation, but we can’t help but wonder if that will make us miss it just a little.
  2. Custom post types, which will allow you to define and display different types of posts, really propels the notion of using WordPress as a CMS. We realize tho that most people will not be comfortable updating their functions.php file.
  3. The ability to choose  a username and password upon installation. We always encourage our clients to remove “admin” from their user list as a security mechanism, so this is a nice addition.
  4. An improved Media Gallery makes adding images, videos, and podcasts a whole lot easier. Yay!
  5. The custom menus system, including creating multiple menus, categories, and custom external and/or internal links. Despite not being quite finished, this could be WP’s best feature yet.

5 Things We Could Live Without …

  1. A big deal has been made about the merging of WordPress Multi-user and core WordPress. While we are big fans of sharing code, we think that there are 2 distinct audiences that require two distinct products.
  2. Another update to the User Interface. The Twitterati has certainly been busy dissecting this change…
  3. Custom backgrounds means that those who have little design sense could make for pretty ugly blogosphere.
  4. Many, many themes (and probably plugins) will be rendered unusable, unstable, and unable to take advantage of 3.0 offerings.
  5. Still looks like you have to be code digger to get the most out of WordPress. But it can only get easier, right?