When I began building web sites back in 1995 we had few if any tools and practically no reference material. Creating a web page was almost like a hidden, secret art where few even knew what a web page was, much less how to create one using this strange markup called html. Well things have changed and no one that lived through those days ever looks back with much fondness over the good ole bad ole days of hand coding web pages.

Fast forward ten years to 2005 and while some things had changed the ability to build a website was still clunky. Frontpage and other HTML front end tools had made things somewhat easier however the ability to talk to a backend database was still restricted to ASP, Cold Fusion and PHP/MySQL masters.

While I could use any of those programs I still found the process painful and the ability to rapidly build a decent looking web site – even a simple site – that interfaced with a database was limited to a few hardcore coders.

So get to the point?
- WordPress is the easiest and least expensive tool I have found to rapidly build a decent looking dynamic web site.
- Millions of people use WordPress therefore security holes and bug fixes are quickly discovered and rapidly patched.
- Thousands of themes exist for WordPress so you can create a site that looks good without having a creative bone in your body.
- CSS. CSS. CSS. What does this mean – no HTML TABLES. Why is that good? Search engine optimization. HTML tables completely destroy the information flow to an automated tool (i.e. Google) that is trying to “read” your page and understand it.

Get your feet wet at http://wordpress.com/