Transparency Report Update: July–December 2016. Consistency is Key.

Today we launch our seventh bi-annual transparency report, covering the period between July 1 and December 31, 2016. As usual, we detail the number of takedown demands and requests for information received from governments, as well as the intellectual property (IP) takedown notices we have received.
Having published these reports for a number of years now, something that is particularly striking is just how consistent the intellectual property figures are from one period to the next. To demonstrate this point, here are the percentages for the number of DMCA takedown requests we have rejected for each period, on the basis of being incomplete or abusive. The graphs include the total overall number of requests to provide some more context:
We believe that these numbers demonstrate a persistent and ongoing issue with the current copyright takedown system, which allows abuse to go unchecked due to a lack of real statutory consequences. Ten percent of notices on a single platform may not appear like much of a concern, but if our experience is representative of other similar hosts in the industry, the overall volume of abuse would amount to a huge number.
The same consistency seen in the IP
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14752/transparency-report-update-july-december-2016-consistency-is-key

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/transparency-report-update-july-december-2016-consistency-is-key/

Google Chrome SSL certificate proposal could affect millions of websites

Last year, the developers behind Google’s Chrome browser began taking steps designed to protect users and encourage companies to use HTTPS.

But now, potentially millions of websites that use SSL certificates issued by Symantec and affiliated resellers could find that their certificates are effectively worthless as far as Chrome is concerned, after a member of the Chrome team published a proposal that would make them untrusted over the next 12 months.

The reason? According to the Google Chrome team, Symantec has not properly validated thousands of certificates. In fact, the Chrome team claims that “an initial set of reportedly 127 [misissued] certificates has expanded to include at least 30,000 [misissued] certificates, issued over a period spanning several years.”

Ryan Sleevi, the Chrome team member who wrote the announcement, elaborated,

“This is also coupled with a series of failures following the previous set of misissued certificates from Symantec, causing us to no longer have confidence in the certificate issuance policies and practices of Symantec over the past several years.”

Under the proposal he put forth, the accepted validity period of newly-issued Symantec to nine months or less, and an “incremental distrust” of currently-trusted certificates and removal of recognition of Extended Validation status of Symantec-issued certificates.

A nightmare scenario?

Symantec is the currently the largest Certificate Authority (CA) and by some estimates, has issued a third of the SSL certificates in use on the web.

So if the Google Chrome team moves forward with its proposal, it will have a huge impact on Symantec and its customers. Symantec would have to reissue potentially millions of certificates, creating a huge headache for customers, who would have to go through the validation process and install replacement certificates.

What’s more, under the Chrome team’s proposal, Chrome would immediately remove the status indicators for Extended Validation certificates issued by Symantec.

These certificates, which require companies to provide greater verification that they are who they say they are, are often used by companies running websites that absolutely need to use HTTPS, such as those that handle payments and financial transactions.

Extended Validation certificates are more costly, and one of the justifications for the greater cost is the fact that most browsers display indicators for websites that use them. If those indicators go away, it could theoretically harm companies that have relied on these indicators to signal trust to their users.

Not surprisingly, given the gravity of the situation, Symantec is disputing the Chrome team’s claims about certificate misissuances. In a response, it called the Chrome team’s proposal “irresponsible” and said the allegations leveled at it are “exaggerated and misleading.”

Symantec is open to working with the Google Chrome team and while it’s reasonable to hope that both parties will identify a satisfactory resolution that averts disruption, companies with certificates issued by Symantec will want to monitor the situation as it develops.

source https://searchenginewatch.com/2017/03/31/google-chrome-ssl-certificate-proposal-could-affect-millions-of-websites/

weDevs is Bringing Back The Missing Stats of New WordPress.org Plugin Directory!

Missing the Plugin Stats in the New WordPress.org Directory? We know! Here at weDevs, we feel your pain. To ease your pain we brought it back, and you know what, we made it even better than it was before! The Problem!
The new design for Plugin Directory in WordPress.org came live yesterday. We all seen it in beta, but still, after seeing it live, most developers freaked out about several things. The new search algorithm is one thing, you could read about it here. And the next disappointment is when you find out you cant see any download count at all, beside just the Active Install. So, how do you could know if your plugin is being ranked bad, and not getting Downloads like before? There is no official default way. That’s problematic!
Why We Created This?
At weDevs our core business is WorPress product, to be exact WordPress Plugin. Not being able to understand how we are hit with new algorithm is a big blow for us. But the good news is the API still works, and our Founder & CTO Tareq Hasan was able to cook something very quick.
Presenting “WP Stats by weDevs”
Here I would like to Present “WP Stats by weDevs” – WPStats.weDevs.com
It shows you even
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14751/wedevs-is-bringing-back-the-missing-stats-of-new-wordpress-org-plugin-directory

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/wedevs-is-bringing-back-the-missing-stats-of-new-wordpress-org-plugin-directory/

Genesis 2.5 Beta Released

We are happy to announce that, after several months of work, Genesis 2.5 Beta is ready to download and test. In Genesis 2.4, we began the process of expanding our Markup API to allow for nearly universal markup control. Through filters, you can modify the HTML element, modify the attributes, add additional microdata, or disable the output completely.
We also began removing the legacy xHTML from the main output functions: The output logic is now its own file, which doesn’t load unless you’re running an older theme that doesn’t support HTML5.
Genesis 2.5 will continue to add new elements to the list of those that have been passed through the Markup API. It will extract more and more of those last bits of xHTML logic, as well.
We made significant progress, both in conversation and code, in starting to move Genesis into a better-organized, more object-oriented direction. This work will continue into 2.6, but the steps taken so far are as much examples for future development as they are code improvements.
In addition, we’ve tried to extract large blocks of HTML that were previously mixed in with large blocks of PHP in order to move them into their own files. We call
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14748/genesis-2-5-beta-released

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/genesis-2-5-beta-released/

WordPress Theme technologies Web Usage Statistics

This page has technologies from Content Management Systems and Ecommerce groups to provide a complete picture of coverage for WordPress Theme based technologies.
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14750/wordpress-theme-technologies-web-usage-statistics

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/wordpress-theme-technologies-web-usage-statistics/

10 Ultra Useful WordPress Cheat Sheets for Developers & Coders

WordPress is the best platform for blogging and creating websites. 27% of the websites in the world are powered by WordPress platform & the number speaks for its popularity. There are lots of free themes and plugins available which you can pick from to make your blog look good and function well. The challenging part comes when a blogger needs to make some changes or tweaks in the existing theme design and then has to deal with the coding files.
This is also a problem if a web developer wants to develop a theme/plugin from scratch and has to deal with lots of functions and tags, as there many in WordPress.
Though you can refer to the Codex for help, having a WordPress cheat sheet will be very handy for you.
In this post, I have rounded up the 10 most useful WordPress cheat sheets that you can download and refer to at any time.
If you are a web developer, a blogger, or a beginner, this WordPress Cheat Sheet collection will save you time and help you remember most of the tags, functions, and file names in WordPress.
1. WordPress Cheat Sheet For Developers
If you are a WordPress developer and want to develop or tweak a WordPress theme, this cheat sheet would be enough for you to start.
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14749/10-ultra-useful-wordpress-cheat-sheets-for-developers-coders

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/10-ultra-useful-wordpress-cheat-sheets-for-developers-coders/

Gutenberg Core Editor User Testing

This is a guest post by Martin Lugton (@martinlugton), Johan Falk (@j-falk) and Lucijan Blagonic (@lucijanblagonic). During WordCamp London contributor day, we created a user testing script to test the features of the Gutenberg editor. The aim was to build a set of instructions so that people can easily carry out user testing, and quickly share the results.
We prepared 18 questions that cover the functionality of the prototype, and created a form for recording the results. This form populates a spreadsheet that gives an overview of each task and each test. This will allow us to identify which tasks are easy for users to complete, and which ones need some further design work.
We did one test run (with only a handful of questions) and one full run with a test subject (Thanks, @Jip). The whole interview is 24 minutes long and can be viewed here:
Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3.
Tammie Lister (@karmatosed) suggested we add another text field where the user can write down comments. We also added conditional formatting to the results spreadsheet so that tasks which were rated with 3 or lower (out of 5) are marked red. If you want to use this form you can or create your own based on it.How to do
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14747/gutenberg-core-editor-user-testing

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/gutenberg-core-editor-user-testing/

Five most interesting search marketing news stories of the week

Welcome to our weekly round-up of all the latest news and research from the world of search marketing and beyond.

This week, the Google SERP has got a bit more interactive with the addition of rich results for podcasts, and a new study has found that marketers are still failing to use advanced search tactics in their campaigns.

Plus, Google has launched a new website to bring all of its open-source projects under one umbrella, and an unlikely partnership has arisen between Google and Chinese search giant Baidu to bring faster mobile web pages to a wider user base.

Google adds rich results for podcasts to the SERP

Google has stealthily launched some new guidelines for structured data on its Developers blog, to bring rich results for podcasts to the SERP.

At the moment the new feature is only available via Google Home (where you can use voice activation to start up a podcast) or in the Google Search app v6.5 or higher on Android, but Google hopes to soon add support for Chrome on Android.

Google’s blog provided a sample image for how this will look in practice:

In his article for Search Engine Watch this week, Clark Boyd explains how you can get your podcast indexed on the SERP, and how to add the right structured data to your podcasts.

Study: Marketers still aren’t using advanced search tactics

Those of us who keep close tabs on search innovation and strategy – or comment on it – are probably familiar with search tactics like retargeting lists for search ads (RLSA), voice search optimization, ad extensions in paid search listings, and schema markup. We know how to use them, and the benefits that they bring to ROI and visibility.

But a study by Bing and search agency Catalyst has revealed that among marketers as a whole, very few still are making use of advanced search tactics like these in their campaigns.

When asked which of a range of tactics their company used or was planning to use in 2016, only 34% of marketers reported using ad extensions; 30% said they used Product Listing Ads (PLAs); and 28% used retargeting lists for search ads (RLSA).

Just 28% of respondents reported using voice search optimization, 27% said they used sitelinks, and a dismal 17% reported using schema markup.

So why are many marketers still failing to tap into the full potential of search? Search Engine Watch spoke to Microsoft’s Rob Wilk and Catalyst’s Kerry Curran to find out what search marketers can do to improve their campaigns.

Twitter introduces pre-roll ads for Periscope

Pre-roll ads might just be everyone’s least favorite ad format – so much so that YouTube did away with 30-second unskippable pre-roll ads earlier this year. But Twitter-owned livestreaming platform Periscope announced this week that it will be adding pre-roll ads to live and replay Periscope streams.

The new ad product is named, unsurprisingly, Ads on Periscope, and is an expansion of Twitter’s existing Amplify ad product. The Periscope ads are expected to share revenue with content creators in the same 70/30 split as Amplify ads.

Amidst Twitter’s struggle to drive revenue on its social platform, monetizing Periscope could be one way to bolster its flagging fortunes. But the autoplay ads may prove to be unpopular with users, especially with the news that they will run over streaming content – meaning that viewers will miss several seconds while the ad finishes.

Google’s new site brings all of its open-source projects under one umbrella

Google has launched a new website this week which is designed to act as a central directory for all of its open-source projects, bringing them together under one umbrella.

In its blog post announcing the launch, ‘A New Home for Google Open Source‘, Google wrote that the new site:

showcases the breadth and depth of our love for open source. It will contain the expected things: our programs, organizations we support, and a comprehensive list of open source projects we’ve released. But it also contains something unexpected: a look under the hood at how we “do” open source.

The site contains the source code for Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages Project official website, as well as the source code for its Android mobile OS, the Chromium web browser, its Tesseract Optical Character Recognition engine, and hundreds of other Google projects, both well-known and obscure.

While Google has always made the code for these projects available on GitHub and its self-hosted git service (this being the nature of open source), this is the first time users have been able to browse them from a central location, and is sure to provide Google enthusiasts with plenty of cool material to scour.

Baidu is working hand-in-hand with Google to accelerate the mobile web

And speaking of Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP), an unlikely partnership has arisen in the world of search, as Baidu and Google confirmed that they are teaming up to bring a faster mobile web to a wider user base.

Google has a rocky history with China. It has had a presence in the country since 2005, but in 2010 decided to stop censoring its searches in accordance with Chinese law in response to a Chinese-originated hacking attack on itself and a number of other US tech companies, redirecting the searches instead to its Hong Kong search engine. Access to Google’s search engine and services has been blocked by the Chinese government on a number of occasions.

In the wake of this, native Chinese search engine Baidu overtook Google as the main search provider in China, and now enjoys around 80% of the Chinese search market, while Google China only has about 10%. But the two have evidently agreed to set aside their rivalry in order to pursue a higher goal: accelerating the mobile web.

At Google’s first AMP conference in New York, Baidu’s Gao Lei announced Mobile Instant Pages (Chinese-language link), or MIP, Baidu’s answer to Accelerated Mobile Pages. Hermas Ma reported on Search Engine Land that MIP has very similar technology to AMP, the main difference being that MIP are optimized for the Chinese internet.

Mobile Instant Pages can reportedly reduce the rendering of above-the-fold content by 30 to 80 percent, and Baidu has been considering giving MIP a ranking advantage in search results (something which AMP doesn’t yet have).

Ma also notes that the AMP Project website now loads in mainland China where it didn’t before, further pointing to a burying of the hatchet between Google and its Chinese counterpart.

source https://searchenginewatch.com/2017/03/31/five-most-interesting-search-marketing-news-stories-of-the-week-18/

WooCommerce 3.0.0. Release – April 4 – Webby Blog – WordPress & Web HTML development best practices

WooCommerce stands favored and powers over 28% of the online stores. It not only provides you with an easy user interface, but is also free and open source. The option to add along various plugins to enhance performance of the store is yet another beautiful advantage that WooCommerce gives away. WooCommerce recently released its 2.7 Beta 3 version on the 17th of February. Many small and big improvements and fixes were made, thus making the last beta version all the more usable. However, don’t be quite so satisfied by using the current version of WooCommerce and if you are, be prepared to drop it like a bad habit because the Woo Ninjas are all up and about to present the WooCommerce 3.0.0. Version instead of 2.7. This Bionic Butterfly is all set to woo you with the new and fixed features.
The updated features for the Developer Community are:
CRUD (Create, Read, Update and Delete) option for orders, products, customers, line items, shipping zones, payment tokens and coupons.
The API would use CRUD classes due to which codes won’t be used as much as it is usually.
The previously structured data has been output inline which now is JSON-LD format which keeps the template files
Source: https://managewp.org/articles/14745/woocommerce-3-0-0-release-april-4-webby-blog-wordpress-web-html-development-best-practices

source https://williechiu40.wordpress.com/2017/03/31/woocommerce-3-0-0-release-april-4-webby-blog-wordpress-web-html-development-best-practices/

44 Best Free WordPress Blog Themes for 2017

Are you looking for a free WordPress blog theme for your website? There are thousands of free blog themes for WordPress making it harder for beginners to choose from. In this article, we have hand-picked some of the best free WordPress blog themes that you can use on your new blog.

Getting Started with WordPress

First, you need to make sure that you are using the right platform. Self hosted WordPress.org site is the perfect platform to start your blog because it gives you more freedom and control.

It is open source and comes with support for thousands of free templates and extensions that help you grow your blog faster. See our guide on why you should use WordPress for more details.

You can use our step by step beginner’s guide on how to start a WordPress blog for detailed instructions.

Once you are up and running, it is time to choose a theme for your website. You can choose a theme from our expert selection below and then follow the instructions in our how to install a WordPress theme guide to set it up properly.

Having said that, let’s take a look at some of the best free WordPress blog themes that you can install on your website.

1. Bento

Bento is a powerful multi-purpose WordPress blog theme with tons of features. It works great with the most page builder plugins and even recommends installing one upon activation.

For a free WordPress theme, Bento comes packed with great customization options. All of them can be accessed using theme customizer.

2. Modernize

Need a blog theme with minimalist approach to design? Checkout Modernize. It is a simple WordPress blog theme with collapsible menus and it comes in one and two column layouts.

Designed to improve readability it uses clean typography and elegantly handles featured images.

3. Nisarg

Nisarg is a beautiful free WordPress blog theme. It comes with a clean layout with two navigation menus and a large full-width header image. It also supports custom backgrounds and colors.

All theme options are easily customizable using the theme customizer. It also comes with multiple post formats for videos, gallery, audio, chat, aside, quote, etc.

4. Hueman

Hueman is one of the most popular free WordPress themes. It comes with a multi-column layout and can be easily used on any kind of content rich blogs or magazine websites.

You also get support for custom headers, two column layout, full width layout, and tons of easy customization options.

5. Juno

Juno is an elegantly designed free WordPress blog theme. It allows you to easily customize colors and fonts. Juno includes features such as a slider area, masonry style blog, fully responsive design, and multiple widget areas.

It supports WooCommerce and comes with page, product, and blog post layouts.

6. Peaceful

Peaceful is a minimalist WordPress blog theme. It features a single column layout with large header image, a compact navigation menu, and beautiful featured images. It is quick and easy to setup and looks great on all devices and screen sizes.

7. Ajaira

Ajaira is a simple free blog theme for WordPress. It features a minimalist design with focus on crisp typography and beautiful featured images.

It comes with header social menu, header search bar, custom background, custom header, and colors. All theme options are easy to setup using the live theme customizer.

8. Wisteria

Wisteria is a simple WordPress blog theme with focus on beautiful typography and content. It comes with custom background, custom colors, custom header and a left sidebar.

Wisteria also has a single navigation menu on top and beautiful homepage that features your posts with custom excerpts and featured image.

9. Ribosome

Ribosome is a magazine style free WordPress blog theme. It comes with custom header, custom background, and unlimited colors. It has a single navigation menu and a social menu on the top.

Ribosome comes with a two column layout with sidebar on the right. It has six different Google Fonts, round or square thumbnails, two widgets areas at beginning and end of posts, perfect for displaying ads or related posts.

10. Poseidon

Poseidon is a free multi-purpose WordPress blog theme. Featuring a spacious layout, it comes with a full-width slider, homepage layout, and multiple page templates. The homepage layout can be easily setup using widgets.

11. SiteOrigin Unwind

SiteOrigin Unwind is a multipurpose free WordPress theme with full WooCommerce support. Designed with a minimalist style, Unwind is highly customizable using SiteOrigin Page Builder plugin. It comes with multiple layouts, custom header, background, and color support.

12. Hemingway

Hemingway is a clean WordPress blog theme featuring a two column layout, full width header image with parallax effect.

It supports custom accent color, custom logo upload, custom widgets (video, Flickr and Dribbble), page templates, etc. All theme options are quick and easy to setup.

13. Maxwell

Maxwell is a minimalistic and elegant WordPress theme. It features a clean magazine-style layout with beautiful typography. It comes with various post layouts and a gorgeous featured posts slideshow.

14. Hit

Hit is a minimalist WordPress blog theme. It features a full width header image and a two column layout. It comes with a distraction free style that is perfect for reading and showcasing your photos.

15. Writee

Writee is a free WordPress theme suitable for personal websites, travel and adventure blogs. It features a large slider on top using featured images from blog posts. It comes with multiple templates and custom widgets among many other features.

16. Libretto

Libretto is a beautiful WordPress blog theme designed specifically to showcase long form writing, stories, poetry, etc. It uses beautiful typography with Playfair Display and Libre Baskerville fonts, an elegant color scheme, and distraction free single column layout.

17. Verbosa

Verbosa is an elegantly crafted WordPress blog theme. It is designed with readability and visual appearance of your content at the center. It uses a three column layout on the homepage with two columns showing your content in a beautiful grid.

18. Flat

Flat is a modern WordPress blog theme with a two column layout. It features left sidebar with navigation menu. Large featured images, custom logo, custom background and header support.

It comes with flexible customization options that can be setup using the live theme customizer.

19. Lovecraft

Lovecraft is a clean and simple free WordPress blogging theme. It features a full-width custom header at the top and uses bold headlines for post titles. It comes with a left sidebar and one navigation menu at the top.

20. Baskerville

Baskerville is a modern and stylish WordPress blog theme. It features a large full-width header image followed by your posts presented as a grid on the homepage. It comes with gorgeous templates for single posts and pages.

21. Sanse

Looking for an incredibly fast and extremely simple WordPress blog theme? Try Sanse. This free blog theme does not support featured images and the homepage layout is just a grid of your posts with excerpts. It has three widget areas in the footer and single navigation bar at the top.

22. Magnus

Magnus is a free WordPress photography theme for bloggers. It uses featured image on each post as the fullscreen header image. The homepage layout is just featured image with post titles.

It uses a single column layout for the single posts. It has collapsible sidebar, a navigation menu on top, and supports custom headers.

You should also consider using Magnus in combination with Envira Gallery, a powerful WordPress gallery plugin.

23. Fashionistas

As the name suggests, Fashionistas is a WordPress theme for fashion and lifestyle blog. It features a light breezy design with beautiful typography and gorgeous display of featured images. It comes with two navigation menus, right sidebar, and footer widget areas.

24. Admiral

Admiral is a magazine style WordPress theme suitable for sports blogs, magazine, and news websites. It features a three column layout with two sidebars on both sides and content column in the middle.

It comes with a featured posts slideshow, a magazine homepage template, a widgetized header area, two different post layouts and support for infinite scroll.

25. Coral Dark

If you are looking for a WordPress blog theme with dark background, then try Coral Dark. It comes in one-column or two-column layout with built-in slideshow. It allows you to customize fonts and colors and comes with two widget ready areas.

26. Barletta

Barletta is a light and elegant WordPress blog theme. It is designed for lifestyle, travel, fashion, food, and personal blogs. It focuses on improving readability and displaying your images gracefully. It has a two column layout with sidebar on the right. It supports custom headers, background, and a featured content slider on homepage.

27. Revive

Revive is a beautiful free blog theme for WordPress. It features a magazine style layout with large header image and your featured content displayed in a posts grid. It comes integrated with Font Awesome icons and supports multiple blog layouts.

28. Hiero

Hiero is a free WordPress blog theme with a magazine style layout. It uses bold colors for header and accent. It uses a two column layout and comes with a navigation menu on top. The home page displays your latest posts with excerpts and featured images.

29. Zeal

Zeal is a free WordPress blog theme for the creative types. It comes with a parallax Jumbotron with color filter option, featured posts, multiple widget areas, and stunning parallax effects.

It supports custom headers, background, and custom colors. It comes with multiple widget ready areas and page templates.

30. Tracks

Tracks is a thoughtfully designed WordPress blog theme for personal, magazines, and photography websites. It includes a logo uploader, social media icons, search bar, widget ready areas, and crisp typography. The homepage features a grid layout of your posts with featured images.

31. Extant

Extant is a minimalist WordPress blog theme designed specifically for photographers and artists. It offers a clutter free design with no sidebars, or widget ready areas. Homepage is made of grid of your posts using only the featured images and post titles. It comes with a collapsible menu on top and two layout choices.

32. Scratchpad

Scratchpad is an illustrative and colorful WordPress blog theme. It uses a set of patterns, drawings, and styles to create a beautiful and fun look. It supports multiple post formats and displays them beautifully. It has a sidebar on the right, and another at the bottom.

33. The Columnist

The columnist is a WordPress blog theme featuring a magazine style look. It comes with different layouts for homepage, archives, single pages, bbPress, and BuddyPress. It also includes a responsive customisable slider and four color schemes.

34. Satori

Satori is a highly customizable WordPress theme for blogs and personal websites. It features a full-width header on the homepage and comes with different page templates including support for WooCommerce, multiple widget ready areas, and post formats.

35. Nitro

Nitro is a highly customizable free WordPress blog theme. It comes with a beautiful homepage layout with slider on top and featured content below. It has multiple widget ready areas, page templates, and supports custom headers, backgrounds, social menu, custom colors.

36. WriterBlog

The WriterBlog is a simple WordPress blog theme featuring a classic blog layout. It comes in a two column layout with sidebar on the right. It supports full-width custom header, custom background, custom colors, etc.

37. Illdy

Illdy is a multi-purpose WordPress theme suitable for business, personal, magazine websites. It is built on bootstrap framework and features large header images, two column and full-width layout, custom background, and color selection.

38. Tecblogger

Tecblogger is a simple and clean WordPress blog theme. It features a classic blog look with content column and a right sidebar. It comes with a navigation menu on top and supports custom headers, custom backgrounds, and colors.

39. MadHat

MadHat is built on Bootstrap framework, and it is a multi-purpose WordPress theme featuring a black and white layout which can be easily customized. It comes with Font Awesome icons, multiple blog layouts, and sidebar customizations.

40. Garfunkel

Garfunkel is a stylish WordPress blog theme featuring a grid layout on the homepage. It supports custom headers, custom backgrounds, six post formats (including a gallery slideshow), six custom widgets, social menu, and two page templates.

41. Author

Author is a beautiful WordPress blog theme for authors and writers. It features a simple two column layout with sidebar and navigation menu in the left column and content on the right. It supports custom colors, background, and multiple post formats. It is optimized for accessibility and performance.

42. Tempo

Tempo is a modern WordPress blogging theme that can be easily used as a business website as well. It features clean crisp typography with a bright breezy layout. It supports custom header, parallax, header buttons, custom logo, custom colors, custom background, social links, left and right sidebar, and custom widgets.

43. Natural Lite

Natural lite is a simple blogging theme with earthy tones. It uses large featured images, supports custom header and background. It comes with multi-column layouts and easy customization options.

44. Ignite

Ignite is a stylish WordPress blog theme featuring a classic blog look. It comes with a two column layout, a compact top bar used for navigation menus and site title and description. It uses medium sized featured images before post titles and utilizes crisp typography for better reading experience on your blog.

That’s all for now.

We hope this list helped you find the best free WordPress blog themes for your website. You may also want to see these actionable tips to drive traffic to your new WordPress site.

If you liked this article, then please subscribe to our YouTube Channel for WordPress video tutorials. You can also find us on Twitter and Facebook.

The post 44 Best Free WordPress Blog Themes for 2017 appeared first on WPBeginner.

source http://www.wpbeginner.com/showcase/best-free-wordpress-blog-themes/