[theme-reviewers] A Question About Theme Review/Submission

[Philip Walton]

Ryan, you've brought up good points in a fair manner. I don't think 
you've wasted anyone's time. These discussions are good.

Regarding the data lock-in of plugins being essentially the same as 
themes, I'd have to disagree. While I see your point that any custom 
post-type/taxonomy locks that content in at creation time, there is 
still one big difference:

The purpose of a theme is primarily presentation, and the purpose of a 
plugin is primarily functionality. Sure there are grey areas, but 
keeping this distinction in mind is good for everyone.

Being "locked-in" to a particular plugin because of functionality the 
user wants is very different than being "locked-in" to a specific design 
because of functionality the user wants.

Philip


On 5/24/11 2:55 PM, Ryan Frankel wrote:
> I see what you are saying about data lock-in.  Even with a plugin and a custom post type the data would be locked into that post type. As I think about it, if you add any Custom Taxonomy you have already automatically locked-in that data too.   It seems to me that creating a plugin that adds this functionality doesn't really solve the problem with the data being 'stuck' except that a user can switch their theme.  They would still be stuck to our plugin so it just pushes the problem deeper down.