It’s common knowledge that people love “Top 10 Lists”. People love WordPress. It’s also common knowledge that people love celebrities and finding new ways to connect with them. I took these facts to create what should be the best blog post of all time: The Top 10 Celebrity websites running on WordPress.
The list and my findings after the break.
First off, here are my notes to all celebrities reading this (I’m sure they are flocking here in droves as we speak):
- It’s 2010. How can you not have a website?!? An official website is probably the easiest way (outside of Twitter) a celebrity can reach their fans. You could use it to release press releases, dispel rumors, or just connect to your fans that might not be into social networking. Also, while doing the research for this article I found several “imposter” official sites, and in almost all cases there was no real official site to dispel the info on the counterfeit one. Get with it celebrities.
- For celebrities that do have websites: Stop. Making. Crazy. Ass. Flash. Websites. I do not want to wait 90 seconds for some ridiculous flash layout to load to when all I want to know is your next concert date, book, or movie. I will get my info somewhere else and never visit your site again.
- On the other side of the coin: If you have a website that was designed in 1998, for God’s sake, get it redesigned. You’re supposed to be some kind of artist (be it film, music, or writing), express yourself on your website a little bit.
- If you’re 40+ years old stop using head shots from your 20’s on your website (looking at you Alec Baldwin)
OK, enough ranting, let’s get to the list. In no particular order (other than the one I felt like putting them in).
1. Miley Cyrus
Site: http://www.mileycyrus.com
I was surprised to see that Miley Cryus’ website was built on WordPress as you would think such a large scale site would have been mentioned in WordPress community before, but this is the first I’m hearing of it.
This site gets +points for using Amazon’s S3 as a CDN for images, stylesheets and JS files.
2. Russel Brand
Site: http://www.russellbrand.tv
One of my favorite comedians/actors has to be Russell Brand, so I was glad to see that his site is running on WordPress. The site features a custom design (which I actually kind of like), a Twitter feed and some basic info about dates, announcements, etc. Sadly, the site seems to only be updated a couple of times per month at best.
3. Kobe Bryant
Site: http://kb24.com
One of the greatest basketball players of all time has his site running on WordPress. The homepage design is fairly simple and clean, and the site’s main focus seems to be around announcements about the player. There is a small shop section, but it seems to be lacking on products at the moment.
4. Terrell Owens
Site: http://www.terrellowens.com
Love him or hate him – his site is running WordPress, so here it is. This site is actual pretty solid in design, layout, features and usability. It also seems to be regularly updated (which is the most important aspect of any website nowadays). Also, Owens is on my fantasy football team so I thought including him in this list might be a positive offering to the football gods.
5. John Grisham
Site: http://www.jgrisham.com
One of the most famous authors of our time runs his site on WordPress. Nothing too fancy here, fairly basic design and functionality, but still cool that it’s running WordPress.
6. Jewel Staite
Site: http://jewelstaite.com
OK, complete disclosure here, I’m a huge Firefly/Serenity fan so I had to include Jewel Staite’s site which features a custom design built on WordPress. Nothing too fancy here, just a custom design, a blog, few content pages, photo gallery and it looks like there is a link for a store which contains no info (Jewel, may I suggest Shopp or WP-Ecommerce). Nice use of personal branding in the design.
7. Wyclef Jean
Site: http://wyclefjean.wordpress.com
Wyclef’s recent presidential run in Haiti may not have gone the way he would like, but at least he can take comfort in the fact that his site is running WordPress (and on WordPress.com in fact). A lot happening on the homepage of the site.
8. Jay-Z
Site: http://www.jay-z.com
The king of hip-hop himself, Jay-Z has a website which is running on WordPress. The design is more minimalistic than I would have thought it would be, but I guess it works to get the message across. I’m normally a big fan of minimalistic, but I wouldn’t mind seeing a little more of a clear separation between the different content.
9. Stephen A Smith
Site: http://stephena.com
If you watch ESPN or listen to ESPN Radio, chances are you know who Stephen A Smith is. One of the best, most influential basketball analysts and commentators around (other sports as well, but basketball analysis is where he shines). Pretty slick, clean website built on WordPress
10. Danielle Steel
Site: http://daniellesteel.net
I have to admit, I’ve never read a Danielle Steel book, but I do know she is one of the most influential romance writers of our day. Her website is very minimalistic, but still maintains a clear structure and division of content through the use of bold, yet subtle color scheme. Also, the biggest plus is that the site seems to be regularly updated by Ms. Steel hereself.
About the Author
Dan Cannon is the Chief Technology Office/Lead Programmer of Nicasio Design in Savannah, GA. Dan is the author of several WordPress plugins, has worked on dozens of custom WordPress sites, is a WordCamp speaker, and is the lead developer of Nicasio’s e-commerce solution, NicE-Comm.
Follow Dan on Twitter @NicasioDesign