LOCAL—Like most people that host a WordPress blog, web developer Bryant Knight is excited when a new version comes out. New features, new look, but one distressing side effect: the return of the dreaded ‘Hello Dolly’ plugin.
“The first time I tried it out, I thought it was cute,” Knight recalls. “It doesn’t do much. It prints a lyric from the song ‘Hello, Dolly’ in the upper right corner of the admin screen on every page. That’s it.”
But the novelty wears off quickly, and while the plugin is easily deleted it’s impossible to prevent it from returning. When WordPress updates, Dolly comes back.
“I maintain dozens of blogs. Dolly didn’t bug me too much the first few dozen times I deleted it, but after fifty, one hundred, five hundred times? Fuck my life. It’s like herpes, or that damned cat. You think it’s a goner, but it just won’t stay away.”
Beyond the time wasted in continually uninstalling the unwanted plugin, Knight has lost personal productivity whiling away countless hours fantasizing. In this case, imagining creative and entertaining ways of torturing and killing the man responsible.
“Don’t get me wrong, Matt Mullenweg is obviously a talented guy, but if I knew that hooking up with WordPress would mean a lifetime of irritation from this horrible plague . . . uhm, plugin . . . well, who knows? I might have gone with Tumblr.”