As the premium WordPress themes market continues to grow and competition becomes more intense, it is only natural to begin looking towards the future of premium WordPress themes. We all have different opinions of what that future holds, but one thing that is for sure. Widgets are going to play a huge role in the future of these themes.
The first theme that appears to be focused completely around widgets is the Shifter WordPress theme, which features a fully customizable dashboard with widgets for pretty much everything.
Here are two screen shots:
My buddy Jeffro of Jeffro2pt0 is one of those guys that is always ahead of the times. If you’d like to see an example of what Shifter can do, I recommend you check out his website. He switched to Shifter awhile ago and hasn’t looked back. You can also read his explanation for “shifting” to Shifter.
Sound interesting? You can purchase Shifter for $79.95 for a single-use copy, $99.95 for a single-use copy with support from the author, advanced copy is $199.95, and the developer’s package is $999.95.
If you’d like to learn more, I recommend you check out Shifter’s website.
PS. It's at www.rachelhenwood.com 
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Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008 at 8:50 am
As we say in Britain, Shifter is the dog’s bollocks. I love the potential of this theme, and their support is exemplary too.
Wednesday, April 2nd, 2008 at 8:10 pm
Dangit, by the time I found my wallet, I came back to this post and saw I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t find the buy link. Geezus, I wanted this.
Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 7:44 am
Shifter is defiantly cutting edge. The move to a multi-user platform has tremendous potential. Best of luck to them, but I guess I should take down their banner if I want to make any money.
Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 8:10 am
The only problem I can see with their hosted offering is that it doesn’t seem possible to tweak the theme, so you’re limited to their basic skins with perhaps just a customised header image.
Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 9:59 am
I’m not a big fan of the setup they have moved to, as the point of WordPress.org is self-hosting. You turnover control to someone else. Will he be putting up ads on “your” blog and collecting the money? I’m sort of a control freak I guess, but that is what I hated about Typepad back in the day (Typepad doesn’t do ads, but charges a monthly fee and they host the blog for you)
I suppose for someone that isn’t comfortable coding or doing basic blog maintenance, this may be a good option for them.
Thursday, April 3rd, 2008 at 5:13 pm
Hey Kyle, thanks for linking to my post regarding shifter. Although it doesn’t appear to be for sale anymore, I still tout it’s feature set and it’s extensive use of Widgets. I still believe it to be a cutting edge theme which I hope to see more of in the future.
I did some naughty things such as editing some of the core coded files in the Shifter theme for a particular skin but that was the only way I was going to get a look and feel that was unique to me while using the Shifter theme system. I did lose a little bit of versatility, especially with the top most part of the site but because I don’t change my theme once a week, I didn’t mind the loss.
Friday, April 4th, 2008 at 6:42 am
@ Jeffro - You’re welcome! Yes, you lose a lot of customizability with that type of theme I think, but its designed more for people that aren’t good with hacking code.
Thursday, April 24th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
Your site has been super helpful in my theme decisions. I’ve taken down previous blogs out of frustration, and I wish I would have tapped into your resources prior to now.
Re. Shifter: I just purchased a license. I emailed them first to ensure they were still offering it for purchase, since, as you noted, it was difficult to find. The ‘Purchase’ tab isn’t available at getshifter.com, which must be their “free” hosting arm.
Information regarding purchases of Shifter can
be found at http://wordpress.shiftertheme.com/purchase
@Jeffro2pt0, you have a great site, and I’m hoping to figure out some hacks to also modify. You should be part of Shifter’s portfolio.
Friday, April 25th, 2008 at 9:03 am
@ Dana - Thanks for the information! It looks like they have re-added the purchase tab, so I will update the post accordingly.