WordPress.com is a fully hosted solution. WordPress.org is a self hosted solution. With new services entering the WordPress eco-system such as Poll Daddy and IntenseDebate that start to remove that distinction for certain aspects I have begun to wonder whether there is a third way, and if so whether anyone would want to use it.
When a visitor comes to your blog at WordPress.com they access pages stored on WordPress’s servers. These contact the database, also on WordPress’s servers and serve that data up in the form of the finished page.
When a visitor comes to your self-hosted WordPress.org blog they access pages stored on your servers. These contact the database, also on your servers, and serve that data up in the form of the finished page.
When a visitor comes to a third way site they access pages stored on your server. Your server contacts the third way API to collect data, carry out formatting functions, etc. The API retrieves the data from the third way database servers, does whatever it needs to and returns it to your servers where it is output in the form of pages.
What third way does is separate out the data and logic which is a hosted solution, from the administration and presentation which is self-hosted.
The first and most obvious benefit is that by separating out the core logic you can now write your client in any language you choose. Want a C# version of WordPress? No problem, you are really just connecting to web services anyway.
A much smaller server client with much less logic means much less upgrading. But because it is a client and not a truly hosted solution it is up to you which plugins you install, which themes you install, or even if you want to do something very different with the data.
It also leaves the way open to do vastly different things with the design of the client if you don’t like the official version and, possibly even more importantly, allows another platform to use the API to switch solutions.
I don’t know if something like this will ever happen but I can see the possibilities. How about you? If Automattic (or anyone else for that matter) offered a third way version of WordPress would you be interested?