@marc - people have been saying this for years, each time a new fad in programming rolls into town, but it's only fair to ask: why have none of these wonders of "proper" coding yet managed to magic up any sort of production-ready alternative to WordPress? One that actual, real users choose for actual, real uses?

Don't pay too much attention to armchair critics who don't understand the difference between talking and doing. If someone, someday, somewhere produces a better publishing platform using Rails or whatever, great, we can all jump over to that but, for now, WordPress is where the action is - use it, enjoy it, improve it.