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Comment by Johnny2727 | Hacker News Reader

Hi, Matt. Why, in late 2025, should I opt to use PHP and WP for a blog or a web site instead of just using Rust and Tokio?

If I use Rust, my web site will be blazingly fast and memory-efficient, with no runtime or garbage collector, and it can power performance-critical services that run on embedded devices and easily integrate with other languages. Rust's rich type system and ownership model will guarantee me memory-safety and thread-safety, which eliminate many classes of bugs at compile-time. And that's on top of how Rust has great documentation, a friendly compiler with useful error messages, and top-notch tooling. I can even use Rust to supercharge my JavaScript, one module at a time.

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It depends on your goals, your customer needs. All technology is just a means to an end. Languages and frameworks are easy to switch between once you understand programming fundamentals. We run production Erlang code at Automattic. Use the right tool for the job. Don't start with a language; start with a problem to be solved.

> Rust's rich type system and ownership model will guarantee me memory-safety and thread-safety, which eliminate many classes of bugs at compile-time.

With PHP, you don't have to worry about compile-time bugs, because there is no compile time.

…and instead you get runtime bugs which is somehow better?

you also get runtime bugs with rust and everything else, so i just don't get the "somehow better" line of comparison

The idea is that if something would have been a compile-time error (ex: using a method that doesn’t exist), but you don’t see that compile error because you don’t have a compiler, the error is still there. It’s just that you won’t see it until the associated code happens to run. Essentially the compiler can catch whole classes of bugs early on. Just because it’s annoying to be told your code has bugs doesn’t make that better than having bugs and just not being told.

Computer nerds should probably use Rust and Tokio. Then they can spend hundreds of evenings tinkering with their oh-so-superior contraption of a website, muttering how silly everyone else's websites are.

But everyone else who just want to put their small business website up that their marketing assistant can easily edit, will just pay someone on Upwork to pop up a WordPress site for them in a day or so, with everything they need included, so they can spend their time on value-added activities.

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