Hat tip to Daniel Jalkut and his Red Sweater Software blog post about the decision to disable the Atom Publishing and XML-RPC Protocols by default in the upcoming 2.6 release of WordPress.

This is a pretty interesting decision by the core development team that’s done under the premise of greater security. I don’t think anyone in their right mind would argue that WordPress could do with less security but there’s also an interesting twist to this development. For software creators like Daniel, and customers of his remote blogging client MarsEdit, one more hurdle has been put in their way to using WordPress the way they want to. I’m sure it will be trivial to turn off the setting and use remote clients as normal but this is still a bump in the road for users.

Another take on this is that WordPress, now featuring a fresh new admin design with the 2.5 release, is trying to shut the door on third-party posting interfaces to draw more attention and use to the new look. I don’t wear a tinfoil hat or anything but you have to admit it’s interesting to think about.