MariaDB is the offshoot of MySQL created by the original creator of MySQL. The point being to maintain a non-Oracle, open-source version of ‘MySQL’ since Oracle has since aquired MySQL. I don’t know I care either way but supposedly MariaDB is faster than MySQL also so that’s why I did the switch.
The switch was a piece of cake. I moved from MySQL 5.1 to MariaDB 5.3 just by exporting the databases from MySQL, moving them to the new server, and loading them to MariaDB.
So for anyone afraid of making the switch you don’t at least have to worrying about the migration of data. So far MariaDB seems fine inasmuch as I don’t have any issues, it just works.