As a guy who makes videos where I use WordPress as my main tool, and I show people how to do stuff it I haven’t really talked a whole lot except for in my weekly newsletter about this whole WP engine Matt Mullenweg thing. And I figure also people have been talking about it endlessly. And if you’re watching this video, you’re probably familiar with the inside baseball. It’s occurred to me that I haven’t really commented on on this YouTube channel. It isn’t as if my thoughts on the matter really changed anything.

They’re really not even all that important in the space, but I just figured, being that I do have a YouTube channel in the space, I figure perhaps I should make a few my points about it. You know, because I also do see a little bit of alarmism, and I wonder is it deserved? Is are we looking at the potential end of WordPress? Is it better? Is is WordPress now too unstable and you should go check out other platforms like Drupal or Webflow or something like that?

Where do we stand? So with all that said, I just kinda wanted to make a few off the cuff comments about the entire thing, and it’s just gonna be my opinion. 1 of the reasons I haven’t talked about this a whole heck of a lot is mainly because I feel a little bit like an intruder talking about it. I I consider myself to be a somewhat advanced user of WordPress. Ultimately, I think I’m more in the customer service business.

I help my clients as a support, you know, avenue through concierge. And so, basically, I’m there to support them with whatever needs to be done. I mean, sometimes I’m handling stuff with their email, and it’s got nothing to do with WordPress. So I’m a more of an advanced user. I look at things holistically.

I am not a WordPress developer. I know how to to code some stuff, but I don’t consider myself a programmer. If you ask me to program my own WordPress plugin, it’s gonna be a rough 1. I’m a little out of practice. And I definitely don’t get involved in the WordPress community from a developer core contributor thing.

There’s definitely aspects of that side of WordPress that I simply just don’t deal with. And so from that perspective, there are there are ins and outs of this stuff that, frankly, I’ve been concerned that I might speak about things that I don’t know, and therefore so that’s a part of the issue, just being honest with you. So, and the the other thing too is there’s so many people out there talking about this whole thing with Matt Mullenweg that there is definitely not a whole lot of need to reiterate everything. At the end of the day, if you’re watching this video, you kind of already have probably seen the affair play out. So I’m not gonna give a play by play of what has occurred between Matt Mullenweg and WP Engine.

Overall, I will say, I think that this is primarily a matter of inside baseball between us WordPress geeks. I think that we look at this as like watching a drama unfold. And I think something about the way the world works these days is people like to watch these dramas. It’s almost like all our lives are boring enough. So we watch this thing play out and we get to nominate who the good guy and the bad guy is.

And overall, it looks as if the community is really a little sour on Matt Mollenweg right now. And they’re just it’s almost like it’s a pile on. People are having fun just ripping the guy to shreds. And I’ll be honest, I think some of it may be deserved. But I also think we need to not lose sight of the fact that we’re here to a big extent because of the work of Matt Mullenweg.

So it isn’t as if just because he’s been acting a little weird, and I totally think so too in the last few months, I’m not gonna sit here and get onto the bandwagon where I’m just gonna bash the guy around. I I don’t I know how social media works. I know people like to pile on. I don’t wanna pile on other than just commenting, so for the sake of putting my opinion onto a YouTube channel that does talk about WordPress. Out in the real world where normal people are using wordpress, it’s business as usual for the most part.

There a lot of people aren’t even aware of this. It’s this is kind of the kind of stuff that you’re seeing in discussion groups with a bunch of other WordPress people primarily, and sometimes you you’ll see something pop up on TechCrunch. But for most people who use WordPress, they don’t even know about this stuff. That’s the that’s the thing. If you look out of the big picture, this is just inside baseball for wordpress nerds like me alright now overall I think that Matt started off with a good point on the whole thing I don’t like the way he’s managed everything, but I think he started off with a good point, and then it went sour because I think the way that he’s handled it was frankly pretty stupid, and I don’t think the way, I don’t think he’s been consistent with how he’s handled the issues with trademarks.

That whole thing about acting like WP Engine is is trademark infringement. So many people out there are using WP. It’s been understood for the longest time that you could use WP. It’s not confusing. Nobody was confused by the word WP engine and thinking that it was associated with WordPress.

I guarantee you that. I don’t know where he came up with that. It’s just not true. WordPress.com, which is his company, confuses the shit out of people. Nobody was confused by WP Engine.

So I think that that was an excuse to play out something that he kinda wanted to do. That’s my personal opinion. I could be wrong. That’s what it seems like. I don’t I don’t think he’s been consistent about it.

I think he’s going based on emotion at this point. But underneath all that, I think he started off with an overall good point about contributing to core, and he has us you know, the the the the efforts to get different companies to contribute to core. I think there’s some value to that. I just don’t think the way that he went about this was smart in any way. Outside of the right or wrong of it, I think what’s coming out of this is that we’re exposing some weak points in the WordPress ecosystem.

And it’s, it brings up just larger issues. And I think the big thing is that, it the whole ecosystem is too centralized around that. The funny thing is there there’s pros and cons to that. I will say I do think that WordPress is as big as it is to a large extent because of, some centralization around that. Now the because the WordPress trademark is what it is.

He owns it. Okay. Now the funny thing is he says it’s the WordPress foundation, but from what I can tell, that’s just fuzzy for Matt. There is other 2 other person on people on that board. It seems as if they’re like nobodies.

So basically, it sounds like Matt has monopolistic control over the entire thing, and he tried to make it look like he didn’t. So that exposes a weak point, and it also exposes the weak point about how much this ecosystem depends on wordpress.org and the repository there, and that he completely controls that. Unfortunately, it’s not only good control. It would be okay if he controlled it as, a point of benevolence and consistency. However, he has proven that he’s not.

He is willing to steal and fork other people’s plug ins. He did it with advanced custom fields. I thought that was a real boneheaded maneuver on his part. He’s he’s been willing to lock people out, kick them out. He’s acting like that.

It is just not how he 1 acts if you want an ecosystem to thrive. And so the sent the the 1 of the strong points that’s actually helped WordPress get to be as big as it is has now turned into a problem. I think the real thing that comes up here is that the world of WordPress needs to decentralize and needs to move away from Matt. It doesn’t mean that we cast Matt to the curb. I think it’s just it’s kinda like how in the US government, we’re supposed to have checks and balances.

Those checks and balances exist for a reason. We broke away from England because everything was was ran by a king, and and there was a lot of issues with that. Right? I see the parallels here with the world of WordPress. Right now, Matt Mollenweg is basically the king, and when the king loses his rocker, loses his magnetic north on his little personal compass, it throws things into limbo.

And it doesn’t mean WordPress is gonna fall apart. I just think it exposes some issues, and I and I think those issues would be solved by decentralizing. It doesn’t mean that Matt needs to go away. I just think that Matt needs to, not be the center of the WordPress world I mean on the flip side look at it the the things are really centralized around wordpress.org who pays for that that website is not free Okay? It probably costs a lot of damn money to keep that thing up.

It’s understandable. If I if I’ve I’ve been and I’m running a website, and I’m paying for that, I’d probably feel some sense of ownership over that, and I probably also could feel like I could make the rules. Even if the rules might ultimately not help, but I have the right to do it. So I think it’s not I think we need to decentralize away from just wordpress.org, and I have seen some talk about that with regard to, different repositories, basically different app stores for themes and plugins. I don’t think it’s a bad thing.

I don’t think it’s necessarily just an escape from Matt. I think it’s more for the health of the ecosystem. You look at some of the like, in I I have a little I have some interest in the world of crypto. You look at 1 of the strengths of Bitcoin is the fact that it’s decentralized, and nobody can shut it off. And I think what we need to do in the world of WordPress is introduce some decentralization, so that Matt might continue to be the big thing with wordpress.org, but we don’t have to completely rely on that, and we can actually put some real work and marketing chops into creating other app stores for WordPress.

It would be really easy to do because this the the code is all open source, nice and easy to do it. So that it does splinter the ecosystem up some, but I think it’s just kind of a necessary thing so that we’re not at a point where Matt can just take people’s stuff or shut people out of the out of the ecosystem. I don’t think that that’s the right thing to do. So I do think decentralization is probably gonna be 1 of the things that comes out of this entire affair. Another thing that I think needs to happen, I just don’t know if it will because a lot of it’s gonna rely on Matt.

But I think that the trademark needs to go to a true WordPress foundation. And I’m not a WordPress friend, Ashton, that is basically a disguise. Underneath it, it’s all Matt. I think we need a real 1 with a lot of people in it. There needs to be some consistency.

There needs to be guidelines on a very simple website about how the trademark works. I personally think that the trademark should be transferred to a WordPress foundation that is just not where Matt might be on the board, so to speak, but he’s not the major player. I think where there needs to not be a major player, I think there needs to be more people there when you know who they are. And, I just I think that’s a necessary thing for the WordPress ecosystem to move forward. Maybe it will happen at some point.

I do think that it we’re that, Matt’s gonna have to pipe down a little bit first, and people probably, like, need to stop attacking them and putting them on the defense constantly. And then maybe he he will eventually see the light in that regard if he wants this thing to con to not, you know, continue to have these types of issues. Now I don’t know. Maybe Matt thinks that this that this world of WordPress is so strong that nothing can really hurt it. I don’t really know what he’s thinking.

But I do think that, as long as the rules with regard to the WordPress trademark can be changed on his whim, that will be a problem. And I do think that we have to remove the whim from it by having a a transparent, WordPress foundation where everything that happens there is transparent, not fake transparency, which is what I think is going on right now. Part of the issue with that is also because he runs automatic and has wordpress.com. I think there’s a major conflict of interest there with regard to him running that that, commercial company, which has everything, every right to do, of course. And, but but yet treating the not the wordpress.org side of things the way that he is.

He’s basically the way it’s working right now, because he’s doing everything on a whim seemingly, is that he is he wants people to contribute to core. However, he gets the a lot of the economic benefit of that, by way be with the ability to change the rules. And obviously, WordPress is a really large economy, and a lot of a lot of people are making money on it. It’s not just Matt, but he he owns a trademark. He gets to change the rules.

He uses the trademark very, very commercially. He runs the only company out there that that I just don’t think has been handled very well at all. It’s it’s it’s 1 of it’s just a it’s a really fuzzy gray area that I just don’t think has been handled very well at all. I’m not I just think that some of these issues could be solved by having the WordPress trademarked, owned by an actual separate entity. A WordPress Foundation is a separate entity where Matt is not the sole person.

Even if it’s a not even a 3 board thing, a 3 person thing, where the other 2 are are like nothing and that’s it. That’s fake. That’s what’s going on now. I think we need to have a larger board, and I think we need to know exactly who’s on it. It should be people who are actually in the space.

I think that’s what makes a heck of a lot more sense here. Yeah. About the topic of WordPress Forks, there’s been a lot of talk about, oh, they’ll just fork the code. It’s all GPL, and you will and there’ll be other new WordPresses, so to speak. I don’t think that that is going to do the trick here.

Obviously, there have been forks of WordPress. Okay? And the thing is you’ve probably never heard of them. That’s the thing. The strength of WordPress is the ecosystem around WordPress.

All of us doing things in this world of WordPress. People like me, people like a good chunk of you watching this, people who make themes and plugins. Yes, the brand recognition of WordPress. Yes. Also, the centralized repository of wordpress.org and how easy it is to put all that stuff.

It’s kinda like the App Store with Apple. It it provides a lot of convenience to the iPhone, the fact that we have an App Store. Right? That’s kind of the way WordPress is working right now. Again, it’s a strength.

It’s also proving to be a weakness right now because the person who controls it has gone off on a whole different direction from the rest of us. But I don’t think a WordPress fork is how you’re gonna solve it because it will ultimately be a brand that is probably not really known, you’re start you’re sort of starting from scratch with a different brand, you’re not gonna have the inertia, and therefore, I just don’t think that that’s really going to work. I really you could anybody could do it, I just don’t think it’s gonna work. The other thing is I’ve been seeing people say, oh, WordPress is now I I it’s so unpredictable. It’s unstable.

I I I now recommend that my clients go and they use something like Webflow. What are you thinking? That that is not yes, it’s an alternative, but to go from 1 open source product, like WordPress, that you can still pretty much do whatever you want with, regardless of what’s going on with Matt, and go to Webflow, which is completely closed source and proprietary and you’re stuck there and you’re replacing you what your fear Matt might end up being, Webflow actually is. I mean, remember when they changed the pricing and people were freaking out and going, oh my god. I you know, they they had your sites hostage.

Why would anybody move from a platform like WordPress to a Squarespace or a Wix or a or any of these proprietary platforms where your site’s basically stuck there. That’s a stupid argument, and in my personal opinion, anybody that recommends to a client to go that route over something like WordPress because of the map thing is not serving their clients properly. In the end, we’re gonna have to see how this whole thing plays out but the WordPress ecosystem ticks on I think it’s gonna continue to tick on I think Matt didn’t open up a little bit of a can of worms with this, and I do think that some changes will probably come with the WordPress ecosystem as a result. I don’t necessarily think they’re gonna be a bad thing, though. I I think it’s 1 of those things that in the end, what needs to happen is probably what’s going to happen.

I don’t think that this thing has gone the way Matt thought it was gonna go. I think he’s on a little bit of a defense now. Doesn’t want to admit it. And, he’s probably kind of angry about the whole thing. I think he’s probably kinda surprised about how this has played out.

I think when he portrays confidence and everything he’s made and how it’s all, like, part of a plan, I probably not. I I think this thing backfired on a way that he probably didn’t expect was gonna happen. And and frankly, he brought it on himself. Again, I I I’m I’m not gonna bad mouth him because I think he’s done a colossal amount of good in the world. I really do.

I don’t think we would be here, doing all this if it wasn’t for actions taken by Matt Mullenweg. It isn’t as if he created it, but he did it put some structure into things that has helped this ecosystem grow to the size that it is. And so I will always be thankful to Matt for that role, but it doesn’t mean that every decision he makes is a good 1. And I will say the ones that I’ve been seeing him make over the last few months seem a little immature to me, and it’s not serving the ecosystem, and his and WordPress very well. And I wish I wish he would stop and just kinda let this thing play out the way that it is.

But all that being said, this whole thing has exposed, some issues that I think need to play out, and I think it’s going to go in the theme of decentralization. We need we need to, go that direction in the world of WordPress. But in the meantime, I’m not concerned about WordPress as a platform. I continue to use it for my clients, not just because that’s all that I know. It’s it’s, it’s not actually, but it’s, it’s because I still think that it is the best way to go for the purposes of what I call digital sovereignty.

It’s where you can own and control your own website and your own data, and you can still do that with WordPress. 1 thing about anything that Matt’s doing, he can’t turn off your website. He just can’t do it. And so, that’s that’s a really, really important thing. 1 final thought to those of you who are in the WordPress business, like I am.

I I I just wanna remind you that if you think that that’s your bread and butter is WordPress, I think you should reposition that and reframe that a little bit in your mind. The way I look at it is that I am in the customer service business. I’m there to support my clients with their web goals. I happen to use WordPress as a platform, and I still think it’s fine. I’m not worried about the stability of it.

But that’s the business that you’re in. So you people who are who are on there pontificating and freaking out, acting like, oh, I can’t make stuff for WordPress, or I can’t even recommend WordPress anymore for my clients because of Matt. I don’t know. I think you’re being a little shortsighted. I think you’re being drama queens, to be honest.

You’re in the customer service business. You’re you shouldn’t have everything that you do so framed mentally around the idea of WordPress that you can’t have a little bit of adjustability in what you do. Anyway, that’s just, a few side thoughts. All that being said, I think, this video has been a little bit random because, frankly, the topic I’ve got a bunch of little thoughts going together, but I just kinda wanted to make at least 1 video where I kinda made a few of my thoughts known about it. I don’t it’s not gonna change anything because, honestly, my opinion doesn’t matter that much.

It’s just that I have had some people email me and ask about it, and, so I figured I would make at least 1 video where I just kind of put my opinions out there for whatever they’re worth. With that being said, I’ll see you on the next video where we’ll do something a lot more useful.