The drama within the WordPress community continues into the new year. Automattic, the company behind WordPress.com, announced it would reduce its involvement in the WordPress core project, which is essential to the longevity of both the technology and the WordPress community.
Matt Mullenweg, Automattic’s CEO and co-creator of WordPress, has been in conflict with WP Engine since last September over the issue of contributions to WordPress as an open-source project. Automattic’s latest move involves reducing its commitment to the "Five For the Future" initiative, aligning its hours with WP Engine's contribution of about 45 hours per week. These efforts will likely focus on security and essential updates that benefit the community as a whole.
Automattic stated that it would redirect its resources toward its ongoing legal battle with WP Engine, which has been a point of contention. Mullenweg previously criticized WP Engine, calling it “cancer to WordPress,” due to its ownership by private equity firm Silver Lake and its lack of significant contributions to WordPress's growth. Automattic reiterated this criticism, arguing that WP Engine's minimal contributions need to be addressed for the well-being of WordPress. The company aims to foster fairness and greater participation from all organizations benefiting from WordPress.
Automattic’s current weekly contribution under the Five For the Future program is around 2,560 hours, significantly lower than the 3,900 hours contributed in September. The reasons for this reduction are unclear, though it may be due to a smaller workforce or a shift in strategy. Automattic also sarcastically pointed out that contributions from its commercial products, like WordPress.com and WooCommerce, are sometimes viewed as contributions to WordPress itself. Consequently, engineers will focus on these products instead of the WordPress core. Additionally, Automattic faces financial pressures, with BlackRock marking down its investment by 10% in December, following a previous 50% devaluation.
In another related development, Thijs Buijs, a WordPress core contributor who led the sustainability team, resigned after disagreeing with Mullenweg’s approach to WordPress’s future. The sustainability team focused on WordPress’s long-term sustainability across social, economic, and environmental factors. Following Buijs’s resignation, Mullenweg disbanded the sustainability Slack channel, remarking, “Today, I learned we have a sustainability team.” Mullenweg had initially created the channel in 2022.
Mullenweg’s handling of the WP Engine legal dispute and broader issues within WordPress has led some to call for new leadership. Joost de Valk, the creator of the popular Yoast SEO tool, proposed a decentralized “federated” approach to WordPress repositories for greater access to assets like plugins and themes.
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