Mastodawn

Cory Birdsong Dec 20, 2024

If you don't work in the WordPress ecosystem, you may not understand how HUGE this post is

https://joost.blog/wordpress-leadership/

Joost is probably the second biggest figure in the entire WP ecosystem, only after Matt M himself. He is the biggest voice from the "Enterprise WordPress" world.

This is not anymore open source contributors complaining about governance. This is the Business WordPress demanding a leadership change and suggesting it either happens or a hard fork, backed by big business, is on the way.

Breaking the Status Quo

A vision for a new WordPress era WordPress is at a crossroads, now even more clearly then when I wrote my previous post on WordPress’s roadmap. I had very much intended to leave this topic alone for a bit until after the holiday break, until, last night, Matt imposed a holiday break on us all. ... Read more

joost.blog

javi Dec 20, 2024

To be clear, Joost doesn't mention a hard fork, but one of the things he demands is moving from WordPress' centralized plugins and themes repository to a "federated and independent" repositories, and he mention this needs AND CAN be done whether MM agrees or not. I don't see any way to do this against MM wishes that doesn't end in a fork

Charity Gamble Dec 20, 2024

@javi I agree. There's really no way to do this without a hard fork and forcing people to choose sides. But I'd love to know why when I started w/ WordPress back in 2003, MM *wanted* the community aspect and now wants to just be a dictator instead (excuse me, *enlightened leader*)...

ophiocephalic 🐍Dec 20, 2024

@javi
Just noting: Interesting that he's calling for a decentralized network of federated repos; not as an ideological abstraction, but because it can be the practical solution to a problem, which originates as a centralization of power

Korrupt Dec 20, 2024

@javi I think i get maybe *some* of the implications and know a* little bit* about the backgrounds, but nevertheless i'm actually undecided on "heh, cool", "well, shit" or "hm, popcorn".

The Nexus of Privacy Dec 20, 2024

@javi wow. Really great point about this signalling where Enterprise Wordpress is. Looks like Matt's got a lot to think about on his holiday break.

René Seindal (MOVED)Dec 20, 2024

@thenexusofprivacy @javi
He's already refused to collaborate in a comment.

He clearly wants control more then he wants community.

The Nexus of Privacy Dec 20, 2024

Yeah. But he's not going to get what he wants here, so has to decide between burning it down and taking another strategy.

Stephen Dioxide

@javi I can't tell if this is good news or bad. I don't like the idea of corporate control of OSS, but I do like the idea of corporations contributing time and/or money to OSS. So, maybe it's a question of any one corporation having an outsized voice. If the power balance is roughly equal, they will be incentivized to create code that favors transparency and interoperability. Hopefully.

javi Dec 20, 2024

Honestly, neither do I. It's a escalation of the situation, for sure. No idea what's going to happen next

Stephen Dioxide

@javi It's enough to make one examine one's options.

Darnell Clayton

@javi I wonder if @joost will do a “soft” fork instead‽ Basically it would reduce friction with the #WordPress community & they could introduce ideas that were desired albeit ignored by the community.

But yeah, with this lawsuit going on, I do not see @WordPress changing their board anytime soon.

javi Dec 21, 2024

My guess is that would be his first choice. But with Matt being against it, I don't see it being a feasible option: WordPress core is full of hardcoded references to the centralized repo, it's hard to change that without breaking compatibility.

Darnell Clayton

@javi Yeah, after reading through the comments on @joost post, it is clear that @photomatt is encouraging a fork (for better or worse).

A fork might be a good idea. It could also end the silly legal drama between WP Engine & @wordpressdotcom, as the former will probably pivot towards using the fork.

javi Dec 21, 2024

Also, in the comments of the post MM himself tells Joost he is free to do it, but be better calls it something else. The moment the brand changes, if some of the big hosting companies decide to go with the new brand (and after WPE they have all the incentives), WordPress can find itself being the smaller part of the fork soon.

Darnell Clayton

@javi Well, WordPress itself is a fork of B2, & they surpassed them. Something similar could happen here as well.

A cool crab wearing shades Dec 21, 2024

@javi and WordPress only got such wide adoption in the first place because Movable Type changed their license restrictions sending free personal users scrambling.

Andrew Dec 21, 2024

@javi i feel like mattt is still thinking of the wordpress brand as worth what it was worth in August

Major Denis Bloodnok Dec 21, 2024

@javi "I asked ChatGPT". Got anything by someone who doesn't trust automatic BS generation?

(More seriously, I am aware of the issues here, but it seems extraordinary that the author would so directly undermine their own credibility!)

A. P. Howell Dec 21, 2024

@denisbloodnok So glad I'm not the only one whose eyes rolled far enough back to see her brain.

Moved, see description Dec 21, 2024

@javi
Wow this is massive!
I'm very far from the WordPress ecosystem. Reading see is very interesting.

Thanks for the share!

Avi Rappoport (avirr)Dec 21, 2024

@javi The Inc article mentioned by matt, without paywall: https://archive.is/2024.12.19-214420/https://www.inc.com/dfreedman/matt-mullenweg-wordpress-wp-engine/90994969

Seth is Pissed Dec 21, 2024

@javi @dusoft Yea, this is huge

Marcin Juszkiewicz 🙃Dec 21, 2024

@javi the WordPress situation is getting me closer to spend a day and migrate my last WP site to a static generator.

I hope that WP will end like Joost wrote cause current state is a shame. It is too big project to continue the old way.

🐈‍⬛David Sommerseth Dec 21, 2024

I have one WP site which could easily be a static site. I've tested hugo slightly and pelican a bit more to explore that field.

So far Pelican has been reasonably impressive. Simple tooling, simple templates which is easy to understand (for someone not doing web stuff for a living).

If I get enough time the coming 2 weeks, it will be migrated. I might also run some more tests with hugo again and also Jekyl. But I'm a bit more attracted towards Pelican as it is written in Python, which I know better than Go (Hugo) and Ruby (Jekyl).

Marcin Juszkiewicz 🙃Dec 21, 2024

@dazo @javi my personal website is Pelikan for something like 5 years now. It was a great decision.

It started with WordPress MU in 2005, then normal WordPress for 13-14 years.

Nowadays I would not start new site using WordPress. Was tired of plugins losing functionality ("move to Pro version") and piles of JS/Css crap.

Reinder Dijkhuis Does Art Dec 23, 2024

@javi TIL that the second-most important person in WordPress is a guy who asks ChatGPT things. The project is doomed.

javi Dec 23, 2024

Oh the MOST importantv person in the project is an AI maximalist that believe even the smaller piece of hype on the field, so asking chatGPT for a servicing l definition is nothing 😂

Reinder Dijkhuis Does Art Dec 23, 2024

@javi It is DOOOOMED. Migrate as soon as you can.
Which is a problem for me based on how I've set up stuff over the past two years.

Mystery Babylon

heart_progress_Hearts

@javi 👀