There has been a war going on in the WordPress ecosystem for two weeks. In the latest development, employees are leaving controversial WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg is dividing the WordPress community. It appears that one eighth of their own workforce does not share their position. It’s about the demands of millions of people, about blackmail, about “nuclear options” and, on a larger scale, about protecting the future of open source against profit-oriented corporate giants.
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At least that’s how Mullenweg, one of the co-founders and main developers of the widely used CMS and web publishing system WordPress, sees it, which as an open source project currently powers nearly two of all known websites. Third supports. Mullenweg himself is also the founder and CEO of Automattic Inc., a for-profit company that also owns Tumblr and the freemium platform WordPress.com, among other things. To clarify: WordPress itself is under the umbrella of the WordPress Foundation, which Mullenweg also founded. Since the project is under the GPL license, the codebase is freely usable, modifiable and can be used to create commercial content.
discord
Since mid-September, Matt Mullenweg’s declared rival has been hosting provider WP Engine, which has been selling free WordPress-based products for a decade. The platform serves more than 150 million customers, including large companies. WP stands for WordPress and in the past WP Engine has been a welcome guest at community events and also part of the Five for the Future initiative, which encourages large WordPress recyclers and hosts to voluntarily work on WordPress. WP Engine is clearly tied to WordPress – and its offering competes with Automattic.
The stumbling block appears to be the acquisition of WP Engine by US technology investor Silver Lake, which is backed by multibillion-dollar holding company Mosel Bidco SE. In a blog entry in mid-September, Matt Mullenweg criticized the impact of such profit-driven companies on open source-based projects: Here, people take without giving back, and in doing so, bring the entire system down. Is weakened until nothing is left of it.
Silver Lake is no stranger to the detrimental impact of venture capital on software companies: Software AG, which was acquired by Silver Lake, is currently selling its assets; Development at Talend, also largely owned by Silver Lake, has stalled in recent years. Mullenweg’s critical view of Silver Lake in particular seems justified – although he appears to attack WP Engine more than Silver Lake.
Among other things, he criticized WP Engine’s practice of removing the “undo” function from its offering, which is so important to the final product, and the low number of work hours that WP Engine invests in the codebase. mentioned. This time on the Five for the Future show – their company Automattic is on top with about 3,500 hours per week, leaving WP Engine with only 45 hours left for development. But WP Engine also ranks in the top fifth among all contributors. Another allegation: lack of donations to the WordPress Foundation. If you donate just one dollar, you will be donating more than the million-dollar WP Engine.
nuclear option
Mullenweg hence demanded compensation From WP Engine. The hoster is using the WordPress brand, which actually belongs to the WordPress Foundation, for advertising purposes without permission – which confuses even his own mother – and so he has to give up some of his income every month to pay for the usage. The share should be handed over. There’s a lot of money at stake here: Mullenweg demanded 8 percent of the proceeds, about $35 million. It can also be performed by WP Engine employees as a workforce who dedicate their paid time solely to working on WordPress. The time Mullenweg gave WP Engine to fulfill his demand was limited: exactly one week later, Mullenweg wanted to obtain the expensive signature. If WP Engine did not comply, Mullenweg threatened the “nuclear option”, which meant delivering an accusatory keynote speech at the annual WordCamp community meeting on September 20.
WP Engine cited communications with Matt Mullenweg in its statement of claim (not yet verified for authenticity)…
(Image: WP Engine)
WP Engine talks about this “Blackmail” And in the one listed on 2 October Claim details by WP Engine There are screenshots of communications with Mullenweg – a classification as blackmail not plucked from thin air, assuming it is correct. The signature was not signed, Mullenweg kept it nuclear keynoteWhich consisted of two slides: an explanation of useful open source systems and a headshot of Silver Lake Managing Director Lee Wittlinger, along with a public email address.
…which can definitely be considered blackmail.
(Image: WP Engine)
perfect and ideal
The dispute here, which has become a full-blown drama, has split into a legal dispute over the WordPress brand and Mullenweg’s activism. In addition to the documented communication, the statement of claim also includes another juicy detail: the rights to the WordPress brand do not belong to the WordPress Foundation, but to Mullenweg, or rather Automattic. When WordPress assigned the trademark to the Foundation, the Foundation immediately and exclusively transferred it to Mullenweg’s company, which is why Automattic also serves as a cautioned party with respect to its use. WP Engine also cites years of use of the trademark without warning and asks the central question: “Why suddenly now?” This also includes the explicit licensing of WordPress as GPLv2, which should legally allow WP Engine to conduct its business practice.
Mullenweg recently dismissed the statement of claim as irrelevant, meaning he is currently facing a legal dispute. Instead of legal papers, he relies on the strength of the community and his own influence. With his keynote and his blog post, in which he mentions the essential security of open source software, accuses WP Engine of scaring its supporters and assures that he “definitely will not commit suicide”, he Brings out big silverware from the drawer and has so far effectively turned the community against Silver Lake and WP Engine. Plus, something more tangible: Shutting down WordPress services for WP Engine Till October 1st. WP Engine documented the significant impact on its incident blog but continued to refuse to pay.
While WP Engine chooses the legal form, Mullenweg takes his own path.
(Image: CKU)
Crack
Such actions now also affected the community, of whose sympathy Mullenweg was genuinely confident. However, the idea of a fork is currently circulating and Mullenweg’s approach is creating uncertainty: why does he mention WP Engine so much when many other providers also use WordPress, use the brand and the project? Contribute less?
The fact that his own company, Automattic, is the primary beneficiary of the compensation also does not reflect well on the open source campaigner, and in response to the impending community split, he announced on October 5 that he would be furloughing his company’s employees. will give one to to pay compensationIf they want to leave the automatic due to dispute. 156 employees have now accepted the offer – an eighth of its workforce. The mudslinging will continue on two fronts: Mullenweg will take more public jabs and WP Engine will defend itself legally.
(KKI)
