I have never seen a more reckless case of CEO behaviour in a long time. I have no idea how the discussions with streamers and now Hacker News, is going to fare for Mullenweg, but I don't think it's good.
Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
111–120 of 717 posts
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#112What's sad here is that this dispute isn't likely to make Wordpress any better, but rather send money to lawyers and reduce enthusiasm for the OSS project.
And what is more sad is that it really appears that the WordPress figurehead is to blame. Matt has made so many unforced errors in the last month, in addition to revealing, one way or another, that he basically considers WordPress, the .org, the .com, the Foundation, and Automattic, all to be synonymous, which is news to a significant portion of the community, let alone to the incorporation and other founding filings…
He's Temu Elon Musk: https://mashable.com/article/tumblr-transphobia-matt-mullenw...
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you missed the point. They (i know it's you but easier to not personalize it here) do not own all the rights to the software themselves. For the parts they do not own, they have no rights other than what they got through GPLv2. Those rights are conditioned upon them not trying to sublicense/etc the software in a way that conflicts with GPLv2. Which this term sheet purports to do.
The agreement wasn't about their license to the code, it was about their license to the WordPress and WooCommerce trademarks. They could agree to not do things allowed under the GPL, like replacing our Stripe attribution, it's their right to. Or not.
Let's be clear about who did what here. WP Engine didn't agree to anything. You demanded that they not do these things.
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#114Howdy, Matthew Charles Mullenweg from the lawsuit here. One thing I'm surprised they disclosed is on page 35 that Heather Brunner at WP Engine was interviewing for a job at Automattic. That's why we were spending so much time together 1:1 without her team there in the meetings I posted here: https://automattic.com/2024/10/01/wpe-terms/ They lied that it was to run WordPress.com, though, she wanted to be the Executive…
Don't lawyers usually advise their clients to stop talking about it when they're sued? Or is that one of those cliches that isn't true
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
She was interviewing November 2023 to January 2024. She declined the WordPress.org role on January 26, 2024. I even invited her to my 40th birthday on Jan 11, another text message she decided not to share.
Why you don't share it? You said there's much more emails and messages, but you never shared any. Why not?
Why doesn't she share messages that prove she declined a WordPress.com job in 2022? You're holding me to a different standard. I'm here, I'm talking to journalists. They're not.
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#116[deleted]
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#117Howdy, Matthew Charles Mullenweg from the lawsuit here. One thing I'm surprised they disclosed is on page 35 that Heather Brunner at WP Engine was interviewing for a job at Automattic. That's why we were spending so much time together 1:1 without her team there in the meetings I posted here: https://automattic.com/2024/10/01/wpe-terms/ They lied that it was to run WordPress.com, though, she wanted to be the Executive…
Even if the initial allegations outlined in the introduction are only half-true, I would be too ashamed to continue posting like this. Yikes.
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
Of these, the ones that are interesting are basically 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10. The CFAA claim here is actually basically an extortion claim (plus other throwaway general claims) framed in CFAA terms. See 18 U.S.C. § 1030(a)(7) This is actually somewhat uncommon to see :) However, it seems likely to be dismissed (without prejudice) or need to be amended since it looks like it doesn't plead the claim properly. "(g)Any person…
Well, there’s also specifically the element of exceeding authorization that doesn’t even seem plausible on its face. The real meat of the federal complaint is the request for a declaratory judgment.
Yeah but at least they bother to plead the exceeding authorization portion.
I actually think they want more than just the trademark issue resolved.
I agree it is sort of the minimum they want resolved (but i flag it as non-interesting because i don't think they will have a lot of trouble winning unless there is something amazing in the response)
But i think they bothered to include the CFAA claim and unfair competition claim because losing access to those services worried them (and because the unfair competition claim enables them to air a whole bunch of evidence of conflicts/etc in front of a jury when it would otherwise be irrelevant)
Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#119It's hard to even imagine what a best-case scenario looks like for Matt at this point. Putting aside the matter of righteousness, his business is pretty much chalked for professional applications at this point. B2B partnerships are done - anyone with lawyers on-staff are going to get shoulder-tapped and asked to find another hosting solution. Smaller customers have all the more reason to bleed out to competitors, and…
If it's any three things, it's about money, money, and money. Zooming out a bit, Automattic acquired Tumblr and like all those before it seems to be choking on it. Competitors like Wix, Squarespace, WebFlow and Shopify are all nipping at WordPress' marketshare. I don't know what WordPress.com's stats look like, but blogging is out of sytle. New cool kids want the new black. That is to be social media influencers. Alo…
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Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]
#120Howdy, Matthew Charles Mullenweg from the lawsuit here. One thing I'm surprised they disclosed is on page 35 that Heather Brunner at WP Engine was interviewing for a job at Automattic. That's why we were spending so much time together 1:1 without her team there in the meetings I posted here: https://automattic.com/2024/10/01/wpe-terms/ They lied that it was to run WordPress.com, though, she wanted to be the Executive…
Your response to this complaint is going to look very interesting. Also, a note for the audience: Quinn Emanuel is one of the premier (and most expensive) litigation firms in the US. Partners in their litigation department run $2000/hour or more. Associates cost almost $1000/hour. WPEngine apparently has deep pockets.
Not only that but the team is lead by Rachel Kassabian. As I noted elsewhere in the thread, she was lead counsel for Google which in Perfect 10 v Amazon (originally it was against Google) resulted in thumbnail of copyright images in search results being fair use.