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Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

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Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#201

Post by bigiain »

photomatt wrote: post #52
DataDive wrote: post #20

That's what going "nuclear" looks like ... I guess Mullenweg found out. Sadly, instead of supporting open source with $5 million, they each will spend 10 million on lawyers.

Silver Lake and WPE's legal attacks may impact my ability to provide free services on WordPress.org in the future, especially things like Slack or forums that are grounds for discovery. I hope not, though. Going to fight this with everything I have.

As I see things, WPE's legal _responses_ to being attacked by you are what's going to grind your ability to provide "free services" into the ground.

All of WordPress's reputation and goodwill transformed into luxury cars and 3rd holiday chalets for lawyers...

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#202

Post by chrismorgan »

photomatt wrote: post #169
mthoms wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why did you tell the community: "the most central piece of WordPress’s identity, its name, is now fully independent from any company" ? That's objectively untrue. Period. That was 14 years ago Matt. You mislead the community for 14 years .

The trademark originally belonged 100% to Automattic. It transferred it to the Foundation, and retained the commercial license and the ability to commercially sub-license. The Foundation gave me a license to run WordPress.org. This has all been public, though I agree it's complicated and not widely understood.

I’m curious: what else is there to a trademark? Nominal ownership may lie with the Foundation, but if they’ve granted “irrevocable, exclusive, royalty-free rights in the WordPress trademarks right back to Automattic” (as claimed in this lawsuit), what else is there? Maybe there is something, I’m no lawyer or particularly deeply familiar with trademark law, but it sounds to me like, for all practical purposes, ownership belonging to the Foundation is a furphy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furphy>.

(This is an honest question.)

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#203

Post by hashim-warren »

zambiboy wrote: post #135
photomatt wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Silver Lake and WPE's legal attacks may impact my ability to provide free services on WordPress.org in the future, especially things like Slack or forums that are grounds for discovery. I hope not, though. Going to fight this with everything I have.

[flagged]

This is compassionate and wise

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#204

Post by Aloha »

felizuno wrote: post #184

After some seriously bad experiences with them I hope WPEngine loses their shirt. WRT their headless tooling the advertising versus the reality is insane. They held one of our clients hostage asking for $10k/month, we left for Kinsta for low hundreds per month and have had nothing but performance improvements and great support. I frankly don't like WordPress at all and don't really care about this lawsuit, but was bu…

I moved to WPEngine from a self hosted job, money well spent.

I've never had a lick of trouble, and even though I'm pretty proficient at hosting LAMP apps, it's much less effort than self-hosting.

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#205

Post by [deleted] »

photomatt wrote: post #84
aimazon wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Thanks, I carry a co2 and carbon monoxide monitor. Co2 where I'm at is 572. I do own a place in Montana, and I meditate several times a day. I have not threatened to take down WordPress.org. WPE's preservation requests do complicate things, legally, though, for the Slack and forums that W.org offers. Both Cloudflare and Fastly have reached out offering CDN services to W.org, which we're considering. Cloudflare also s…

[deleted]

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#206

Post by cdolan »

rideontime wrote: post #183
batuhanicoz wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As I understand it, WordPress Foundation's board can revoke the license if Automattic is no longer a good custodian of the brand. It makes sure even if Automattic is no longer in good hands, the Foundation can protect the WordPress brand from Automattic. (I work at Automattic but did not specifically checked the details of the trademark agreement)

The lawsuit asserts pretty vehemently that it's "irrevocable."

It quite literally states in the document that the trademark is irrevocable

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#207

Post by crummy »

shabgzer wrote: post #129
pclmulqdq wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

That $1000+/hr apparently does not guarantee great proofreading. Already found two typos and am not even a quarter of the way through: - Page 12: "wordrpess.org" - Page 17: "fundamental principal"

that's how you can tell they didn't get chatGPT to write it

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#208

Post by ErwinAI »

photomatt wrote: post #150
spellsaidwrong wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question you need to ask yourself is whether you _should_ talk to journalists during a legal matter, instead of trying to fight the court of public opinion.

I'm very comfortable with the truth of everything being public, it's on our side. The legal case will drag out for years.

You're aware that the messages shown in that document (if authentic) can be interpreted as extortion, right?

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#209

Post by cdolan »

fhfhfhjfnfnfmf wrote: post #171
cdolan wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So wordpress.org is effectively for-profit Why did your legal officer today post in a blog post that its a non-profit?

What blog was this? Matt’s agents post in so many different places it’s hard to keep track. Edit: found it. Wow. This guy has the worst lawyers. https://automattic.com/2024/10/02/wordpress-trademarks-a-leg...

You start to wonder if they work for WPE

Re: Filed: WP Engine Inc. v Automattic Inc. and Matthew Charles Mullenweg [pdf]

#210

Post by ChallengeEup237 »

photomatt wrote: post #115
Mystery-Machine wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

What does her position have to do with the lawsuit? It could have been a developer position, it doesn't materially change anything.
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