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Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

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Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#81

Post by notpushkin »

Ukv wrote: post #72
bmelton wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've seen conflicting claims made. Everything from "WPEngine gives nothing" to (in this thread) "WPEngine sponsors a dozen developers" [1] I do not use either Wordpress nor WPEngine, so I don't have any stake in this nor insight into the dispute. [1] - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41656542

> I've seen conflicting claims made. Everything from "WPEngine gives nothing" to (in this thread) "WPEngine sponsors a dozen developers" [1] To at least partially back up my claim linked for the latter, WP Engine is part of WordPress.org's "Five for the Future" program, stating "This organization contributes 5% of their resources to the WordPress project" and listing developers they sponsor: https://web.archive.org/w…

Thanks! This is the first time I’ve seen a fleshed-out counter-claim like this. Yeah, if this is (still) correct I think I’m with WPE on this one.

(I also do not really have a stake in this, but as an open source developer trying to launch a product it’s really easy for me to sympathize with WP.org/.com)

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#83

Post by Ukv »

bmelton wrote: post #80
Ukv wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I've seen conflicting claims made. Everything from "WPEngine gives nothing" to (in this thread) "WPEngine sponsors a dozen developers" [1] To at least partially back up my claim linked for the latter, WP Engine is part of WordPress.org's "Five for the Future" program, stating "This organization contributes 5% of their resources to the WordPress project" and listing developers they sponsor: https://web.archive.org/w…

Thanks. Another counter-claim I've seen to this is that WPEngine used to provide developers and sponsor events, but no longer do. Any insights there? Not trying to come across as interrogating or particularly concerned with the answer, but the whole thing is a curiosity.

The "Five for the Future" page is still up. Wayback machine shows that the contributor/hours numbers seem to have been revised downwards last week, possibly suggesting that WP Engine contributes less than it used to (or that Matt noticed and decided to give it a more conservative estimate), but also meaning the figures there now should be up-to-date and that WP Engine does still currently sponsor at least 11 contributors.

WP Engine was listed as sponsor for WordCamp Europe 2024[0], which was in June, and ran DE{CODE} back in March. So they seem at least relatively recent on events.

[0]: https://europe.wordcamp.org/2024/sponsor/wp-engine/

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#84

Post by bmelton »

Ukv wrote: post #83
bmelton wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. Another counter-claim I've seen to this is that WPEngine used to provide developers and sponsor events, but no longer do. Any insights there? Not trying to come across as interrogating or particularly concerned with the answer, but the whole thing is a curiosity.

The "Five for the Future" page is still up. Wayback machine shows that the contributor/hours numbers seem to have been revised downwards last week, possibly suggesting that WP Engine contributes less than it used to (or that Matt noticed and decided to give it a more conservative estimate), but also meaning the figures there now should be up-to-date and that WP Engine does still currently sponsor at least 11 contribu…

Thanks so much for taking the time to respond

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#85

Post by JimDabell »

batuhanicoz wrote: post #77
Deukhoofd wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might want to add a disclaimer that you work at Automattic.

Most of my other comments I was speaking in first person, in others I did not initially realize it wasn't as clear in some of them. I also updated my bio here to reflect the product I am working for belongs to Automattic. Previously, it only mentioned the product which not everyone has to know belongs to Automattic.

Your employer has been served a cease and desist. Does your legal counsel know you are commenting on the legal matters on social media as an employee? This doesn’t seem like a wise position to put yourself or your employer in.

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#86

Post by teaneedz »

batuhanicoz wrote: post #75
Ukv wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The WordPress Foundation's trademark policy[0] seemed fairly clear that: > The abbreviation “WP” is not covered by the WordPress trademarks and you are free to use it in any way you see fit. and > a business related to WordPress themes can describe itself as “XYZ Themes, the world’s best WordPress themes,” but cannot call itself “The WordPress Theme Portal.” To me it looks like a conflict of interests that Matt's usi…

I am an employee of Automattic, that's correct and public. The problem is not the "WP" in their name but their specific usage of "WordPress" and "WooCommerce" on their website and marketing. You don't have to literally use the trademarked in your brand name for infringement. Legal threshold, AFAIK, is around 15% of the people thinking you are officially related to the owner or the licensees of the trademark. https://…

I'm hoping that contributors balk and are willing to walk since the ramifications are way beyond just WP Engine within the FOSS community.

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#88

Post by thekid314 »

the_mitsuhiko wrote: post #41
timkq wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This only tanks the reputation of Mullenweg himself and his WordPress hosting company. WordPress powers about 40% of the web - it is too big to fail (as of now).

> This only tanks the reputation of Mullenweg himself and his WordPress hosting company. I am only looking at this from the outside but given that Wordpress.org (not the wordpress hosting company wordpress.com) is involved here, it's clear that this dispute involves the Wordpress project itself and not just the commercial Automattic entity/Matt Mullenweg.

Yeah, I'm afraid if WordPress.org doesn't have control over their own API's then they are compromised and reduces trust in them.

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#89

Post by bilekas »

I thought this didn't affect me until tonight I had a call from a freelance client maybe 5 years ago call me.

Just spent the better part of 3 hours after work trying to help him out, what WordPress have done here is ridiculous. It feels like something more petty than a child. Mullenweg needs to grow up and realise that open source is open source. I've read through the cease and desist claims. It's Mullenweg's petty ego destroying an ecosystem of WPE users. So much for his high and mighty 'wordpress is the pinicle of user's experience'

Whatever his angle is, I just replaced Wordpress with a home rolled cms for my client. WordPress can die for all I care. The web would be safer for it.

Re: Incident: Wordpress.org has blocked WP Engine customers from registry

#90

Post by ILILILIL »

WPEngine has been a supreme disappointment in the last year. Agency Partner Program is a bogus seduction tactic. The development instance you can have now is embarrassing when displaying progress to clients as they swear no caching exists when the instance is password-protected. I'm tired of WPEngine and love that this is happening. Been much happier with Kinsta.
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