--- title: "What's going on with WordPress?!" date: 2024-12-03T05:30:00-05:00 author: Sean Smith canonical_url: "https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-2/whats-going-on-with-wordpress/" section: Podcast --- <!\[CDATA\[YII-BLOCK-BODY-BEGIN\]\]>[Skip to main content](#main-content)Season 08 Episode 2 – Dec 03, 2024 36:49 [Show Notes](#show-notes) ## What's going on with WordPress?!  0:00 0:00 1.0x 0.75x1.0x1.25x1.5x2x [](//dts.podtrac.com/redirect.mp3/website101podcast.com/uploads/mp3/Season-08/S08-E02-whats-the-deal-with-wordpress.mp3) Mike and Amanda discuss the current WordPress controversy and how it affects how it affects developers and website owners. ### Show Notes - What is WordPress - Original WordPress.org - Wordpress.com hosting - Broad overview of the issue - Trademark Lawsuit - Advanced Custom Fields vs Secure Custom Fields - Matt's conflict of interest - Summary - Advice for the future - Cautionary tale ### Show Links - [WordPress](https://wordpress.org/) - [WordPress.com (hosting)](https://wordpress.com/) - [Automattic](https://automattic.com/) - [WP Engine](https://wpengine.com/) - [Advanced Custom fields](https://www.advancedcustomfields.com/) - [Secure Custom Fields](https://wordpress.org/plugins/advanced-custom-fields/) Powered Transcript Accuracy of transcript is dependant on AI technology. **\[00:00\]** **Amanda:** Welcome to another episode of the Website 101 podcast. This is the podcast for people who want to learn more about building and managing websites. Hello, I am one of your co-hosts. My name is Amanda Loots and with me today is Mike Mella. Hey, Mike. **\[00:18\]** **Mike:** Hi, Amanda. How are you? **\[00:20\]** **Amanda:** I'm doing fine. Thanks. **\[00:22\]** **Mike:** How are you? I'm well, and Sean couldn't be with us today, so it's just you and me. **\[00:28\]** **Amanda:** Yeah. If it's more informative or if it's less entertaining, come back soon, Sean. **\[00:37\]** **Mike:** Yeah. Website101podcast.com slash contact. Let us know how you felt about just us doing this for ourselves. **\[00:45\]** **Amanda:** Yeah. So today's topic has been in the news for months and months and months and in fact, we're slow to get on it. We are like the last people, I think, in the entire universe. talk about the WordPress controversy. And mostly I avoided it because I'm trying to move away from everything WordPress-related. But once I started reading about all of the facts and the important points that are going into this topic, it can affect more than just WordPress. It can affect, you know, eventually other content management systems, other, you know, programming languages, a bunch of other things. So it's probably good to talk about this, and we will try to keep it high level, 101 level. And also this is going to be a really great listen for, you know, small business owners and people trying to manage their websites on their **\[01:42\]** **Mike:** own. Yeah, that's right. There's a lot of, like you said, there's a lot of takeaways you can get from it, even if you're not a WordPress user. I mean, I'm considered myself not a WordPress users. But I'm learning a lot from this controversy. And yeah, so we're going to tackle it with our own little spin on it. And here we go. So Amanda, can you summarize real quick before we get into it in any depth? What exactly is going on? If you met someone in an elevator and they said, what is the deal with this WordPress thing that's going on? What would you say? WordPress **\[02:16\]** **Amanda:** thing. I'm glad that you didn't limit it to a 32nd elevator sales pitch because It's going to take a bit more than that, but for anyone who doesn't know, WordPress is a content management system. So you can log in to the backend, you can add your content, and then that's it, you can't just have content editors that just do that. And then there's also the templating code that makes the front end of the website, which would be what everybody sees when they go to look at it. So that is the overall content management system. With WordPress specifically, there are actually two versions and I feel like a lot of people get these confused. Yes. There is the original WordPress.org which is an open source content management system and it was developed back in 2003 by these two guys, Matt, I'm not even going to try to say his last name, I'm going to mess it up. Mullenweg. Mullenweg, there you go, Matt Mullenweg, and this other guy, Mike Littel, and that's the last we hear about Mike Littel for the rest of today's episode. Yeah, right. So the whole point of open source software is that all of the code, so like all of the instructions that make the CMS work, is publicly available. Everyone can view it. Everyone can modify it. Everyone can, you know, distribute it as part of their own projects. This is, of course, like the complete opposite of, like, Microsoft Word. You can't go and look at the source of that. It is what it is. You just use it. But open source software is supposed to have this really great community that is going to allow developers to get in and make changes and help with bug fixes and adapt it to specific needs so that they can share with their own little sub-community and it's supposed to be this really great idea of collaboration and promoting innovation. And so that was the original WordPress.org. You go to WordPress.org and you download a whole bunch of PHP files and you have to put them on your own server and congratulations, there is your website. **\[04:30\]** **Mike:** Yeah. **\[04:31\]** **Amanda:** A couple of years after that, in 2005, which is what I found, is that Matt then went and made WordPress.com. Now WordPress.com is a managed hosting service, specifically just for it's just the WordPress software. And so you go sign up to WordPress.org and yes, they do have a free tier, but the whole point of it is for more customization, for more choices of plugins and themes and for hosting bigger sites and stuff, you have to start paying money for it. And so Matt made this with this company. He created a company called Automatic. And so they're using the free WordPress.org software. But now they're profiting from it, which is great. Why not? Okay. So why not be able to do that? Let me stop you right there real quick. **\[05:26\]** **Mike:** Yes. And I'll see if I've got you so far. First of all, I recently learned Automatic, his company name has two T's in it. And that's because it has the word Matt in the name, which is his first name. That's a little tidbit for you. You can take away and tell it to annoy people at your Christmas party this season. Yeah. So, okay, so here we go. So Matt makes this software. Matt and the dude's name. Mike. Something little. Mike's little. My name is Mike. I should remember that. Okay, so he makes this software. It's free to make a blog or a website. And hey, go ahead and use it. Put it on your servers and make your own websites. And then he sort of realized, Well, some people it's so simple that why don't I offer a hosting platform where you get the free software and you don't even have to put it on a server and set up all that we'll do it for you. So that's what the dot com is. It's like the same software but we'll handle the setting up of it and it's pretty much with a click of a button. Isn't that correct? **\[06:28\]** **Amanda:** It. Yes. **\[06:30\]** **Mike:** Okay. I roughly have it. **\[06:32\]** **Amanda:** Have it right there. Yeah, and that's not to say that for every user who has gone and signed up for WordPress.com, I don't know that they actually have their own spin of a WordPress CMS installed just for them. They could have, because it's all their code, and because it's all open source, they could have done something so that many users could log in to just this one WordPress install and It's like separated out, but like the content is separated out by user like I'm not I'm not I'm not privy to their inner workings **\[07:06\]** **Mike:** I don't know how they've got that set up. I think you're actually right about that now that you mentioned it because I remember hearing a story about that It was actually with an interview with Matt Mullinwig many years ago and he did say that something to the effect of there's millions of sites running on one Technically one word press install on that thing which blew my mind, but yeah, I guess the way the thing works. Yeah, it's that's possible. **\[07:32\]** **Amanda:** So yeah, okay, okay. So continue. That's the groundwork. That is the difference between WordPress.org, which is, and I had to research this today, WordPress.org is run by a non-profit organization. But it is run by this nonprofit organization that Matt Mullenweg is on the board. **\[08:04\]** **Mike:** He's on the board of the nonprofit, but he also runs or owns the dot com for profit. Got it. **\[08:12\]** **Amanda:** Okay. **\[08:13\]** **Mike:** So any decision that he makes with one is going to affect the other and vice versa. Shifty. **\[08:19\]** **Amanda:** Okay. So as WordPress becomes more popular, and of course people are figuring out ways to profit off of it. You've got plug-in developers who are charging for their software. Fantastic, get it. You've got companies who are like, oh, hey, you can host with us. We are like specifically hosting for Word, I almost said word perfect again, for WordPress websites. Which is great, you know? Like get that money, whatever that we have gotten money from like making WordPress sites, fantastic. Over the last couple of months, this big controversy came out. And what I've been able, and I'm gonna just try to like glance over this stuff because it is the controversy, but it's really just like the tip of the iceberg of what's actually going on. So there's been a lot of conflicts between automatic, who is the owner of WordPress.com, And this company called WP Engine, who has become one of the more popular WordPress hosting providers. So WP Engine is this company all off on its own, but they're like, hey, go get your WordPress.org files and then come back to us and you can host your WordPress sites here. All of our servers are specifically configured for it and optimized and resources and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. et cetera. So is it like a competitor to WordPress.com's managed hosting? No, because with the wordpress.com, you don't need to install anything. You just go and sign up and start using it. **\[10:00\]** **Mike:** All right, like we said earlier about it, it could be all worth it. Yeah, because it's managed hosting. **\[10:04\]** **Amanda:** Whereas WP engine, like you have to go and it's like any other shared hosting package that you're you're gonna get, unless I'm mistaken. Again, I don't know their inner business workings. **\[10:15\]** **Mike:** I mean, I guess the truth is I've never used WP engine, but I assume because there's things like, what is it, script calculus and stuff on a lot of servers, you could probably install WordPress from within their hosting thing by clicking something. You don't literally have to go download it and bring it over and probably I don't think, I don't know. **\[10:36\]** **Amanda:** Yeah, but a lot of hosting companies, even just regular virtual hosting companies, we'll also have that. Click here to install WordPress, hooray. So I mean, it's not like WP Engine is the only place it's doing this. And they've been around for a while. So the conflict came up because Matt Mullenweg criticized WP Engine for allegedly leveraging WordPress's open-source contributions to generate substantial profits. Sorry, and this is like a quote that I read online, which I think is so funny, without adequately supporting the community. **\[11:18\]** **Mike:** Okay. The open-source community. **\[11:21\]** **Amanda:** Yes, I guess the WordPress community. **\[11:24\]** **Mike:** Right, so his whole thing about WordPress being free is that it's free, everyone can use it and everyone should help contribute the open source community that is WordPress and he feels that WP engine or at least he suddenly feels that WP engine has leveraged the freely availability of WordPress to make a business that makes lots of money and they're not contributing enough to the open source community according to him. **\[11:53\]** **Amanda:** And according to him, so Matt demanded a portion of WPNGEN's revenue. **\[12:00\]** **Mike:** And that would be a lot of money, I would think, that's a big one. That would be a lot of money, yeah. And they also, I'm sure you'll get to this I guess, but WPNGEN develops plugins, very popular plugins for WordPress, correct? **\[12:17\]** **Amanda:** Yes. So I'm getting, and you're right, I am getting to that. Okay. So in September, WordPress.org, remember, this is the not-for-profit, band WP engine from accessing its plug-in repository. **\[12:35\]** **Mike:** And that's huge. **\[12:38\]** **Amanda:** And that's huge. If anyone has ever had, like, so, I mean, WordPress has its place. If you just want to blog, yes, if you want, like, blog posts, if you want a couple pages, fantastic. If you want to do anything beyond that, you basically need to install a plugin or have a developer who is very familiar and very comfortable with getting into WordPress because again, it is all open-source. You know, many developers could get in and do that. So but the fact that WordPress.org banned all of the customers from WP Engine from using any of the plugins. So it's like they wouldn't be able to install any new ones, they wouldn't be able to make any updates. And again, if anyone out there is on a WordPress site, there are updates about every minute and a half. Yes, indeed. It's happening constantly. It is ridiculous. So what they said, what WordPress.org said was that a potential, oh, no. So limiting access to the plugins, of course, is going to potentially expose the WPNGEN customers to security risks because they can't install updates. WP engine then filed a lawsuit accusing automatic of trademark misuse, defamation and other violations. **\[14:01\]** **Mike:** Yeah, I heard about that. I don't quite know, we don't have to get into it. It's probably a very small part of this whole thing, but trademark misuse, like, **\[14:10\]** **Amanda:** because I think it goes back to the open-sourceness. So it's like, if you create the software that's got an open source license that says, hey, everybody use it and then somebody uses it, but you don't like how they're using it. You can't then sue them and like limit the access to like the core components of it is my guess. Again, I'm not a lawyer. I haven't like read anything about it, but that's my guess about the trademark stuff. **\[14:35\]** **Mike:** Well, but it's isn't it though that WP engine, the for profit thing, is filing a lawsuit against the non-automatic because automatic has used WP engines trade marks. Isn't that the accusation or am I getting that wrong? **\[14:55\]** **Amanda:** Again, I don't know. I didn't like really read into any of the legal stuff about it, but from what I got, I think it's just more of a WP engine saying, hey, automatic, if you're telling us to cease and desist, then you're not allowed to, because of your trademark that you've left as open source. Of course we can use it. That's my guess. **\[15:18\]** **Mike:** I see what I see. So they're misusing their own trademark by saying it's copyrighted when it's actually open source. Something like that. That's my guess. That's my guess. Okay. Got it. **\[15:29\]** **Amanda:** So, oh it gets better. They become toddlers in the playground. So, there's a very popular WordPress plugin called Advanced Custom Fields. Now again, like I was saying before, WordPress is fine for blog posts and for pages, but basically what you get with it is like the entry title, a whizzywig field, maybe you can do categories, maybe you can do like a couple pictures. At the heart, yes, there are fancy content editors, yes, things can be added, etc., etc. But at its heart, that's what it is. So there's a very popular plugin called Advanced Custom Fields that will let you add a whole bunch of different field types to the pages, to the blog posts, if you in the functions.php, if you create custom entry types or using a different plugin, create custom entry types, you can use this plugin to add custom fields to that. Right. So, and this advanced custom fields plugin is owned by WPNGEN. **\[16:40\]** **Mike:** They made it. **\[16:41\]** **Amanda:** Right. So automatic went and forked advanced custom fields and for anybody who knows Git or is familiar with Git, Basically, if somebody has a GIP repo and it's public, anybody can go in and be like, oh, I like the status of this project right now, I'm gonna fork it, which is kind of like making a copy of it, and sort of start taking it in my own direction. So I'm starting with where you are right now, and I'm gonna make it my own. Again, open source. That's basically how forking works, right? **\[17:14\]** **Mike:** Yeah, is advanced custom fields that plug-in? Is that open source? **\[17:19\]** **Amanda:** Well, yeah, because it's all, I mean, yes, you have to pay for the license, but the actual code itself is open source. **\[17:25\]** **Mike:** Okay. Okay. Yeah. **\[17:28\]** **Amanda:** Okay. Okay. So, automatic, forked advanced custom fields, and decided to call it secure custom fields. **\[17:36\]** **Mike:** Yeah. Smart. **\[17:38\]** **Amanda:** A clever name. So, so now, again, this kind of bully who is stomping around the playground, saying, you're Well, do you have to share your lunch with me because it came from my kitchen something like that who knows now they're like being even busier and it's like oh well, you know what since we're already in this beef I'm gonna make a copy of the plugin that you make and now it's mine. So I mean it's could because it's a copy it is theirs Yeah, it's I mean and they're probably gonna say something about like you know fair consumerism and if you can use ours than we can use theirs anyway. So this has alarmed a lot of developers who rely on the plug-in for their WordPress solutions. Because if you are not on WP Engine is WordPress now going to force you to use their secure custom fields instead. So you've got to go back and you've got to you know, change content, you got to change your templates, you got to change a whole bunch of all of these other things. So yeah, so like WordPress.com basically stole WP engines advanced custom fields and made it secure custom fields instead. **\[18:57\]** **Mike:** Yeah, and not only what you said about the fear of, you know, what plug-in am I going to use or whatever, I'm sure there are a lot of plug-in developers. There are people who make good money building plugins for WordPress. And I bet a lot of them are sweating bullets thinking, oh, I guess WordPress is not above ripping off a popular plugin. Maybe they'll rip off my plugin **\[19:21\]** **Amanda:** next. Don't piss them off. Yeah. Yeah. That'd be scary. Okay. So there are growing concerns about increasing centralization and potential future control over other tools understandably. And then the cherry on top, this is the last point, the cherry on top, which I think is like the funniest thing at all. Remember before we were talking about how WordPress.org is the non-profit and you can just like go and download the files and put it wherever you want. Matt Mullenweg I added a checkbox on the WordPress.org login pages requiring users to confirm that they are not affiliated with WP Engine. **\[20:09\]** **Mike:** Yes, so I've heard about this now. How in the hell is that possibly legally binding in any way, like what, what, it's ridiculous of course. **\[20:21\]** **Amanda:** It is ridiculous. But then that comes down to it again. It's like the fact that this is like it's, it's open-source software and yes, there are different licensing levels for open-source software, but if all of this time the license has been, hey, use it in good health, but you know if something messes up don't, don't blame us for it. I don't know that's what their license level is, but I assume that's what it's at because it's been very open all this time. For them to all of a sudden turn around and be like, mm-hmm, you can't use it. Now we're gonna change the licensing agreement, which I guess big corporations do all the time, **\[20:53\]** **Mike:** But it just seems so petty yeah doing it so explicitly that you a user a regular user who may not know anything about this stuff Has to suddenly check a box like I don't even care. I just want to have a web page for my yoga business **\[21:07\]** **Amanda:** You know like whatever it is. And now they've got to get dragged all through this Yeah, so the biggest I mean, I think that the biggest problem is that Matt Mullinweg is both the CEO of automatic and And also on the board for wordpress.org. **\[21:27\]** **Mike:** Conflictive interest, for sure. **\[21:29\]** **Amanda:** A big conflict of interest. Yeah, he's the director of the WordPress Foundation. That's who takes care of wordpress.org. **\[21:37\]** **Mike:** Okay. **\[21:38\]** **Amanda:** So, I think that in the end, what this comes down to is, if you're invested in the wordpress ecosystem, you gotta just stay informed and I guess stay tuned tuned and figure out what this all is going to mean to you in the end. And the thing is it's like, if WordPress can now change their minds about this, can they start to change their minds about, hey, you're using our WordPress software, that gives us the right now to like go through all of your content and use it for our AI training because there's been a lot of controversies about that. Adobe has kind of gotten hit with that a little bit. So it's, you know, it could one day somebody at WordPress wake up and be like, nope, and just like turn off all of the WordPress sites and like what is some statistic that, like isn't it like over 70% or it's a third, it's like a third of the internet and like that. **\[22:37\]** **Mike:** Yeah. But still insane. A big number. Yeah. If they suddenly required everyone to put that check box on saying, hey, we're not affiliated or something like that. Yeah. **\[22:47\]** **Amanda:** So you're just going to probably not randomly, I'm sure they have their reasons, but we're going to take down this company because they won't share their profits with us. And if they can do it to WP Engine, who are they going to turn their sites on next? **\[23:01\]** **Mike:** Right. And from what I can tell, this is largely between the WordPress, Matt's WordPress people and WP engine. And from what I understand, Matt is really coming out looking like the Drake in the Drake and Kendrick thing. He's not coming off. Well, people think he's basically a jerk for doing this. Like they're not siding with the WordPress as far as I can tell. I don't know if you've heard differently. **\[23:33\]** **Amanda:** I have not heard differently, but like I said, until I started doing research for this episode, I was really just trying to stay out of it. I really didn't need to get my head into it unless I absolutely needed to. **\[23:50\]** **Mike:** Yeah. OK. OK. Well, that's a great summary of what's going on. Now, what can we draw from this? Being WordPress developers or users or otherwise, I'm sure there's all kinds of things we can pull out of this. I'm going to start, I'll start with one, and that is, so when you're relying on, and I'm not saying this as a way to talk people out of doing this, but like if you're relying on something as open source and as free and whatever, as the WordPress ecosystem has been, you're now using, you know, the software that, and you're, and you're, you got to keep an eye on updates for that and so on. There's 30 or 40 plugins you're going to need to install, all made by different developers, many of whom are probably not vetted to be actually working well with the latest version of WordPress. I'm sure people have encountered that where you click a button and this is updated but it's not compatible with the newest version of something else. When you have all that, I feel like there's a lot more you have to stay on top of, You know, and whenever a controversy like this happens, you're at risk of having parts of your site be compromised or your entire business. There are businesses that make a living. We've interviewed some on this podcast, building WordPress sites for clients like many of them. So we use a lot of for-profit CMSs as you and I and Sean, and the plug-in developers do get vetted. I feel like in that case, you can go to one place. You can go to their blog and read, oh, there's a breaking change coming up. It's going to affect you in this way. Get ready. Here it is. But in this case, I feel like if I was a WordPress guy, a WordPress developer, there's no source of truth for what you're going for. It's not like you can go to this one blog by the company and read it. That's what you, you know what I mean, it's, you're kind of left on your own to the wolves sort of thing, to figure it out yourself. It must be really scary. **\[26:03\]** **Amanda:** Yeah, absolutely, especially, so I think that, I mean I think that if you are a savvy experienced WordPress developer, maybe you can figure out how to work this to your advantage, you know, like straddle defense, be on both sides, you know what WordPress is up to when doing, etc. But also know how you can leverage the WP engine side. So if that entire WordPress universe is going to splinter into two factions, take advantage of both of them, I guess. I do know that a lot of other content management systems right now are pushing their services, products hard, they're trying to pick up anybody who wants to leave. Obviously, the users, the site owner is prerogative. **\[26:57\]** **Mike:** Yeah, I guess that's true. If someone who does develop WordPress sites for clients, that's part of your business model. The least you should be doing is because your clients might be hearing about this, knowing that they're on WordPress, you should at least be reaching out and saying, look, you may have heard about this controversy. Don't sweat it. Don't worry. We've got it under control. We know what to do for your website. Just leave it to us. We're WordPress professionals. Even if you're still figuring it out, say that to your clients to put **\[27:30\]** **Amanda:** them at ease. That's what I would be doing. Absolutely. But I do also want to point out, like, yes, this is all happening with WordPress right now, but let's, I just want to talk about like the open source environment. The open source world for a little bit. There is, and every semester, I tell my students about this, there's a very famous story about the guy who broke the internet. And it all comes down to, like, Node.js with their NPM modules. And the funny story is that this guy made hundreds and hundreds of modules and published them on npmjs.com. But they all did really basic JavaScript functions. So why wouldn't you just use basic JavaScript? Who knows? Maybe this guy was just experimenting. Maybe he was just playing. Maybe he was just getting practice making modules and publishing them and seeing how that works. I am not at all sure. But this guy got a cease and desist from the people who make JavaScript, saying, hey, you're copying our code, stop it, and he panicked. And he just straight up deleted all of these modules that he had made. And over time, these modules were starting to become a little bit popular. Again, I don't know why somebody would install a module to do a thing that JavaScript does on its own, whatever. But if you've got somebody who's made a module, and then somebody else makes a module that's dependent on that, and someone else makes a module that's dependent on that. If that, if that base, all of a sudden gets deleted, nothing is going to work. And like, there were a lot of big sites that came down when this guy panicked and just straight up deleted all of the stuff that he had published and put out there. Yeah. So I mean, like, there are so many parts of the internet that are just on this delicate balance of things working by people who have been created by people who have full-time jobs, have families who have lives and made this thing for fun and oh hey look it got popular, that's kind of neat. And then they like abandon it or delete it or it breaks and they don't have time to fix it. Like the internet is dependent on that all the time. Yeah I've used plugins that are **\[29:52\]** **Mike:** where the developer just vanishes. You know, he's like, I'll put this out there, use it, whatever you can use it if you want. And there's some problem and you reach out and you try to get tech support. And it's just, nope, there's nothing. So yeah, you do have to be aware of that stuff when you're using, especially free open source software. Like that's usually the trade-off. They're not supporting it, right? **\[30:15\]** **Amanda:** And even if you wanna go deeper, I mean, think about it, HTML is a free language. CSS is a free language. JavaScript is a free programming language. And I mean, it's not so much, I mean, it's not as bad now, but how often do you still go and check out cannause.com or dot whatever it is to see if like some CSS property is going to work across all of the browsers. Like any of our older listeners that are going to remember way back in the day, doing a bunch of really hacky stuff because Internet Explorer 6 and Internet Explorer 11 just didn't follow the same CSS standards that all of the other browsers were already implementing. So again, this is like some company has made some decision that is affecting the developers and then affecting people who own websites, you know, right down at that like really base level. This has been happening since the beginning of the Internet, but it's just this is like really vocal and really out there in your face and you know I think what it comes down to I mean yes it's two companies betting heads but I think it what it comes down to is again this discussion about open source software. Yeah it's **\[31:30\]** **Mike:** funny that it goes way back I remember in the early I guess it was when around when WordPress was first coming out there was a CMS called Mombo and it might even steel still exists. I don't know. But at one point, it was free. I think if I recall correctly, it was free. And some part of the community wanted to make it for profit maybe. And they wanted to become a for profit company. And others didn't. And it split. And the split became jumlah, which is another sort of popular sea on bass even today. I think the exact same **\[32:06\]** **Amanda:** thing happened. It was movable type that started charging their users. And the users was like, nope, and that's how WordPress started. **\[32:14\]** **Mike:** Okay, gotcha, yeah. **\[32:16\]** **Amanda:** So I mean, so that happens, that happens a lot. It happens all the time. **\[32:20\]** **Mike:** I can remember when I worked at this company at that time, I was like the web developer in the company, and my boss came up and told me about that controversy between Mombo and Jumla, and said, we basically have to decide which one are we gonna go with, which, and there was like, I remember there was like a logo design contest for Jumla at the time, back when people used to do that. Anyway, it was like a, whatever, it's a nerdy thing to have to worry about, but I remember it vividly, like it was like a big deal back then. **\[32:53\]** **Amanda:** I was complaining yesterday. I was trying to use this like free online tool to do like a WCAG like accessibility testing and it wasn't working. And I became unresonably angry, that this free tool just stopped working. I had no control over it. I didn't set it up, but it was like, ah, you're free, but you're supposed to work. So yeah, we always got to keep our eyes on that. **\[33:25\]** **Mike:** Yeah, it's funny, you're right, it does all, and it's like, I'm sure there are also in this case, there are a lot of, or maybe I'm wrong about this, I would think there's a lot of WordPress themes that you can buy that are themselves using advanced custom fields, would that be possible? Probably, yeah. And therefore they would be at risk of, if they think it's not going to get updated in the future because WordPress won't let them up to, you know, I don't know. But I think there's, there's like a tower, like a jenga tower of things built on other things that could come crashing down. **\[34:00\]** **Amanda:** Absolutely. So yeah, for a topic that I was trying to avoid for a very long time, it ended up giving me a couple really good giggles as I was researching what was going on. **\[34:11\]** **Mike:** Like you said, it's petty earlier, it is so petty. **\[34:15\]** **Amanda:** It is, and I agree with you, but at the same time, I have always been very do something to get that cash. And so, if my opinion is that if WordPress wants to suddenly, you know, be charging people for stuff, then okay, what I can't help but wonder is why are these specifically targeting WP engine? Like, is there something else going on with that? **\[34:41\]** **Mike:** I don't know. Yeah, and this whole thing about, they claim that they're not contributing enough to the open source community when they use the WordPress stuff. Like I don't know if that's all of a sudden, that's a thing that everyone's required to do. I bet there's tons of WordPress developers who never contribute anything to the WordPress community, the open source community. They just build sites for clients and that's that. What would they have to say about them? I don't know. **\[35:15\]** **Amanda:** I don't know. There could be more changes on the horizon. I guess we'll just have to sit back with some popcorn. **\[35:24\]** **Mike:** That's right. need help navigating this, reach out to any one of us. **\[35:29\]** **Amanda:** Yes. We'll be happy to help you. That's it. I think it's a good topic and I think it's a good place **\[35:34\]** **Mike:** to stop. OK, I think we covered it pretty well for people who don't use WordPress every single day. It's in the news, so we learned what we could. And you summarized it very well, so nice work there. All right, so that's it for today. Check us out on YouTube. Lunch bites every first and third Wednesday. Yes. Hello, 30 Easter, yes. And Shawn, we'll be back soon. Please tell your friends like and subscribe. And we'll see you next time. **\[36:04\]** **Amanda:** Bye, everyone. The website 101 Podcast is hosted by me, Amanda Loots. **\[36:12\]** **Mike:** You can also find me online at AmandaLoots.com. And by me, Mike Mella, find me online at belikewater.ca or on socials at Mike Miller. **\[36:22\]** **Sean:** I'm Sean Smith, your co-host. You can find me online at my website caffeinecreation.ca and LinkedIn at caffeinecreations. Close Transcript Have a question for Sean, Mike, and Amanda? [Send us an email](/contact). [![Listen on Google Play Music](/assets/images/google_podcasts_badge@2x.png)](https://www.google.com/podcasts?feed=aHR0cHM6Ly93ZWJzaXRlMTAxcG9kY2FzdC5jb20vZmVlZC5yc3M%3D)[![itunes badge](/assets/images/itunes-badge.png)](https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/website-101-podcast/id1449510012)[![itunes badge](/assets/images/spotify-logo.png)](https://open.spotify.com/show/3rmSM1R9t6q1U8DmYWJRSO?si=NrYPMgDaRV6Dd56PjEaPow)### Season 08 - 1 [ Keeping up with Tech Trends](https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-1/keeping-up-with-tech-trends/) - 2 [ What's going on with WordPress?!](https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-2/whats-going-on-with-wordpress/) - 3 [ Shortcuts That Save the Day: Boost Productivity in Web Dev and Beyond](https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-3/shortcuts-that-save-the-day-boost-productivity-in-web-dev-and-beyond/) - 4 [ Stand Out on Social Media with Jessica Perreault](https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-4/social-media-with-jessica-perreault-2/) - 5 [ Code of Ethics: Navigating Moral Dilemmas in Web Development](https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-5/code-of-ethics-navigating-moral-dilemmas-in-web-development/) - 6 [ Season 8 Wrap](https://website101podcast.com/episodes/season-08/episode-6/season-eight-wrap/) ### All Seasons - [Season 01](https://website101podcast.com/season/01/) - [Season 02](https://website101podcast.com/season/02/) - [Season 03](https://website101podcast.com/season/03/) - [Season 04](https://website101podcast.com/season/04/) - [Season 05](https://website101podcast.com/season/05/) - [Season 06](https://website101podcast.com/season/06/) - [Season 07](https://website101podcast.com/season/07/) - [Season 08](https://website101podcast.com/season/08/) - [Season 09](https://website101podcast.com/season/09/) <!\[CDATA\[YII-BLOCK-BODY-END\]\]>