4 ms·

I am so curious why now, what changed? The WPEngine saga was started two years ago.

by ChoosesBarbecue 23d ago

minimaxir 23d ago
It never ended.
- ChoosesBarbecue 23d ago
  Touché, reworded it to be clearer on what I meant :).
nikcub 23d ago
from my own observations: a) you don't want the WPEngine case going to trial and that is coming to a decision point soon. chances are the new CEO and board settle. b) wordpress is being absolutely obliterated by ai. work for commercial plugin authors and agencies has dried up while the platform and ecosystem see major security issues and worms exploit a large number of sites every week. wordpress and automattic haven't responded to this well, at all. at times it is often straight denial. founder CEO distracted by expensive lawsuit while facing existential threat to project that will require complete attention and a lot of skill to steer out of
- gpm 23d ago
  How is the WPEngine case going anyways? Glancing at the docket [1] in an attempt to answer this myself... looks like the trial is scheduled for a bit over a year from now [2].. A ton of fighting over discovery... a motion asking for fairly monster sanctions for spoilation of evidence [3] (to be argued on the 30th). Claiming in [3] with what appear to be pretty solid receipts (as far as we can see through the redactions anyways) that Matt was willfully destroying communications related to the case and subject to the discovery - and Automattic's lawyers lied to the court that they preserved them (naturally Automattic's lawyers have a reply with an entirely different interpretation of events if you go look for it... but at least at a glance WPEngine seems more convincing). [1] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69221176/wpengine-inc-v-automattic-inc/?filed_after=&filed_before=&entry_gte=&entry_lte=&order_by=desc https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69221176/wpengine-inc-v... [2] https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.437474/gov.uscourts.cand.437474.371.2.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.43... [3] https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.437474/gov.uscourts.cand.437474.357.0.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.43...
- Anonasty 22d ago
  Just side note that AI is not destroying one of the largest e-commerce platform, Woocommerce on top of Wordpress.
  - pluc 22d ago
    Ok, Shopify is then. If you've ever used Woocommerce, the one thing you want to do is stop using Woocommerce.
    - slig 22d ago
      Indeed. I'm very grateful for Woocommerce, but since I use a tiny subset of its features, I'm "vibe coding" my own alternative with way less surface area and less bloat.
    - thunderfork 22d ago
      A Shopify monopoly (and thus a shopify payments monopoly) would be very rough for a number of reasons
bsder 23d ago
Probably back room deal between Wordpress board/management and WPEngine board/management. It's a safe bet that WPEngine was destroying Wordpress legally simply because their CEO doesn't suffer from verbal diarrhea and actually shuts up when the lawyers tell him to. If you get Matt out of the way, you can ink a deal and resolve everything so that even if Matt pulls something else, there are contracts in place that can't be gotten rid of so easily.
- ubermonkey 22d ago
  This is a completely reasonable take and I'm stunned you're getting downvoted for it.
  - bsder 22d ago
    Matt is a creature of social media and has a lot of minions and sockpuppets. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  - JumpCrisscross 21d ago
    > I'm stunned you're getting downvoted for it It's a reasonable hypothesis. Saying it's "probable" is nuts.
deleted 23d ago
[deleted]
Aurornis 22d ago
Unless there's a full on scandal or emergency, boards don't force CEOs out quickly. This would have been building for years with multiple rounds of trying to de-escalate and get the situation under control.

I am so curious why now, what changed? The WPEngine saga was started two years ago.

minimaxir 23d ago

It never ended.

ChoosesBarbecue 23d ago
Touché, reworded it to be clearer on what I meant :).

nikcub 23d ago

from my own observations: a) you don't want the WPEngine case going to trial and that is coming to a decision point soon. chances are the new CEO and board settle. b) wordpress is being absolutely obliterated by ai. work for commercial plugin authors and agencies has dried up while the platform and ecosystem see major security issues and worms exploit a large number of sites every week. wordpress and automattic haven't responded to this well, at all. at times it is often straight denial. founder CEO distracted by expensive lawsuit while facing existential threat to project that will require complete attention and a lot of skill to steer out of

gpm 23d ago
How is the WPEngine case going anyways? Glancing at the docket [1] in an attempt to answer this myself... looks like the trial is scheduled for a bit over a year from now [2].. A ton of fighting over discovery... a motion asking for fairly monster sanctions for spoilation of evidence [3] (to be argued on the 30th). Claiming in [3] with what appear to be pretty solid receipts (as far as we can see through the redactions anyways) that Matt was willfully destroying communications related to the case and subject to the discovery - and Automattic's lawyers lied to the court that they preserved them (naturally Automattic's lawyers have a reply with an entirely different interpretation of events if you go look for it... but at least at a glance WPEngine seems more convincing). [1] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69221176/wpengine-inc-v-automattic-inc/?filed_after=&filed_before=&entry_gte=&entry_lte=&order_by=desc https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/69221176/wpengine-inc-v... [2] https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.437474/gov.uscourts.cand.437474.371.2.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.43... [3] https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.437474/gov.uscourts.cand.437474.357.0.pdf https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.43...
Anonasty 22d ago
Just side note that AI is not destroying one of the largest e-commerce platform, Woocommerce on top of Wordpress.
- pluc 22d ago
  Ok, Shopify is then. If you've ever used Woocommerce, the one thing you want to do is stop using Woocommerce.
  - slig 22d ago
    Indeed. I'm very grateful for Woocommerce, but since I use a tiny subset of its features, I'm "vibe coding" my own alternative with way less surface area and less bloat.
  - thunderfork 22d ago
    A Shopify monopoly (and thus a shopify payments monopoly) would be very rough for a number of reasons

bsder 23d ago

Probably back room deal between Wordpress board/management and WPEngine board/management. It's a safe bet that WPEngine was destroying Wordpress legally simply because their CEO doesn't suffer from verbal diarrhea and actually shuts up when the lawyers tell him to. If you get Matt out of the way, you can ink a deal and resolve everything so that even if Matt pulls something else, there are contracts in place that can't be gotten rid of so easily.

ubermonkey 22d ago
This is a completely reasonable take and I'm stunned you're getting downvoted for it.
- bsder 22d ago
  Matt is a creature of social media and has a lot of minions and sockpuppets. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- JumpCrisscross 21d ago
  > I'm stunned you're getting downvoted for it It's a reasonable hypothesis. Saying it's "probable" is nuts.

deleted 23d ago

[deleted]

Aurornis 22d ago

Unless there's a full on scandal or emergency, boards don't force CEOs out quickly. This would have been building for years with multiple rounds of trying to de-escalate and get the situation under control.