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Imagine if Wix invested in opensource.

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Imagine if Wix gained on WordPress.

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Imagine if Wix conquered our beloved CMS.

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Imagine if Wix focused
on one area in WordPress.

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Data liberation.

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I don't think the closed source
CMS will supplant tens of thousands

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of WordPress professionals.

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One-click installing WordPress for their
clients anytime soon, even with their

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aggressive marketing tactics, with a
whole section devoted to their open source

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initiatives, documented@wix.engineering,
including a behind the scenes, look

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at how they scale their platform
for hundreds of thousands of users.

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It's obvious they know the importance
of connecting with developers.

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So why not call the bluff?

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Matt Mullenweg just mentioned in his
summer update at WordCamp Europe,

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that the data liberation initiative
isn't moving as fast as he'd hoped.

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He wants to unlock customer website,
content and other data proprietary.

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CMS is like Wix hold
hostage from their users.

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If they decide to migrate away
what an amazing opportunity for

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Wix and others to take part in for
the greater good of WordPress open

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source and all users of the web.

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I agree with one of the
Kevin Geary's points.

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I don't believe there's a master plan
coming from the sidelines at Wix, they

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are a product and profit first company.

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Their core product is an open source.

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Automatic on the other hand,
started with air quotes.

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With an open source product and
is now trying to build the profit

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first part of their business.

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Or have that in my last post, what would
we do with the keys to the kingdom?

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Open source winning doesn't mean that
WordPress wins at every single front.

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It shouldn't, it can't
really we've lost the plot.

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If we think that our goal is to
build a defense against these other

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CMS platforms, instead of devising a
timeline where WordPress must win at

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all costs, we should be advocating
and demonstrating the WordPress way.

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To these commercial entities.

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Look, I don't think it's an easy task,
but if anyone from Wix is listening,

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spending a few hundred thousand in
engineering time could create a plugin

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that syncs data to and from a WordPress
installed, it's probably money well spent

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much more than sponsoring a YouTuber.

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And the end of the day users
win, which is the ultimate goal.

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And the optimist in me hopes that the
more proprietary brands see the value in

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this type of portability data liberation.

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The more, they might be enticed
to go deeper investing in

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other parts of open source.

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Heck.

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Imagine if you could install the gravity
forms, plugin on your WordPress site and

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a WIC site, what a world that would be.

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But I'm not foolish.

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I know these are epic challenges
and largely not part of the

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mainstream software's agenda
or automatics for that matter.

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I also know the idea of wanting
other platforms to look more

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attractive for developers means that
WordPress could certainly look less

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appealing through the same lens.

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There's a model here that
we've halfway on earth.

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It's worked for 21 years
instead of the goal to have

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WordPress installed everywhere.

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Maybe it's the impression of our
community that should be spread first.

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Don't laugh.

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I can hear you.

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Do we need to be more than 50% of the web.

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Can Wix and others have their
share so long as they become

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good stewards of open source.

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My fear isn't that the other
platforms will conquer WordPress,

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but that open source WordPress in
collaboration with automatic can't

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move fast enough to find its footing.

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Loose terrain, not just built on the
rough edges of UI and UX decisions,

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but the lack of deep bonds threaded
throughout the community, the stuff

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that gets challenged every day.

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More transparency from leadership,
automatic, truly investing in partnerships

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with us and community members, treating
everyone with respect and integrity.

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Across the board.

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Finally a problem.

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AI can't solve.

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WordPress thriving because of humans.

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In the battle for a dominant
CMS, it's hard to pick a winner

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or loser because the real fight.

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Should be for more choice.

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Everywhere.

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So, as I spoke about at State of the
Word, I'll reintroduce Data Deliberation.

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This is the idea that one of the
best things we could do as an open

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source community is unlock all
the proprietary platforms, all the

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places where people have their data
locked in to systems which might not

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allow export or easy composability
or transferability of their data.

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Um, so we, we termed this data
liberation and uh, if you scan

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that QR code or go to wordpress.

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org slash data dash liberation,
you will see we have.

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The start of what, uh, hopefully
will be something that creates a ton

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more freedom on the web and a ton
more portability between platforms,

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including in and out of WordPress.

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WordPress could be maybe a middle
ground between something else.

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Um, however, this has had
very, very little progress.

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So if you go to that page, click
on some of the links, you'll

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see mostly empty GitHub repos.

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So I just wanted to point this out.

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As an amazing place, if you're interested
in contributing to WordPress, uh, to adopt

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something and have total ownership of it.

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So if you wanted to, sort of, each of
these projects is fairly self contained.

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So if, uh, you wanted a chance to
actually lead something within the

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WordPress project, you could be in
charge of the, say, Wix to WordPress

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converter, or something like that.

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Um, this, I think, is also going to
be really important for us, as the

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more and more marketing dollars, uh,
hundreds of millions of dollars are

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spent in marketing for proprietary
platforms, the proprietary platforms.

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have gotten tons of investment in
the past few years, things like

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Shopify, Squarespace, et cetera,
and they are coming as sort of the

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macroeconomic conditions have changed.

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They've started to really target
WordPress agencies, WordPress

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users, WordPress sites, quite a bit.

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And so they're coming and trying
to snipe away our community.

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So we have to keep an eye out for
that and the problem as well is

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when people go that way it's almost
impossible to go back the other way.

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It's like, uh, I don't know if
you had this advertisement here,

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but the Roche Motel, the Roches
check in, they don't check out.

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That's a lot of these proprietary CMSs.

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They'll let you check in your data,
but you can never check it out.

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So, as part of our mission to democratize
the web and increase freedom, I think

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it's really, really important that
we create portability, even when the

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platforms themselves try not to allow it.