Matt: Mark Zemanski, welcome back to the WP Minute.
Mark: Matt Medeiros.
It's always a pleasure.
As if
Matt: I'm dubbing it Emergency Pod.
It's not quite an emergency pod, but there you go.
We'll roll with it just to get the, uh, to get the clicks.
Um, you put out, A tweet.
We talked about this.
Mmm, when I jumped on the WP Town Hall podcast, was it last week?
With Chris
Mark: Chris Pearson, yeah, last week.
Yeah, maybe, maybe the week before, but yeah.
Matt: Frame the question, frame the tweet, uh, for me.
It's in the title, but go ahead, say it.
What did you tweet out?
Mark: Tweeted out, has the term open source been overused, and
therefore now largely misinterpreted?
Matt: Do you really feel that way?
Mark: Uh, is this a therapy session?
Uh, no.
Uh, yeah, definitely.
I mean, there's definitely, I ask questions because I don't have an answer.
I don't have all the answers.
You know, I look to everyone else to give me the wisdom and then I
can kind of like piece it together.
And, you know, you mentioned that WP Town Hall with Chris Pearson.
Everybody should go check that out.
Interesting things.
We're probably going to call on some of the things from there.
This question was, It had something to do with that, maybe, uh, and obviously
everything else that we've heard about in open source LAN and everything
like that for the last, however long.
But the other big thing was, the specific thing, the reason that I tweeted, like,
you know, when you see something and then you tweet, you know, a question
out, was, I was watching a video, and it was about WordPress, like kind
of alternatives and just other, you know, like other platforms, basically
just kind of like looking into like Webflow and Wix and all the other ones.
And I normally go to the comments and I just kind of see like what people
are thinking because we're always trying to do that type of research.
And somebody said something to the tune of, Hey, this is a nice
list, but there aren't any open source platforms on this list.
As you know, again, you would think alternative to WordPress.
WordPress is one of its biggest things is open source.
So that's the concept there.
And that got me thinking, I was like, I hear this word open source so much.
It has value, but I just feel like it's one of those things that have
been almost like the concept of searching for something on the
internet has become now Googled.
It's like, it's, it's almost like you just say it and you think it means
something, but it itself doesn't really mean the thing that you're talking about,
but you've attached to these other.
Pieces to it, and I'm not saying that open source is bad.
That's not what I'm saying with this I just think that we just throw it around
at this point And I feel like there's way more things underneath it that
we've literally seen in WordPress now When we kept saying open source, open
source, open source, but it's like, there's really two different things.
There's like the technology, and like the code, and then there's
also the actual brand, and all that sort of other stuff there, so.
Matt: Let's play the clip from your, uh, WP Town Hall.
This is where you pose the question to Chris Pearson about, uh, open source.
Feedback loop.
Here we go.
Uh, we'll try to link up the, uh, rest of that episode in the show notes.
WP Town Hall, search for it on Spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
And you can listen to the last episode with Chris Pearson, uh,
featuring, of course, the hosts, Mark Szymanski and Kevin Geary.
Um, yeah, I mean, I think he distilled, Chris distills it
down into those two areas.
I agree with you that oftentimes, uh, people, uh, We'll start to
give a new meaning to a word.
This goes well beyond WordPress , but can, can give a meaning to a, a word or
a phrase, and over time, either dilute it, change it, uh, or what have you.
I think, and I did get into a, a bit of a, a debate with
Chris on that podcast episode.
Uh, 'cause I called in and, and, uh, sort of talked to him
about this open source thing.
The thing that gets me, well, let me start with this.
The thing that gets me with.
Uh, Pearson, especially in the context of your episode is on one hand,
he's, uh, building success off of the back of an open source project,
but at the same time saying that open source is a big, big red flag.
I've seen and heard this across the, our space for a while now, and it's
not something I can really wrap my head around, um, because I look at that and
go, well, don't you see the benefits?
Of open source.
I'm not saying you necessarily have to agree with everything in it.
Or pull all the levers in it, which we'll break down in a moment.
But, can't you see the, the, the driving success that at least WordPress
has had for the last 20 years?
Maybe we're coming too ahead of all that stuff, but still.
If you launch Thesis, one of the most popular premium themes many years ago.
Imprinted.
I don't know, using his words, I think millions of dollars,
eight million of dollars.
Um, man, don't you see the success in that?
And I think that that's such a hard thing for me to wrap my head around.
When I see folks who have been successful because of open source also say it's
not really a thing that we should want.
And it blows my mind quite honestly.
Mark: Yeah.
Matt: I mean,
Mark: I, I think that.
Using that as the example, and we, you know, we, we had that episode.
I thought there was a lot of interesting topics that were brought up there, and
the way that Chris kind of defines open source is, you know, I think he says in
there, it's like, it's free, and then, you know, and I tried to, I tried to
understand it, because it was kind of hard to understand, like, the exact, the
exact way that he described it, and like, he was talking about his platform and how
it would be and all that sort of stuff.
I don't know, here's where my mind goes with this type of stuff.
It's like Open source until it gets to a point where it's not
your type of open source anymore.
Is one of the themes that I've seen.
I think we kind of see that in WordPress a little bit.
Like, you know, now that it's getting to a point where, you know,
WordPress is just the biggest one that we can kind of pull from.
And I'm not as extremely, uh, experienced with like a Drupal or
anything else that are like this.
You could probably tell me more there.
I just think that at a certain point it becomes where It was a free software
that everyone loved and in the run up, it's incredibly beneficial to
everyone for it to be open source.
And again, I'm saying the word open source and in my mind, I'm like,
that's not what open source means.
It's open source.
Just doesn't open source at the end of day just means that the
code is everybody can see the code.
And like, does it inherently mean that you can contribute to it or no?
Matt: Uh,
Mark: don't we get into like license territory and licenses are different?
Matt: Yes.
But this is kind of what
Mark: I'm talking about though, is like, we say the word open source
and like, isn't there normally like a license attached to it?
And I understand people are just talking, you know, trying to
get their points across quickly.
But anytime I hear that, I'm like, it's, it's more nuanced than that.
You'd love that word.
I do love that
Matt: phrase.
It is always more nuanced than that.
And you know, in the, in the thing that there, so there's like that.
Pearson.
Um, Component or viewpoint where You know, at the end of the day, I would
just say, well, are you just greedy?
Is that what this distills down to?
Like, how can you, like, you built a business off it.
Presumably you still, he still has thesis and themes and stuff.
Like you're, you're, you're building a solution for WordPress.
How could you hate, uh, or call out, uh, open source is a bad thing.
It's literally, uh, the fuel for your business.
So that part doesn't make sense.
So there's that one camp.
And then there's another camp where I think there's the extreme
side of it where it's like, Hey, this open source WordPress thing.
It's for all of us to have a say, to have the direction.
Uh, don't like that pixel that you put on the dashboard.
I want that changed and I want it changed now.
Uh, there's that extreme side where people feel like, Well,
we're all, we're all building this.
This should all have, you should always have our say in this direction.
And I don't agree with that side either.
Uh, you know, I'm much more.
My own personal opinion is much more where DHH from Basecamp sort of sits where
the code is out there, it's open source, but I'm the driving force behind it.
Like, this is my project or a collection of contributors projects, and this
is the direction it's going in.
It's open source, we'll certainly listen to your feedback in the case of WordPress.
You know, we have GitHub, and of course we have SVN version control for WordPress
core, but let's just call it GitHub.
Like, yeah, we'll take your feedback.
You can open up an issue.
You can say, yeah, you know, change that button, add this feature.
We'll listen.
That doesn't necessarily mean that you're going to get it.
Um, I think that WordPress has the best chance of like, hey, if I just
want this one feature, nobody's going to really listen to me.
But if a hundred people say they want this feature, and they, and they rally
behind it, Well, now we have a better chance if a thousand people do it.
Well, now we even have a better chance to get this deployed into WordPress.
So I think WordPress gives us the best chance at that utopian scenario of open
source, but I don't necessarily agree that it's guaranteed in my opinion.
Mark: Yeah.
I mean, I, where I'm going with that and where I'm thinking when
you say all that is like, what, uh, 10 years ago, did you feel like.
From a top down perspective of like WordPress, did you feel like it was more
We are building this together, it's all of us in this together, we're going In
a direction that almost everybody wants, like everybody has a say in everything
like that Contrast that, I'm assuming I know the answer to that question,
what is the answer to that question?
Matt: It's nuanced, but It's uh, I've never felt like it was uh I never
felt, personally never felt like I was a part of building WordPress.
I always felt like I was a part of supporting WordPress, if that makes sense.
Like, I knew it would have its issues, you know?
Um, but at the same time, like, I was there for the mission of, you know.
That's how I've always approached it.
I never felt like It was a me thing or I never said myself shoulder to
shoulder with these other developers and said we I'm much more like
you guys are doing a great job.
Let me help you.
Let me help you get this, uh, to the finish line with what I can do.
Um, which is an interesting point because I believe there are people who feel
very opinionated and, um, on both sides of like the positive and negative in
the WordPress world where they like, I know I've committed code and nobody's
listening to me where I committed code and they're not taking this.
Um, yeah.
Which should be.
And that's something I don't know.
I've never felt cause I just can't do that.
You know?
Mark: Well, I, I don't have, again, I don't have specific answers and I
don't, I'm not trying to criticize anyone with the things that I say.
I just think of it like I really like this type of like human
business psychology aspect.
I don't know why, but I just like these nuanced topics.
And I just feel that.
From a pattern recognition standpoint, which I also feel like I somewhat can,
can do reasonably well and like just see and observe is that I feel at a certain
point, it's always going to continue to go, it's going to manifest into this thing
where every, it was smaller, it was more tightly knit, everything was like that.
And it was like open source, like everybody's kind of driving and
rowing the boat in the same point.
I actually don't know of a way, and again, we've talked about this
before, where WordPress has gotten to this point now where it's so big, I
don't know if there's actually, It's like completely uncharted waters.
I don't know how you could possibly make everyone happy.
I don't think it's, I don't even know if it's possible to make everyone happy.
But at the same time, I do think that there's like, There's conflicting
things where maybe you have like, Just as a, as a, you know, as a
figurehead, Matt Mullenweg has an idea for what he wants WordPress to be.
He always has, and now he has to like, again, we've talked about it for X, Y,
and Z reason has to actually like enact it a little bit more and put a little
more pressure behind it or what have you.
But then you also have like real, I mean, I'm sure it's always been like this.
You would know there's always been thought leaders in this space of
WordPress and WordPress adjacent web design, and they actually have.
things that they say based in fact, reason, experience from all these
other things that actually mean and make sense to a lot of people.
And then a lot of times those views conflict.
And I don't think it's like on purpose thing.
It's literally just because humans have different thoughts and stuff like that.
And this is where we kind of come and it all comes back a little
bit to the open source thing because we have a project that.
But I feel like, whether or not it was intentional or not, always kind of
build as like, anytime you hear that word open source, it's like you're
a part of it and you can enact like kind of the change and everything.
But then it, then a lot of times other people, it doesn't end up
feeling like that, especially when it gets to this level.
Again, I don't have any answers.
I'm just trying to observe that.
So
Matt: yeah, I think I, I rarely the glass half full kind of person,
but in this case I am because.
I just look at the alternative, which is absolutely zero say,
right, in anything, you know?
Um,
Mark: you know The one thing I would say that
Matt: Go
Mark: ahead.
I don't want to interrupt you with that, but I think it's a really important point.
The one thing is that I do kind of feel like, whether it was explicit or not,
or it has been explicit or not, maybe it's just like the stuff that I consume.
Would you rather have like a complete Uh, I don't know what an ex like,
complete, like, dictatorial approach where, like, you absolutely know that
you have no say versus the other end of the spectrum where you it's, like,
almost anarchy, like, you can kind of do whatever you want, like, you have
all the say, I don't know, whatever.
But there's a middle ground like the middle ground is always weird where it's
like you feel like you have a say but then You don't end up actually having one
and now you're just confused my I'm not saying that's exactly where we're at I'm
just saying that I feel like most of the time people would rather be told exactly
What the rules are rather than the rules?
being so obfuscated and gray.
And again, it's a difficult thing.
I'm not saying these are easy problems.
I'm just kind of giving you my perspective on it because I'm trying
to be a little bit of the mouthpiece for the things that I hear and see
and all that sort of stuff, just from the people that I associate with.
So, that's kind of always what I've felt really for like the last like year
and a half just like trying to feel everything out is, uh, it's really big.
And I don't know if there's a way around those types of things but
that's, that's kind of how I feel like.
A vast majority of people that are kind of in it feel like in it to the extent
that they care about the stuff that you make stuff that I make, you know?
Matt: Yeah, I can certainly sympathize with, you know, folks that want more
clear cut, you know, guidelines and rules.
I think that's something that WordPress, the community has always been seeking.
Um, where are those upper limitations?
Who's really doing what?
Um, You know, marketing team, what kind of access do you probably, you know,
that you, can you have, uh, what kind of access do you have, what kind of
access actually makes sense from, um, I know this is so hard to say it this
day and age with what we've, uh, you know, uncovered with, with Matt and.
org and stuff like that, but what kind of continuity, like, you know,
I think any, we've talked about this before, like any volunteer marketing
team, like, can you really get, Yeah.
Pure Google Analytics access to an enterprise as big as org.
I know, given what we've come up with, but just hear me out.
Uh, you know, any, if it was, I don't know, I can't think of another, like, non
profit off the top of my head that would, that this would roll with, but like if,
if there was a big non profit in your local town, you know, millions of dollars
worth, and You were all just volunteers.
Would you expect to get, like, access to Google Analytics and the data
behind this stuff as just a volunteer?
Probably not, right?
Like, it's probably not going to get that access.
So there's like these up, these limitations that we, that we run into.
Um, and I know that's super challenging.
Um, but I also look at it as, you know, We have an opportunity
to have some say in this stuff.
And maybe that's not good enough, you know, for people.
I think people look at WordPress as something that
is so vital to the open web.
I agree.
It's so vital to the open web that people should have it.
But I don't think, I don't think that's a reality.
Like, I don't think that's a reality.
We, it's not a utility, WordPress.
Right?
It's not water.
Okay?
Like, we, we can't, we can't have that.
And, and, you know, I think that's the, I think all these questions that
you have, and I still have, are really being pushed, uh, or, or pressed
right now because of, of what we, and we've never seen anything like this.
Um, you know, and this is really pushing the boundaries of, of
Open Source and what it means.
Mark: Yeah, I mean, I, I don't know, I think that if A question
was posed to like, you know, again, just Matt as the figurehead.
It's like every time that I've, but I would have to, I'd have to go back.
I'd have to know again, like 10 years ago, what, what the vibe was like, what
the answers were like when anytime like he or anybody was asked a question,
it's just like, I feel like it's always like, Hey, we want, somebody says, or a
group of people say, we want X, Y, Z in Gutenberg or in WordPress is the answer.
Yeah, that's a really good idea.
Or is it more like, yeah, like, well, like, I just feel like if, if I feel
like every time I've heard Like, again, just Matt, as an example, speak, it's
like kind of, it's not really answers.
It's again, like, again, maybe big founder, kind of like
political speak almost in a way.
And I just feel like that is something that people have just really just across
society have just learned to just snuff out and just like, this is bullshit.
Like I'm tired of hearing, like, maybe we will, maybe we won't
like this middle ground thing.
It's more, if somebody asked me that question to be like,
yeah, there's like a pretty low likelihood we're going to do that.
And then it's some, in some ways.
You might be pissed at that answer, but you might respect it a little bit more
because it's like, okay, well, at least he told me like how he actually feels.
Again, I'm not criticizing Matt.
I don't know.
I'm not saying he ever like he's doing that specifically, but
I, I'm just saying like from everything that I've not just him.
It's just, it seems like kind of more like that.
It's like we have a direction.
We know what the direction is.
You know, again, like we talked about the blogging, the publishing, like
those are valid things, but then other people have different thoughts
on where the platform should go.
But at the same time are not specifically empowered to make those decisions, but
people are, you know, I feel like there is a fair amount of people that actually
agree with those sentiments and then it's now you get in this point where
like you have this this like conflicting like the brand and the people that back
and have power versus like all the The lay people, so to speak, or whatever,
just the users that have opinions.
And it's just like, now, where are we at?
It's like, are we, are we listening to our users?
Are we not listening to you guys?
I mean, that's a whole nother conversation.
Do we think that WordPress is listening to the users or not?
Largely we've had this conversation many times.
I think there's a lot of inactive voices in the WordPress community
that we don't even really know what they want because they're just, you
know, they're doing other things, so that's a whole different thing.
But I mean, if we could go back just to like the very beginning of.
Because that's a lot of good context around open source.
The thing I would say is like, Do you believe that the word open source,
when you hear it in the wild, is often like, I, Over, when I said overused and
misinterpreted, I meant because so many people like, use it as kind of a buzzword,
it's a real word, it means something, but I just feel like people are attaching more
things to it than what it actually means.
Particularly in the context of WordPress, because Really, I was going to tweet this
out too and we could have a discussion about it here because it's pertinent.
I was going to tweet something out like, you know, we were having a chat, I think
there's a thread in the WP Minutes Slack, and I was thinking in my mind, the thing
that was coming to my mind as I was putting all those pieces together, is
the revelation that there's WordPress, like the brand of WordPress that really
everyone knows, like that's the real value of the name and like what the platform is.
And then there's all the code, certainly.
But those are two different things.
It's like the code is open source.
Like you could take WordPress and go do it.
But the brand it's in you, but you have to rename it, right?
Like you wouldn't be able to just keep it.
The brand itself is where the value is.
And Matt Mullenweg, unless I'm getting something wrong, like
owns that and controls that brand.
So like, that's where the actual value is mostly like, obviously the code
is valuable, like I'm not trying to.
the contribution of all the people making this, making the code.
But I'm saying that those are two very different things.
And we are now in this, I feel like we're in this weird spot where people
are saying open source and they're attaching these, these weird like
brand attributes to it and whatever they're making, you know, like whatever
the, the conclusions are drawing.
And that's just not, that's not a one to one.
It's like, yeah, the code's open source, but it's Matt Mullenwig's thing.
And I just feel like that's not.
I'm not even saying that's wrong.
I'm just saying, like, I like, again, I like the clear vision of
what's going on, and I don't, I just don't see it all the time, so.
Matt: Yeah, I mean, again, there's so many variables here, but they're
certainly, like, Matt's vision of what that means to to be a WordPress
contributor, not only just like where the project goes and like how he divvies
up like dot org and dot com initiatives or automatic initiatives, like how he
sees contributions, there's him, there's like figureheads in the in the community.
There's a lot of stuff like this isn't this is not easy.
Yeah, but but I think I think maybe your biggest like just
hearing you like play this out.
So, I'll answer your question with a question before I get to it, but I think
your, your biggest issue is that people are thinking they have more of a say in
this project, in the direction it's going.
Is that really the biggest challenge you see out there when people are
maybe misconstruing open source?
It's that they just think that they have more ownership
in this than they really do?
Mark: I think that's part of it.
Is that the biggest?
Mm.
It's probably pretty, I see it as
Matt: the big, I see it as the biggest issue, but I don't know how you say it.
It's
Mark: probably, it's probably pretty big.
Yeah.
But it, but that particular part of it only impacts the
people that you and I speak to.
Like, it only impacts, uh, you know, it only impacts this 10,000, you know.
English speaking and obviously abroad people that like actually
care, you know what I mean?
Like that, that, that number that we've kind of like, you know,
talked about before I feel like, because everyone else like probably
wouldn't necessarily care about that.
The other thing that's like interesting though, is that secondary part where
people talk about WordPress, like it is literally a project that's for
everyone by everyone almost, but really the brand I still think seemingly
belongs to Matt Mullenweg, which again, I'm all for people doing their
own thing, having their own thing.
I love that.
Like, I think you should be able to have your own thing.
But I'm saying that I think that just throughout the years, again, maybe not
even intentionally, it has gotten to the point where everyone feels like,
this is like huge, hugely crazy, too.
Because it's 20 years in the making.
Like, we've, I don't think in history, you know what I mean?
Like, it's, this is kind of a phenomenon where there's so many People that, again,
I say this all the time, that feel very attached to this platform and they feel
like maybe they didn't build it, but they've been around for a long time.
They want to see it continue to prosper and stuff.
And then everything we've seen now is just kind of weird.
It's thrown a little monkey wrench in there and it's like, ah, I didn't,
I didn't know it was like this.
I didn't realize that, you know, Matt had full control or whatever
that, you know, whatever the, whatever the thing is, it's just.
So I think that a lot of people do feel like they have more of a say, and
then I feel as well, as a little bit of a sidebar to that, that there's only
certain ways that you can absolutely contribute to, which we've had this
conversation ad nauseum, but, um, you know, I still think that there's extreme
value in educating and providing thought leadership outside of a GitHub repo.
But I've never really felt like that's actually fully, uh,
appreciated necessarily to nth degree.
It's tried, definitely not trying to make a complete blanket statement there,
but yeah, that's, that's kind of what I would, it's definitely a big challenge.
And I think a lot of people are becoming tired of it, I feel like in a way.
Matt: So, I mean, there's probably is, you'd have to go back to like
Linux, Linux kernel, uh, and.
Probably, roughly the same amount of time ago when WordPress was really blowing up.
Like, there was a lot of debate, and probably still is.
I just don't follow it anymore by any stretch of the imagination.
But, the Linux kernel and that open source and, uh, Who has control over that?
I mean, that was hugely debated way back, uh, you know, in the day.
So, there are projects, probably Linux is the only other project at scale
that you would actually even hear about the challenges of open source.
Everything else is probably a lot smaller, Drupal being the next and,
you know, it's just a human thing.
And people not, you know, getting along or, you know, seeing eye
to eye and wanting the vision and ownership, yada, yada, yada.
Um, Ruby on Rails with, uh, DHH and his, his framework, uh, it's
just a much smaller footprint.
Plus, WordPress is unique because you have just such, at least in my view,
there's such a, uh, mix of people.
You know, hardcore developers, uh, marketing and content people like you
and, and me, uh, end users, business owners, investors, venture capital,
um, you know, and then all the while, like, you, you, the enigma of Mullenweg
and the control over all of this stuff.
There's just so much more.
Um, and plus it's massive.
So you have like this perfect storm of like this massive thing.
Empowering a chunk of the internet for over 20 years.
All these different kinds of people with different goals and ambitions.
So it just gets amplified.
You know, much more than any other open source project.
That's just me sort of framing.
Yeah, there's probably the same stuff happening.
Just at lesser degrees in other worlds of open source.
AI being one of them.
I mean, we see this with DeepSeek.
Um, allegedly it's open source.
It's open source.
Um, we don't know.
But, you know, HuggingFace is a massive open source community
for all AI technologies.
Um, there's just a million technologies on HuggingFace versus
one WordPress, um, at that size.
So, I mean, we see it.
You just don't see it like you see it in WordPress.
Um, plus I think,
I want to say, Again, I'm rarely a half glass full kind of guy, but I think
like there was a lot of, um, structure built, loose structure built to have
the democratic, uh, apparatus of WordPress, right?
For better or for much more for worse, right?
So it was kind of built.
But it didn't really, you know, it was, it was kind of built like to have
this democratic apparatus behind it, but you know, for years before all of
this stuff, we were kind of like, all right, we all know Matt pulls the, pulls
the strings behind, behind the scene.
Um, so I don't know, it was kind of good that that was there, but also kind of
bad because it, it led us, it led a whole bunch of people down this direction that
they thought they had this ownership and this say, uh, but they truly didn't.
Right?
On one hand, I'm like, it's kind of cool that it was there, but on the other hand,
it's like, eh, it was a lot of false hope.
So I totally get it.
Um, you know, I get your point of view on that stuff.
Are you saying that exists though?
Mark: Say it again.
You're saying, you're saying you agree with that though?
Like you, you, that's your estimation that that did, that is the case?
You've been here longer than me.
Again, I'm
Matt: relatively new.
You know, you have, I mean, look at, you had meetups, you had word camps,
you had, um, You know, the, the bigger milestone WordCamps like US,
uh, before WordCamp Europe and Asia, like this stuff all evolved over time.
And there was like this inertia that we were all there, man, like we're all there.
We're all building this.
This is all us, right?
You know, and then you'd have, uh, contributor days.
Uh, you get there early, you write some documentation, like you're feeling like
you're a part of this thing and you are and you're making a difference.
Believe me, it's like, yeah, certainly it made WordPress what it was.
But you just never really had that full control.
Um, but you had teams.
Again, marketing team.
Media core.
Don't even know what the hell is going on with that anymore.
Right?
You have Slack.
You have, you know, all these things where you can, you can jump
in and be a part of this stuff.
So that's like that apparatus part where you kind of feel
like there's something there.
Right?
Like your local town or city has a parks board.
Uh, uh, you know, um, Uh, historic commission board, like you have all these
boards, and it's just like, oh, people can, you know, apply and be on these
boards, and you're like, oh, we're all a part of this thing, we're all, you know,
making this thing move forward, and you kind of had that semblance in WordPress,
it's still there, I don't know how, you know, for much longer, but, um, it was
sort of that feeling, like we're all doing this thing together, right, and
that's that, what I'll call that false democratic hope, you know, that you
all had a say, and you did have a say, but certainly, The big direction of the
project, of course, now with dot org dot com, like we all know, like we never
really had that control in the foundation.
Um, but I think that we're all led to believe it.
Not even intentionally, not even intentionally.
There was like a hope that it was going to be like this democratic.
Well, I think it's
Mark: great.
I think it also probably wasn't here, but I feel like Who started WordPress
meetups, you know, I mean like just as an example, like it probably just
kind of happened serendipitously because You know people saw this thing.
It was free.
You could get into it easily.
It was powerful I'm sure Matt probably encouraged it heavily at a certain
point like when he saw his hat I mean I could put myself kind of in that
shoes I don't know exactly what he's feeling but like you build this thing
People are adopting it like crazy Unbelievable timing, you know what I mean?
Like all these, all these variables together And now you see all these people
popping up And they're like, you know, I, I, I try to empathize as much as
possible If I was a founder of something like this, like, you know I got people
that are making meetups about my shit And like, you know, like, they wanna
do conferences, they wanna do all this stuff I'm sure he didn't like, envision
all that, maybe he did But I, I, I don't think he like, you know, I don't
think he was like Had a premonition of like all this stuff happening, right?
So it's like, I can totally get that Uh, and I just feel like You know,
it's a little bit of Monday morning quarterbacking type thing, but at the
same time, it's like, I look at these things and I think how, if I was going
to do something, any, anywhere, like even a micro amount of this scale,
what would I like try to remember?
And it's like, how do you keep the people's understanding of what is going
on, like in check and in alignment with what you actually kind of want?
And maybe his, as an example, him and whoever else like kind
of changed along the way as well.
But.
I don't know.
I'm looking at all this and I'm thinking, was, is there a way if we could replay
it or just like, you know, like no for the next like WordPress thing
that we, that we build or whatever, not, I'm not saying an alternative
WordPress, but the next type of thing, like what will we do differently?
I just think these exercises are important and educational.
Like, would we focus on making sure that we're monetizing the
backbone, like heavily, like heavily monetizing the backbone of the thing
that's free and open source so we don't like get like to a point.
I'm not saying it is, but it seems like that's partially it, right?
We've talked about this many times where some, at some point you got to make money.
It's just how it is.
And I know that Automatic does make money.
I'm just saying that like, the thing that you're giving away for free and
is extremely valuable, you do have to somehow monetize some aspect of that
to make sure that the people that are using that don't go out of business.
Or like, the platform doesn't lose, you know, adoption, right?
You know, stuff like that.
Uh, I don't know, I just try to think about all that, and, um,
I'm not saying it's easy, and, uh, but we're in a weird spot now.
Matt: I also think, like, there's open source, like, things can be open source,
and I think we're gonna see this really get pushed because of AI, uh, coming up,
is, like, if I'm starting to build little software solutions, and by the way, open
source doesn't always have to be, like, software, um, If I'm starting to build
out these little software solutions and I want to open source it, it's this tiny
little thing that does one like, just like plugins, any kind of tiny little plugin
that's uploaded to to wordpress.org.
Your favorite, most basic WordPress plugin that does this cool little utility thing
that you can't live without is open source and it doesn't need to be maintained.
By a thousand people and have the meetings in this apparatus that we've
had with WordPress because it just doesn't need it does not require it.
So, I think looking at open source and what I, what I don't want to do,
here's what I'm trying to get at.
What I don't want to do is to beat up on open source as a bad thing because
of what has happened in WordPress.
Right?
Because I I I I I'm with ya.
Yeah.
It's just the same thing.
Like, I have the debate with like, Kevin and others.
Not just Kevin, but like Don't let, you know, don't let video take over podcasting
because then we start to push out, like, the essence of free and open publishing.
Right?
So I say the same thing about, like, open source.
And I'm not this crazy open, like, I'm not running, I mean, we've
talked about it, I'm not running, like, Graphene OS on my phone.
I'm not using a Linux, uh, uh, uh, computer like I used to back in the day.
And by the way, neither is Matt.
He's running iOS and he's talked about Matt Mullen way.
He's talked about this.
He's still using Apple, which is closed source.
Like you can't just be like 100% consumed by it, but the idea of that just existing
challenges, the status quo, deep seek, open source, challenged, open ai, um,
WordPress challenges, any closed source CMS, and these things help balance.
There's a balance there.
Like the, the swing of the pendulum going side to side and sometimes it's
really good for WordPress, sometimes it's really bad for WordPress.
And I think the existence of this stuff challenges that status quo.
And the one other thing I want to, I want to remark on is before
I forget, is Keys to the Kingdom.
Mark: Oh my god.
Matt: There is, like, I think, you know, for everyone, Like, saying the,
the, I know it's so hard to say these days, so don't come after me, but, you
know, like for all of the criticism you want to give Mullenweg and WordPress,
it still remains free and open source.
You can still take it, walk down the street and charge somebody 10, 000
to put a WordPress website together for you, 100, 000, you can still
profit off of this open source thing.
So as much as you want to criticize it and beat up, uh, you know, Mullenweg and
the decisions, some of them rightfully so.
And the challenges of this stuff, you could still take from WordPress.
You can still run, have a career off of WordPress.
So that's why I say you can still take from it, but don't beat up on it.
You know, again, Pearson from your podcast episode makes absolutely no sense to me.
You know, build, build off the back of WordPress and then just beat it up because
you didn't get along with, with Mullenweg and, and some of the, uh, of the things.
You can debate the technology and the process and all that, fine.
But at the end of the day, like, the thing still allows you to survive.
And that's, that's the thing for me.
Um, you know, when I, when I hear these debates from, from folks who have made a
ton of money off the back of WordPress.
Mark: Yeah, I mean, I, I, I think that I would, when I hear you say beat up
on WordPress, I would need to know.
Like almost specifics on what you mean, like, what is your definition of beat up?
Because I just, and maybe this is, maybe this is a weird thing that I
and other people do, I just feel like Criticism is valid in a lot of ways
Especially the way it's delivered.
Like, I feel like a lot of times when I'm saying things I'm just like observing
and I'm being like, hmm I'm asking, almost like asking a question, like I
wonder why they did it like that or I think there might be a better way To
do that and they're, people are free to not take Like that into consideration.
Sure, it's not my thing.
I don't, whatever.
But, at the same time, I just feel like there's another angle of that.
What you said there, where people are utilizing WordPress and they
are charging somebody money for that and they're doing it in a sense
of they, they feel like that's the best decision for their business.
And then, you know, X, Y, Z happens, new update happens, whatever.
And it like, it's just totally Kind of like against with it.
I don't know.
I, I don't know.
I, and I mean, it kind of goes back to the yin and yang thing.
I think you were talking about, like with like closed source versus open source
and I'm really not a hundred percent like, like I'm, I'm feeling that,
but I would need to think about that more because it feels like
a lot of stuff is closed source.
And there's not like, it feels like open source is kind of from my macro
lens of just a couple of things that I watch, it seems like closed source is
winning like a lot from what I've seen.
Like if you, if you see like, like all of the, the um, website
alternative things that I see, a lot of them are closed source.
Well, I don't know.
You'd have
Matt: to define what winning means because WordPress still has a massive.
Mark: I don't mean winning in like an absolute, I mean like winning as far
as if you look at WordPress versus like these other ones, like, like just as
like, like WordPress or the alternatives.
And then you see the alternatives and a lot of them are like the Wix, Squarespace,
Shopify, that type, Webflow type thing.
So I, I just, this is, this is, again, I've talked about
this, this is a societal thing.
I feel like we're just like becoming way less like willing to have
like open source and like you are a literal living testament to.
You have to fight for it, pretty much.
And I don't know if people really want to fight for it.
I think that they just want to have the thing that they want.
And I'll tell you this much, I'll tell you this much too, okay?
Because this is a different angle of this whole, this whole conversation.
But it's very relevant.
Let me compare and contrast two things.
When I want a new feature in WordPress, or when I think of, I have that conversation.
I would have to go into github and make a ticket or whatever and
I don't do that nearly enough.
Maybe I guess as I'm supposed to or whatever.
Okay, fine, fair.
But I'm making like WordPress videos and all that sort of stuff.
I use Sass products that are closed source, you know, just like
the things that you use, right?
StreamYard, Restream, like whatever, right?
When I want something changed in those platforms, I either go to the feature
request or I find the person that actually makes that change and I tell them and
it's like normally pretty fast because I'm not like saying some weird niche thing.
It's normally something like, Hey, this is kind of like a very normal
feature that needs to be in here.
And if you guys want to compete with these other people, like, I don't
understand why you can't, why I can't move things around on my streaming,
you know, set up like I, like I would.
And I did that for restream and it worked.
So.
Maybe you're going to tell me just go throw it in GitHub, but I just feel like
that is, that dichotomy there, at least in my personal experience, has been very
different, I feel like, in one avenue.
And again, it's not a dig at open source, I'm just wondering like, what are the
inherent differences there, and then psychologically, societally, are we more,
are we just becoming more of like a closed source capital money type system, where
like, This, these people are paying us.
We're going to listen to them from like the, from the brand perspective
versus this is an open source project.
We're going to do whatever the hell we want.
Uh, we'll consider what you want, but ultimately we have our own things
that we're trying to do here, that or that, whatever you have to find
your own developer, basically that knows what they're doing to put
these things in that type of stuff.
I don't know, just a bunch of thoughts there.
I know there's a lot, but
Matt: yeah, I mean, I, I think that, you know, the challenge,
yes, 100 percent you are correct.
Uh, Probably the most phenomenal thing I've ever heard you say.
Wow.
That you have to fight.
Clip it.
Right?
Like you have to fight for this open source thing.
And that's why, this is why I don't, I don't give up on it.
Because the more you push it away, Um, WordPress still has a long way to fall.
Trust me.
Yeah.
But.
We've never, you know, we've definitely seen some of these, these glacial moves
over the last few months where you really start to feel threatened by it.
Uh, but yes, you must fight.
And I also believe that, to some degree, I know the haters are going to
come out, that Matt is also thinking of, is fighting for it right now.
Fighting for his business, Automatic, to stay relevant.
Poor went out, if I wasn't in my office, poor went out for Brian Kord's, right?
Fighting for his, his business to stay relevant, because he does see
himself as, sees Automatic as the only champion for WordPress, whether
you agree with that statement or not.
I think that he believes Automatic is the only champion, and rightfully
so, with the amount of hours that he's, and money that he's put into it.
Um, and he does want to defend that.
I too want to defend it.
Not because I want it.
Because I want to be able to tell WordPress what to do.
I want to have a say.
It's cool.
But I also want it to survive because I think it's a great
app that humans should want.
Uh, you know, want from, uh, freedom of publishing.
So, yes.
Fight for it.
For open source.
Fight for open publishing.
And the open web, technically.
Um, so there's that.
Um,
You know, the, the, the other stuff about You know, contributing
and giving back like, yeah, we have, it's an imperfect system.
It's an imperfect system.
How many times have you called up, you know, the paying corporate company,
Xfinity, right, your cable provider, if you have that in your area, and you're
like, I got a problem with my bill.
Okay, let me push you over here.
You talk to this next person, I got a problem with my bill.
I was not in this department, let me push you over to this department.
And you're just like, God damn, like, I just want to get this thing solved.
Right?
It's just an imperfect system that we have with WordPress, but a system nonetheless.
Which also, you know, it contributes to its issues, right?
Like, go put it in GitHub.
I get it.
Don't like it, but that's the system we have not saying it's perfect And yeah
It takes one person from the from the github aisle to reach across to the normie
aisle and say hey, what do you need?
You know, but then sometimes you have to go into the github
and go what is an issue?
Okay, I'll draft it and create it.
I'll provide screenshots.
There's a little bit of give and take and that has certainly been an issue
for WordPress, but also Again, as you watch the, the, the, the two camps
collide, hardcore developers that get this stuff, average users who are
trying to make a living with it, and, uh, it has caused, you know, it's
caused this, this rift, um, over time.
And it's, and again, it's, it's just not perfect.
Um, yeah, and, and, and that's, and, and that's where, that's where we've, that's
how we've come to this, to this pass, at least on, like, the communication side.
Because I've always felt like no one's ever listened to me either.
Right?
Which is why I started a podcast to talk about this stuff.
From like the business perspective.
You know?
And I think that um, yeah, a lot of folks don't feel heard.
And can't make progress in this space.
But at least the space exists.
It doesn't, it makes sense in my head, you know, when I say it, it's
like, we, we could have nothing.
Um, and on the commercial side, like you say, like commercial side is winning.
Um, yeah, I mean, maybe on like a feature set level, but you can, you
would also say that Wix and Squarespace or Webflow are not as big as WordPress
because not just because of the dollars, but because there aren't people behind
that machine pushing it forward.
So, it's like, it is a testament to the WordPress community that
has pushed WordPress so far.
Um, and it's adoption, because there are people who do care, who say,
Nope, I'm gonna start a web agency, and I'm gonna advocate for WordPress.
Whether or not they even think of it that way, Um, I think that that is something
that has, has really helped WordPress.
And, uh, that's something that Matt definitely lacks
in seeing, because, you know.
He's got his lane and he's seeing it from his perspective.
He's forgetting that there are thousands of people who are like, Cool man, I'm not
even, I don't even want to contribute, I just want to help this cool product.
People use it, just want to have people use it.
Um, and that's a huge reason why WordPress has been successful.
It's folks like you and me who have advocated for it.
Again, whether or not you're thinking of it actively, like
I'm an activist for this thing.
I'm like, Hey, this thing's pretty cool, let's use it.
And it's free, it's this open source thing and a bunch of people use it.
It's good to just like distill down to that and you're just like
cool use it versus this company.
I have no idea about Wix You know, I don't know if that answers your question,
but that was um, that's how I see that commercial side of defeating WordPress
Mark: Yeah, I think that it's just I Really go back the more and more
that I talk about this stuff and and then in some ways it's really
like a large conversation about
I don't want to say like large conversation about one guy, so to
speak, but it is like a lot of it really comes back to, again, I feel like the
control that, that Matt Mellenweg has.
And again, I, I'm really like an
Matt: open.
So you see that as a bad thing, right?
Let's try to close this out with some conclusion.
You see that as a bad thing with his control over this?
Like, do you, do you see his position in leading WordPress as a bad thing?
Mark: Um,
Matt: This is me
Mark: pulling the pin out of the grenade.
Matt: I don't think so.
Mark: No, I don't, no, I don't.
Thanks.
I don't, I don't think so because I don't really care what the rules are.
I keep saying it like that but I don't, I don't care what the rules are.
This is a, this is a life thing for me.
I don't care what the rules are.
I need to know the rules or the circumstance or the,
the guidelines or whatever.
I just feel like I've never really fully known that, but now we do.
I feel like a lot of people didn't know that truthfully.
And now it's a seismic shift.
Matt: And now
Mark: they realize that Matt Mullenwee is the king.
Um, and that's actually fine when I say fine, it's like, thank you for telling me
Matt: right
Mark: now with that information, I am going to make my own decision of whether
I want to stay, how much I want to use the platform, how I actually have to literally
re this is a lot of shit that I've seen, like people have to literally refactor
their whole thought process on wordpress.
And again, I want to emphasize this.
I understand people have been here for much longer than I have, like years and
years, multiple decades almost right.
Like they, Are going to like, I can understand the turmoil that that brings
to somebody when you think it's been like one way the whole time and now
either again intentionally or just by by need or maybe the veil was pulled off.
I don't really think that that really is the case, but like now it has to change
or it did change or the, the, the rules of change, the guidelines, whatever.
And now it's something different.
So that's me.
That's me.
I don't, I don't actually.
Yeah.
Absolutely.
I don't, I wouldn't tell Matt Mullenweg, it's not the type of person I am,
that you have to do something with the platform that you poured all of
your time, energy, and money into.
I, I, that's not me.
I'm not going to tell him how to do his thing.
What I am going to do though, is I'm going to observe that,
and I'm going to be like, okay.
These are the new parameters that I'm operating in.
How do I feel about that?
What am I going to talk about?
Because I'm free to have my own thoughts and opinions on it, and
use the thing if I still want to.
So to answer your question more succinctly, do I think it's a
bad thing that he has control?
Not inherently, no.
I think that it's, I'm glad that we know it and I think now the question
becomes is do we agree with what he is controlling and like what his thought
process is and how he's handling it.
I do think that with these new set of parameters and with what has happened.
There are two things can be true at once.
Like he could want open source to continue and say that and be and be like that and
also be ruining the thing that he has been building like the community aspect of it.
I think those two things are true.
And to me, I'm looking at it going, that just seems like a poor play
from somebody that wants their thing to continue to be prosperous.
And as somebody, as a user in the community.
I don't want to say I'm a thought leader by any means, but like somebody that
makes some content around this shit, it's like I can't just not say anything
about that because this is a strange situation that we're in here where we
have a guy that wants to be a steward of open source actively is, and I don't
want to go into the drama thing, but I'm just trying to like pull it all together.
The open source thing really is at the linchpin of it and it's
used as kind of like a, like the reasoning for a lot of it.
But I still think that the actual definition of the whole thing is kind
of like co opted in a way where We just keep throwing more things to it.
At the end of the day, it means that it's free to the public, right?
And you can see the code.
Does it mean anything else?
I, I don't really think so on the surface.
Because all the other shit that people have been thinking about and attributing
to WordPress are actually on the brand side, the business side, that a lot of
like WordPress Specific people I feel like, they're in business, like they're
here and there, maybe they're employees, maybe they have their own plugins, but
like this is big time fucking business.
Like these small problems like ten years ago are massive now
because of how big this is.
You know what I mean?
Like anything like that, it's just, it's just how it gets.
So, um, and it's just we, again, this is so big that I don't think anybody's
really ever seen something like this.
The only competitor, like you said, is like Linux.
So, and it's in a different industry entirely.
So, um.
Yeah.
Uh, I don't know if that answered anything, but that's,
that's, that's how it is.
I don't think he's bad.
It's just, it's, I'd have to continue to see what, what, what evolves.
But those are my thoughts right now.
Matt: Yeah.
Yeah.
Like I, I'm just not in the, in the camp of, um, Yeah.
You know, I, again, if I, if I reflect on why it's always been WordPress,
it's, it's for me, it's not because it's because I felt like I had a say in it.
I just knew that this was a piece of technology that I could
understand, look at, uh, unpack, break apart, and know what's happening,
regardless if I did anything with it.
I just want to know, like, how this thing operates.
Yes, it's under the GPL.
Yes, there's a community behind it.
There's all these, like, good things for it.
But I like the idea.
Of being able to see what this thing does, especially if it's gonna contain my
life's work, overemphasizing a little bit.
But if it's my blog post, my media, my comments, my forum, like this
is my thing and I'm gonna be able to move this thing around the web.
Don't like it over here, I can move it over there.
Wanna change the way it looks, I can change the way it looks.
Right.
And this is my thing that I kind of own.
Um, you know, so that's why it's, it's always been.
Important to me to, to support it.
Never felt like I was making an impact, you know, on the software until I got
my command K go to template parts button put in, I really felt like every time
I still use it every day, every day.
But when I'm in it, I'm like, I made this happen.
Um, or at least I was a small part of it.
And, um, you know, that, that is important, uh, too, but I mean, I just
like supporting it because I think it's, um, I think it's important.
I think where it.
Um, I think what we've seen now, at least in my head, and I've been
talking to a lot of other content management systems through CMS minute.
com, um, and talking to these guys running their, their particular CMS,
they have some open source components.
They have free versions of it, but at the end of the day, like they're
not free and GPL on except for ghost, um, where, although I don't know if
ghost is GPL, but it is open source.
Um, but some of them are like, look, we're, we're.
We love that idea.
We want to incorporate more, but we also need to survive and we need to make money.
Total.
Totally get it.
100 percent right there for you, man.
Like, totally makes sense.
Does that mean I would use, like, would I still choose your platform over WordPress?
Mm mm.
A little bit harder sell.
Um, but I think what all of this does is it starts to open
up the idea of alternatives.
And I said this before.
I said this on the, on the Fork WordPress with Kevin Geary.
If you give me a blogging platform that is like WordPress, but slimmed
down, ultra fast, open source, I think that's the play for anyone who's
thinking about forking WordPress.
Don't fork WordPress at its entirety and then go through the same challenges that
we've had for 20 years, which is like, how do you build a website with this thing?
Go back to the essence of it.
And build a project around blogging and putting words on the internet.
That, I'd instantly go, there's another one?
Okay.
I'll definitely play with this on my blogging sites and stuff like that.
Mark: Well, we don't, that's, that's a topic for another episode.
Cause, uh, we, uh, we, I definitely don't, I got some thoughts on
that, that we're not going to agree together there entirely.
But, the last thing I'll say here is, What, words on
Matt: the internet are still viable?
Is that what you're going to say?
Mark: They're definitely still viable, they're just not, They're, if they're
not, if they're not below other mediums, they're, it's, it, it's decreasing fast.
So that's my, that's my shorthand version of that.
But let me, let me, let me, one thing on this is, and this is maybe another topic
that kind of revolves around that, but this concept of, I, I don't have any data.
This is a hypothesis.
Just think about this.
It is my belief, my hypothesis, that.
The world, again, and the general average person, is not
like you just explained there.
Like, the archetype that you just painted yourself as, that wants
to know and values the open source aspect of things, that like cares
about all that, I think is shrinking.
I'm not saying it's a good thing, I just think it's happening.
And it's, it's purely, the assumption is purely based off of
all of the social media that has sprouted 10 years or so, right?
Where we're just handing our shit over, our data over, into a locked black box and
we, we are, like, it's a give and take.
Like, you can, there's people that are creating brands and actual, and
garnishing attention on these platforms.
But, at any time, they could pull the switch and it could be gone, right?
But the problem is, and this is again another topic for a different discussion,
is the level of distribution is like, the distribution part is so, you told me this,
like, I mean, I'm not telling you anything you don't know, but the distribution
is so valuable that people are willing to do that and take those risks.
And honestly, in some cases, I can't really fault them entirely for doing that.
I do think maybe you should still have your own open source platform.
Obviously, we're, you know, proof of that and everything.
But I'm just saying that, I worry, genuinely kind of worry, and maybe this
is the con, the concept, is that I'm literally being swayed in that direction
because I am starting to see all the perils of open source from WordPress
but also you can kind of like, you even just mentioned a little bit on
the other platforms they're not like full, uh, you know, everything's free,
everything's open because they understand that they still have to make money and
they have to protect some of their shit.
I Kind of also totally agree with that, that if I put my blood, sweat, and
tears into building something, I also want to kind of own it to a degree.
Maybe not everything, but like the main shit that's going to make me money.
That just doesn't sound like a good business decision to
give everything away for free.
So, I think people are seeing all of the things that have came before them, the
CMS stuff that's came before them, the open source pieces just in that realm.
And they're like, Hmm, maybe we're not going to do it just like that.
And I feel like over time, it's going to continue to go that route
where we just don't have, there will still be open source stuff,
but it's not going to be like the entirety of everything that you have.
And I don't even know, where's WordPress gonna go?
We talk about that all the time.
Is one version, is 7.
0 or whatever?
You're just gonna be like, oh, you know what?
Everything before, still open.
Moving forward, nah.
You know what I mean?
I don't know.
So