What Happened Between Automattic and WP Engine?
WP Engine and Matt Mullenweg, CEO of Automattic and co-founder of the WordPress Foundation, have had a private disagreement going on for a while, it seems. In his presentation during the 2024 WordCamp US in September, Matt made this disagreement public, calling WP Engine a “cancer” to WordPress.
It appears that Matt Mullenweg was requiring WP Engine to pay 8% of their WordPress income back into WordPress (like the Five for the Future campaign https://wordpress.org/five-for-the-future/), or he would force them to pay to use the WordPress trademark.
The basis for this demand is that Automattic contributes more than 3,700 hours of code contributions per week, while WP Engine contributes a little over 40 hours a week. Nothing like this demand has ever been seen before with WordPress.
Technically Matt Mullenweg has the authority to demand WP Engine cease and desist using the WordPress brand name, but WordPress thrives off of the diverse ecosystem of business that surround it, or at least it did.
As it turns out, this was just the start of a war.
After announcing the refusal of WP Engine to put money back into WordPress, Matt blocked WP Engine from logging into the WordPress.org website. WP Engine isn’t able to update their plugins in the WordPress plugin directory, and WP Engine customers have been blocked from downloading or updating any plugins from the WordPress directory. (Although they still have the option to manually download and upload updates to their websites.)
Recently, Automattic replaced the Advanced Custom Fields plugin in the WordPress repository with their own fork. This fork uses the same slug as ACF did, so all reviews of ACF have been acquired by the fork. In addition, anyone using the free ACF plugin from the WordPress repository will have their plugin switched to this fork without any notice outside of the change log.
In the end, no matter who gets the popular vote in this Automattic vs WPEngine war, the WordPress community is now severely divided. So what happens now?
WordPress is Divided
It’s never good when a community of open source software users are divided over something that is so corrosive. In addition, there is bound to be concern over if Matt, Automattic, or the WordPress Foundation, will do something like this again to other companies that are using the WordPress trademark.
At this point, even if Automattic and WP Engine were somehow able to come to terms and stop the hostility, the damage is done. Morale has dropped, and it will be a while before all of this is just WordPress history.
Is WordPress Dead?
The question now on my mind is, “Will WordPress survive?” I think WordPress will, and here’s why.
WordPress is Used on Too Many Websites to be Abandoned
WordPress is used in over half of the websites on the internet. According to W3Techs.com, WordPress is used by 43.5% of all websites on the internet. That’s a lot, considering all the millions of websites out there!
If WordPress were to be completely replaced, that would mean approximately 650 million websites would need to be redone. If only half of all WordPress websites were to switch over to another CMS, approximately 320 million websites would need to be recreated.
Somehow I don’t think that’s going to happen anytime soon.
WordPress is One of a Few Highly Modular CMS’s
Most CMS’s, or website builders, as they’re also called, are not very customizable.
- WordPress – Over 60,000 plugins in the official plugin directory. WordPress is home to more than a handful of different page builder plugins, and has plugins offering security, SEO, email marketing, ecommerce, and beyond. WordPress is used in small and large websites alike.
- Drupal – More than 50,000 modules. Drupal is highly customizable, but overly complicated to design a website on, as the majority of websites that seek to introduce Drupal actually confess. Drupal is designed more for corporations than small businesses.
- Wix – More than 500 apps. Wix is easy to design a website on out of the box, and comes with a decent amount of apps for various uses, but it is more restrictive than some of the open source alternatives. Wix is focused on serving small businesses over large corporations, so some companies may outgrow their services.
- Joomla – Almost 500 extensions in the official Joomla directory. Joomla is somewhat customizable, but most users will admit they end up paying a developer to make the customized content they’re missing.
WordPress has the most flexibility over all other CMS’s on the web. I highly doubt the internet can afford to let it disappear.
Millions of Businesses are Making Money with WordPress
Of the 60,000 plus plugins available for WordPress, the majority of them either have a higher-tiered paid version, or a way to donate to the developer. With so much money invested in WordPress, it would be very unlikely that these businesses would want to just walk away.
You Can Fork Open Source Software, but You Don’t Want to
When you fork software (copy it), you just pull people away from the original. Most people who are interested in the fork would also have been interested in the original to some degree. Forked software dilutes the user base.
- ClassicPress is a fork of WordPress that removed the Gutenberg page editor from WordPress. Unfortunately it is pretty lacking in available plugins that work with it.
- FreeWP is a newly announced fork of WordPress. It is not yet obvious what exactly it will become.
So What Happens Now?
Here are my predictions about the fallout.
- Other CMS’s/website builders will continue to grow in popularity, partially as a byproduct of WordPress losing ground on the internet.
- Automattic will become more powerful in the WordPress ecosystem, and the community won’t like it.
- Ultimately Matt will admit he moved too hard, too fast against WP Engine’s lack of giving back.
- The WordPress community might Aspire(Press) to be better.
Will AspirePress Inspire the WordPress Community to be Independent from Automattic?
AspirePress might be the best thing that could come out of this mess. Let me explain. AspirePress isn’t a fork of WordPress, it’s a fork of the WordPress plugin and theme repository.
“The first goal of the [AspirePress] project is to offer a viable solution to the centralized control of the .org website.”
AspirePress
AspirePress wants to democratize and federate WordPress’ plugin and theme repository, so that not only can they host a repository, but you can too! So you won’t need to worry if Matt decides your favorite plugin doesn’t deserve to be in his repository anymore.
You might think AspirePress sounds dandy, but you wonder if it’s possible for a community of individuals and businesses to come together to host a repository for the greater good. Let me tell you, it is possible! Ever heard of Debian?
Ready to start using AspirePress? The directory isn’t ready yet, but hopefully will be soon! Check out their plugin for updates!
Want to get involved? Check out their GitHub repo!
And lastly, don’t forget that WordPress still needs your contributions too!
