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Happy Friday! It's August 30 and we're covering a proposed marketing consortium, Automattic's epic Tumblr migration, WordPress' "outdated" philosophy , and much more.
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Note: The Repository is taking a three-week break (Das warme Wetter in Deutschland ruft!). We’ll be back on September 27.
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Three big headlines
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1. Is a marketing consortium the solution to WordPress's stagnating market share?
During this week's episode of WP Product Talk, Miriam Schwab, Head of WordPress Relations at Elementor, proposed forming a marketing consortium of major WordPress companies. The goal? To pool resources and develop a clear, sustained marketing strategy to compete with aggressive advertising campaigns from the likes of Wix and Squarespace.
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"Large companies that are highly dependent on WordPress... who need and want WordPress to continue growing and it's important to them, with this type of marketing consortium idea, everyone puts in some budget," said Schwab. "Yes, I know that's a crazy idea, but these companies tend to have pretty large marketing budgets anyway."
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Schwab’s proposal followed an analysis of CMS market share data. Emilia Capital's Joost de Valk shared findings from his latest analysis of HTTP Archive’s dataset, which shows WordPress at 35.26% market share, down by 0.28% month-over-month. Though the decline is within the margin of error, he said it raised concerns given WordPress’s growth trajectory in recent years.
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Noel Tock, co-founder of Human Made, also shared an analysis using BuiltWith data on the top 1 million sites. Tock said trends showed WordPress was increasingly being used on subdomains rather than main domains, raising questions about its positioning in enterprise markets. He noted that market share data was a "lagging indicator," capturing current usage but missing the broader trend of diminishing excitement around WordPress.
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Automattic Product Manager Rich Tabor, who also participated in the discussion, agreed that if WordPress could make its product more exciting and accessible, marketing efforts would have a greater impact. "We have a lot of capability; it's just not in a state where it's inspiring. A lot of the pieces have been built over the years, but they need refinement," he said.
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2. Automattic launches ambitious Tumblr migration to WordPress
How do you get maximum eyeballs on a job ad? In Automattic’s case, announce that you’re planning "one of the largest technical migrations in internet history."
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Reporter Sarah Perez also covered the story for TechCrunch, and Emma Roth wrote about it for The Verge.
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Announcing the move on Wednesday and calling for programmers to join the project, the company said since acquiring the microblogging site, it had focused on making it more efficient, growing its revenue, and improving the platform. Now, it’s moving Tumblr to WordPress.
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A migration has been on the cards since Automattic acquired Tumblr in 2019 and as the company points out, it won’t be easy. "We’re talking about one of the largest technical migrations in internet history. Some people think it’s impossible. But we say, 'challenge accepted'" the announcement boasts.
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On his blog, Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg likened the undertaking to Ernest Shackleton’s famous Antarctic expedition and the mythical job ad calling for men to join the hazardous journey for "honour and recognition in case of success."
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Responding on X, Stripe software engineer Anthony Morris said it was an, "Epic way to announce you're hiring!"
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Developer David Bell noted, "That should bring WP up to about 55% of the Interwebs!"
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"This is so exciting. I hope this means it becomes easier to create Tumblr themes in the future; especially, dare I say, if they’re just block themes…" posted Seth Rubenstein, Platform Lead Engineer at the Pew Research Centre.
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WP Engine’s Damon Cook added, "I wonder if there will be outcomes from this large migration that could overlap and help solve pieces of the Data Liberation project. 🤔"
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3. WordPress YouTubers challenge "outdated" philosophy
WordPress' philosophy has sparked debate among WordPress YouTubers, who argue that it’s outdated, misaligned with the current needs of its diverse users—in particular freelancers and agency users—and needs updating.
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The philosophy was a key focus of last week's Uniting WordPress YouTubers call, organized by Automattic-sponsored contributor Anne McCarthy, who invited long-time core committer Aaron Jorbin to share insights into WordPress' decision-making process. Jorbin discussed WordPress’ philosophy, which many on the call were not aware of, and highlighted core principles, including minimizing options and designing for non-technical end users rather than site builders.
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Kevin Geary, an entrepreneur and vocal WordPress critic, proposed updating the philosophy page, noting that its focus on publishing didn’t resonate with his audience, which he described as "zero bloggers." WPTuts' Paul Charlton also suggested polling WordPress users to understand how they actually use it.
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Long-time podcaster Matt Medeiros and YouTuber Mark Szymanski also weighed in on The WP Minute+ podcast. While Medeiros defended the philosophy as vital to WordPress' identity as a free and open-source publishing tool, Szymanski said he was "kind of shocked" that WordPress continued to maintain a blog-first philosophy despite its use by freelancers, agencies, and enterprise companies as a website-building platform.
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The call was the second since McCarthy launched their Uniting WordPress YouTubers initiative in June. The calls have stoked conversations among YouTubers, both good and critical.
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In other news
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WordPress project
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> Gutenberg 19.1 was released this week and includes a long-awaited plugin template registration API and changes to image caption styles (Make WordPress Core)
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> Anne McCarthy is calling on folks to help test the Block Bindings API. The Automattic-sponsored contributor said work was underway to create a UI for the feature for the upcoming WordPress 6.7 release (nomad.blog)
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> The WordPress Design Team is refreshing the Five for the Future section of WordPress.org to sync the design with other sections of the site that have been updated in recent months (Make WordPress Design)
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> The WordPress Community Team is retiring its use of Automattic-owned CrowdSignal in favor of Jotform to address the need for a multilingual solution (WP Tavern)
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> The WordPress Training Team has put a call out for ideas to help draw new learners to Learn WordPress. Automattic-sponsored contributor Kathryn Presner says potential activities include marketing initiatives, increasing the training team's presence at WordCamps, and creating promotional materials (Make WordPress Training)
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> The WordPress Training team is also still seeking contributors to help create content for a new intermediate plugin developer course (Make WordPress Training)
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> WordPress Themes Team rep Ganga Kafle is calling folks to learn block themes development. "With the use of Create Block theme plugin, it is super easy," he says. There are currently 904 block themes in the WordPress.org theme directory (Make WordPress Themes)
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> The WordPress Core team has flagged shipping jQuery 4.0 with WordPress 6.8 next year. A second beta of jQuery 4.0.0 was released in July and a release candidater is expected "soon" (Make WordPress Core | jQuery)
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WordPress community
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> The WP Minute’s Matt Medeiros hosted a live "watch party" yesterday featuring marketer Marc Benzakein giving commentary over the top of a video of his recent WordCamp Canada talk, "The Problems with WordPress." Benzakein’s talk highlighted several challenges the open source project is facing, including concerns about leadership, community dynamics, software usability, branding, and competition in the WordPress ecosystem (YouTube)
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> Should WordCamp Asia features more Asian speakers? Only 27% of speakers at WordCamp Asia 2024 were Asian, according to marketer Lawrence Ladomery, who notes the WordCamp Organizer Handbook suggests 80% local speakers and 20% out-of-town speakers. "WordCamp Asia is an opportunity to celebrate the region as much as the platform, and the usual suspects that are often in the limelight," writes Ladomery. In March, WordCamp Asia 2024 organizer Jon Ang told The Repository he wanted Asian people to "see and connect with the best WordPress people in the world," adding, "Not everyone has money to fly to WordCamp US or WordCamp Europe." (WP BizDev | The Repository)
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> Could the sale of premium plugins in the WordPress.org repository provide funding for marketing WordPress? Equalize Digital’s Amber Hinds proposed the idea on this week’s episode of WP Product Talk. On X, Barn2 founder and CEO Katie Keith highlighted that "WooCommerce is open source and has a marketplace…" (X)
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Business, enterprise & acquisitions
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> The Onion is now powered by WordPress. Announcing the news, the satirical publication noted that the U.S. populace was "deeply wary of a suddenly usable website" that "seemingly overnight had become simple to navigate, aesthetically pleasing, and unburdened by unhinged, shitty ads." Nick Gernert, CEO of WordPress VIP, also shared the news on LinkedIn, noting that "America’s finest news source" is now powered by the Automattic-owned enterpise company (The Onion | LinkedIn)
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Plugins, products & themes
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> WP Engine and The Webby Awards have been delving into the how-they-did-it stories behind select Webby-recognized websites built with WordPress as part of their fifth annual Crafted with Code series. This year’s projects include Clooney Foundation for Justice by Redback Solutions, LUMA Vision by WONDR, and Harvard Law Review by 10UP (WP Engine)
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> Gravatar is continuing to evolve its link in bio features with the latest version introducing header images, the ability to reorder sections, and mobile wallet cards for both iOS and Android (Gravatar)
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> WooCommerce 9.3 Beta was released this week ahead of the official release on September 10. The next major version will bring remote error logging, improved wp-admin stability, a significant reduction in WooCommerce's file size, coming soon mode optimizations, shortcode checkout accessibility improvements, and product meta checkboxes accessibility improvements (WooCommerce)
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> WooCommerce engineers are seeking feedback on a hack project they're calling Woo Blueprint that provides a tool for exporting and importing WooCommerce settings (GitHub)
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> Review Signal’s Kevin Ohashi has launched Orderly Ape, an open source load testing project that allows users to run distributed load tests using k6 on their own infrastructure—and he’s looking for sponsors (WordPress Hosting Performance Benchmarks)
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Security
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> The team behind popular multilingual plugin WPML has patched a Remote Code Execution vulnerability that security researchers have classified as "critical," with a CVSS score of 9.9.
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Users are being used to update their sites to the patched version, WPML 4.6.13 (WP Tavern)
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> Kathy Zant, a former security analyst, and Nathan Ingram, a long-time business coach and trainer, have launched MonsterSecure, a user-friendly, expert-led security course for agencies to teach clients about their site’s security (Post Status Happiness Hour)
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> Kinsta has attained ISO 27001 certification. Erik Van Dijk, Kinsta's Head of IT, led the certification effort and says the framework is "gold standard" in security compliance (Kinsta)
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Conferences & events
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> Tickets are still available for WordCamp US in Portland, Oregan, from September 17-20 (WordCamp US)
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> Tickets are available for this year’s WordPress Accessibility Day on October 9-10. Organizers Danielle Zarcaro and Isla Waite joined this week’s Post Status Happiness Hour to talk about the event (WordPress Accessibility Day | Post Status)
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> KadenceWP is seeking speakers for its Kadence Amplify virtual event on October 25 (KadenceWP)
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> WordCamp Asia 2025 has open calls for volunteers, speakers, emcees and sponsors. The event will be held in Manila, Philippines from February 20-22 (WordCamp Asia)
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> Applications to join the WordCamp Europe 2025 organizing team close on 31 August. The event will be held in Basel, Switzerland, from 5-7 June (WP Tavern)
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> WP Campus Connect is seeking partner institutions to join a month-long initiative designed to introduce students to WordPress. Organizer Anand Upadhyay says students will learn how to build websites and discover career oportunities within the WordPress ecosystem (WP Campus Connect)
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A successful website needs work. The new plugin Progress Planner will help you to get the work done. It provides the tools and motivation you need to keep your site in top shape!
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Help diverse voices in WordPress be heard! Support Inclusion in Tech removes barriers for speakers at WordCamps. Donate and empower SiNC.
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Got a something to promote? Our classifieds are seen by the most influential people in WordPress each week.
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Meanwhile...
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🎵 Business coach Lee Blue’s earworm "WordPress is still for me" (YouTube)
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🤝🏼 Developer and writer Eric Karkovack on establishing user trust in products (The WP Minute)
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🎉 Developer and author Jeff Starr is celebrating his site's 20th birthday (Perishable Press)
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🗣 Open web advocate Matthias Pfefferle on making commenting cool again with ActivityPub for WordPress (WordPress.com)
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🚀 Malcolm Peralty on working at Acquia, the "mothership" of Drupal (Do the Woo)
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💰 Marc Benzakein recounts a harrowing story involving a hacker's demand for $40,000 (WP Builds)
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🎸 Nyasha Green on her academic journey, ancestry, and repertoire of instruments (Seriously, BUD?)
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🦸🏼♂️ Developer Chris Ferdinandi on how ADHD has shaped his career and life (WP Tavern Jukebox)
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The Repository is a weekly email for the WordPress community by Rae Morey. Mike Johnston is our proofreader. A big thank you to Kinsta, our hosting sponsor, and MailPoet, our email sponsor.
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Send your feedback to [email protected] and help us provide high-quality news written entirely by humans that matters to the WordPress community.
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