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Joost de Valk and Marieke van de Rakt Announce Nonprofit Plans After Acquiring Post Status

The acquisition includes the Post Status brand, website, Slack account, and other related assets, which have been transferred to a new nonprofit foundation in the Netherlands.

Post Status is set to become a Dutch nonprofit, with Yoast founders Joost de Valk and Marieke van de Rakt announcing today that they’ve acquired the popular business community for WordPress professionals.

Founded in 2013 by Brian Krogsgard, Post Status has evolved from a link-sharing blog to an active community with over 1,700 members in Slack, a weekly newsletter, and a job board. It’s become known as a place where executives and developers who work in the WordPress ecosystem mix, and where partnerships and business deals happen in private messages.

Announcing the news on the Post Status blog, de Valk said he and van de Rakt had bought out Cory and Lindsey Miller’s share of the U.S.-based LLC for an undisclosed amount. The acquisition includes the Post Status brand, website, Slack account, and other related assets, which have been transferred to a new nonprofit foundation in the Netherlands.

“Over the past few months, it’s become very clear that Post Status is an enormously important place for the community to come together and discuss all things WordPress,” de Valk said. “A place with light moderation, but also with true freedom of speech and the freedom to have different opinions. We want to enshrine those freedoms even more.”

de Valk and van de Rakt joined Post Status as equity partners in August 2023 through their investment firm, Emilia Capital. de Valk told The Repository that the acquisition was less about taking over and more about securing Post Status’s future as a nonprofit.

“We didn’t necessarily decide to buy; we decided it needed to become a nonprofit, and buying out Cory and Lindsey [Miller] was a logical result,” de Valk said. 

“It’s honestly not a money-making machine, and trying harder to make it that would hurt the community, which we think needs this safe place to have discussions.

de Valk emphasized the importance of transitioning the Post Status into a Dutch nonprofit foundation, citing the country’s robust privacy protections and the legal system’s familiarity.

“Post Status is the virtual water cooler for all of those who work in/with WordPress professionally, but also the bazaar, the place where contacts are being made and deals are started. It’s a safe space to discuss all things WordPress, and most of all, a good bunch of people,” de Valk told The Repository.

de Valk has invited business consultant Juliette Reinders Folmer, known for her role as a maintainer of WordPress Coding Standards (WordPress CS), and Karim Marucchi, CEO of Crowd Favorite, to join him as founding members of Post Status’s new board. Reinders Folmer and Marucchi won’t be paid for their involvement.

In Post Status Slack, de Valk said a new reduced membership fee of $50 would be introduced, alongside ongoing efforts to attract sponsors to cover operational costs and reinstate a paid Slack account. He noted that Slack offered an 85% discount to nonprofits.

de Valk and van de Rakt are well-known in the WordPress community as the founders of SEO company Yoast. In 2021, they sold Yoast to Newfold Digital. In 2023, the couple left Newfold Digital to focus on investing in open source, sustainable and female-led companies via Emilia Capital. 

More recently, de Valk made headlines for calling for an end to Matt Mullenweg’s reign as WordPress’s BDFL (benevolent dictator for life) leader. Mullenweg was an active Post Status member until December when he “rage quit” in Slack following WP Engine’s successful preliminary injunction motion, as reported by 404 Media.

Cory Miller, who joined Krogsard as an equal partner in Post Status before taking over sole ownership with his wife Lindsey in 2021, thanked de Valk and van de Rakt. He also thanked Michelle Frechette, who will continue as Post Status’s Executive Director.

“Thank you for taking this monumental step and investment in this community … and honestly, taking Post Status to where it was always meant to be,” Miller wrote in Slack. 

He urged companies in the WordPress ecosystem to step up as sponsors: “Post Status has always served a vital function for us, for your work, and for WordPress … But you have to support them—they can’t do it by themselves.”

Looking ahead, de Valk said there were no significant plans for change.

“I want to make sure that we deliver value to our members mostly by giving them ways to interact with and find each other,” he said. “We want to inform them through our newsletters and podcasts about what happens on the business side of WordPress, and help make the entire community thrive. That’s a lot of words for: we’re not going to change all that much in the near future.”

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