What is the WordPress drama about?

I figured a few of us might need the WordPress drama explained like we are 5. So, here you go.

  • WordPress is the GOAT of internet website builders
  • WordPress was founded by Matt Mullenweg
  • With much of the internet running on WordPress … hosting WordPress is of course … lucrative and a big business.
  • The founder of WordPress, Matt Mullenweg, is CEO of a company called Automattic
  • WPEngine is the other big gorilla in the WordPress space.
    • hosting platform etc.
  • There is a lot of money involved
  • Mullenweg was/is unhappy with WPEngine
    • went after WPEngine for being Equity Firm owned, and doing things with WordPress features to “save money,” as well as confusing consumers about the WordPress Trademark based on what is official and what isn’t.
  • The fight turned very public, and now lawsuits are flying back and forth
  • The fight is also spilling over into the open-source community, as there are myriad of developers and businesses who’ve built their companies and businesses around WordPress.

It reminds me of the Rust trademark hoopla. The who thing has quickly devolved into what is supposed to be “open-source” software being controlled by money hungry interests who lay claim to trademarks and other “stuff” surrounding brands, who then start telling tons of developers and companies (who’ve been happily doing things for years) that they are now all subject to x, y, z and we will sue you and destroy if you don’t.

People take sides, and the open-source world and all the “things” attached to the “thing” in question descend into chaos.