WordPress is essentially an internet infrastructure. It is widely used, generally stable and therefore does not generate many headlines.
But over the last week, the WordPress community has been embroiled in a dispute over the ethos of the platform. Last week, WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg lashed out at WP Engine, a major WordPress hosting provider, calling the company a “cancer” on the community. The statement has sparked public debate about how for-profit companies can use open source software and whether they are required to contribute to the projects they use in return.
Since then, the conflict has escalated with a barrage of legal threats, leaving numerous website operators caught in the crossfire of a conflict beyond their control. WP Engine customers were denied access to WordPress.org's servers, preventing them from easily updating or installing plugins and themes. And although they were granted a temporary reprieve, WP Engine now faces a deadline to resolve the conflict or their customers' access will collapse again.
WP Engine is a third-party hosting company that uses free, open-source WordPress software to create and sell its own pre-built WordPress hosting service. WP Engine was founded in 2010 and has grown into a competitor to WordPress.com. More than 200,000 websites use the service to strengthen their online presence.
“Silver Lake doesn’t give a damn about your open source ideals, it just wants return on investment.”
Mullenweg runs two different WordPresses. There's WordPress.org, the open source project that develops the backbone of the WordPress publishing platform, and then there's WordPress.com, a company that sells a hosted version of the open source WordPress software – just like WP Engine. Mullenweg runs Automattic, the owner of WordPress.com. Data suggests that around 43 percent of all websites use WordPress, but it is not clear how many are hosted by WordPress.com or another party.
In addition to selling plans on WordPress.com, Automattic contributes a large development effort to the open source project, whose operation itself relies on donations and community contributions. According to Mullenweg, the team works 3,988 hours per week. The company may not have to pay to use WordPress, but it is definitely worth developing and improving.
WP Engine works a little differently. The focus is on investing in the community through sponsorship and driving adoption of the platform. The hosting platform was acquired by private equity firm Silver Lake in 2018 and Mullenweg sees it as a company that profits from open source code without giving anything back.
This frustration reached its peak last week when Mullenweg took the stage at WordCamp – a WordPress conference sponsored by WP Engine – and took direct aim at WP Engine. “The company is controlled by Silver Lake, a private equity firm with $102 million in assets under management,” Mullenweg said. “Silver Lake doesn’t give a damn about your open source ideals – it just wants return on investment. At this point, I ask everyone in the WordPress community to vote with their wallets. Who will you give your money to: someone who will nourish the ecosystem or someone who will drain it of all value until it withers?”
Mullenweg followed up that statement with a September 21 blog post in which he criticized WP Engine for only contributing 40 hours per week to the open source WordPress.org project. “WP Engine sets a poor standard that others may look at and think it's okay to reproduce. We need to set a higher standard to ensure WordPress endures for the next 100 years,” Mullenweg wrote in the blog. He went even deeper into WP Engine, saying it's about “strip mining the WordPress ecosystem” and giving users a “worse experience so they can make more money.”
Mullenweg not only defends the open source ethos, but also his rival WordPress provider
Mullenweg seems to have a point about WP Engine's contributions. But WP Engine ultimately adheres to the rules of WordPress' open source license: it's generally free to use, but WP Engine is not have to give something back to the WordPress community just for relying on the open source code. Of course it would be nice if WP Engine did that, but nothing requires it to do that.
To make matters worse, Mullenweg not only defends the open source ethos, but also his rival WordPress provider. In his blog post, he claims that WP Engine “benefits from the confusion” caused by the company's branding. Mullenweg claims that WP Engine promises to make WordPress available to its customers, but that the company actually offers a distilled version of the service. He goes on to say that WP Engine needed a commercial license for “unauthorized” use of the WordPress brand, which is controlled by the WordPress Foundation and later sent a cease-and-desist letter to force the company to pay up.
WP Engine is not silent. A cease and desist letter was sent which tells a very different story about what was going on behind the scenes. In its letter, WP Engine claims that Automattic demanded a “very large sum of money” just days before Mullenweg's keynote at the WordCamp convention on September 20 – and if the company didn't receive it, Mullenweg allegedly threatened to take a “nuclear approach.” the scorched earth “to carry out” towards WP Engine.
WP Engine claims Mullenweg harassed the company through text messages and calls. A screenshot of the text reads: “If I want to explain to the WP community why we are banning WPE, I have to do that in my talk tomorrow.” In the texts, Mullenweg confirmed that he wrote them in an interview with the Twitch streamer ThePrimeagen said he had prepared several presentation slides for his WordCamp talk with the working title “How private equity can undermine and destroy open source communities, a story in four parts.” ”
After WP Engine refused to pay WordPress, the company accused Mullenweg of following through on his threats. “Mr. “Mullenweg's covert demand that WP Engine hand over tens of millions to his for-profit company Automattic, while publicly posing as an altruistic protector of the WordPress community, is a disgrace,” WP Engine's letter reads. “WP Engine will not give in to these unreasonable demands, which not only harm WP Engine and its employees, but also threaten the entire WordPress community.”
WordPress.org has now made it clear that it is taking action against WP Engine for not only failing to provide consideration for the WordPress project, but also for alleged misuse of the WordPress brand. Mullenweg now says that Automattic has given WP Engine two options to “pay its fair share”: either by paying a license fee or by contributing to the open source WordPress project. “This isn't a money grab: it's the expectation that any company that makes hundreds of millions of dollars from an open source project should give something back, and if they don't, they can't use its trademarks,” Mullenweg said .
The WordPress Foundation — the nonprofit that supports the open-source WordPress project — is led by Mullenweg and other lesser-known board members who are not listed on its website. It appears that the WordPress Foundation has made some changes to its brand guidelines in the last few days. As of September 19, the policy states that you are “free” to use the abbreviation WP in “any manner you see fit.” But now WordPress has deleted that language and replaced it with a line that says not to use WP “in a way that confuses people.” For example, many people think WP Engine is 'WordPress Engine.'” The updated policy also specifically states: “If you would like to use the WordPress brand commercially, please contact Automattic, they have the exclusive license.”
WordPress.org banned WP Engine from free access to its servers due to “legal claims and litigation” — a move that has made it harder for customers to use WP Engine. However, just two days later, Mullenweg decided to temporarily lift the ban. He gave WP Engine until October 1st to create its own mirror or resolve the conflict. “Why would WordPress.org WP Engine provide these services for free given their attacks on us?” Mullenweg wrote. WP Engine says it has only sent a cease and desist order to WordPress and has not yet filed a lawsuit.
When asked about the WP Engine ban, Automattic spokesperson Megan Fox said in a statement: The edge that “trademark violations have resulted in the company being banned from some WordPress resources,” WP Engine pointed out The edge about his statements about X when asked for comment.
The fight has provoked different reactions. On one side, people think WP Engine is in the wrong, while others say the company is in the wrong should contribute more to the open source project and that using “WP” is misleading. On the other hand, some WordPress community members are calling on Mullenweg to resign and accusing him of abusing his power over WordPress.org and WordPress.com. Others believe the situation could lead to a fork of WordPress and expressed concerns about whether WordPress will take action against other companies that use the abbreviation or trademark “WP.”
But in an argument meant to clarify what WordPress is and isn't, Mullenweg risks blurring the lines even further. Both WordPress.org and WordPress.com are right – but it looks very much like they're working together to get it done.