News WP Engine is banned from WordPress.org - GoFuckYourself.com

Killswitch · Yesterday, 06:32 PM

Who'd have thought that what would kill WordPress wasn't all the "I'm gonna rebuild it in a modern codebase" people, but the leaders of the community themselves.

Quote:

Any WP Engine customers having trouble with their sites should contact WP Engine support and ask them to fix it.

I won’t bore you with the story of how WP Engine broke thousands of customer sites yesterday in their haphazard attempt to block our attempts to inform the wider WordPress community regarding their disabling and locking down a WordPress core feature in order to extract profit.

What I will tell you is that, pending their legal claims and litigation against WordPress.org, WP Engine no longer has free access to WordPress.org’s resources.

WP Engine wants to control your WordPress experience, they need to run their own user login system, update servers, plugin directory, theme directory, pattern directory, block directory, translations, photo directory, job board, meetups, conferences, bug tracker, forums, Slack, Ping-o-matic, and showcase. Their servers can no longer access our servers for free.

The reason WordPress sites don’t get hacked as much anymore is we work with hosts to block vulnerabilities at the network layer, WP Engine will need to replicate that security research on their own.

Why should WordPress.org provide these services to WP Engine for free, given their attacks on us?

WP Engine is free to offer their hacked up, bastardized simulacra of WordPress’s GPL code to their customers, and they can experience WordPress as WP Engine envisions it, with them getting all of the profits and providing all of the services.

If you want to experience WordPress, use any other host in the world besides WP Engine. WP Engine is not WordPress.

https://wordpress.org/news/2024/09/wp-engine-banned/

King Mark · Today, 01:55 AM

Brass, you can pm me if you need to talk about it bro. I'm here for you ��

Publisher Bucks · Today, 03:56 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by King Mark

Brass, you can pm me if you need to talk about it bro. I'm here for you ��

cerulean · Today, 07:59 AM

Quote:

What I will tell you is that, pending their legal claims and litigation against WordPress.org, WP Engine no longer has free access to WordPress.org’s resources.

This is really the crux of the issue, I think. I'm not a lawyer. WordPress foundation believes that WP Engine is abusing their trademark, and looking at WP Engine, they really do make it seem like they are WordPress, or at least are the best implementation of WordPress. And they've made a fortune out of it. So, of course, I'm sure WordPress' lawyer greenlit them in saying: "you can't use the tools we provide to access our labor, for free, if we're actively in a legal battle." I don't think anyone would think that's strange. They can still download WordPress, and use it under GPL, but they can't use WordPress.org's repository and servers.

This is a very interesting and complicated situation, though, because it's all about open source software. On the one hand, WordPress is OSS, but the licensing for GPL has implemented some rules and restrictions for WordPress which I think most people ignore completely. Are derivative works like WP Engine forced to comply with GPL? And, does the GPL license allow unfettered access to WordPress' servers in addition to their code repository? Trademarks, on the other hand, are a different best entirely, and I'm sure there's going to be a good argument about what is considered fair use.

Can I call myself a "WordPress developer", but I can't call myself a "developer for WordPress", because I don't actively develop WordPress?

Does this have an even bigger implication with software development on the Web? Right now, if I couldn't use OSS through Packagist or NPM to build software for my clients, and I had to recreate everything from scratch, it would not only greatly extend the development timeline, but it would cost a fortune.

From their license page:

Quote:

There is some legal grey area regarding what is considered a derivative work, but we feel strongly that plugins and themes are derivative work and thus inherit the GPL license.

From Matt directly:

Quote:

WP Engine wants to control your WordPress experience, they need to run their own user login system, update servers, plugin directory, theme directory, pattern directory, block directory, translations, photo directory, job board, meetups, conferences, bug tracker, forums, Slack, Ping-o-matic, and showcase. Their servers can no longer access our servers for free.

This is ultimately going to be the legal test, and I'm somewhat surprised it has taken this long for OSS to be challenged around WordPress. WP Engine basically takes WordPress, heavily manipulates it, possibly makes it less secure, and then sells that AND the hosting. If they just sold WordPress hosting, like Vacares, or MojoHost do, then that would be totally different. WP Engine is completely dependent on WordPress, their contributions to WordPress are poor, and they are actively biting the hand that feeds.

I personally don't like the way it calls into question whether I can use the term WordPress when I advertise my services, but I also don't think WP Engine are the good guys here, and I think they're going to ultimately lose this battle.

Killswitch · Today, 08:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by King Mark

Brass, you can pm me if you need to talk about it bro. I'm here for you ��

Nah I'm good, I've been shitposting and trolling Matt Mullenweg on X (formerly Twitter) almost a whole week about it.

https://x.com/joshmanders/status/1839101211091296722

https://x.com/joshmanders/status/1839136514652954630

https://x.com/joshmanders/status/1839146103448514730

https://x.com/joshmanders/status/1839135223541309910

Ironhorse · Today, 08:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cerulean

..

FYI the portfolio page in your sig is verbroken for me https://www.ceruleansoftware.net/portfolio/

Killswitch · Today, 08:18 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by cerulean

This is really the crux of the issue, I think. I'm not a lawyer. WordPress foundation believes that WP Engine is abusing their trademark, and looking at WP Engine, they really do make it seem like they are WordPress, or at least are the best implementation of WordPress. And they've made a fortune out of it. So, of course, I'm sure WordPress' lawyer greenlit them in saying: "you can't use the tools we provide to access our labor, for free, if we're actively in a legal battle." I don't think anyone would think that's strange. They can still download WordPress, and use it under GPL, but they can't use WordPress.org's repository and servers.

This is a very interesting and complicated situation, though, because it's all about open source software. On the one hand, WordPress is OSS, but the licensing for GPL has implemented some rules and restrictions for WordPress which I think most people ignore completely. Are derivative works like WP Engine forced to comply with GPL? And, does the GPL license allow unfettered access to WordPress' servers in addition to their code repository? Trademarks, on the other hand, are a different best entirely, and I'm sure there's going to be a good argument about what is considered fair use.

Can I call myself a "WordPress developer", but I can't call myself a "developer for WordPress", because I don't actively develop WordPress?

Does this have an even bigger implication with software development on the Web? Right now, if I couldn't use OSS through Packagist or NPM to build software for my clients, and I had to recreate everything from scratch, it would not only greatly extend the development timeline, but it would cost a fortune.

From their license page:

From Matt directly:

This is ultimately going to be the legal test, and I'm somewhat surprised it has taken this long for OSS to be challenged around WordPress. WP Engine basically takes WordPress, heavily manipulates it, possibly makes it less secure, and then sells that AND the hosting. If they just sold WordPress hosting, like Vacares, or MojoHost do, then that would be totally different. WP Engine is completely dependent on WordPress, their contributions to WordPress are poor, and they are actively biting the hand that feeds.

I personally don't like the way it calls into question whether I can use the term WordPress when I advertise my services, but I also don't think WP Engine are the good guys here, and I think they're going to ultimately lose this battle.

Just so you know, Automattic invested in WPEngine's Series A round. They blessed all of this over a decade ago.

The problem now is that WPE is doing better than Wordpress.com and Mullenweg wants to extort them and is willing to burn the whole community down for 8% of WPE's revenue (which is literally in the millions) ANNUALLY.

fris · Today, 11:57 AM

they want to make certain words trademarked, so you need permission to use them even for plugins.

‘Managed WordPress’ & ‘Hosted WordPress’

Killswitch · Today, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fris

they want to make certain words trademarked, so you need permission to use them even for plugins.

‘Managed WordPress’ & ‘Hosted WordPress’

He's crashing spectacularly. https://x.com/joshmanders/status/1839399277384323345

Today, 01:55 AM	#2
King Mark Masterbaiter Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2016 Posts: 26,611	Brass, you can pm me if you need to talk about it bro. I'm here for you �� __________________ Unlock the limitless potential of AI

Today, 11:57 AM	#8
fris Too lazy to set a custom title Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2002 Posts: 54,765	they want to make certain words trademarked, so you need permission to use them even for plugins. ‘Managed WordPress’ & ‘Hosted WordPress’ __________________ Since 1999: 69 Adult Industry awards for Best Hosting Company and professional excellence. WP Tube Themes