My post today isn’t about my involvement with WordPress though. Instead it is about WordPress itself, and the unfortunate state of the WordPress community today. It isn’t the WordPress community of a few years ago. Things are a mess, and I feel like I need to stand up, one more time, and go over my thoughts on the current state of the WordPress project.

What Made WordPress Great

The things that made WordPress great included its community, the open source ideal, the low barrier for entry, its simplicity, and the excitement of something new. WordPress and its community, back around the time of version 1.5, was energetic. Many people felt like the decisions they were making were helping build a great product, one that would be used by millions of people. Even those that only contributed a theme could eventually find themselves famous within that community. A great example of this, in my mind, is Michael Heilemann.

Many of you might not know this, but the default theme for WordPress was designed, developed, and released by Michael. He spent a great deal of time on the theme, and was honoured to have it become a staple part of WordPress. Everyone thanked him, and nearly every community member, at that time, knew who he was, and where to find his blog Binary Bonsai. Then, as things continued to move forward, everyone forgot about his contribution, and as WordPress aged, people got bored of the default theme. Today, I would hazard a bet that less than five percent of those using WordPress know of Michael Heilemann, and so, it is of no surprise to me that his blog now runs on Habari rather than WordPress.

Automattic: Good and Bad

Back when WordPress was a young project, the idea of creating a corporation around it probably seemed ridiculous to many community members, especially since it was open source, but Automattic came to existence without asking the community if it was a smart idea, or even needed, and it became the controlling power behind WordPress and all related brands.

Then in January 2008, it received Venture Capital funding, and not just a few thousand, or a few hundred thousand, but instead twenty-nine point five million dollars (via GigaOm). Surely, they spread this money around to everyone that has contributed to WordPress, right? Nope, they used the funds to purchase web applications, hire staff, and build out WordPress.com.

Automattic as a company isn’t bad, evil or negative, but they have positioned themselves, especially one of their employees, as gatekeepers over WordPress, and as an open source, community project, I don’t feel that it is entirely right. All corporations, no matter how good their public relations, are focused on one thing: increasing profit.

Do you think that the poking and prodding that Automattic does regarding WordPress, WordPress.com, Akismet, BuddyPress, and the half a dozen other projects they manager, are solely for our benefit? I am not against a company making money, but I think far too many people have an idealized version of Automattic and its pursuits. I’ve found people treating the company as though it were Apple or Linux in such that they feel that the company or idea can do no wrong.

When was the last time that Automattic worked to bring a new project to the foreground, and I don’t mean one that they acquired? They are a business and should be treated as such by the community. I’d hate to see WordPress split in many directions like Linux is today, but we’ve all witnessed what happens in the Linux world when a company decides that their corporate version is the best. I mean, when was the last time anyone installed Red Hat Linux on their desktop? Oh right, the free version doesn’t really exist anymore, and Red Hat Enterprise Desktop is around $80 (Yes, I know about Fedora), and that’s just one of many examples of the commercialization of an open source project.

Think that WordPress will never go commercial, then take a look at WordPress.com. Domain mapping is $10 per year, custom CSS is $15 per year, no ads is $30 per year, and access to VideoPress video hosting is $60 per year, and that isn’t all of the potential upgrades you can purchase.

Matt Mullenweg: Smart Business Person

Matt Mullenweg is probably the smartest person I’ve ever met. His ability to manage his brand image is almost supernatural. Fighting against any ideal he comes up for the WordPress community seems to be like fighting mother nature herself. Matt has made himself the word of God when it comes to WordPress, and millions of people follow that blindly.

When WordCamps started, I wondered how long it would take before the Church of WordPress was created. Matt traveled the world like a holy crusader, talking to his flock about the good that was WordPress. He was their Messiah, and saved them from the horrible web publishing systems of the past.

He isn’t infallible though and has made mistakes. The issue today is that most of the major mistakes he has made either happened before mass adoption of WordPress (Pre-2.0) or have been relatively unknown as they’ve happened behind closed doors, or outcries have only existed on smaller blogs.

Say anything wrong about Matt Mullenweg, and the hordes of his followers would descend upon you taking you to task. Say anything negative about a choice he has made, and you’ll find millions defending that choice, even if they themselves don’t fully understand it.

Back in 2005, Matt added thousands of pages to WordPress.org for the express purpose of using its immensely high Google PageRank to earn money. (Source – Waxy.org)

One great question from that post that really struck me was:

First, do organizers of open-source projects need to disclose how they’re making money off the project? Matt isn’t disclosing anything about this activity to the community. I don’t think anyone would be upset about Matt trying to support Wordpress with outside sources of revenue, but as an open-source project, they should be held to a higher level of transparency. Without the users and developers all working for free, it wouldn’t exist.

Sure, he has apologized for this since then, and swept it under the rug. It has been a long time, but he continues to make project-threatening mistakes which could easily be managed through a small council of source code submitters looking over decisions that could effect the project, the brand, and its future.

Don’t get me wrong. I’ve met Matt on a few occasions, and seen him speak. I think he’s a smart guy, and a savvy business person, but the “nice guy” persona that he puts out there doesn’t seem to be quite the same as the person behind the scenes, away from the microphone.

Drinking the WordPress Kool-Aid

So many people are fooled into believing that WordPress is the best blogging platform of our time, but to me, that is like saying Microsoft Windows is the best operating system of our time. While most fans of WordPress will probably fight me on the comparison, I think the similarities are too many to ignore. We have a company that works back room deals in order to get big players on board, makes a fair bit of money through its self-serving attitude, brands itself as something that it isn’t, and is run by a single voice that feels somewhat like a dictatorship. Just because it is everywhere, and there are lots of additions that make it more useful, that doesn’t make it the best.

Matt Mullenweg was great for the project back when it started. He helped it gets its footing, and took care of the project. He was able to quickly navigate the business world so that WordPress could grow into the massive project that it is today, but I think it is time for him to step back and allow those with the community focused ideal that he once held to take over so that he can focus on building his company, and maybe join back in on the community aspect that he seems to enjoy so much.

His single minded approach of what is good for the community is only going to be its downfall. He needs to let go and let the community vote for what it wants. If any portion, no matter how small, wants to purchase themes, plugins and whatever else, then Matt should have no bearing on their decision. His job should be to inform them of their options, market WordPress to the world and contribute code to the project.

Should that code usurp work that premium theme and plugin developers have created, then that’s within his right, but he shouldn’t have any bearing on those third party projects through manipulating the community to see the additions as a negative thing, removing them from the community focal points, downplaying their work, or directly fighting against them in back rooms.

The WordPress community, if it is going to survive, has to evolve, change and meet the needs of everyone, not just those that believe they have the right to vote on behalf of everyone, and especially not by those that want to uphold an ideal.

GPL: It’s the Law

One of the biggest issues in the community right now is GPL. It creates a divide that shouldn’t exist. The idea of GPL is to promote community, and I had hope that it was why Matt stuck to his guns when defending GPL, but unfortunately, GPL does not a community make. If the idea was to promote open source, and give back to the community, then why wouldn’t Automattic release the source code behind Akismet, or the code behind other online services they’ve acquired?

In December 2008, over 200 WordPress themes were pulled from the Theme Repository because they didn’t fit either GPL licensing, or the spirit of GPL licensing. The second half of that sentence is the giant power hammer that Matt Mullenweg and Automattic have over the community. Some themes that were pulled complied with GPL but the creators used the themes to promote non-GPL compliant themes on their own sites. The fact that the themes on the repository had no real bearing on Matt’s decision to have them removed because there was potential to lead people astray from his GPL ideal.

It is assumed that becoming GPL gets you in good graces with Automattic, and after they put up a page for Premium WordPress themes on their site, everyone applauded their decision. Matt had been against Premium themes for a long time, but quickly his tune changed as nearly every developer announced their GPL compliance.

Earlier this year, some Premium WordPress plugins started looking at how they could feel the love from the WordPress community, specifically Automattic, in hopes of having their own page on the illustrious community site, but while Matt changed his tune regarding themes, he was quick to stand fast against any paid plugins for WordPress. His worry that the extendability of his beloved software would become commercialized lead him to publicly state his dislike of such developments.

Plugin developers went on the offensive and made their new additions GPL compliant in hopes of pleasing Matt, but even their hard work to follow his rules left them feeling the cold shoulder.

It isn’t GPL that has become law in the world of WordPress, but instead the ideal of GPL. The “spirit” that things should be given away for free if they are a product, and businesses should be built around service. This “spirit” protects Automattic from having to give away any of their prized jewels, and allows them to charge as they see fit. It allows them to hide behind a shield as they work against companies that seek only to provide powerful additions to the WordPress community. Additions that require one hundred times the effort of earlier plugins, themes and extensions on the WordPress platform.

Conclusion

WordPress and its community has matured. The ideals of Matt Mullenweg and Automattic are becoming a limitation and a hindrance. While they are still great at spinning positive press, and continuing to appease the masses, they’ve lost the spirit of WordPress somewhere along the way, and it is my hope that someone out there will take blogging to the next level through true community building, and the ability to keep an open mind as things change.

WordPress is still a great piece of software, despite all of the flaws in leadership, community, and in the system itself. I have no doubt that it will continue to expand all the while lining the pockets of Automattic, and fulfilling the ideals of a young developer that can’t let go of his community project.

One of my favourite things to do is teach, and I can’t wait to see the community response over this blog. Deb Ng is currently employed as the Community Manager for Blog Talk Radio, and brings her own thoughts and insights from her active career. Together, we hope to cover ever facet of the job, and help those that are managing their own communities work more effectively.

Community management is a growing area of concern for individuals, brands and companies as they have to contend with the speed that the Internet can disseminate knowledge compared to the less connected society we lived in only one or two decades ago.

Kommein will be a blog filled with passion, advice, and insights, and I hope you’ll all check it out and let me know what you think.

NO!

Community is not something you can force or even make plans around. Communities aren’t to be leveraged in ways that you should be trying to put on a balance sheet for a return on investment. Communities are built up of people, and while people can sometimes be sheep-like in that they will follow a strong leader, they still deserved to be treated with respect.

Finding shortcuts and ways to artificially create a community around your product or service will only end up failing. True communities build themselves. You can help shape them, support them, and keep them engaged, but you can’t create them from nothing.

You have probably read a million posts that talk about creating communities before stumbling onto this post, and it might be disappointing to hear what I have to say, but as a business, you will be better for it.

How Can I Create a Community Then?

So, you still want to have a community around your product or service? Why do you want a community?

Some of the answers I have seen are that businesses expect users to support each other, or that they will be able to create passionate community members that will do evangelist work for them, but what companies don’t seem to understand is how saturated the life of an average community member now is.

Community leaders are rare and have to truly feel that they are benefiting not only the community, but themselves in some way. What is a community member’s return on investment? If you can calculate what your community members will earn by being part of your community, then you will be thinking along the correct lines to build one.

Of course, this doesn’t mean you can just give tokens of your appreciation in the form of an e-mail thanking them, but make it tangible in some way. If you are a software company, give away copies of your software. Don’t make it a big contest or anything like that. Make it something you do behind the scenes as a show of appreciation.

Doing these types of things without asking for anything from your community will build a relationship beyond one of just business to customer.

My biggest tip though would be to find someone outside of your company that is great at managing communities and hire them. Let them be slightly independent and become the filter between your business and the community that you have created, as it can help create the most important parts of a business related community: sincerity and honesty!

Stop trying to do various tricks, following tips, and be open, honest, transparent and real with the people you want to connect with, and while you might not create the largest community in the world, you will start to build a valuable one.