In this month’s World of WordPress, we talk about marketing and Joost, a full site editing plugin, and the legacy of Alex Mills.
Let’s ride.
Joost steps away from leadership role
(Why) I’m stepping down from my WordPress marketing role
Earlier this year there were some raised eyebrows when Joost de Valk accepted a position with WordPress to be the Marketing & Communications Lead.
Call it a misunderstanding. Call it a difference in opinion. Call it a difference in how to execute marketing. Call it what you will, but Joost announced he was stepping down.
At best, it was unclear. He said,
My position is unclear, not just to me, but to many people which makes me uncomfortable. I’ve been asked dozens of times on Twitter, Facebook and at WordCamps why I now work for Automattic, which of course I don’t but that is the perception for a lot of people. On other occasions, I seem to be the token non-Automattician, which I’m also uncomfortable with. Joost de Valk
He seems uncomfortable with the situation.
Joost was used to being part of the visioning process as a leader, but that was something that never happened while he was at WordPress.
I’ve not encountered (or been brought into) any discussions about our product vision, something I would need to translate into day-to-day actions. I was expecting there to be some backchannels where these discussions were had and these decisions were made, turns out these simply don’t exist. Joost de Valk
Ultimately, he made a plea for a bit more open environment for the visioning process.
He has, as he says, no hard feelings and is looking to continue contributing to WordPress.
After a vacation, Joost will resume his roles at Yoast.
A full site editing plugin for blog post layouts
Automattic is Testing an Experimental Full Site Editing Plugin
WordPress may see the day where no themes or page builders are needed. Well, that may be extreme, but this Full Site Editing Plugin may remove some of the needs of either.
At the least, the plugin can help you create a custom layout of a blog page.
Full Site Editing currently provides three custom blocks for post content, templates, and a blog posts listing. The Blog Posts Listing block expands upon core’s Latest Posts block to include an excerpt and meta information. WP Tavern
Now, if you aren’t currently using Gutenberg, this may not be something you will be using soon.
Nevertheless, the Gutenberg capabilities are getting further down the road.
It seems likely that this will all be baked into WordPress.com soon.
Even now, it is only recommended for WordPress.com website.
The legacy of Alex Mills lives
File this under the feel-good section. The plugins of Alex Mills (aka Viper007Bond) who passed away in February will live on.
Alex expressed the desire to see someone take over the plugins in a blog post before his passing.
Automattic has stepped forward to take care of Mills’ plugins including Regenerate Thumbnails.
https://profiles.wordpress.org/viper007bond/#content-plugins
In a post by Donncha Ó Caoimh of Automattic, it was announced,
We will fork each of Alex’s GitHub repositories adding them to the Automattic GitHub account. We’ll update any links in his plugin readme files so they’re pointing at the new locations.”
Alex lives on in his work.
Wrapping it up
Has anything stood out to you in recent weeks on the Word of WordPress? We are still waiting for WordPress 5.3 to be released. What new things will happen during the Summer?
