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The WordPress vs. drama explained. WP Engine

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stylized wordpress logo

The world of WordPress, some of the popular technologies for creating and hosting web sites, is experiencing very heated controversy. At the guts of the difficulty is a battle between WordPress founder and Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg and WP Engine, which hosts web sites built on WordPress.

WordPress technology is open source and free software, powering an enormous portion of the Internet – about 40% of internet sites. Websites can host their very own WordPress instances or use an answer provider similar to Automattic or WP Engine for a plug-and-play solution.

In mid-September, Mullenweg wrote blog entry calling WP Engine the “cancer of WordPress.” He criticized the host for disabling users’ ability to view and track the version history of every entry. Mullenweg believes this feature is “at the heart of the user promise to protect data” and stated that WP Engine turns it off by default to lower your expenses.

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He also called WP Engine investor Silver Lake and said it was not contributing enough to the open source project and that WP Engine’s use of the “WP” brand had misled customers into believing it was a part of WordPress.

In response, WP Engine sent a cease-and-desist letter to Mullenweg and Automattic, asking them to withdraw their comments. It also found that use of the WordPress trademark falls under fair use.

The company claimed that Mullenweg said it might take a “scorched earth nuclear approach” against WP Engine unless it agreed to pay “a significant portion of its revenues to license the WordPress trademark.”

In response Automattic sent its own stop and desist letter to WP Engine claiming that it did violated the foundations for using WordPress and WooCommerce trademarks.

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WordPress Foundation too modified the trademark policy page and called out WP Engine, claiming that the hosting service confused users.

“The abbreviation “WP” shouldn’t be trademarked by WordPress, but please don’t use it in a confusing manner. For example, many individuals think that WP Engine is “WordPress Engine” and officially related to WordPress, which shouldn’t be true. They have never even donated to the WordPress Foundation, though they make billions on WordPress,” the updated page reads.

The ban on the WP engine and the fight for a trademark

Mullenweg then banned WP Engine from accessing WordPress.org resources. While items like plugins and themes are open source, providers like WP Engine must run a service to download them, which shouldn’t be open source.

This broke many web sites and made them inoperable updating plugins AND topics. It also exposed a few of them to security attacks. The community didn’t like this approach of leaving small web sites without help.

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In response to the incident, WP Engine wrote in a post that Mullenweg had abused his control over WordPress to disrupt WP Engine customers’ access to WordPress.org.

“Matt Mullenweg’s unprecedented and unjustified action disrupts the normal operation of the entire WordPress ecosystem, impacting not only WP Engine and our customers, but all WordPress plugin developers and open source users who rely on WP Engine tools such as ACF,” WP Engine said .

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On September 27, WordPress.org temporarily lifted the banallowing WP Engine access to resources until October 1st.

Mullenweg wrote a blog post a proof that the fight is just with WP Engine over trademarks. He said Automattic had been attempting to broker a trademark licensing deal for a very long time, but WP Engine’s only response was to “pull us along.”

On September 30, the day before WordPress.org’s deadline to ban WP Engine, the hosting company updated its site’s footer to make clear that it shouldn’t be directly affiliated with the WordPress Foundation nor does it own the WordPress industry.

“WP Engine is a proud member and supporter of the WordPress® user community. The WordPress® trademark is the intellectual property of the WordPress Foundation and the Woo® and WooCommerce® trademarks are the intellectual property of WooCommerce, Inc. The names WordPress®, Woo® and WooCommerce® on this website are for identification purposes only and do not imply endorsement by the WordPress Foundation or WooCommerce, Inc. WP Engine is not endorsed by, owned by, or affiliated with WordPress Foundation or WooCommerce, Inc.” read the updated description on the web site.

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The company also modified the names of its plans from “Essential WordPress,” “Core WordPress,” and “Enterprise WordPress” to “Essential,” “Core,” and “Enterprise.”

WP Engine said in an announcement that it modified these terms to challenge Automattic’s claims.

“Like the rest of the WordPress community, we use the WordPress logo to describe our business. Automattic’s suggestion that WPE needs a license to do this is simply wrong and reflects a misunderstanding of trademark law. To address the concerns she raised, we have eliminated several examples that Automattic provided in its September 23 letter,” an organization spokesperson told TechCrunch.

On October 1, the corporate posted on X that it had successfully implemented its own plugin and theme update solution.

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On October 15, TechCrunch reported that Automattic had been planning to define trademarks with “nice notes and notes nice” lawyers since earlier this yr, in accordance with an internal blog post written by the corporate’s then-chief legal officer. The post also mentioned a technique for filing more trademarks, which the inspiration finally did so in July.

The WordPress community and other projects imagine this might occur to them too and wish a proof from Automattic, which holds the exclusive license to the WordPress trademark. The community can be asking for clear guidelines on how they will and can’t use “WordPress.”

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The WordPress Foundation, which owns the trademark, has also registered as a trademark “Managed WordPress” and “Hosted WordPress.” Developers AND suppliers they fear that if granted, these trademarks could also be used against them.

Developers have expressed concerns over-reliance on industrial open source WordPress products, especially when access to them can quickly disappear.

The founding father of the open source content management system, John O’Nolan, also spoke out on the matter and criticized the single-person control of WordPress.

“The network needs more independent organizations and greater diversity. 40% of the network and 80% of the CMS market mustn’t be controlled by one person,” he said post X.

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On October 9, the creator of the Ruby on Rails web development platform, David Heinemeier Hansson, expressed the opinion that Automattic was violating open source software principles by asking WP Engine to pay 8% of its revenue.

“Automattic is totally out of touch and the potential harm to the open source world goes far beyond WordPress. Don’t let the drama and its characters turn you away from this threat,” he said blog post.

On the identical day, Mullenweg added a brand new checkbox to the WordPress.org contributor login, asking people to confirm that they usually are not affiliated with WP Engine in any way. This move was met with criticism from the writer community. Some authors said yes forbidden Slack community for opposing this motion.

Image credits:WordPress.org

In response, WP Engine stated that its clients, agencies, users and the community at large usually are not associates of the corporate.

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On October 12, WordPress.org took control of the ACF (Advanced Custom Fields) plugin — which makes it easier for WordPress developers so as to add custom fields on the edit screen — powered by WP Engine. Because WP Engine lost control of the open source plugin repository, the Silver Lake-backed company was unable to update the plugin. WordPress.org and Mullenweg said plugin guidelines allow the organization to take this step.

WP Engine i lawsuit

On October 3, WP Engine sued Automattic and Mullenweg for abuse of power in a California court. The hosting company also alleged that Automattic and Mullenweg did not keep guarantees to run open-source WordPress projects with none restrictions and didn’t give developers the liberty to construct, run, modify and redistribute the software.

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“Matt Mullenweg’s conduct over the past ten days has revealed serious conflicts of interest and governance issues that, if unchecked, threaten to destroy this trust. “WP Engine has no choice but to pursue these claims to protect its employees, agency partners, customers and the broader WordPress community,” the corporate said in an announcement to TechCrunch.

The lawsuit also notes alleged text messages from Mullenweg regarding the potential employment of WP Engine CEO Heather Brunner. In a comment for Hacker News, Mullenweg he said that Brunner desired to develop into the chief director of WordPress.org.

In response, Automattic called the case baseless.

“I stayed up last night reading the WP Engine complaint, trying to find any value in it. The entire case is without merit and we look forward to hearing their lawsuit in federal court,” the corporate’s legal representative, Neal Katyal, said in an announcement. blog post.

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On October 18, WP Engine filed a lawsuit in a California court, asking a judge to revive its access to WordPress.org. A day later, the corporate submitted its application administrative request asking the court to shorten the deadline for considering an earlier preliminary injunction.

Automatic exodus

On October 3, 159 Automattic employees who disagreed with Mullenweg’s direction for the corporate and WordPress as a complete took severance pay and left the corporate. Nearly 80% of those that left worked in Automattic’s Ecosystem/WordPress division.

On October 8, WordPress announced that Mary Hubbard, who was TikTok US’s chief executive and experience officer, would begin as executive director. This position was previously held by Joseph Haden Chomphosawho was considered one of 159 people leaving Automattic. The day before, considered one of engineers from WP Engine announced that they’re joining Automattic.

On October 12, Mullenweg wrote in a post that all the things was working An Automattic worker would receive 200 A12 shares as a token of gratitude. These shares are there special class for Automattic employees, which may be sold after a yr and has no expiration date.

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On October 17, Mullenweg posted one other customization offer on Automattic Slack – with only a four-hour response window – with a nine-month severance package. However, if any person took up the offer, they’d also lose access to the WordPress.org community, Mullenweg said.


This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com

Technology

Trump to sign a criminalizing account of porn revenge and clear deep cabinets

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President Donald Trump is predicted to sign the act on Take It Down, a bilateral law that introduces more severe punishments for distributing clear images, including deep wardrobes and pornography of revenge.

The Act criminalizes the publication of such photos, regardless of whether or not they are authentic or generated AI. Whoever publishes photos or videos can face penalty, including a advantageous, deprivation of liberty and restitution.

According to the brand new law, media firms and web platforms must remove such materials inside 48 hours of termination of the victim. Platforms must also take steps to remove the duplicate content.

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Many states have already banned clear sexual desems and pornography of revenge, but for the primary time federal regulatory authorities will enter to impose restrictions on web firms.

The first lady Melania Trump lobbyed for the law, which was sponsored by the senators Ted Cruz (R-TEXAS) and Amy Klobuchar (d-minn.). Cruz said he inspired him to act after hearing that Snapchat for nearly a 12 months refused to remove a deep displacement of a 14-year-old girl.

Proponents of freedom of speech and a group of digital rights aroused concerns, saying that the law is Too wide And it will probably lead to censorship of legal photos, similar to legal pornography, in addition to government critics.

(Tagstransate) AI

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This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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Microsoft Nadella sata chooses chatbots on the podcasts

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Satya Nadella at Microsoft Ignite 2023

While the general director of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, says that he likes podcasts, perhaps he didn’t take heed to them anymore.

That the treat is approaching at the end longer profile Bloomberg NadellaFocusing on the strategy of artificial intelligence Microsoft and its complicated relations with Opeli. To illustrate how much she uses Copilot’s AI assistant in her day by day life, Nadella said that as a substitute of listening to podcasts, she now sends transcription to Copilot, after which talks to Copilot with the content when driving to the office.

In addition, Nadella – who jokingly described her work as a “E -Mail driver” – said that it consists of a minimum of 10 custom agents developed in Copilot Studio to sum up E -Mailes and news, preparing for meetings and performing other tasks in the office.

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It seems that AI is already transforming Microsoft in a more significant way, and programmers supposedly the most difficult hit in the company’s last dismissals, shortly after Nadella stated that the 30% of the company’s code was written by AI.

(Tagstotransate) microsoft

This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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The planned Openai data center in Abu Dhabi would be greater than Monaco

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Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI

Opeli is able to help in developing a surprising campus of the 5-gigawatt data center in Abu Dhabi, positioning the corporate because the fundamental tenant of anchor in what can grow to be considered one of the biggest AI infrastructure projects in the world, in accordance with the brand new Bloomberg report.

Apparently, the thing would include a tremendous 10 square miles and consumed power balancing five nuclear reactors, overshadowing the prevailing AI infrastructure announced by OpenAI or its competitors. (Opeli has not yet asked TechCrunch’s request for comment, but in order to be larger than Monaco in retrospect.)

The ZAA project, developed in cooperation with the G42-Konglomerate with headquarters in Abu Zabi- is an element of the ambitious Stargate OpenAI project, Joint Venture announced in January, where in January could see mass data centers around the globe supplied with the event of AI.

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While the primary Stargate campus in the United States – already in Abilene in Texas – is to realize 1.2 gigawatts, this counterpart from the Middle East will be more than 4 times.

The project appears among the many wider AI between the USA and Zea, which were a few years old, and annoyed some legislators.

OpenAI reports from ZAA come from 2023 Partnership With G42, the pursuit of AI adoption in the Middle East. During the conversation earlier in Abu Dhabi, the final director of Opeli, Altman himself, praised Zea, saying: “He spoke about artificial intelligence Because it was cool before. “

As in the case of a big a part of the AI ​​world, these relationships are … complicated. Established in 2018, G42 is chaired by Szejk Tahnoon Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the national security advisor of ZAA and the younger brother of this country. His embrace by OpenAI raised concerns at the top of 2023 amongst American officials who were afraid that G42 could enable the Chinese government access advanced American technology.

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These fears focused on “G42”Active relationships“With Blalisted entities, including Huawei and Beijing Genomics Institute, in addition to those related to people related to Chinese intelligence efforts.

After pressure from American legislators, CEO G42 told Bloomberg At the start of 2024, the corporate modified its strategy, saying: “All our Chinese investments that were previously collected. For this reason, of course, we no longer need any physical presence in China.”

Shortly afterwards, Microsoft – the fundamental shareholder of Opeli together with his own wider interests in the region – announced an investment of $ 1.5 billion in G42, and its president Brad Smith joined the board of G42.

(Tagstransate) Abu dhabi

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