#194 - Automattic And Matt Respond To WP Engine, WooCommerce New Logo Unveiled

Issue #194 | November 5, 2024 | Reading time: 14 mins

Hello!

Automattic and Matt have filed new three documents against WP Engine and the legal battle wages on. WooCommerce has unveiled its new logo and also WordPress 6.7 RC2 is now available.

If you have a Black Friday or Cyber Monday WordPress deal for 2024, submit your details to be featured on our WP-Content.co blog and promoted across our social media channels.

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See you next week!

Team WP-CONTENT.CO

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📰 WORDPRESS & AROUND

All the updates around WordPress and its closely related technologies

WordPress 6.7 Release Candidate 2

The RC2 is now available for download and testing. We can expect RC3 later today.

Recap: Hallway Hangout DataViews and DataForm Components: A summary of the recently concluded Hallway Hangout where they discussed the evolution and future of DataViews and DataForms in WordPress.
WordCamp Europe seeks new host city for 2026: Applications are open until Friday, 15 November 2024. The final decision on the 2026 host city is expected by Friday, 29 November 2024. Applicants should consider an appropriate venue that can accommodate 1,500 seats in a main auditorium-style layout, with additional spaces for breakout tracks and workshops, as well as around 15 rooms for support functions.
Design share #67 (Oct 21-Nov 1): The design team has shared an update on a few projects they have worked on over the past couple of weeks.
Community Team Rep nominations for 2025: Two new Reps for 2025 will be elected and the nominations will close on 15 November 2024.
Kim Parsell Memorial Scholarship expands to WordCamp Asia and WordCamp Europe: Kim Parsell Memorial Scholarship will now be available for WordCamp Asia and WordCamp Europe, in addition to WordCamp US. The scholarship is designed to support those who are passionate about contributing to WordPress, especially individuals who might otherwise face financial barriers to attending. The applications are open until 30 November 2024 for both WordCamp Asia and WordCamp Europe.
All new Studio Assistant from WordPress.com: The Studio Assistant is a smart chatbot integrated within Studio, the free and open-source local development app, and it’s now available for all Studio users.
Google updates crawl budget best practices: Google has updated its crawl budget guidelines, stressing the need to maintain consistent link structures between mobile and desktop websites.
Google Chrome DevTools adds advanced CLS debugging tool: Chrome introduces new debugging tool in Canary build, helping developers identify and fix website layout stability issues.
SearchGPT launches as ChatGPT’s real-time search feature: OpenAI integrates real-time web search into ChatGPT, offering live news and data with source attribution for verified information.
Google loses €2.4B battle against small business founders: British couple wins €2.4B case against Google over search manipulation that destroyed their price comparison startup.

🗣️TALK OF THE TOWN

Automattic and Matt file three new documents against WP Engine

Defending open source: Our legal response to WP Engine’s meritless complaint: Automattic and Matt have filed three separate documents: A motion to dismiss WP Engine’s complaint, a motion to strike (under anti-SLAPP law), and an opposition to the preliminary injunction. WP Tavern has more details on this.
Matt also published GPL clarification as a quick follow-up on his prior conversation with Theo to state, “I want to be clear that my reference to legality and GPL was solely focused on the copying and modifying of the code…..I was not speaking about their right to charge money for nulled plugins. GPLv2 prohibits that because they aren’t providing physical copies or support.”

Some writings/discussions on the subject:
Matt Mullenweg talks about Automattic’s staffing issues and financials at TechCrunch Disrupt: From TechCrunch

Thoughts on lawyers, judges, and timing: From The Delta

🚨WEB SECURITY & VULNERABILITIES

A collection of web security and vulnerability news and updates for the past week

10,000 WordPress sites affected by Arbitrary File Upload vulnerability in AI Power: Complete AI Pack WordPress plugin

An Arbitrary File Upload vulnerability was patched and users to update to the latest version immediately.

Rare case of privilege escalation patched in LiteSpeed Cache plugin: An unauthenticated privilege escalation vulnerability was recently patched and users are to update to the latest version immediately.
WordPress vulnerability & patch roundup October 2024: Monthly report from Sucuri.
WordPress vulnerability report — October 30, 2024: Weekly report from SolidWP.
Wordfence Intelligence Weekly WordPress Vulnerability Report (October 21, 2024 to October 27, 2024): There were 234 vulnerabilities disclosed in 206 plugins and 6 themes.

🔌 NEW PLUGINS & THEMES

Be one of the first ones to explore some fresh plugins and themes

Fashivo theme

A WooCommerce theme.

Educator Academy theme: A theme suitable for education websites.
Machine Learning theme: A theme designed for AI-driven businesses, tech startups, and educational platforms focused on artificial intelligence.
Product video showcase for WooCommerce plugin: This enables dynamic video previews on product hover in WooCommerce shop pages.
Back in stock notifications for WooCommerce: A free plugin for WooCommerce that notifies customers when products they’re interested in are back in stock.
Plugin closure status inside of WordPress admin panel: This plugin adds the much-awaited “This plugin is closed” notice under each plugin on the admin panel.

👥 COMMUNITY NEWS

Updates and News from the WordPress Community

New logo unveiled for WooCommerce

The updated logo for WooCoomerce was unveiled during WooSesh by Tamara Niesen, CMO at Woo and the new logo will be rolling out in early 2025.

The State of Frontend 2024 report is now available: The survey reveals that the most used and liked framework is React, followed by Vue.js and Svelte, the most preferred method of hosting applications is Vercel, and so on.
Introducing Blueprint: Blueprint is a PHP library for dynamically replacing placeholders within a template string.
Upcoming GenerateBlocks 2.0: The upcoming version will include new blocks, upgraded Global Styles integration, dynamic tags, and an enhanced UI with full search/filter functionality.
VRTs v2.0: Runs, update automations and more: The latest update includes a redesigned review interface, automatic tests after WordPress core, plugin, theme, or language updates, and more.
All new Shorrrrrten: Shorrrrrten is a React-based frontend for YOURLS, using the YOURLS API to interact with a YOURLS instance
Announcing FluentCommunity: Fluent Community is an upcoming all-in-one community plugin for WordPress which allows users to build a community platform with unlimited members, groups, courses, real-time messaging, and much more.
Call for feedback: What’s next for WooCommerce Tax?: The team at WooCommerce is looking for feedback to make tax management in WooCommerce work better.
WooCommerce 9.4 releases update: WooCommerce 9.4, originally planned for October 21, 2024, will now be released on Monday, November 11th, 2024.
GoDaddy announces website builder API integration for Third-Party platforms: The first strategic partner to incorporate the company’s award-winning Website Builder into their digital presence offering is Tailor Brands, a premier business building and LLC formation platform.
Press Forward is funding WordPress publishers: A total of 205 small local news outlets will receive a portion of $20 million in funding from Press Forward. The majority will receive $100,000 in operating support.
Morten Rand-Hendriksen is looking for contributors: The contributors will be working on the Creator Code of Ethics project to integrate and add translations and other stuff.
Brian Coords on what could possibly happen to WordPress as a result of WP Engine being owned by SilverLake?: The discussion initiated on X saw several community members express their opinions of what the outcome would be. Katie Keith said, “ Maybe the worry is that all WP companies will one day be owned by private equity and none will contribute hours to the WP project, which will therefore die from lack of resources?” while Cameron Jones said, “ Worst case from their end is they run A8c out of business and core development dwindles to nothing. Not a totally unreasonable fear. But what we’re seeing happen is the actual worst case I think. Contributors leaving, goodwill shattered, and faith in project leadership decimated.”
Claude 3.5 Sonnet on GitHub Copilot: The new Claude 3.5 Sonnet begins rolling out on GitHub Copilot, enabling developers to choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet for coding—directly in Visual Studio Code and GitHub.com.
Flutter has been forked: To help expand Flutter’s available labor, and accelerate development, a fork of Flutter has been created, called Flock.
Piermario Orecchioni receives the Yoast Care fund for his contribution to the WordPress community: Piermario Orecchioni, a member of the WordPress Community team is the latest recipient of the Yoast Care fund.

🔖 INTERESTING READS & PODCASTS

More posts and podcasts from the WordPress Community you don’t want to miss

What can hosts do for WordPress?: From The WP Minute
The People behind the platform: How WordPress’s community drives its success: From Joost de Valk
Rocket.net – Fiercely independent & fiercely yours: From Rocket.net
In conversation with Matt Medeiros: From Seriously BUD?
Aaron Reimann and Keith Osburn on how WordPress is transforming Georgia’s educational landscape: From WP Tavern Jukebox
12 best WordPress block themes for FSE (most are free!): From Kinsta
Favicons and your online brand: Make sure you stand out!: From Yoast

🛠 GUIDE ZONE – HOWTO’S and MORE

Handpicked fresh guides from WordPress circle

Getting and setting Block Binding values in the Editor: From WordPress Developer Blog
How to quickly write a blog post outline (Template): From WordPress.com
Converting WordPress uploads to WebP: From Anchor Hosting
Building WordPress with AI?!: From WP Minute Tutorials
WordPress Salts: What are they, how they work, and how to use them: From Patchstack

📆 SAVE THE DATES

Do not miss a WordPress event ever again

Rome Core Days on November 8-9, 2024: This will be a two-day event dedicated to WordPress Core developers with round tables, open discussions, and contribution rooms. The schedule is out.
WordCamp Kerala on November 9, 2024: The call for sponsors, speakers and volunteers is out.
WordCamp Romania on November 14-15, 2024: Tickets are out.
WordCamp Malaysia on November 22-23, 2024: Tickets are out.
WordCamp Netherlands on 29-30 November 2024: The call for sponsors is out.
WordCamp Asia on February 20-22, 2025: The venue will be the Philippine International Convention Center, Manila, Philippines.
WordCamp Europe on 5-7 June 2025: The event will be held at Basel – Switzerland’s Capital for Art and Culture.
WordCamp US 2025 on August 26-29, 2025: The event is in the early planning stages.

🎁 WORDPRESS DEALS OF THE WEEK

Again, these are the best deals of the week, handpicked by yours!

EXCLUSIVE DEALS

4 Months free offer on hosting plans of WP Engine (Coupon Code- FREEDOMTOCREATE)
10% off on monthly & annual plans at SureTriggers (Coupon Code- WPCONTENT10)
15% off yearly plans at Videvo (Coupon Code – WPV15)