Matt Mullenweg has decided to dissolve the Sustainability Team and has archived the #sustainability channel on Slack in a surprising turn of events, as it was Matt himself who suggested starting a Sustainability Slack channel at WordCamp Europe 2022.
The Incident
Thijs Buijs, one of the team reps of the WordPress Sustainability Team, announced on the #Sustainability Slack channel that he is stepping down as representative for the WordPress Sustainability Team, “ I’ve decided to step down as Team Representative for the WordPress Sustainability Team and to cease my active role within the team immediately.”
This decision to step down from the Sustainability team was influenced by Matt’s post on Reddit about what drama to create in 2025. He explained,” I was truly hoping that 2025 would bring more positivity into the community after the WP Drama in 2024. However, I was wrong. @matt ’s call for what Drama he should create in 2025, was yet another proof to me that this community needs a change in leadership. These acts of a single person are so counterproductive to the economic, social, and ecological sustainability and longevity of the project. Personally, it’s not sustainable for me to invest any more energy into this project under the current leadership.”
He expressed his gratitude to fellow Sustainability Team members, Nora Ferreirós, Nahuai Badiola, and Csaba Varszegi, “ I would like to thank my fellow Team Reps @Nora Ferreirós , @Nahuai Badiola and @Csaba , Team Members, and everyone who has contributed to pushing things forward. It’s been a true pleasure to collaborate with you for over two years, and to contribute to the WordPress community that I love so much.”
He concluded by saying, “In the coming period, I will reflect on how to make an impact to create a more sustainable world.
Shortly after the announcement, Matt joined the channel, noting he was unaware of the sustainability channel’s existence, “Today I learned that we have a sustainability team.” He went on to explain that, based on the team’s results and ROI, he had decided to dissolve the team entirely, “Thank you @Thijs Buijs for your effort in this area, looking at results of the team so far, and the ROI of time invested, it’s probably a good time to officially dissolve the team entirely. It doesn’t seem like creating a team around this was able to further any of its goals, so we should probably try a different approach, or consider whether it’s salient for us to be involved at all. (For example, is it worth talking about the climate impact of WordPress, or instead should we just have really great performance metrics and try to optimize our code as much as possible, and focus on that efficiency.)”
A Timeline of the Sustainability Team
Back in WordCamp Europe 2022, Matt suggested that a Slack channel for Sustainability be created after Nora from the Spanish Community raised questions about sustainability. On the same day, the channel was created.
A proposal to establish the Sustainability Team was published on May 30, 2023, and the team was officially formed during the WCEU Athens Contributor Day on June 8, 2023.
It was also announced during WordCamp Europe 2023 and an official announcement was made on Make WordPress. Recently, the team had put forth a proposal for the team reps for 2025.
Community Response
Gus Austin on X voiced his thoughts as:
Veerle Verbert posted:
Kellie Peterson tweeted as follows: