Hi,
We are starting this year by pledging our support to WordPress and we have donated to the WordPress Foundation. We encourage all WordPress lovers out there to do their bit too by contributing time or money. We have plans to contribute very actively to WordPress this year.
See you next week
Bye!
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📰 WordPress & Around
- Gutenberg 14.9 has been released: It introduces a new button titled Push changes to Global Styles under the Advanced panel for individual blocks and typography support for Page List block.
- Aggregate data for 2022 about WordPress Core contribution on Trac: WordPress Core team shipped 2597 commits (1852 in 2021). 2656 tickets were opened, 2413 tickets were closed, and 353 were reopened. Country-wise US was the top contributor, followed by Russia, France and Australia. Contributor-wise, US still was top followed by India and Bangladesh.
- YouTube predicts what will go viral in 2023: YouTube predicts we’ll see more travel content in 2023, and an influx of videos about AI-generated content.
- Google agrees to pay up in 12 year class-action lawsuit: The lawsuit alleged that Google violated both the Stored Communications Act, a federal law that governs access to records held by internet service providers, and state laws in California.
- Google’s John Mueller on using AI & ChatGPT for title tag ideas: He said on Mastodon that using AI or ChatGPT blindly for title tag generation is not a great idea. But he added that if you are running out of ideas and need inspiration, you can leverage the tools for some ideas.
- Microsoft Bing with ChatGPT reportedly launching In March: Microsoft made a $1 billion investment in OpenAI in 2019, and the two companies have been collaborating on integrating GPT into Bing since then. The new feature is expected to give Microsoft a competitive edge over Google. Microsoft also announced Store Ads to promote desktop apps on Windows 10 and 11 devices on desktops.
- Meta fined $414M for EU privacy law violations: The Irish Data Protection Commission found that Meta unlawfully required users to consent to personalized and targeted advertisements. Meta has announced plans to appeal the decision, stating that it believes its approach to data protection respects user privacy.
- France fines Apple for targeted App Store ads without consent: France’s data protection authority (CNIL) has fined Apple €8,000,000 ($8.5M) for collecting user data for targeted advertising on the App Store without requesting or securing the user’s consent.
- Twitter is lifting its ban on political, cause-based ads: Users will start seeing more cause-based ads on their feeds “in the coming weeks.”
- LinkedIn announces 7 updates coming in 2023: It includes improved video accessibility, updates to job search, post scheduling, and content analytics.
- Google and Meta are losing their edge as TikTok, Amazon, Instacart ads grow: 2022 marked the first year since 2014 that Google and Meta’s advertising market share dropped below 50%, standing at 48.4%. By the end of 2023, that number is expected to drop to 44.9%.
- Commerce Components by Shopify gives large retailers new ways to use the platform: Commerce Components by Shopify (CCS) is the latest innovation from Shopify that gives large ecommerce retailers direct access to its component infrastructure. CCS is Shopify’s composable stack for enterprise retail.
🚨Web Security & Vulnerabilities
- Booster for WooCommerce plugin patched vulnerability: The Popular WooCommerce Booster plugin patched a Reflected Cross-Site Scripting vulnerability, affecting up to 70,000+ websites using the plugin.
- Popup Maker WordPress plugin patched an XSS vulnerability: The U.S. government National Vulnerability Database issued an advisory about a Stored Cross-Site Scripting vulnerability in the popular Popup Maker plugin for WordPress.
- Slack Says hackers stole private source code repositories: The compromised repositories did not contain customer data or information that could be used to access customer data.
- Microsoft ends Windows 7 extended security updates: Windows 7 Professional and Enterprise editions will no longer receive extended security updates for critical vulnerabilities starting Tuesday, January 10, 2023.
- Hackers use CAPTCHA bypass to make 20K GitHub accounts in a month: South African threat actors known as ‘Automated Libra’ has been improving their techniques to make a profit by using cloud platform resources for cryptocurrency mining.
- Zoho urges admins to patch severe ManageEngine bug immediately: Successful exploitation of the SQL injection vulnerability provides authenticated attackers with access to the backend database and allows them to execute custom queries to access database table entries.
🔌 New Plugins & Themes
- CF7 Blocks Plugin: It integrates Contact Form 7 with the WordPress block editor.
- Lazy Load Control For Elementor plugin: It adds a control to the Elementor image widget to remove the Lazy Load attribute.
- Alt Text AI plugin: It automatically generates alt text for your images using the latest AI computer vision and deep learning technology.
- ChatPressAI plugin: It allows users to ask for information, text, ideas etc. and receive a response directly in the post or page edit screen.
- SureTriggers plugin: An automation tool that helps you connect different WordPress plugins and SaaS services to automate repetitive tasks.
💵Investments, Acquisitions & Partnerships
- Duplicator is joining the Awesome Motive Family: Snapcreek co-founders Bob Riley and Cory Lamle, creators of Duplicator, will be moving on to pursue other endeavors but the rest of the team will continue to work on the product at Awesome Motive led by John Turner.
- ChatGPT’s popularity boosts OpenAI’s value To $29 Billion: ChatGPT developer OpenAI is reportedly considering a tender offer valuing the company at $29 billion, making it one of the most valuable US startups.
👥 Community News
- Oxygen 4.4 Beta 1 now available: Oxygen 4.4 introduces the ability to edit and manage Oxygen stylesheets directly in the WordPress admin panel.
- BuddyPress 11.0.0 is now available: Named “La Scala” in honor of a pizza restaurant located in Issy-Les-Moulineaux, a Paris suburb, BuddyPress added a filter for improved JS and CSS asset loading, WebP support, and new ways to fetch activities.
- CodeWP launches Firefox Extension for WordPress AI code snippet generator: This simple extension allows you to open the platform and generate WordPress code using AI directly from your Firefox Devtools.
- Meet HTTPie AI: It’s a new way to interact with APIs. HTTPie AI assistant, built into HTTPie for Web & Desktop, uses state-of-the-art artificial intelligence to increase your productivity when testing and talking to APIs.
- Announcing WP Rocket’s new pricing: They have increased the prices from December 30 for new licenses and upgrades. All existing customers are being grandfathered and will keep their renewal price.
🔖Interesting Reads & Podcasts
- 47 Third party data breach statistics: From Astra
- Domain names and their influence on SEO: From YoastSEO
- Seven WordPress predictions for 2023: From WebTNG
- WordPress gold rush?: From Justin Ferriman
- Should WordPress have a certification program?: From The WP Minute
- Common email marketing mistakes you should avoid: From WPManageNinja
- Cumulative Layout Shift explained: How to fix your score: From Kinsta
- Web design trends 2023: A preview of the future of web design: From Torque
- Behind the scenes of creating art with WordPress: From Nomad Blog
- What is a WordPress Contribution?: From Remkus de Vries
- Why I am fascinated but mostly scared of the latest AI photo craze: From MasterWP
- Google’s 2022 year in review: From Google
- WordPress Gutenberg Block News – 6th January 2023: From Jamie Marsland
- 30 Content marketing statistics you should know: From Search Engine Journal
- Can you trust your VSCode extensions?: From Aqua Blog
- How hackers might be exploiting ChatGPT: From Security Affairs
- Is SEO dead? Heck NO. Here’s why: From Ahrefs Blog
- Damon Cook on the future of website styling in WordPress: From WPTavern
🛠 Guide Zone – Howto’s and More
- How to create email links in WordPress with ease?: From RankMath
- From WordPress to the world: Intro to the standalone Gutenberg Block Editor: From Gutenberg Hub
- Create Python comments the right way: From Kinsta
- How to monitor your website performance: From Torque
- How to view WordPress site analytics in your dashboard: From Jetpack
- Let’s code: developing blocks without React! – Review: From WordPress.TV
📆 Save The Dates
- WP Wealthbuilder Summit on February 03: Learn how to grow your business profits and build your wealth and secure your retirement from this online event.
- WordCamp Asia 2023 on February 17-19 at IconSiam, Bangkok Thailand: Organizers have announced the first round of speakers, and also unveiled its wapuu mascot.
- WordCamp Entebbe on March 10, 2023: It is the first in-person WordCamp scheduled in Africa.
- WordCamp Phoenix on March 24 & 25, 2023: About 400 attendees are expected for a weekend of reconnecting, making new connections and learning about WordPress.
- WordCamp Kerala 2023 on March 25: More details to be shared.
- WordCamp Switzerland 2023 on March 31st to April 1st 2023: Call for Sponsors is out.
- YoastCon 2023 on May 10 & 11: It’s a two-day interactive conference focused on search engine optimization and online marketing.
- php[tek] 2023 on May 16-18, 2023: It is the longest-running web developer conference in the United States that has a focus on the PHP programming language.
- WordCamp Europe 2023 on June 8-10, 2023: Call for speakers is out. Organizers call for more interactive sessions.
- The WordPress Community Summit on August 22-23, 2023: In the early planning stages, the Community Summit is an “unconference,” without slides, selected speakers, or planned presentations.
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- Two months free hosting for Kinsta’s annual plans
- 23% off on TaxoPress Pro (Coupon Code – NewYear2023)
- Up to 75% off on plugins, themes and hosting at WP Hive
- 50% off Web Hosting Packages at StableHost (Coupon Code – 50OFFYEAR1)
- 80% off for plugins at WPPool
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- 50% off for Advanced Giftcards for WooCommerce plugin
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- 30% off for Fluent Forms plugin
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- 75% off VPS Monthly Plans at Liquid Web
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