Hi,
Another week and another acquisition! And we are only into the first month of 2023. We can safely assume that more exciting days are ahead of us.
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📰 WordPress & Around
- WordPress project to evaluate replacing Slack with Matrix open source chat: In 2020, Automattic invested $4.6M in New Vector, creators of the Matrix open standard for decentralized communication. At that time, Mullenweg indicated his intention for Automattic to adopt Matrix-based tools and build bridges to WordPress.
- WordPress launches Old Tickets Trac Triage Sessions: WordPress Core Committer Jb Audras has organized Trac triage sessions dedicated to moving the old tickets forward or closing the ones that are no longer relevant. The next “Classic” triage session will happen in the #core Slack channel on Thursday, March 9, 2023 at 10:00 AM EST.
- WordPress contributors work towards removing Site Editor Beta label for 6.2 release: Contributors have been aiming to get the Beta label removed since 6.1 but the criteria had not yet been met. The current blockers include a ticket to improve the Site Editor loading state so that everything is fully loaded before users start interacting.
- Individual Learner Survey from Training Team: Help shape the future of the WordPress “Learn” project as the Training Team is currently working toward updating the Needs Analysis for this resource. The first phase is a survey to help inform the project’s contributors and team.
- January 25, 2023 and WordPress: Mike Little commented on Matt’s blog and kicked off the project that became WordPress powering over 43% of internet today.
- Difference between WordPress Community Support & WordPress Foundation Entity Structure: WordPress Community Support (WPCS) is set up as a for-profit public benefit corporation, and WordPress Foundation (WPF) is a non-profit charitable organization. All WordCamp activity and finances are conducted through WPCS, not WPF.
- Open Source Initiative and OpenLogic release 2023 State of Open Source Report: Responses indicate that open source adoption continues to grow and the industries where open source adoption increased significantly include oil and gas, telecommunications, and energy.
- Microsoft, GitHub, and OpenAI ask court to throw out AI copyright lawsuit: The three companies want to dismiss a complaint that alleges that the AI-powered Copilot relies on ‘software piracy on an unprecedented scale.’
- LinkedIn’s new feature can help you find must-read newsletters: LinkedIn is introducing a new feature that will allow users to see the newsletters that other users are subscribed to.The only way to prevent a newsletter subscription from being publicly visible on LinkedIn is to unsubscribe from the newsletter.
- Microsoft CEO: “Every app is going to be an AI app”: During a recent earnings call with shareholders, the CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, stated that artificial intelligence would eventually be included in all of the company’s applications.
- Google Optimize discontinued: Google announced that Optimize and Optimize 360 will be discontinued on September 30. It plans to provide a new solution in GA4, but it’s unlikely the features will be available by the time Optimize is sunset.
- Google’s new AI turns text into music: Google researchers have made an AI that can generate minutes-long musical pieces from text prompts, and can even transform a whistled or hummed melody into other instruments, similar to how systems like DALL-E generate images from written prompts
- Twitter has launched a Search Keyword Ads beta test to all advertisers: Search Keywords Ads differ from other Twitter Keywords campaigns in that they only reach people who are searching for targeted terms when they are searching, offering a stronger signal of intent.
- Yandex ‘leak’ reveals 1,922 search ranking factors: A former employee allegedly leaked a Yandex source code repository, part of which contained more than 1,900 factors used by the search engines for ranking websites in search results.
🚨Web Security & Vulnerabilities
- Multiple critical vulnerabilities fixed in LearnPress Plugin: Plugin Version <= 4.1.7.3.2 had unauthenticated Local File Inclusion vulnerability and SQL Injection vulnerability.
- WordPress Vulnerability Report – January 25, 2023: Regular report from iThemes
- Massive campaign uses hacked WordPress sites as platform for Black Hat Ad Network: Sucuri had been tracking a new spike in WordPress website infections related to the malicious domain track[.]violetlovelines[.]com. PublicWWW results show over 5,600 websites impacted by this malware
🔌 New Plugins & Themes
- SQLite Database Integration plugin: As part of unbundling the Performance plugin, the new SQLite database integration is now available for testing as a standalone plugin. The intent is to allow testing an SQLite integration with WordPress and gather feedback, with the goal of eventually landing it in WordPress core.
- BananaCrystal Payment Gateway plugins: It helps accept payments for your store or business almost free.
- Timetics plugin: An advanced booking plugin for WordPress to create and manage online schedules and unlimited appointments.
- Php Version Fay plugin: It displays important information about your PHP, database and server on the WordPress Dashboard.
- WordPress SVG Enabler plugin: It allows SVG uploads whilst ensuring that they’re sanitized to stop SVG/XML vulnerabilities affecting your site.
- Upsidedown theme: A blog theme from Automattic, with a direct experience on post reading: noticeable post titles listed on a text-only page, with an original swap of header and footer blocks.
- Consus theme: Multi-purpose theme mainly designed for small businesses, startups, or personal portfolio websites and works perfectly with Kubio Page Builder.
- Mahalo theme: Designed specifically for online newspaper and portal websites.
- General News theme: Designed for news, blog, and magazine websites.
💵Investments, Acquisitions & Partnerships
- UpdraftPlus acquired WP Overnight: WP Overnight is a highly regarded Netherlands-based developer of WooCommerce addons. The acquisition is the first for UpdraftPlus in the WooCommerce space.
- Patchstack now has a partnership with WPMU DEV: WPMU DEV’s Defender Pro security plugin now uses Patchstack’s vulnerability intelligence feed to help protect their users’ sites.
👥 Community News
- Yoast SEO 20.0 released: It has a new admin settings interface that also reorganizes the menu into four main sections: General, Content types, Categories and Tags, and Advanced.
- Oxygen 4.4 released: It has a new Oxygen Stylesheets editor.
- SEOPress 6.3 is now available: It has OpenAI integration to automatically generate meta titles and descriptions.
- Beta version of WPML 4.6 is out: Look out for better automatic translation workflow, new language switcher block, and reviews for bulk automated translations.
- Meet GPTZeroX: It is a new AI detection model built for educators and highlights portions of text that are most likely to be AI generated.
- New MoonWP project: Ranuka Herath created MoonWP to gather together the most comprehensive collection of WordPress resources and present them to you in an organized, easy-to-use format.
- Introducing WooThumbs 5: WooThumbs 5 will not make your WooCommerce product gallery look better and increase conversions too.
- ViewSource Podcast: A weekly conversation around tech, web development, and WordPress with hosts Aurooba Ahmed and Brian Coords.
🔖Interesting Reads & Podcasts
- The Wordfence 2022 State of WordPress Security Report: From Wordfence
- Top 10 SEO mistakes you’re probably making: From WPManageNinja
- AI-to-code, building WordPress plugins with ChatGPT: From PressThis
- WordPress’ admin UI needs to be better: From Joost de Valk
- Copilot + WordPress: A few tips: From Brian Coords
- What’s new in Laravel 10: From Kinsta
- The case for showing freelance clients your authentic self: From Speckyboy
- 8 States vs. Google: A closer look at the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit: From Search Engine Journal
- Is ChatGPT use of web content fair?: From Search Engine Journal
- Writing code without plain text files: From Erik Engheim
- WordPress and virtual reality: From WPLift
- How AI will revolutionize WordPress in 2023: From Jamie Marsland
- Content Marketing in 2023 (WordPress products & more): From Matt Report
- Mike Demo, Tracy Apps and David Wolfpaw on LGBTQ and WordPress: From WPTavern
🛠 Guide Zone – Howto’s and More
- Sticky Posts in WordPress: Complete guide for beginners: From RankMath
- How to use the WordPress Query Loop Block: From Elegant Themes
- How to create a masonry gallery in WordPress: From Gutenberg Hub
- How to add a background image or background video with full site editing: From Carolina Nymark
- How to add meta boxes and custom fields to Posts in Gutenberg: From Kinsta
- How to add Google Analytics to WordPress: From Jetpack
- How to access and edit the default WordPress .htaccess File: From Jetpack
- 8 Best WordPress Gutenberg Blocks (And how to use them): From Torque
- SQL query optimization for faster WordPress sites: From Delicious Brains
- Patterns, reusable blocks and block locking: From WordPress.TV
- Using theme.json with classic themes: 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 Birmingham 2023 on February 4-5, 2023: The schedule and list of speakers are out.
- WordCamp Cebu 2023 on February 11, 2023 in Mandarin: Grab your tickets.
- 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 10-11, 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: It is the first regional WordCamp in Kerala, India. Call for Sponsors, Speakers and Volunteers are out.
- 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 focuses on the PHP programming language.
- WordCamp Lisboa on May 19 & 20: It is one of the largest WordPress conferences in Portugal.
- WordCamp Europe 2023 on June 8-10, 2023: Tickets are available now.
- 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.
🎁 WordPress Deals Of The Week
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- 3 Months free offer on hosting plans of WP Engine (Coupon Code- WPE3FREE)
- 15% off yearly plans at Videvo (Coupon Code – WPV15)
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- Upto 40% off on Astra theme
- Upto 50% off for CartFlows
- Up to 50% off for RankMath
- Two months free hosting for Kinsta’s annual plans
- 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
- 20% off at OceanWP
- Up to 67% off hosting plans at HostPapa
- 50% off for Advanced Giftcards for WooCommerce plugin
- 33% off for Annual Hosting plans at Nexcess
- 81% off at AtlasVPN
- 20% off for Fluent Forms plugin
- 60% off at Formidable Forms
- 20% off for FluentCRM plugin
- 20% off for WP Social Ninja plugin
- 95% off for PitchGround products
- 90% off WordPress Hosting plans at InMotion Hosting
- 73% off hosting plans at SiteGround
- 60% off at Hostgator India
- 75% off VPS Monthly Plans at Liquid Web
- 50% off on Managed Dedicated Server Hosting at Liquid Web
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