Hi!

What a week!! Last week saw the WP community abuzz due to the .com page ranking higher than .org. It quickly escalated and ended up with Matt blocking WP Marketing Team co-rep Sé Reed.

In other news, Openverse has bagged the 2023 Open Education Award for Excellence in the Open Infrastructure category. Also, the call for Sustainability team representatives is now open.

You can also subscribe and listen to the podcast version of this newsletter on Amazon Music, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts.

Until next week,

Bye!

Team WP-CONTENT.CO

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📰 WORDPRESS & AROUND

All the updates around WordPress and its closely related technologies

Openverse wins the 2023 OEG Open Infrastructure Award

Openverse has been awarded the 2023 Open Education Award for Excellence in the Open Infrastructure category. OEG is a non-profit organization under the WordPress project’s umbrella and supports the use of open education to expand education access and affordability. Anyone who wants to contribute to Openverse’s future can reply to the team’s blog post requesting feedback.

• Core editor improvement: Commanding the Command Palette: The post summarises the updates done to the Command Palette.
• Theme handbook overhaul: Phase 3 (publishing content): The post provides an update on the progress made on the theme handbook overhaul and what Phase 3 is all about.
• Call for WordPress Sustainability team representatives: The nominations for Sustainability team reps will be open until September 29th, 2023 11.00 UTC.
• Hallway Hangout: What’s new for developers in WordPress 6.4: The next month’s Hallway Hangout will include Justin Tadlock and Ryan Welcher alongside Nick Diego where they will discuss developer-related changes coming in WordPress 6.4.
• Design Share: Aug 28-Sep8: The design team has shared an update on a few projects they have worked on over the past couple of weeks.
• Falcon 180B is here: It is the largest openly available language model, with 180 billion parameters, and was trained on a massive 3.5 trillion tokens using TII’s RefinedWeb dataset.

🗣️ TALK OF THE TOWN

⚔️ WP.org Vs WP.com

• WordPress.com replicated the entire WordPress.org plugin directory on its .com domain name?: This tweet from WordPress core developer John Blackbourn sparked a heated discussion and the reverberations were felt throughout the WP ecosystem. He tweeted that searching for some plugin names now results in the .com page ranking higher than .org. He later apologized.
• Developers raise concerns about WordPress.com plugin listings outranking WordPress.org on Google Search: WPTavern’s take on the issue.
• DOT com has an SEO advantage over (probably) every independent plugin developer: Vova Feldman (Freemius founder) tweeted it’s unfair that a 3rd party site gets the lead while the plugin authors don’t even know about it.
• I can’t control Google rankings: Matt Mullenweg’s take on the issue. “Since its foundation, .org has benefitted from the branding and reputation of having a robust SaaS version available from .com, including a free version, something basically no other host does”, he tweeted. He also took digs at Vova Feldman, Jason Coleman (CEO of Stranger Studios) and finally, blocked WP Marketing Team co-rep Sé Reed.
• The business is causing confusion for OSS: Daniel Schutzsmith had this to say.
• The WordPress mission is not just for one person to define: Tweeted Scout James, a bi designer, coder and actor.
• WordPress: Community, Code, Conduct: Zack Katz’s (the founder of GravityKit and TrustedLogin) take on what happens when Matt, WordPress co-founder and project lead, violates the community code of conduct.
• Cynical take on Matt Mullenweg’s replies: Mario Peshev (CEO of DevriX) shared the worst that could happen if Matt turns into a nuclear superpower and goes completely rogue forever. There’s no high impact power that affects WordPress short-term as it stands.
• Developers claim damaged trust following public confrontations with WordPress leadership: WPTavern’s take on the issue.
• Is WordPress thriving?: From The WP Minute
• What the heck did Sé Reed get herself into this time?: From WPwatercooler

🚨 WEB SECURITY & VULNERABILITIES

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

Wordfence Intelligence Weekly WordPress Vulnerability Report (September 4, 2023 to September 10, 2023)

107 vulnerabilities were disclosed in 89 WordPress Plugins and 5 WordPress themes.

• Authenticated privilege escalation in Essential Addons for Elementor plugin: The vulnerability was patched in version 5.8.9 and all users are to update to the latest version immediately.
• WooCommerce vulnerability fixed: WooCommerce 8.1.1 contains a security fix for the issue that would potentially allow users with specific capabilities to view user data for all users. Though there’s no evidence of the vulnerability being exploited in the wild, it is better to update your WooCommerce version to the latest 8.1.1. as soon as possible.

🔌 NEW PLUGINS & THEMES

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

Powder business theme

A theme suitable for small businesses and freelancers created by Brian Gardner.

• Malavi theme: A block theme with two style variations.
• Lhotse theme: A theme suitable for business and blog websites with two style variations.
• WPC Smart Attribute Groups for WooCommerce plugin: The plugin allows users to display product attributes in separate groups.
• Post Designer plugin: The plugin adds two new Gutenberg blocks: Post List and Post Carousel.
• Citations plugin: The plugin allows users to mark citations in their text and assign them a specific source and also offers a bibliography block.

💵 INVESTMENTS, ACQUISITIONS & PARTNERSHIPS

• Sezzle and WooCommerce expand partnership to provide flexible payment options: Now Woo merchants can easily integrate Sezzle’s buy now, pay later solution into their checkout process.
• Scale Consortium welcomes more agencies: The existing agencies in Scale Consortium including Crowd Favorite, Human Made, Inpsyde, The Code Company, and XWP, have further welcomed new agencies. They are Alley, BigBite, Reaktiv, rtCamp, and WebDevStudios.

👥 COMMUNITY NEWS

Updates and News from the WordPress Community

Jetpack launched Boost Image Analyzer

The image analyzer is designed to speed up websites by checking the size of the images and ensuring that the images are properly sized for both desktop and mobile users.

• WordPress Syntax Highlighter: Michelle Schulp Hunt and Matthias Hunt have created a new extension for VSCode, a Syntax Highlighter for intelligent FSE/Gutenberg Block Markup.
• ActivityPub released: The Activity Pub version 1.0.0 has been released and your WP blog can now be followed in the fediverse, and receive replies back as comments.
• MainWP introduced Fathom Extension: It enables you to monitor Fathom stats for all your Child Sites from one place.
• Shapo launched: Shapo allows users to collect, manage, and showcase testimonials and offers seamless integration with multiple web applications.
• WPML Export and Import 1.0 alpha: The alpha version of the new WPML Export and Import add-on plugin has been released.
• The WooExpert Awards: Americas, 2023: The winners are Zao, WPSpins, FirstTracks Marketing, Bright Vessel, and Kelp.
• WooSesh 2023: This year WooSesh will happen from October 10-12. The three-day event will have 31 speakers and 23 sessions. The speaker list and event schedule are now live.
• BerthaAI is two years old: A detailed post covering the origins of BerthaAI and how far it has grown.
• MB Custom Post Type plugin has reached a new milestone: The MB Custom Post Types & Custom Taxonomies plugin has reached a new milestone of 10k+ active installations. The plugin helps users register and edit custom post types and custom taxonomies easily in WordPress by providing an easy-to-use UI in the admin area.
• A small WordPress project management plugin for sale: It is being sold on Freemius, sub $1k MRR. Interested parties can DM Vikas Singhal.

🔖 INTERESTING READS & PODCASTS

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

• Automattic: 9 Year anniversary: From Anne McCarthy
• WP Constellations with Josepha Haden Chomphosy: From StellarWP
• WordPress 6.3 release leads: Experiences behind the scenes: From Hostinger
• Podcast with Hari Shanker: Nurturing contributors for the future of WordPress: From Hostinger
• How customer feedback loops benefit your bottom line and how to implement them: From WP Product Talk
• Olga Gleckler on how anyone can contribute to the WordPress Project: From WP Tavern Jukebox
• Writing block themes with Justin Tadlock: From In The Loop
• 7 Must-have pages every website needs (+ 11 Optional ones): From Torque
• What’s in a word? WordPress terminology at a crossroads: From Speckyboy
• 8 CSS & JavaScript snippets for creating blur effects: From Speckyboy
• MEAN Stack explained: From Kinsta
• 7 ways to improve product descriptions in your online store: From Yoast
• The 10 best social media management tools for businesses: From Jetpack
• A 6-minute process to diagnose E-E-A-T issues: From Search Engine Land
  

🛠 GUIDE ZONE – HOWTO’S and MORE

Handpicked fresh guides from WordPress circle

• Understanding block attributes: From WordPress Developer Blog
• The WordPress database: From Learn WordPress
• Creating your own custom synced or non-synced patterns: From Learn WordPress
• Examples of refactoring PHP code for better readability: From Delicious Brains
• What is secure shell (SSH) & how to use it: From Sucuri
• How to switch from a classic theme to a block theme in WordPress: From Jetpack
• How to quickly unpublish a WordPress Page: From RankMath
• How to quickly schedule content updates in WordPress: From RankMath

📆 SAVE THE DATES

Do not miss a WordPress event ever again

• WordCamp Rochester on September 30, 2023: Call for volunteers and sponsors is now open.
• WordCamp Masaka on October 6-7, 2023: Tickets are available now.
• WordCamp Deutschland 2023 on Oct 19-21, 2023: Call for speakers is now open.
• WordCamp Mumbai on October 28-29: The event is in the early planning stages.
• WordCamp Montreal on November 8-9, 2023: Tickets are available now.
• WordCamp Manila on November 11, 2023: The call for speakers is now live.
• WordCamp Asia on March 7-9, 2024: Call for speakers, volunteers, and media partners is now open.

🎁 WORDPRESS DEALS OF THE WEEK

Just the best deals of the week, again, handpicked by yours truly!

EXCLUSIVE DEALS

• 4 Months free offer on hosting plans of WP Engine (Coupon Code- FREEDOMTOCREATE)
• 15% off yearly plans at Videvo (Coupon Code – WPV15)

OTHER DEALS

• Up to 40% off for CartFlows
• 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
• Up to 75% off hosting plans at HostPapa
• 50% off for Advanced Giftcards for WooCommerce plugin
• 55% off for Annual Hosting plans at Nexcess
• 85% off at AtlasVPN 
• 20% off for Fluent Forms plugin
• 50% off at Formidable Forms
• 20% off for FluentCRM plugin
• 50% off for WP Social Ninja plugin 
• Upto 95% off for PitchGround products 
• Upto 65% off WordPress Hosting plans at InMotion Hosting
• 77% off hosting plans at SiteGround
• 60% off at Hostgator India (Coupon Code – SUNSHINE)
• Up to 74% off on 24 month VPS Plans at Liquid Web
• 50% off on Managed Dedicated Server Hosting at Liquid Web

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