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My name is Nathan Wrigley. Jukebox is a podcast</p>\n\n\n\n<p>which is dedicated to all things WordPress. The people, the events, the plugins, the blocks, the themes, and in this case, the move from agency owner to WordPress theme development company, and finally to plugin success.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;d like to subscribe to the podcast, you can do that by searching for WP Tavern in your podcast player of choice. Or by going to wptavern.com/feed/podcast, and you can copy that URL into most podcast players.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a topic that you&#8217;d like us to feature on the podcast, I&#8217;m keen to hear from you and hopefully get you, or your idea, featured on the show. Head to wptavern.com/contact/jukebox and use the form there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So on the podcast today we have Katie Keith.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Katie is a founder and CEO of Barn2 plugins. With a background deeply rooted in WordPress, Katie&#8217;s journey presents an interesting narrative of transformation, from the early days of running a WordPress agency, to now managing a flourishing plugin business Barn2 plugins has a portfolio of 19 premium plugins, many of which extend functionalities inside WooCommerce</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today, Katie previews her upcoming lightning talk, which she&#8217;ll be giving at WordCamp Asia. She talks about the transition from agency work to plugin development, highlighting early challenges and choices that shaped the business&#8217; path.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We get into the initial allure of client projects, and their subsequent realization of the benefits offered by productizing their skills for global reach. Katie describes the decisions that led them to WordPress plugins with products like WooCommerce Protected Categories and Document Library Pro, and explores how customer feedback and market needs drove their product diversification.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>As Katie explains, the plugin world wasn&#8217;t without its hurdles. There was trial and error involved in launching new products. This underscores the importance of market research. Additionally, she touches on Barn2&#8217;s current pivot into Shopify apps, aiming for diversification to help ensure that the business has stability by being available across multiple platforms.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Katie investigates the current WordPress and WooCommerce landscape, discussing how she perceives the industry will change, potential growth areas, and the necessity of staying agile.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re curious about the intricacies of building a plugin business, or are seeking inspiration from someone who has already navigated the WordPress ecosystem, this episode is for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re interested in finding out more, you can find all of the links in the show notes by heading to wptavern.com/podcast, where you&#8217;ll find all the other episodes as well. And so, without further delay, I bring you Katie Keith.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am joined on the podcast by Katie Keith.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:29] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Hey, Nathan.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:30] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Very nice to have you on the podcast. Katie and I have met, actually many times in person over at a variety of different WordCamps. This conversation that we&#8217;re going to have today is inspired by a WordCamp, but a WordCamp which hasn&#8217;t taken place yet. Because Katie is heading off to Manila in a few days time to give a lightning talk at WordCamp Asia. Do you just want to, before we get a bio properly, do you want to tell us what you&#8217;re going to talk about and then we&#8217;ll learn more about you?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:52] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yep. So my talk is going to be a lightning talk about my story, specifically the transition from being a WordPress agency into a WordPress plugin company.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:03] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Now that&#8217;s the perfect opportunity to give us your little bio. So don&#8217;t reveal all the detail of everything that you want to talk about, but just tell us the one minute potted history of you, WordPress, technology, wherever you want to land with that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:16] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, so I&#8217;m Katie Keith, founder and CEO at Barn2 plugins. We are a, as you probably guessed, a plugin shop. We currently have 19 premium plugins, a few free ones, and that&#8217;s about it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But as we&#8217;ll talk about this more later, we started life as an agency building WordPress sites for clients, and then over the years we&#8217;ve switched into plugins.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We mostly specialise in WooCommerce plugins. So about 14 of our 19 are building extra functionality for WooCommerce. And we&#8217;ve also got a really popular document library plugin, which is not for WooCommerce.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:54] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Haven&#8217;t you pivoted a little bit in the direction of Shopify as well?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:57] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, that is in progress. So the current growth strategy is to continue what we&#8217;re doing with the WordPress side of things, and also to diversify into selling Shopify apps so that we are across multiple platforms, and largely as a sort of stability thing, so that we spread any risks. Because we&#8217;re all dependent on WordPress at the moment, which is obviously a good horse to back and always has been. 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And then, to answer your question, at this point, the client work was better than having jobs, but it wasn&#8217;t quite the lifestyle you wanted, in that we wanted more flexibility where we&#8217;re not like on call to clients all the time.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If someone&#8217;s website goes down when you&#8217;re on holiday, you&#8217;ve got to fix it. And we did try to get help, project managers and things. And we did do well getting freelance designers and developers, but we just couldn&#8217;t find anybody that we could trust to communicate with the clients for us. And that really put a limitation on the lifestyle benefits because we were on, mainly me, we&#8217;re on call to clients all the time. So we thought, actually maybe that&#8217;s not the right business model.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:38] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You&#8217;re also selling your time for money, and going through that feast famine life cycle where one project is ongoing. And then at what point do you sort of cut that off and say, okay, we need to start looking for the next one, even though we haven&#8217;t quite finished this one. There&#8217;s inevitably going to be some overlap where that all just works out well. And obviously the agencies which grow and scale and become enterprise, they just have that figured somehow.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>My experience with that was always that there was a period where you were quite uncertain as to where the next website was going to come from. And you were, like I said, just trading your time for money. And WordPress offers so much more than that. You&#8217;ve got yourself into a kind of global marketplace where you could build a thing and then sell that thing 1,000 times, 10,000 times over, which I guess, where we&#8217;re going next. But you didn&#8217;t go to plugins first. You actually went into themes, which was a bit of a, well, a bit of a dead end it turns out. But tell us about the theme building enterprise.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:11:35] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, so because of all those things you&#8217;ve mentioned, selling time for money and the lifestyle thing, we thought selling WordPress products would be a much better business model because it could scale more. You can build one product and then sell it an unlimited number of times in theory, instead of selling one hour for a certain amount of money.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we thought products are good. And we looked at the products and thought, ah, themes are the way to go. Themes seemed to be a big growth area, well, they were a big growth area. This is 2013.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And when we started work in about 2012 on our first, our only theme, ThemeForest was just growing loads. Plugins existed, but you didn&#8217;t hear about super successful plugin companies particularly. Whereas you could go on ThemeForest and you could see the sales that the big themes were getting, and it was very tempting to be part of that. So we thought, let&#8217;s build a theme. So we did. And it took like a year because of all the demands of client work. So it was just a sideline, building this theme. And then in that year ThemeForest changed, which we didn&#8217;t see coming. ThemeForest changed in the year we were building our theme.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we&#8217;d analysed the themes that were successful at the time, and they were quite simple. They were nice, designed, often quite bold, clear designs, a bit minimal, and didn&#8217;t have that many features. And then between 2012 and 2013, themes such as uDesign and Avada and that kind of thing became popular. And they were massive multipurpose themes with so many features. And that wasn&#8217;t what we wanted to do. We wanted a product that we could maintain and develop ourselves easily, and it wouldn&#8217;t be this massive headache or anything like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it just wasn&#8217;t what we wanted. And of course, that meant they rejected our theme because it wasn&#8217;t the sort of theme they were looking for. I think they would&#8217;ve accepted it a year before, but they didn&#8217;t when we got actually ready to submit it. So we were like, ah, do we rewrite the theme and make it loads more complicated? Do we sell it independently? And I wasn&#8217;t confident in my ability to market a theme independently, because you&#8217;re competing with the giants. And I didn&#8217;t have experience of that. I wanted to be on a marketplace.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:13:51] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I think back in the day, 2013, like you mentioned, ThemeForest was the place to go for things like that, wasn&#8217;t it? And although I wasn&#8217;t really in the WordPress space, I jumped in after that endeavor. When I got there, ThemeForest was already, basically saturated with themes that could, well, themes that claimed to do more or less everything. You just buy this one theme and it can do everything. Or there was also a dearth of themes which offered a specific kind of functionality, like a real estate, or you might say, realtor theme, or a portfolio theme or, I don&#8217;t know, I&#8217;m a gym owner, I need a theme for my gym.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Kind of felt like it went in that direction, but it seems like you were trying to build something which was more agnostic of industry. It was just a, here&#8217;s the bare bones of a theme, you now go and do the artistic work. But yeah, like you say, ThemeForest was going off in a different direction.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So what happened there? Was it a case of staring at each other and saying, okay, what do we do? Do we try to pivot this theme? Or did you just at some point say, no, abandon it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:14:51] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> We were fairly depressed and disappointed and just gave up for a few years. So we carried on with the client work, which was going fine. We had a successful business that was keeping us both going. We didn&#8217;t need to do products. So we just continued with the client work.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:08] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Okay, so steady away. And then what was the moment where you, kind of had the revelation about plugins? Because, again, coming into the WordPress space, 2015, something like that, plugins and themes were already selling like hotcakes. I don&#8217;t really know about the period in which plugins was a bit new, a bit maybe dangerous, a bit, putting your business on the line with plugins. Maybe that was a tough one back then, I don&#8217;t know.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:30] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> By the time it got to 2016, I supppose frustrations accumulate over time. So we were again like, oh, the client works just kind of annoying. It&#8217;s not quite flexible enough, and it&#8217;s not scaling enough, it&#8217;s just going up a little bit. So we need to do products. What shall we do again?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And this time we thought, well, plugins could work because unlike these massive multipurpose themes, a plugin can be really tiny or it can be incredibly complex. A plugin can just be a line of code, you know, as an extreme minimum. So we thought, well, that way we can choose products that fit with the scale that we want to offer technically. I hated the idea of a big theme or a massive plugin because you kind of end up being responsible for basically the user&#8217;s whole website.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So imagine if somebody&#8217;s using a theme which takes over their whole site, and it affects every aspect of the visuals. They&#8217;re going to send you a support ticket for everything, even if it&#8217;s not the theme&#8217;s fault. And then you are going to have to prove it&#8217;s not the theme&#8217;s fault. And we just thought that&#8217;s not sustainable.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I think the same would happen with really large plugins like, I don&#8217;t know, a membership plugin or an e-commerce plugin or something thing like that. So we thought, well, we are just the two of us, plus our freelancers, so let&#8217;s choose a more realistic plugin idea and build it and see what happens.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:16:54] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So you always had the agency, the client based websites. That was the backup plan. Always something to fall back on if the plugin business didn&#8217;t work out. You took the plunge. What was the first plugin that you came up with?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:07] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> So the first plugin, we found by going on a website, which used to exist, which was the WooCommerce Ideas Forum. They used to have a whole website where people just gave ideas and, basically feature request board. But they have that now if people want to look, but I think it&#8217;s per extension instead of a whole thing for WooCommerce. So you access it differently and it&#8217;s hard to find. But there was this whole website.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we went on this and you can sort it by the number of votes for each suggestion. And we chose an idea which had the highest number of votes that wasn&#8217;t that complex to build, which was WooCommerce password protected categories, which is very specific.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:47] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> That&#8217;s a great title, I like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:48] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, nice and snappy. WordPress itself already has password protection for its posts and pages, but not categories, and therefore WooCommerce doesn&#8217;t have it for its categories either. And people were saying that they wanted it for things like building a wholesale site, or selling different products to different clients.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you imagine that you sell products to sports teams and they each have a logo, so the product&#8217;s different for each team, you might create a protected category for that team to log in and order their branded sportswear. Those sorts of use cases. And we thought, well, that&#8217;s quite simple. You just add a category field to the page and a few other features like login and things.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we built the plugin. It wasn&#8217;t that difficult, and we launched it. And because it was unique and I was a marketer, I wrote a few blog posts about it, like how to password protect categories in WooCommerce, really niche posts. They went right to the top of Google because you could then, and there was nobody else offering that. And we actually started getting sales after about three days. And we were like, we are getting sales for our plugin and we couldn&#8217;t believe it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:18:57] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> That is quite remarkable because I know the story is harder now than ever. That story is very hard to replicate because, you know, the market is saturated.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But just going back to your actual plugin, realistically, when you built that and you saw that idea, okay, we&#8217;re going to password protect a category, and it will impact WooCommerce, so I don&#8217;t know, we could send it to company A and the category will be A, and they can access it with a password, and we&#8217;ll send it to company B, and the category will be B and they can access it and so on.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Honestly, what was your expectation at that point? Because coming into the community, it&#8217;s hard to understand, how big is WordPress? And then the layer underneath that, how big is the plugin which sits inside of WordPress, WooCommerce, how big is that? And then we&#8217;ve got this niche little one, just does one tiny thing. Honestly, what were your expectations?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:19:44] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Very low. It was an experiment. It wasn&#8217;t a huge amount of work. Basically, Andy stopped doing some agency work for a while, and I relied on the freelance developers a bit more while he coded it. It wasn&#8217;t a big sacrifice for us to build it, and we didn&#8217;t have any kind of a business plan or projections or anything. It was just, let&#8217;s launch a small plugin and see what happens.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And we were amazed. And it still exists now. It&#8217;s now called WooCommerce Protected Categories because it has different ways of protecting the category, not just passwords, like user role and that kind of thing. And it actually, a few months ago it met half a million dollars in revenue lifetime. So that tiny idea has done half a million dollars in 8 years.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:20:30] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So how quickly did that money start to roll in? And so it doesn&#8217;t have to be about money, the amount of, I don&#8217;t know, plugin licenses that you sold or whatever it may be. But how quickly did your intuition turn to, oh, there is really something in this? Like you mentioned you got a sale or two within two or three days, which is exciting. But obviously if it then just sort of trickled along one or two a week, it is exciting, but it&#8217;s not that exciting.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And what was the point where you and Andy started to look at each other and think, woah, we could potentially forget all the agency work if we now pivot into this? How long did it take you to make those decisions?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:21:03] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, because that was just pocket money, the first sales. It was just nice because it&#8217;s an indication that it could work. So that kept growing. And we also launched other plugins as well. Like our second one came from a client project.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The client paid us to build a custom plugin, which was a searchable, sortable table of blog posts for their blog. So they had hundreds of blog posts and they wanted a more easy way for people to find them. So we built this table plugin, and we launched it on wordpress.org as a free plugin called Post Table with Search and Sort. So that&#8217;s just as good a name as WooCommerce Password Protected Category.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:21:40] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Got the SEO juice going there, definitely.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:21:43] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Oh yeah, it does what it says. So that was a free plugin, but that led to a lot of sales because people started sending us feature requests once it was on wordpress.org.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the first ones wanted custom fields, custom taxonomies, and custom post types, rather than just blog posts in their table. So they might want to create like a table of documents or members for a directory of consultants or something like that, like custom post types and data. So we built Post Table Pro, which was the premium version, and that&#8217;s done really well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then people started asking for even more features, which we used to develop different plugins. So we built WooCommerce Product Table, which is a WooCommerce version of that table, which has things like add to cart buttons and variation dropdowns.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so that cluster of plugins that came from this free table plugin is what really kind of catapulted the success. So that within about six months of launching our first plugin we were making, I don&#8217;t know, several thousand dollars a month. And we thought, given that we have some revenue from clients like maintenance and hosting, so our existing clients were paying us for certain things, we can afford to stop taking new projects, and therefore put more resources into building more plugins, and improving our existing ones, and marketing them, of course. So it was about six months that we decided, let&#8217;s stop accepting new client projects.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:23:13] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So the plugin that you just mentioned there, the sorting of the tables, it sounds like you got that out of a client project. So it was actually a client that came to you. We need this idea and, okay, we&#8217;ll build that. But then the back of that is, can we then take that code and run with it? Which you did. And then you&#8217;ve got the pro version, which adds in a bunch of different features. And now you&#8217;ve got two plugins and a third one came on quite quickly. We&#8217;re six months in, and the dollar signs are starting to make sense.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can see that, okay, there&#8217;s a living in this. We&#8217;ll take our foot off the client websites, but we&#8217;ll keep it going just in case something goes wrong. So I&#8217;m presuming though, at this point you are all guns aimed at, we need more plugins, more and more and more plugins. And so when did it become, okay, let&#8217;s just go in on Woo? How did you end up as Woo as opposed to just WordPress?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:23:59] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> We never did. Our biggest plugin now is Document Library Pro, which is not Woo, and that came from Post Table Pro as well. The biggest use case of Post Table Pro ended up being documents. So we built a document plugin that had download buttons and previews and stuff that&#8217;s specific to documents. Again, it&#8217;s just a table plugin, and that has been our biggest seller for the last three or four years since we launched it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So because of the success of that and Post Table Pro, we never could actually just be WooCommerce. So we are not like, say Iconic, who specialise in WooCommerce, that&#8217;s all they do.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we have this reputation of being WooCommerce. And I wish we were actually. Obviously I like having a successful plugin, but I wish that we had that clear identity because it&#8217;s, like I explained the business at the beginning in the introduction, I&#8217;m like, oh, we have these plugins, they&#8217;re mostly WooCommerce. It is not as clean as it could be.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:24:56] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Sitting where you are now, and we can get into the numbers of how many plugins and all of that that you&#8217;ve got. Have you made any missteps with, like has any plugin that you&#8217;ve built misfired completely? You thought this would be a great idea, let&#8217;s build it, let&#8217;s market it. But then you build it and the customers do not come. Or has every single one had a fair degree of, they don&#8217;t all have to be super successful, but has everything stood on its own two feet and been worth doing?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:25:20] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> It depends how you define success. But it&#8217;s largely relative. So if you&#8217;re doing one plugin that&#8217;s doing X a month, then if you have one that&#8217;s much smaller, that&#8217;s not necessarily worth it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I would say my biggest mistake, repeatedly, has been thinking too small. So I have a very bad track record of building plugins that are too small and too niche to be worth bothering with. Lots of examples.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>One example was WooCommerce Discontinued Products. So that adds a discontinued stock status to your store. We built it because we were hiring some new senior developers and we were doing a project for these developers. Before we hired them, we were paying them to build a small plugin to check how good they were. And we thought, well, the ones we hired, we may as well release their plugin. So we did.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We did WooCommerce Variation Prices, Discontinued Products. We had multiple plugins that were just trial projects for the developer, but they were good. And their first project after they joined properly was to complete the plugin, and make it sellable. But that&#8217;s a lot of work. You&#8217;ve got to create all the marketing images, the marketing content, the sales page, market it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Each plugin has an overhead as well as maintaining it. And so with hindsight, I shouldn&#8217;t have released all of those small plugins. And we actually sold five of our plugins last year to a WooCommerce company called Kestrel, because we had 24 at the time, and it was just too many. And I did an 80 20 rule analysis of the business and how much revenue was coming from each plugin. And that cluster of five were all doing, they were all doing at least several hundreds a month, but generally less than a thousand a month.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And compared to our other plugins, that was a small proportion. So I thought, let&#8217;s group these plugins and sell them to a company who would appreciate and grow them more, where that fits better with their business plan.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:17] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Are you still on the lookout for new ideas? Or do you want to just hunker down on the ones that you&#8217;ve got? In other words, do you constantly ideate and think, let&#8217;s find a new thing or is it more serendipity? You accidentally stumble across an idea, we should build that, and so we do. Or do you deliberately try, in the same way that you did previously going to the WooCommerce forum, do you try to find new products to build and see how they work?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:41] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> I suppose a bit of both depending on our current priorities. So for example, in 2024 last year, that&#8217;s when we sold the five plugins. And I thought, we&#8217;ve got a handful of really successful plugins, we need to put our resources into making them as good as they can be to maximise their potential sales.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So for example, instead we did launch one plugin last year, our WooCommerce Discount Plugin, but we were already building that when I made this decision. So once I made that decision, I put all our developers on adding features to our existing plugins, including some really big features.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, we have a WooCommerce Product Options plugin, which adds extra options to your product pages. And dozens and dozens and dozens of people were saying to us, we want live image previews. So when you use our plugin to upload an image to the product page, we want that to appear superimposed on a picture of the T-shirt, for example. So if you upload your picture of your child, that will appear on the T-shirt.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that was a big project. So we could have built a completely different plugin, but instead we added live preview. We actually did it as an add-on, so it&#8217;s sort of an extra plugin, but it&#8217;s dependent on the main plugin, and things like that. So we thought, what&#8217;s working and how could we make what&#8217;s working even more successful? But I do have a list of plugin ideas for the future.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:29:06] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So there&#8217;s a laundry list of things that you might build, but the priorities are not to build them all right away? Just see how the market goes. Speaking of that, speaking of the market, you&#8217;re obviously heavily embedded in WordPress, heavily embedded in WooCommerce. What do you make of the landscape at the moment?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You&#8217;re obviously beginning to pitch into Shopify a little bit as well, and I imagine you&#8217;re at pains to say we&#8217;re not taking our foot off the WordPress pedal. How do you feel the landscape is shaping up in 2025? It does seem like things are plateauing a little bit in terms of market share for WordPress, whether or not they&#8217;ll go up or down. How confident are you in the future? Is it still WordPress all the way down?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:29:42] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> I certainly don&#8217;t think WordPress is going anywhere, and it probably won&#8217;t shrink a lot, if at all. But I also don&#8217;t feel that we are having a rising tide that we can all ride the journey upwards like we used to. For example, in 2020 when everybody was locked down, there was huge growth for nearly all WordPress companies, because the world was going online so rapidly and we had a huge, huge growth very quickly.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then since then it has slowed down. The growth has slowed down and now seems fairly stable. Stable is a good word, but it&#8217;s not really growing in a particularly measurable way. And you could argue that that is just a correction because it went up so much, so quickly during the pandemic that maybe it just took a few years to get back to where it would&#8217;ve done if there was no pandemic.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So if you imagine a steep line rather than a big bump followed by a plateau. So you could argue that. But it feels like we have to work harder than we used to to see growth, and make that happen through our own efforts, rather than just relying on a growing market.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:48] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So obviously that would be nice if WordPress could keep going in that same way. What about Woo? Obviously we were just talking about WordPress. I don&#8217;t really involve myself with Woo so much, so I don&#8217;t really know what the statistics are. I know that in terms of e-commerce platforms, it&#8217;s the leader, but I don&#8217;t know if that&#8217;s sort of going up or going down. You got any insight in that?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:07] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> It is very confusing because it depends where you look. So there&#8217;s two main websites that publish data about e-commerce usage, and one of them says WooCommerce is the leader and the other says Shopify is. And they use slightly different data sets. For example, the top X websites in the world, versus the whole internet, versus a sample of a million, which they use to extrapolate upwards.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So there are different ways of looking at the data. So I genuinely don&#8217;t know, there probably is no correct answer, which is the biggest e-commerce platform, but they&#8217;re both doing really well and neither are going anywhere. So that&#8217;s why it felt that it made sense for us to be building products for both.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think WooCommerce is really interesting because it has a good reputation. It has, I think the best leadership team around it that I&#8217;ve seen in the 8 years I&#8217;ve been building plugins on top of it right now. But I wish they would do more marketing. They&#8217;re not promoting their platform in the way that say Shopify is, and that scares me. I would like to see them doing more centralised marketing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>They&#8217;re a company, they make money from WooCommerce, even though it&#8217;s free. They have extensions, they have revenue sharing from their Stripe and they have lots of ways of making money, which they&#8217;ve recently talked about publicly. And so I&#8217;d like them to be doing some proper marketing like Shopify does.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:32:29] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It is interesting, I know you no longer live in the UK. I do, and it doesn&#8217;t take many trips down high streets to realise that the high street is really in decline. You only have to walk down one street in more or less any town to realise that the shutters are going up, the wood is going over the doors, bricks and mortar shops are really struggling.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it&#8217;s this inexorable rise. I can only imagine that, well, people are still buying things, but they&#8217;re buying things increasingly on the internet. My age group, I imagine has been fairly straightforward, because we grew up when the internet was coming around. Children that are growing up now, I think they&#8217;re really just not interested in doing things like going into town in a sort of social way like I did. So I imagine that eCommerce&#8217;s future, just generally e-commerce, platform agnostic, you&#8217;ve got to imagine its got everything going for it, I would&#8217;ve thought.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:33:24] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, that makes sense. And we often look at things like market share data, but that&#8217;s just a percentage. So even if WordPress&#8217; market, or let&#8217;s say WooCommerce&#8217;s market share did go down at some point, if the whole of e-commerce was growing, then WooCommerce could still be growing. And it doesn&#8217;t really matter so much if it&#8217;s smaller percentage, if the whole cake is bigger.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I think that&#8217;s the case. And you do see quite regularly published e-commerce data about, particularly after Black Friday, like the most revenue ever went through e-commerce sites this Black Friday. And it does seem to be constantly growing. And I think that is primarily through websites. A lot of people are buying through apps, of course, instead of websites, particularly something like Amazon or even Temu or something these days. But I think e-commerce websites are still huge and I can&#8217;t see that changing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:34:15] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> No, because in most of the towns that I&#8217;ve visited where I can see this, the big, we call them department stores in the UK. An example might be something like Marks &amp; Spencer. They&#8217;ve got a branch in more or less every town. You kind of feel that they&#8217;re immune. They&#8217;ve got their online bit as well, so they&#8217;ve probably inoculated themselves in that way. They&#8217;ve just got so much kudos, and so much loyalty built in that you feel they might be immune for a period of time.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But all of the little shops, the little jeweler, the little corner shop selling a thing that they build, whatever it may be, you kind of feel they are going to struggle because the footfall is less. They really do fit into what you sell. I&#8217;m reasonably technical, but I can&#8217;t build, I can&#8217;t code, I can&#8217;t do any of that, so I need a solution.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think the future for WooCommerce and the kind of things that you create and sell, I think the future&#8217;s really bright because I see that market just going up and up. The younger people are going to be wanting to use their devices because they&#8217;re all really fascinated by them, everybody&#8217;s got a mobile phone nowadays. The footfall is sort of falling away, and it all seems like a perfect storm for e-commerce to grow. I could be being overly optimistic there, but it feels like it&#8217;s fair weather for the next decade or so.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:35:26] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Yeah, I know what you mean. And it&#8217;s a good example to use those small shops because even if they keep their storefront, which probably isn&#8217;t profitable, they should be selling online. And small shops, they&#8217;ve got a few choices, that could be WooCommerce. That might be harder to set up in the first place, they might need to hire someone. But then their costs are super, super low compared to most platforms.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>They could go for Shopify, which is slightly reversed in that sense. Or they could use something like Etsy if they&#8217;re a jeweller, to use your example. So there&#8217;s lots of ways for them to sell online, but they do need to be thinking of it for their survival because of the decline of things like the high street, as you say.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:36:03] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, I think so. Looking back, again, just casting your mind back to 2013 when you began all of this. Do you think that you were lucky when you decided to pivot into making plugins? What I&#8217;m really saying is, if you were beginning now in 2025, everything was the same, it was just 12 years later, 2013 to 2025. Do you think you&#8217;d have the same degree of success with the exact same kind of approach to it?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Basically, has the market got harder, more saturated, more difficult to sell into, more savvy? Anything around there. Do you feel, basically, you were lucky in terms of timing?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:36:38] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> I think to an extent. I don&#8217;t believe it&#8217;s fully saturated yet, but it is more full than it was when we started. So when we started, there were no WooCommerce protected category plugins, there were no WordPress dynamic table plugins, there were no document library plugins, there were no product table plugins for WooCommerce.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we managed to do that because those were gaps. Now they&#8217;re not. And now we&#8217;ve done successful plugins in those categories people have copied. So we have competition now, which came along after we launched. So those are no longer gaps. But I do firmly believe that there are still gaps that you can fill.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the way to find them is through already being in WordPress in some way, which most typically is through building sites for clients, or doing some kind of client work. Because they will always find a gap and ask you to fill it through a custom plugin or something like that. So if you concentrate hard enough on the client work that you&#8217;re getting, you probably will find gaps.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And if you find something that doesn&#8217;t already exist, then yes, you could get to the top of Google quickly for a very specific keyword. Of course, WordPress and WooCommerce are much bigger now than they were in 2016 when we launched our first plugin. So even if it&#8217;s slightly more diluted with competition, the market is bigger. So there is potential now you&#8217;re a part of a bigger market.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:03] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So last question really, Katie. Do you see WordPress being the thing for you and your husband, the business you are going to pursue for the next decade or so, or do you think you will be scrambling around for more opportunities in the Shopify space? I don&#8217;t know, other CMSs, pivot completely, who knows? What does the future hold? What&#8217;s the next decade looking like from where you sit right now?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:24] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> I must admit, I&#8217;m not very good at long-term planning. I just do what feels right for the short and medium term.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:31] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It&#8217;s worked.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:32] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Well, yeah, exactly. Does it matter? You do something and then you focus on what works and learn and keep iterating. I think that&#8217;s why I haven&#8217;t created, I don&#8217;t know, hundreds of million dollar worth business because I&#8217;m not a visionary that has this long-term view that I&#8217;ll do anything to make it happen.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Instead, I try something and keep learning, which has created a successful business, but in a more steady growth kind of way. So I&#8217;d rather be that visionary, but I&#8217;m not. It&#8217;s hard to know personally. I think you wanted to talk about the fact that my husband left the business about 8 months ago now. He&#8217;d lost his passion for it and wanted to reflect on other things he could do for the rest of his career, which he&#8217;s still doing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I&#8217;m now running it on my own and he owns half of it, so that might affect the future. We talked about whether he should sell his share, for example, at the time, and he decided, oh, WordPress is growing so nicely, it&#8217;s so stable, he&#8217;ll leave his money in the business.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, since then there&#8217;s been all this drama, so we are thinking, was that the right call? Should we get some money out?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I love what I do and want to stay doing what I&#8217;m doing for the foreseeable future. But we could do something like take on a partner or investment or something if Andy wants to, say, invest his half elsewhere. So there&#8217;s that, which might affect our future.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:39:54] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Oh gosh, that&#8217;s interesting. So, you heard here first. If people wanted to get in touch with you, Katie, not necessarily about taking on half the business or anything like that, but they&#8217;re just curious about what we&#8217;ve talked about today, or anything else related to WooCommerce plugins, et cetera, where would you be hanging out online? Is that a social network or an email? What&#8217;s the best thing?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:40:15] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> So for company stuff, it&#8217;s Barn2.com to check out our plugins and so on. And for me, the most active place that I am would be Twitter, which is katiekeithbarn2.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:40:27] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So Katie Keith, I appreciate you chatting to me today. Thank you so much and every success for 2025 and beyond. Thank you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:40:34] <strong>Katie Keith:</strong> Thanks for having me.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>On the podcast today we have <a href=\"https://x.com/katiekeithbarn2\">Katie Keith</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Katie is a founder and CEO of <a href=\"https://barn2.com/\">Barn2 Plugins</a>. With a background deeply rooted in WordPress, Katie&#8217;s journey presents an interesting narrative of transformation, from the early days of running a WordPress agency, to now managing a flourishing plugin business. Barn2 plugins has a portfolio of 19 premium plugins, many of which extend functionalities in WooCommerce.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Today, Katie previews her upcoming lightning talk which she’ll be giving at WordCamp Asia. She talks about the transition from agency work to plugin development, highlighting early challenges and choices that shaped the business’ path.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We get into the initial allure of client projects and their subsequent realisation of the benefits offered by productising their skills for global reach. Katie describes the decisions that led them to WordPress plugins, with products like WooCommerce Protected Categories and Document Library Pro, and explores how customer feedback and market needs drove their product diversification.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>As Katie explains, the plugin world wasn’t without its hurdles. There was trial and error involved in launching new products. This underscored the importance of market research. Additionally, she touches on Barn2&#8217;s current pivot into Shopify apps, aiming for diversification to help ensure that the business has stability by being available across multiple platforms.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Katie investigates the current WordPress and WooCommerce landscape, discussing how she perceives the industry will change, potential growth areas, and the necessity of staying agile.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you’re curious about the intricacies of building a plugin business, or are seeking inspiration from someone who has already navigated the WordPress ecosystem, this episode is for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Useful links</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://barn2.com/\">Barn2 website</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.shopify.com/\">Shopify</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://themeforest.net/\">Themeforest</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://iconicwp.com/\">Iconic website</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://x.com/katiekeithbarn2\">Katie&#8217;s X profile</a></p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 19 Feb 2025 15:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:14:\"Nathan Wrigley\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:3;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:99:\"Do The Woo Community: Why You Shouldn’t Miss WP:25: A Virtual Deep Dive into Enterprise 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A Chat with Nathan Tyler.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=90640\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:76:\"https://dothewoo.io/decisions-partners-and-pricing-a-chat-with-nathan-tyler/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:247:\"In this episode of Woo BizChat, Nathan Tyler discusses crucial business decisions for plugin and SaaS owners, covering pricing strategies, customer support, partnerships, and transitioning from services to product development for sustained growth.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 18 Feb 2025 10:30:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:7;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:21:\"Matt: Sun and shadows\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:38:\"https://ma.tt/2025/02/sun-and-shadows/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:38:\"https://ma.tt/2025/02/sun-and-shadows/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:133:\"<img width=\"604\" height=\"702\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/ma.tt/files/2025/02/image.jpg?resize=604%2C702&ssl=1\" class=\"wp-image-137931\" />\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 18 Feb 2025 01:06:58 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4:\"Matt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:8;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:68:\"Gravatar: How to Be Better at Networking: Leverage Existing Contacts\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:32:\"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=2864\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:68:\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2025/02/17/how-to-be-better-at-networking/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:11047:\"<p>Did you know that <a href=\"https://images.forbes.com/forbesinsights/StudyPDFs/Business_Meetings_FaceToFace.pdf\">85% of people build stronger business relationships</a> through in-person networking compared to online? That sounds promising, but the reality is that many professionals still struggle to turn brief connections into meaningful career opportunities. Networking can feel overwhelming, especially for those who face social anxiety or find traditional approaches too transactional.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The good news? <strong>Building genuine relationships doesn’t have to feel like a chore.</strong> By focusing on leveraging the contacts you already have and combining practical strategies with powerful digital tools, networking can become both effective and enjoyable.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This guide will walk you through actionable tips to help you maximize your current network, rekindle dormant connections, and stand out with tools like Gravatar, a <a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/11/08/creating-a-digital-business-card/\">digital business card</a> that keeps your professional presence consistent and memorable.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Turn connections into lasting professional relationships</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Here&#8217;s a counterintuitive truth about networking: <strong>your most valuable professional connections might be people you haven&#8217;t spoken to in years. </strong>While most of us focus on maintaining active relationships or making new ones, <a href=\"https://www.researchgate.net/publication/220520957_Dormant_Ties_The_Value_Of_Reconnecting\">research from Organization Science</a> reveals that reconnecting with dormant contacts often yields greater benefits than relying on current ties. These forgotten connections – rich with untapped potential and fresh perspectives – could be the key to your next career breakthrough.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, what can you do to take advantage of those?&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Start by conducting a </strong><a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/06/16/how-to-network-at-a-conference/\"><strong>network audit</strong></a><strong>.</strong> List your contacts and assess which connections may have gone inactive but still hold relevance. Using tools like Gravatar, you can revitalize your professional presence by ensuring your contact details and digital profiles are updated. This unified presence boosts credibility and simplifies re-engagement.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>When reaching out, avoid generic follow-ups.</strong> Instead, build on shared professional interests or reference past collaborations to create meaningful touchpoints. For example, share an article or idea relevant to their industry. Crafting a strong elevator pitch is essential here – it’s your opportunity to leave a lasting impression when reconnecting.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Finally, don’t let </strong><a href=\"https://hbr.org/2022/05/if-networking-makes-you-anxious-try-this\"><strong>networking anxiety</strong></a><strong> hold you back.</strong> It’s normal to feel nervous, but simple techniques like visualization and scripting your conversations in advance can ease those worries​. With practice and intentionality, reconnecting with dormant ties can transform them into enduring professional relationships.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Making authentic follow-ups that get responses</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Imagine reconnecting with an old colleague. During your initial call, you discuss a mutual interest in emerging industry trends, such as AI-powered customer insights. A week later, you follow up by sharing a report on the topic, along with a thoughtful note: “Our chat inspired me to dive deeper into this – thought you’d find it interesting too.” This kind of personalized follow-up shows genuine interest and keeps the conversation alive.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sharing relevant industry insights or opportunities is a simple but powerful way to create value. It positions you as someone who contributes rather than merely seeks help. For example, sending an article that aligns with their current projects or highlighting a conference they might enjoy can make you memorable.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>If starting these conversations feels daunting, practice a few </strong><a href=\"https://www.themuse.com/advice/30-brilliant-networking-conversation-starters\"><strong>go-to openers</strong></a><strong>. </strong>Questions like, “What inspired you to attend this event?” or “What’s been the most exciting project you’ve worked on recently?” are engaging and natural​. You can also keep it light and personal with openers like, “Have you been to this venue before?” or “What’s your favorite part about working in this industry?”</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>When reconnecting via email or LinkedIn, make your opener personal and specific. </strong>A great example could be referencing a shared memory: “I was just thinking about the project we worked on together back in 2018 – still one of the most innovative teams I’ve been a part of!” These thoughtful touches can make the difference between a generic interaction and one that leads to a meaningful, lasting connection.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Using Gravatar to stay memorable after meetings</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1397\" height=\"716\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/gravatar-new-homepage-1.png\" alt=\"The Gravatar homepage\" class=\"wp-image-2867\" />\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://gravatar.com/\">Gravatar</a> offers an easy way to leave a lasting impression after professional meetings. By creating a unified digital profile, Gravatar ensures that your contact information and portfolio remain accessible and automatically updated across platforms like <a href=\"https://wordpress.com/\">WordPress</a>, <a href=\"https://github.com/\">GitHub</a>, and <a href=\"https://slack.com/\">Slack</a>.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1421\" height=\"985\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/ronnie-gravatar-profile-3.png\" alt=\"Example of a Gravatar profile\" class=\"wp-image-2868\" />\n\n\n\n<p>But the standout feature for networking? <strong>QR codes.</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<p>Gravatar enables users to generate personalized QR codes linked directly to their profiles. Imagine this: You’re wrapping up a productive meeting, and instead of fumbling for a physical business card, you share your Gravatar QR code. Scanning it instantly provides your connection with access to your contact details, social links, and a dynamic calendar link for easy follow-ups​.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The code itself is hidden behind your Gravatar profile picture and to see it, you just need to click the little icon on the top right corner.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1474\" height=\"974\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/gravatar-qr-code.png\" alt=\"Example of profile QR code\" class=\"wp-image-2869\" />\n\n\n\n<p>However, if you’re a developer, you could even <a href=\"https://docs.gravatar.com/api/profiles/qr-codes/\">customize the QR code</a> by adjusting its size and style, and even include your avatar or logo at its center. The codes can be embedded on name tags, event lanyards, or even digital signatures, making them a versatile tool for any networking scenario that includes <a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/08/02/organizational-benefits-of-efficient-contact-sharing/\">contact sharing​</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This not only saves time but also positions you as tech-savvy and organized – qualities that help you stand out. With a Gravatar profile and QR code, staying memorable is as easy as a quick scan.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://gravatar.com/connect/?gravatar_from=blog\"><img width=\"3243\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/free_profile_cta.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2616\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Stand out at conferences: Strategies and digital tools for real-world networking</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Industry conferences often bring together professionals from all stages of your career – making them perfect opportunities to reconnect with dormant contacts and forge new relationships. Here&#8217;s how to maximize these moments:</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Before the conference</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Review the attendee list for former colleagues and new people you’d like to connect with.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Use LinkedIn to identify which of these people (old and new contacts) will be speaking or attending.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Plan your schedule around sessions where you&#8217;re likely to encounter these contacts.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>During the conference</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Use Gravatar&#8217;s QR code on your name tag with a note like &#8220;Worked at [Previous Company] 2018-2020&#8221; to help former colleagues recognize you.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>After reconnecting, use <a href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/help/linkedin/answer/a554240\">LinkedIn Live</a> to host quick session recaps, tagging relevant colleagues and attendees to maintain engagement.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Log reconnections in CRM tools like <a href=\"https://www.hubspot.com/products/crm\">HubSpot</a> or <a href=\"https://www.zoho.com/\">Zoho</a>, noting shared history and current interests. Then, you can set reminders to follow up with a personalized email a week later.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Post-conference follow-up</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Use <a href=\"https://zapier.com/\">Zapier</a> to automate personalized follow-ups that reference your shared history.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Share conference insights relevant to your reconnected contacts&#8217; current roles.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Schedule virtual coffee chats to continue conversations started at the event.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Set up your professional digital hub in five minutes</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>With Gravatar, setting up a professional digital hub is quick and simple. Here’s how to get started:</p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"http://gravatar.com\">Register on Gravatar.com</a> and upload a professional photo to ensure a consistent, recognizable online presence.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Include LinkedIn, GitHub, or other platforms where your professional work is showcased.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Highlight your expertise and current role to make a great first impression.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Use Gravatar’s QR code feature to share your profile at conferences or in follow-up emails​.</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<p>In minutes, you’ll have a centralized, dynamic digital business card that keeps your contact details and portfolio accessible across platforms. Whether you’re connecting online or in person, Gravatar ensures you stay memorable and organized with minimal effort.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://gravatar.com/connect/?gravatar_from=blog\"><img width=\"3243\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/free_profile_cta.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2616\" /></a>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Mon, 17 Feb 2025 16:23:15 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:11:\"Ronnie Burt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:9;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:47:\"Do The Woo Community: Do the Woo v4.2 Changelog\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:43:\"https://dothewoo.io/?post_type=blog&p=89017\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:51:\"https://dothewoo.io/blog/do-the-woo-v4-2-changelog/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:212:\"Version 4.2 introduces new shows including WooCommerce Accessibility Insights and WP Agency Tracks, hosts Marcus Burnette, Mark Westguard, and Matthias Pfefferle, while deleting All Things WordPress and Woo Show.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sat, 15 Feb 2025 09:30:31 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:10;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:45:\"WordPress.org blog: Report: WordPress in 2025\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:35:\"https://wordpress.org/news/?p=18475\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:60:\"https://wordpress.org/news/2025/02/wordpress-in-2025-report/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:2965:\"<p>This year is set to be transformative for WordPress, yet many decision-makers risk overlooking the immense opportunities ahead. 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For complex sites, hybrid architectures leveraging both are the pragmatic path forward.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/news/files/2025/02/WordPress-in-2025-Report-Noel-Tock.pdf\">Download the full WordPress in 2025 (PDF)</a> report directly to learn more.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Don’t miss WP:25, the virtual event.</h3>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://humanmade.com/wordpress-in-2025-event/?utm_campaign=41192678-WordPress%20in%202025&utm_source=event&utm_medium=Noel%20sales%20outreach&utm_content=event%20landing%20page\">Save your spot at our free event, WP:25</a>, exploring the future of WordPress and featuring key people working with many of the ideas discussed in the report. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>About the report&#8217;s author, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/noel_tock/\">Noel Tock</a></strong> — Having built his first website back in 1995, Noel has long been watching the evolution of the CMS space. 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Within this vibrant country lies <strong>Mukono</strong>, a fast-growing town known for its dynamic community, top-tier educational institutions, and entrepreneurial spirit. Mukono is not just a town—it is a hub of ideas, innovation, and collaboration.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This Year, Mukono will host one of the most anticipated WordPress events in East Africa: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/\">WordCamp Mukono 2025</a>. This gathering of WordPress enthusiasts, developers, designers, marketers, and content creators will take place on <strong>March 8, 2025</strong>, at the <a href=\"https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=mukono+synod+hall&sei=nfuqZ53JM4ewhbIP6MmCqQc\">Synod Hall Mukono</a>, near <a href=\"https://www.bishopss.com/\">Bishop’s Senior School</a>.<br /><br />The Venue has been specifically selected to accommodate everyone. This is the easiest venue to get to Ever.  It is in the CBD and in a serene and quiet environment. You will not be suffering from Noise Pollution. Whether you&#8217;re a seasoned WordPress professional, an aspiring entrepreneur, a curious beginner, or someone passionate about technology and community building, this event is designed for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center has-medium-font-size\">A Theme That Matters: WP HERoes – Women Powering the WordPress Universe</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>For WordCamp Mukono 2025, we are embracing a powerful and transformative theme: “<strong>WP HERoes: Women Powering the WordPress Universe</strong>”. This year’s event is dedicated to celebrating, empowering, and amplifying the voices of women in the WordPress community. Women have played a pivotal role in shaping WordPress, from coding and design to content creation and community leadership. However, their contributions often go unnoticed.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>At WordCamp Mukono 2025, we will shine a spotlight on these incredible women—the <strong>HER</strong>oes—who are making WordPress a more inclusive, innovative, and vibrant ecosystem. Just as Mukono is a center for education and opportunity, this event aims to foster growth, learning, and collaboration among WordPress users of all backgrounds. We believe that when diverse voices are heard and empowered, the entire community thrives.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Why Attend WordCamp Mukono 2025?</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>This is more than just another tech conference. <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/\">WordCamp Mukono 2025</a> is a place where ideas spark, collaborations begin, and knowledge is shared. Here’s what you can expect:</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\"><strong>World-Class Speakers and Engaging Sessions</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<img src=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/files/2025/02/Speakerlst.jpg\" alt=\"\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Prepare to be inspired!</strong> We are bringing together an incredible lineup of local and international speakers who will share their expertise on various aspects of WordPress. Whether you&#8217;re new to WordPress or an advanced user, there&#8217;s something for everyone:<br /><br /><strong>Design &amp; User Experience (UX)</strong> – Master the art of crafting visually stunning and user-friendly websites.<br /><strong>Business &amp; Digital Marketing</strong> – Explore strategies for freelancers, bloggers, and entrepreneurs looking to monetize their WordPress skills.<br /><strong>Women in Tech</strong> – Hear firsthand stories of empowerment, success, and resilience from female leaders in the WordPress community.</p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Unmatched Networking Opportunities</h4>\n\n\n\n<p>WordCamp Mukono 2025 is not just an event—it’s an experience. It’s a rare opportunity to meet like-minded individuals, expand your professional network, and forge lasting collaborations. Whether you’re looking for a mentor, business partner, or simply want to connect with fellow WordPress enthusiasts, this is the place to be.</p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Hands-On Learning &amp; Workshops</h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Our workshops are designed to be interactive and practical, giving you hands-on experience with WordPress tools and technologies. Learn from seasoned experts and walk away with real-world skills you can apply immediately.</p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Showcasing Mukono: A City of Growth and Culture</h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Mukono is a blend of urban convenience and natural beauty. From its bustling markets to its serene landscapes, Mukono offers a unique experience for visitors. If you’re traveling from outside the town, you’ll find comfortable accommodations ranging from budget-friendly guesthouses to upscale hotels.<br />We encourage attendees to arrive early and explore Mukono—its culture, food, and hospitality will make your visit even more memorable!</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Event Details: When and Where?</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f4cd.png\" alt=\"📍\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Location:</strong> <a href=\"https://maps.app.goo.gl/rir2trT2GUuGb2kK8\">Synod Hall Mukono</a>, near Bishop’s Senior School<br /><strong><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f4c5.png\" alt=\"📅\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Date:</strong> March 8, 2025<br /><strong><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f465.png\" alt=\"👥\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Capacity: </strong>Over 400 attendees<br /><strong><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f39f.png\" alt=\"🎟\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Tickets:</strong> <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/tickets/\">Buy Tickets Here</a> (Limited slots available—get yours now!)</p>\n\n\n\n<p><br /><a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/location/\">Our venue</a>, Synod Hall Mukono, is a spacious and well-equipped location with excellent lighting, ventilation, and accessibility. Its proximity to Mukono’s central business district makes it the perfect setting for an event of this magnitude.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Be a Part of Something Bigger: Sponsorship Opportunities</h2>\n\n\n\n<img src=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/files/2025/01/Sponsors.jpg\" alt=\"\" />\n\n\n\n<p>WordCamp Mukono 2025 is made possible through the generosity of <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/sponsors/\">sponsors</a> who believe in empowering the WordPress community. If your company or organization wants to gain exposure while supporting a great cause, we invite you to <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/call-for-sponsors/\">become a sponsor!</a></p>\n\n\n\n<h4 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Sponsorship offers unique benefits, including: </h4>\n\n\n\n<p><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/2705.png\" alt=\"✅\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> <strong>Brand Visibility </strong>– Reach a targeted audience of WordPress professionals and enthusiasts. <br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/2705.png\" alt=\"✅\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> <strong>Community Engagement</strong> – Connect with potential customers, partners, and talent. <br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/2705.png\" alt=\"✅\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> <strong>Networking &amp; Recruitment </strong>– Identify and engage with skilled WordPress developers, designers, and marketers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Interested in sponsoring? Learn more here: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/call-for-sponsors/\">https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/call-for-sponsors/</a></strong></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\">Accommodation &amp; Travel Tips</h2>\n\n\n\n<img src=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/files/2025/02/Accomodation-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" />\n\n\n\n<p>Mukono offers a variety of accommodation options, from budget guesthouses to high-end hotels. If you’re traveling from outside Mukono, we recommend booking early to secure the best options near the venue. For more details, visit: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/accommodation-guide-for-visitors-to-mukono-town/\">Location Post</a></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Secure Your Spot – Get Your Ticket Today!</h2>\n\n\n\n<img src=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/files/2025/02/Tickets-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" />\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/tickets-now-available/\">Tickets for WordCamp</a> Mukono 2025 are now available! We offer different ticket categories, including:<br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f39f.png\" alt=\"🎟\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Regular Ticket – <strong>UGX 15,000. </strong>Each ticket includes access to all sessions, networking opportunities, swag, refreshments, and a truly unforgettable experience!<br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f39f.png\" alt=\"🎟\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Actual Cost Ticket – <strong>UGX 100,000. </strong>Each ticket includes access to all sessions, networking opportunities, swag, refreshments, and a truly unforgettable experience! A ticket for people who love and Support wordPress and want to ensure that the Event moves super smoothly.<br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f449.png\" alt=\"👉\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Reserve your spot today: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/tickets/\">Click Here</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Join the WordCamp Mukono 2025 Movement!</strong><br />WordCamp Mukono 2025 is more than just an event—it’s a movement that celebrates WordPress, women in tech, and the power of community. Whether you&#8217;re a beginner, expert, entrepreneur, or enthusiast, there is something for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f4ac.png\" alt=\"💬\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Let’s start the conversation! Use the official hashtags:</strong><br />#WCMukono25 #WordPressMukono #WPHeroes #WomenInWordPress</p>\n\n\n\n<p><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f4e7.png\" alt=\"📧\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Contact Us: mukono@wordcamp.org<br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f310.png\" alt=\"🌐\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Official Website: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025\">https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/</a><br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f39f.png\" alt=\"🎟\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Tickets Info: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/tickets/\">Buy Tickets Here</a> (Limited slots available—get yours now!)<br /><img src=\"https://s.w.org/images/core/emoji/15.0.3/72x72/1f91d.png\" alt=\"🤝\" class=\"wp-smiley\" /> Sponsorship: <a href=\"https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/call-for-sponsors-wordcamp-mukono/\">https://mukono.wordcamp.org/2025/call-for-sponsors-wordcamp-mukono/</a><br /><strong>See you in Mukono for an unforgettable WordPress celebration!</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<p></p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Thu, 13 Feb 2025 08:53:20 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:21:\"Moses Cursor Ssebunya\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:17;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:17:\"Matt: Hash tables\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:23:\"https://ma.tt/?p=137372\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:34:\"https://ma.tt/2025/02/hash-tables/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:405:\"<p>“You didn’t just come up with a cool hash table,” he remembers telling Krapivin. “You’ve actually completely wiped out a 40-year-old conjecture!” <a href=\"https://www.quantamagazine.org/undergraduate-upends-a-40-year-old-data-science-conjecture-20250210/\">There&#8217;s a delightful article on an undergraduate discovering an optimization in a very basic computer science principle</a>.</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 12 Feb 2025 22:03:25 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4:\"Matt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:18;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:52:\"Gravatar: Simplify Link Sharing With Smart Redirects\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:32:\"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=2877\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:80:\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2025/02/12/simplify-link-sharing-with-smart-redirects/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4108:\"<p>You know what&#8217;s better than easy-to-share links? Easy-to-share links on your own custom domain. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>We just rolled out Smart Redirects for all Gravatar custom domains. Zero setup required.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>And right now, we&#8217;re offering free custom domains for your first year.</em> </p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What Are Smart Redirects?</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>They&#8217;re simple shortcuts that make sharing your online presence a breeze. Add the name of any of your verified services to the end your domain:</p>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-preformatted\"><code>your-name.link/bluesky<br />your-name.link/linkedin<br />your-name.link/calendar</code></pre>\n\n\n\n<p>That&#8217;s it. Your domain automatically redirects to your connected accounts. No configuration. No DNS wizardry. Just connect your accounts to Gravatar and the redirects work instantly.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>These are perfect for email signatures, business cards, social media profiles, and more.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Simplified Payments With /pay</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Here&#8217;s something cool: Smart Redirects make sharing payment links much nicer. Instead of dropping a long payment URL in your messages or emails, just use:</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-1 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-global-padding is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<pre class=\"wp-block-preformatted\"><code>your-name.link/pay</code></pre>\n\n\n\n<p>This currently works with:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>PayPal</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Venmo</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Crypto currencies</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Custom (any link you want)</li>\n</ul>\n</div>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\">\n<img width=\"490\" height=\"374\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/cleanshot-2025-02-12-at-12.55.50402x.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2885\" />\n</div>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>Just add your payment details to your Gravatar profile, and your /pay link automatically directs people to all of your preferred payment methods. Perfect for freelancers, creators, splitting the bill among friends, or anyone who needs to receive payments.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Free Domain? Tell Me More</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>For a limited time, claim your .link, .bio, or .social domain (or choose from other popular TLDs) through Gravatar. Just log in to your dashboard and look for the domain claim option at the top of your profile. Free for the first year. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Once you have your domain, Smart Redirects are automatically enabled. No extra steps needed.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Available Now</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Smart Redirects work with most major platforms including GitHub, LinkedIn, Bluesky, Mastodon, Tumblr, and many more. We&#8217;ve also added handy shortcuts for your calendar (/calendar), contact (/contact), and payment info (/pay).<br /></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Getting Started</h2>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Claim your free domain (if you haven&#8217;t already)</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Connect your accounts in your Gravatar profile</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Start sharing your shorter, sweeter links</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<p>And fun fact: both <code><em>/twitter</em></code> and <code><em>/x</em></code> work for your X profile. We&#8217;ve got you covered either way.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Why Your Own Domain Matters</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Your domain is your identity on the open web. It&#8217;s not just for your Gravatar profile – use it everywhere to build your presence and own your digital footprint. And with Smart Redirects, it&#8217;s now even more useful.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Want to see all the available redirects and learn more? Check out our <a href=\"https://support.gravatar.com/smart-redirects\">Smart Redirects guide</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Smart Redirects are live for all <a href=\"https://gravatar.com/custom-domains\">Gravatar custom domains</a>. And remember, domains are free for your first year. Go ahead, claim yours and give Smart Redirects a try!</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 12 Feb 2025 19:52:10 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:11:\"Ronnie Burt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:19;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:76:\"WPTavern: #156 – Derek Ashauer on Analytics Options and Privacy Challenges\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:48:\"https://wptavern.com/?post_type=podcast&p=187359\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:90:\"https://wptavern.com/podcast/156-derek-ashauer-on-analytics-options-and-privacy-challenges\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:57075:\"Transcript<div>\n<p>[00:00:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Welcome to the Jukebox Podcast from WP Tavern. My name is Nathan Wrigley.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jukebox is a podcast which is dedicated to all things WordPress. The people, the events, the plugins, the blocks, the themes, and in this case, analytics options and privacy challenges for WordPress site owners.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;d like to subscribe to the podcast, you can do that by searching for WP Tavern in your podcast, player of choice. Or by going to wptavern.com/feed/podcast, and you can copy that URL into most podcast players.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a topic that you&#8217;d like us to feature on the podcast, I&#8217;m keen to hear from you, and hopefully get you, or your idea, featured on the show. Head to wptavern.com/contact/jukebox and use the form there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So on the podcast today we have Derek Ashauer.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Having spent over 15 years in the WordPress arena, Derek has transitioned from building client sites to creating specialized WordPress plugins. Today we get to hear about his journey creating Conversion Bridge, a tools specifically designed to streamline the process of implementing analytics platforms and conversion tracking on WordPress websites.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We start with an overview of analytics, tracing its evolution from the simple server logs of the early internet days, to the sophisticated data gathering mechanisms provided by Google Analytics and others.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We explore how the introduction of European privacy laws has significantly impacted the data landscape, challenging marketers and businesses to adapt to a new era where data privacy is regarded differently in different locales.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Derek offers his perspectives on this rapidly changing field, discussing the rise of modern privacy focused analytics platforms like Fathom, Plausible and others. He explains how these technologies employ cookieless tracking techniques to respect user privacy, while still providing valuable insights for website owners.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We also address the problem of data accessibility and user privacy. Derek, sharing his personal views as a marketer, acknowledges the complexity of balancing effective marketing strategies with ethical data use. He explains his thoughts on why modern solutions might strike a better balance, ensuring that user data remains private, while allowing businesses to glean just the insights they need.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Whether you are managing a WooCommerce store, or building sites for clients, Derek&#8217;s insights into conversion tracking will be of interest. He talks about some of the hurdles site builders face with traditional systems and how Conversion Bridge simplifies conversion tracking across various platforms and plugins without the need for extensive coding.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re an agency, developer, or digital marketer, this discussion will help equip you with the knowledge and strategies to navigate the ever evolving landscape of web analytics.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re interested in finding out more, you can find all of the links in the show notes by heading to wptavern.com/podcast. Where you&#8217;ll find all the other episodes as well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so without further delay, I bring you Derek Ashauer.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am joined on the podcast by Derek Ashauer. How you doing, Derek?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:40] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> I am doing well, thank you so much.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:41] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Thank you very much for joining me. We&#8217;ve had various chats over the years, but this is going to be a chat that we&#8217;ve never had before. This is going to be all about analytics.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We&#8217;ll talk about all of the different bits and pieces, perhaps get into the future of analytics, the past of analytics, who knows? But stay with us, dear listener. It&#8217;s going to be a really interesting conversation. I feel like things are at a bit of an inflection point, and people definitely have strong opinions on this, and I think that can often lie on geographical grounds, where you live in the world and things like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So before we get into that conversation, Derek, do you just want to give us a little potted bio? Tell us who you are.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:15] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, my name&#8217;s Derek Ashauer, I&#8217;m in Colorado US. I&#8217;ve been in the WordPress community for, well, I guess I&#8217;ve been working with WordPress for about 15 years, I think. Doing client sites and things like that. So I&#8217;ve done the independent freelancer agency, but now I&#8217;ve moved to making WordPress plugins. So I have one for photographers called Sunshine Photo Cart.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But my big one that I&#8217;m working on lately is called Conversion Bridge, which really makes it easy to add analytics platforms to your WordPress website, and also make it really easy to do conversion tracking, which is something that a lot of agencies and people are building sites for clients just neglect to do. And one reason why is because it&#8217;s kind of a pain in the butt.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the goal is to make it a lot easier so that I can do it for myself, and my client sites that I&#8217;ve worked on, but also then to make it easier for everyone else. So that&#8217;s how I got the idea for that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:05:02] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Prior to hitting the record button, Derek and I were saying that, you are on a journey with this, you know, you&#8217;re not putting yourself up here as the definitive authority. I think you were basically saying that a little while ago your knowledge was not that deep in this arena and you&#8217;ve really had to educate yourself. And I think it&#8217;s fair to say that you were trying to summarise it as you&#8217;re still learning.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So let&#8217;s have a conversation about this and see where we end up. The thought occurs to me that if we were to go back, oh gosh, I mean the internet, every time I say this sentence the internet does obviously get a little bit older, but let&#8217;s go for 20 years, something like that. I feel that if you went to a website, there wasn&#8217;t even the thought that there was any kind of analytics. Maybe there was some server log somewhere that was recording that, okay, we served up a page, but that was about it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then at some point analytics software came along and very quickly started to leverage all of the existing technologies and became really, really sophisticated ever so quickly. You would copy and paste a code, and it was typically Google, I think that dominated the arena right from the outset. They offered a free service, Google Analytics. You could copy and paste one line of code. There was no barrier to entry to that technology. And it would give you all sorts of fascinating information really quickly.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think everybody was happy with that status quo, but in the more recent past, let&#8217;s say decade or so, but definitely it seems to be ramping up at the moment. There seems to be concerns about who gets the data, why is this data necessary? Is this data consumable by, I don&#8217;t know, an American company looking at a European who&#8217;s browsing on a particular website and things like that?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>With all of this, just give us your overarching opinion on it, and then we can go from there. What&#8217;s the state of play at the moment with analytics? Where are we? The year 2025 at the moment. Do you have any sort of overarching insight into where analytics, in air quotes, is at the moment?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:06:55] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, it&#8217;s a lot harder because of the European privacy laws for the analytics platforms to get the data that marketers and other people have been used to for a long time. Where people came from, you used to be able to get like exactly what search terms people were looking at and landed on your site and what they did. You know, if someone searched Fort Collins landscaper, local landscape company could see that that&#8217;s exactly what they searched, and then what that user did on their website from that search term. And that&#8217;s just kind of gone. That deep level of data is unfortunately not possible anymore to follow those type of European laws, and privacy restrictions and things like that. So there&#8217;s a lot of people who are struggling to get the data that they were used to. That&#8217;s kind of the short of it, I guess.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:07:40] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Do you think that we kind of let the horse escape from the barn a little bit, and we&#8217;re now just trying to get the horse back into the barn and get it under control again? And what I mean by that is, do you think that these technologies, the analytics and what have you, do you think it kind of just crept up upon us? There was this slow but inexorable extension of what analytics software could do. And all the while it felt like completely benign, you know, there&#8217;s no problem with it. How could anybody possibly make use of this in a way which might be harmful or, I don&#8217;t know, intrusive or what have you?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the software became more and more clever. But then I think people, especially like you said on the European side of things, started to take a look at it and thought, hmm, it&#8217;s interesting, a lot of this data is going to, in many cases, big North American companies. Google, I suppose would be a perfect example, but you&#8217;ve obviously got other things like Facebook and what have you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just try to maybe restore something a bit more where the user is in control, as opposed to these giant corporations being in control. So just trying to bring it back to the starting line, if you like, to the moment before the horse got out so that we can reestablish some rules.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, I don&#8217;t know. It sounds from what you were saying as if you&#8217;re kind of regretful that the analytics solutions can&#8217;t do what they once could. I suppose the European argument would be, well, that&#8217;s because it never really, with hindsight, we should never have let it get that far in the first place. What&#8217;s your thoughts on that?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:09:07] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> I mean, I kind of see it. The way I often describe a lot of things is like a pendulum swing. In the beginning it went really far in one direction, we got all kinds of data, and then the laws popped up and now it feels like, we can&#8217;t get nearly enough data for advanced marketing, for large corporations that are really doing massive campaigns.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then there&#8217;s the alternatives, Fathom, Plausible, Pirsch, you know, lots of great, Usermaven. There&#8217;s a lot of new alternative analytics platforms now that are out there, and now finding clever ways to claw back some of that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s never going to be nearly as detailed as it was a decade ago, that was kind of like the heyday of marketing where you could get so much great data on stuff. But you know, so we had too much maybe in some people&#8217;s opinions, and then maybe there&#8217;s a bit of not enough, and now those companies are finding some ways to move maybe towards a middle ground of what works for everyone.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And as an American, I&#8217;m like, yeah, whatever. You saw that I visited these several websites in a row, I really don&#8217;t care. That never really bothered me, I haven&#8217;t understood the massive problem with it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Going through all this, I have learned, you know, maybe there&#8217;s a few spots where it would be good to protect that and maybe they don&#8217;t know that but, yeah, I&#8217;m the person that does accept all on every single website that I got to as a marketer, because I&#8217;m just like, yeah, great, I&#8217;ll give this website some data on me, I don&#8217;t mind.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:20] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, you&#8217;ve got a very open mind to all of that, haven&#8217;t you? And obviously, you are digging into this and your business is kind of largely tied up to that, so very understandable position to have.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You mentioned there several platforms, and you rattled them off one after another, Fathom and others. So a lot of these will be unfamiliar, I think, to this audience. What is the proposition?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it sounds like many of them are quite new. What is it that they bring to the table, and are these SaaS based products, or are in some cases a WordPress plugin? Or something that can install on your own hardware? What&#8217;s going on there? Just rattle off those names again and maybe just give us the low down on what they do, and how they&#8217;re getting into the market, and competing against giants like Google.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:11:01] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, so there&#8217;s definitely some great new options and a lot of the initial ones were SaaS based. So there&#8217;s ones, like I said, Plausible, Fathom, Usermaven, Pirsch is another great one that I really enjoy. My plugin Conversion Bridging integrates with like 12 different analytics platforms, so there&#8217;s tons of them, and there&#8217;s still many more that I have on my list to do. So there&#8217;s lots of alternatives, which there weren&#8217;t any before, until Google Analytics 4 kind of came out and people were like, we don&#8217;t like GA4, and that opened the door for a lot of platforms.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But to get back to your question, yeah, one of the differences that they offer is they do what&#8217;s called cookieless tracking. So that&#8217;s one of the big things that the privacy laws in Europe were like, it was around cookies and tracking the cross websites. So that the user, they go to landscaper website, then they go, no, I&#8217;m going to go to Home Depot and I&#8217;m going to look for my own lawnmower, and now I&#8217;m going to price check against Lowe&#8217;s and all these different things. And Google Analytics could see where they were going, and all these different places. Or Facebook ads could track all these different websites that they went to and gauge this type of person and who they are and what they&#8217;re shopping for and things like that. So trying to crack down on that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, these alternative platforms do it without cookies. They have a way, a method, without getting too technical of just basically fingerprinting the user, and know for that one session when they&#8217;re on your website, what they&#8217;re doing. But then it stops there. It doesn&#8217;t go to all the other websites and give your entire four hours you were online, and all the different websites that you&#8217;re browsing to a company to let them know what you&#8217;re doing everywhere.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So that&#8217;s kind of their main offering. And they are SaaS, you know, they&#8217;re just like Google Analytics, but they do cost. So that&#8217;s, they can be affordable. They&#8217;re anywhere, I think there&#8217;s some that are like $6, $7 a month for what a basic blog would ever need, up to $50 to, or even $100 a month depending on the amount of traffic, which is hard to reconcile for a lot of people who were used to free Google Analytics.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it&#8217;s hard to make that leap when you&#8217;re going, wait, I could do Google Analytics for free and there&#8217;s some countries, and even like a state or two in the US that have some laws where it&#8217;s like, erm, what&#8217;s the setup involved in that? There might be law violations, simply by using Google Analytics you could be violating some of those things in a couple countries.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But there are some setups you can do to try and make it work with European privacy laws and stuff. Takes some extra work. But it&#8217;s a challenge. Is it worth it? We&#8217;ve been so used to, for 20 years, for having free analytics to then now suddenly switch and pay for analytics can be hard for some site owners.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Or as if you&#8217;re an agency doing that to convince your client&#8217;s like, well, we should actually start paying for this. And because you get 200,000 visits a month, it&#8217;s going to cost you $100 a month. They go, or I could use the free version. Yeah, well, I&#8217;ll just stick to the free version. So it is, it&#8217;s a hard conversation to have. When is it worthwhile? It just really depends on, I mean, you&#8217;ve got to really try it out.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:13:44] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I suppose no matter how wonderful the staff at Google are, they&#8217;re not in the business of losing money. And so I&#8217;m guessing that at some point the pendulum does swing in Google&#8217;s favor. So what might be free at the point of use, so in other words, you download a snippet from Google, and you put it into the back end of your website, or you pay, let&#8217;s say $20 a month, or $50 a month, or whatever. I&#8217;m guessing that Google are doing quite well, let&#8217;s say, in terms of the data that they gather, and the way that they can use that themselves. Or, I don&#8217;t know if they sell that data onto any other brokers or what have you. But presumably there&#8217;s that concern.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just going back to what you said about these other, and I&#8217;m going to use modern platforms, let&#8217;s go for that, the ones that you mentioned. You said fingerprinting, and I&#8217;ve heard this phrase before, and I have the merest idea of what that means. So Google Analytics traditionally came about with a cookie, and we get what that is. But what are the ways around that, that fingerprinting, well, essentially, what is fingerprinting? What are some examples of how that works?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:14:40] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, it&#8217;s a term that I just use in this moment. It&#8217;s not necessarily a term that you&#8217;ll see as you go around, it&#8217;s just the word that came out. But it&#8217;s just a way to uniquely identify somebody through various different points. You check these five different things about a person, and because of exactly what they are, those five elements, then we can say, that&#8217;s this person. So that&#8217;s kind of, each platform, I call them alternative platforms, you said modern platforms, they have their slightly different way of doing it, but they have their way of identifying without using cookies.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the traditional way is like Google Analytics, you set a cookie, random value in the browser, and then every time they go to a new page, you just check for that cookie and that value. That&#8217;s how we know they are, because that&#8217;s how we know who they are. Again, the modern platforms are doing it every time the page loads, it&#8217;s saying, who is this again? Let&#8217;s check these five points. I think sometimes it&#8217;s browser, it&#8217;s various different elements that they&#8217;ll check to then determine who that person is, and then know who you are as you go down the path on the website, but it&#8217;s not setting cookies to do that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:38] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So what kind of information might it be? I mean, I can imagine an obvious one would be things like, okay, what browser are you using, for example? That might be one indicator, and then if you match that with another indicator, and then a third one, and a fourth one, over four or five different indicators, you are going to be, well, what are the chances that that&#8217;s a different person?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:58] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> General location, stuff like that, yeah. Using this specific browser, this version of their browser. In my stuff, I haven&#8217;t fully identified what those platforms are actually using. I&#8217;ve just kind of, at this point left it. They do cookieless tracking, they have a way of doing it, okay great.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Some are better than others. To be honest, there are, Fathom has improved this. I know it was a struggle when I started Conversion Bridge about a year ago. For example, when someone landed on your page and then they did a conversion, say they fill out a form or made a purchase 10 pages later, those two weren&#8217;t associated with, because it was just one page view at a time, wholly independent things. They couldn&#8217;t tell that you are that person on that page view, and that person on that page view. I actually did this, I think last week just to check in on them, and it actually did finally say, okay, yeah, that was the same person. That came in and did that. So yeah, they&#8217;re finding ways to make it work and better identify those across one website.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:16:50] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, is the promise of these platforms though that they are different, or are they trying without cookies to get back to the point where cookies were? In other words, a cookie, until it was cleared out, could literally follow you everywhere. You know, it would know which website you&#8217;d been to, and could last for a long, long time and all of those concerns.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Is the intention of these other analytics platforms to sort of step away from that and say, okay, we&#8217;re going to track you on this one domain. So if you&#8217;ve got example.com as your domain, and it&#8217;s an e-commerce store, whilst you&#8217;re there, our platform will keep an eye on you, and we&#8217;ll learn if you have gone through a bunch of pages, and whether you&#8217;ve converted and bought a thing or not. But once you step away from that domain, that&#8217;s it, we are done with you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Or do you get the intention that they are somehow just, humans always figure out a way, right? If we give them enough time, they&#8217;ll figure out a way. Is the intention for these other platforms, do you perceive that they would like to get to the point where cookies were?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:45] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> No. They&#8217;re number one selling point, I think if you went to the homepage of every single one of them is they do privacy first analytics, is like the banner thing. That&#8217;s what they&#8217;re offering. And that&#8217;s why it&#8217;s so much bigger in Europe than it is here in the US and North America and stuff like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But, yeah, that&#8217;s their main thing, their privacy focused analytics. Google Analytics alternatives that are privacy focused is their main draw. I think someone reminded me of, Katie Keith from Barn2, she reminded me of the story from Fathom. They specifically sent Google Analytics a cake to thank them for being so bad at what they do that they allowed them to create a whole industry as an alternative to them. Stuff like that. So, I think they&#8217;re trying to do the privacy focused stuff, and then backfill in the features to give people as much data as they possibly can that they were used to in Google Analytics.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:18:39] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You said earlier, and we&#8217;ll just touch on this briefly, you said earlier that, the implication of what you said, and you may not have meant this, but I&#8217;ll say it as if you are saying it, and then you can criticise whatever I say. It sounds like, if you could rewind the clock and get rid of the European legislation and what have you, you would do that, and you&#8217;d be happy with that position. You are okay with being tracked and all bets are off. So firstly, let&#8217;s address that. Would you be okay with all of that?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:19:03] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> I think there&#8217;s got to be a balance between the two. I get that there&#8217;s, you know, for me it&#8217;s a thing. I don&#8217;t care if you know all the different things of where I went. You know, you see those futuristic movies where it&#8217;s individualised ads on video screens, and I&#8217;m like, that&#8217;s actually kind of cool. It helps give me gift ideas for my wife, stuff like that, because I&#8217;m a terrible gift giver. So, yeah, recommend me some products. I wouldn&#8217;t have thought to do that. I&#8217;ve bought things off of ads I&#8217;ve seen on Facebook or Twitter, things like that. Because I was like, that was a great gift for my dad. I never would&#8217;ve purposely found that if I hadn&#8217;t been shown that ad because for whatever reason, so I&#8217;m not against that personally.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:19:37] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> My guess though is that it&#8217;s not really that that&#8217;s the problem in most people&#8217;s minds. It&#8217;s like, who&#8217;s holding that data, and where does that data get moved to? Just the idea that, as an example, there might be a data broker firm who may purchase that data. And in some cases, let&#8217;s imagine that you ended up on a website which you regret going to. You can read into that, dear listener, whatever you like. But you end up somewhere and all of a sudden connections are made between you as a person. And you can also imagine scenarios in which, I don&#8217;t know, data gets linked from various data brokers and they start to create an impression of who you are.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I can imagine scenarios where that could get out of hand, and potentially come back to bite you as an individual. So I suppose there&#8217;s a little bit of that muddled up in it. It&#8217;s not that the business, the WooCommerce store or whatever, is going to have any nefarious reason to have that data. Or wish to know where you&#8217;ve come from, where you&#8217;re going to, what ad you might have clicked on, what were the previous page that you came from, and so on and so forth.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s more that there just seems to be this fairly bizarre industry of data brokers who managed to get their hands on this data, and at that moment, you don&#8217;t know what&#8217;s going to happen with it. And we&#8217;ve all made mistakes in life, but we can erase them just with the passage of time. But with the advent of the internet, some of those mistakes might stick with us for a long time. Does that make any sense?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:21:04] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> No, it makes sense. I mean, I could see how someone would visit, again, visit the landscaper website, and all of a sudden they did not know that the fact that they went to a landscaper website was sent to Meta. They&#8217;re like, well, I didn&#8217;t know that was, I was going to a landscaper website. Why does Meta need to know that I was checking out who was going to cut my grass?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I get that in some regards, that there&#8217;s just not a knowledge of where things are going. I think it&#8217;s a pretty safe thing to say that cookie popups, that was just not the right way to go about it. That&#8217;s just made things, made the internet significantly worse. What are the solutions to give website owners the data they need to make good marketing decisions?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because otherwise, I mean, I think of it even on a bigger macro level that that landscaper, if they don&#8217;t know any of the ads are working or what&#8217;s going on or what people are doing, then they don&#8217;t know what ads, where to spend their money that works best. Now they have to increase their costs to cover the blanket marketing that they have to do because they don&#8217;t know exactly what attribution, what marketing channel is actually working for them. So to pay for the 50 different marketing channels they have to do, they have to increase the cost for everybody.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So if they were able to narrow it down and say, well, we know that mailers and these Google ads are actually our best ways to make money, we don&#8217;t need to spend on email newsletter, or all these different things, our marketing spends only 5% of what it would be otherwise, that means we don&#8217;t have to charge as much.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it goes to bigger macro level discussions of economics of, in some ways for the consumer, it could be better for these companies to have some data about you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I understand what you&#8217;re saying though. It is like, again, I don&#8217;t want Meta to have it, I want the landscaper company to have it. That&#8217;s okay. And that&#8217;s the line that I think a lot of people, I think would agree that, yeah, I don&#8217;t want Meta to have that data but, yeah, I&#8217;m okay with my local landscaper having the data so they knew what ads worked and things like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And those privacy or the modern analytics platforms do at least get you a good amount of that data. So they are some good alternatives to that. But it&#8217;s not going to get you, those mega corporations are not going to get the, okay, well they clicked on our ad, they went to these other places, then came back to our site, and then did this and they came back to site, and then did this and came back to our site. And to get those really deep analytics. They&#8217;re not going to and that&#8217;s the challenge. But I would say, the WordPress space, that&#8217;s 90% of people are going to do fantastic with modern analytics platforms and get the data that they need.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:23:29] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, that&#8217;s really interesting because you are owning the domain, you&#8217;re running the domain, you probably don&#8217;t have any interest in brokering the data out to Facebook anyway. So what you can get out of that is probably useful. We&#8217;ll dig into that in a moment.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I&#8217;m just curious, being a resident in the USA, and I&#8217;m obviously, you can tell by my accent, I&#8217;m based in the UK, we may have, and I don&#8217;t know if we do, we may have a very different experience of browsing the internet.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I, for my part, if I was to open up a brand new browser, clean out everything that&#8217;s ever happened in that browser and start again, and browse around a whole variety of websites, I am inundated with cookie banners. Go to any large property, I am going to see cookie banners a lot, a very significant amount of the time because that&#8217;s how it goes over here.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>They can be confusing. They can be deliberately confusing. And in some cases they can be eye wateringly difficult to understand. The language is inverted so that you are kind of clicking on something you didn&#8217;t intend to click on. There can be so many options. I mean, it is really remarkable how many options there can be. You open up this little popup and you scroll, and you scroll, and you scroll, and you scroll, and you could do that whole scroll thing for like a whole minute and you still haven&#8217;t run out of options. And so we are living through this, and I don&#8217;t know if it&#8217;s the same where you are, I don&#8217;t know if you encounter any of this stuff.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:24:51] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> I definitely see them, but it&#8217;s not on every single website because those cookie banners can be configured so that they can be region specific. So if someone is located in a space where there are no laws around that, then just don&#8217;t show on the banner. And I happen to be in that one. So there&#8217;s some that aren&#8217;t as complex that have that feature, and so I still will see those. But I mean, yeah, it&#8217;s not every single website. Honestly not sure how many, but I would say maybe 50%.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:25:16] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, I mean, if I was going to a website which is just purely, I don&#8217;t know, informational in content, it&#8217;s like a blog basically, then I&#8217;m sure I won&#8217;t see those kind of things because, what possible thing could they be doing? But if it&#8217;s a website where there&#8217;s some sort of login option or an option where they clearly are using analytics and they&#8217;re intending to sell that on, you do get bombarded with, there&#8217;s so many things that you can opt into and opt out of. It&#8217;s bizarre.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:25:40] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, it&#8217;s a challenge. And it&#8217;s definitely an area that I am working on with my plugin and stuff, and trying to wrap my head around and understand to help guide people on it. But that&#8217;s one great thing about like the modern ones. For example, if you use Plausible, you do not need a cookie banner because of Plausible. You don&#8217;t need one. It doesn&#8217;t set cookies. It doesn&#8217;t use cookies. So just because you have analytics doesn&#8217;t mean you have to have a cookie banner.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that&#8217;s one thing I think is something that some people may not understand. You may need it for other reasons, depending on what you have going on your site. But there are sites where you just, I think there&#8217;s a lot of sites that have cookie banners that don&#8217;t actually need them because they&#8217;re so terrified of the EU cookie laws or those privacy laws that they&#8217;re like, it&#8217;s better to be safe than sorry. Lets just throw it up there and put it on there, CYA type stuff, cover your ass. Let&#8217;s just put it on there so that we don&#8217;t have to worry about it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But Google Analytics is a little like, probably should but, you know, if you are using one of those alternatives, that analytics platform, just that itself does not mean you have to have a cookie banner. And so it&#8217;s worth investigating to see if you could switch to alternatives. Some of them have free plans that you could stay within for a website, have your clients set up their own account. And if they have very small usage then use their free plan, and stick under that limit. And then you don&#8217;t even need a cookie banner on their site. And that can help annoy their visitors less. It&#8217;s something definitely worth investigating.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:04] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I think what I&#8217;ve noticed is that, and I could be wrong about this, my intuition though, because I see the same UI often. The cookie banner is clearly provided by the same company. Everything is the same apart from the choices that you can make, but obviously at some point they&#8217;ve ticked boxes and what have you. And it does feel a little bit like that. We don&#8217;t have the capacity to figure out what we really need to do, so what we&#8217;ll do is just enable every single option. Here&#8217;s all the choices that we could possibly provide.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And of course that itself, that feels very self-defeating. Looking at it from the end user perspective, no matter what you think about the legislation and the merits of it, the fact that every single one of us is being caught up in this sort of dragnet of clicking away, rejecting cookies and what have you. That does seem like something which is not a good experience. I mean, I don&#8217;t know how many hours humanity wastes every day rejecting cookie banners.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:57] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> I mean, yeah, the cookie banners is a whole other thing. In my opinion it should be, if you&#8217;re going to do it, it should be in the browser. There should be a setting in the browser and the analytics code snippet that you have obeys the browser setting so that there&#8217;s not, there should be no need for independent, every single website owner to do their own remediation of, you know, through cookie banners of doing all this kind of stuff.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s bonkers to me when every single website, if every single website needs to follow this, then put it at the browser level. You can just configure in your browser, in Chrome, say, I want to accept marketing cookies and I want to not accept these types of cookies or whatever, and then call it done. And every website you go to then just includes Google Analytics, includes whatever thing. It just can look at the browser settings and follow that, and you&#8217;re done. And it saves everyone thousands of dollars, hours of headache and all this kind of stuff, and it is what it is.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:28:47] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It sounds like a very sensible position. I&#8217;m just wondering, is that a clarion call that is in the industries that you are following, the analytics and the marketing side of things, is that something that&#8217;s gaining momentum or no?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:28:59] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> I haven&#8217;t heard of any movement to actually make that happen. I don&#8217;t know why I haven&#8217;t looked into it too much, but I haven&#8217;t read in the stuff that I&#8217;ve come across and reading and learning about it on my journey through this and educating myself about it. To me it seems like a pretty simple approach.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:29:12] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Let&#8217;s imagine a scenario in which cookies across the board are just outlawed universally for this kind of thing in the future. And obviously that&#8217;s not something that you would desire, but let&#8217;s just imagine a scenario where that was the case.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>As you call them, these modern solutions, if we were to bind that, let&#8217;s say into WooCommerce website, and obviously with Conversion Bridge, you&#8217;re all about the conversion. Does somebody arriving at the website end up doing a particular action? Do they purchase something? Do they end up at a landing page after a particular transaction has occurred, or something along those lines?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>How credible do those things feel to you now? And it said that a year ago you couldn&#8217;t do it with this particular platform, and now you can. Does it feel like that whole conversion industry, you know, conversion tracking in particular, does it feel like it&#8217;s fighting a losing battle? Or does it feel like with those modern analytics companies that you&#8217;re still in the game. You can still get the data that you probably need all be it, it&#8217;s not going off to some giant third party?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:11] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> So the first answer that came to mind when you&#8217;re asking that is, for example, in my testing of some of the various modern platforms, even on those, you&#8217;re getting 70% of the conversions actually getting tracked. And that could be for various reasons of JavaScript blockers, ad blockers, or things like that. And that&#8217;s one of the reasons why I&#8217;m really focusing on doing API based tracking, so that it&#8217;s server to server, not aligned to JavaScript. Because server to server, behind like, through PHP and APIs and stuff like that. If you can track what people are doing, then it&#8217;s going to be a lot more accurate actually.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>That&#8217;s one thing that I&#8217;m working on for my plugin is so that whatever analytics platform you&#8217;re using, it can be as accurate as possible. But yeah, I think you&#8217;re trying to hint at it, are these other modern platforms going to go the way of Google and try and sell data? Is that kind of what you mean?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:58] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> No, what I was meaning was, do you feel that they are credible in that, okay, so let&#8217;s imagine that I own a WooCommerce store, I&#8217;ve been using Google forever and it&#8217;s been giving me this incredibly valuable data, and I really don&#8217;t want to let go of that. But I feel, for one reason or another, maybe that&#8217;s legislation, or just a moral compulsion that I feel I have, I want to move over to these platforms. Am I throwing away a ton of useful data that I&#8217;ll never get back? Or are these modern platforms slowly but surely offering a solution, which gives me more or less what I need.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:31] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah. From my perspective, what I&#8217;m seeing is when Google Analytics 4 came out, they haven&#8217;t been able to get the same level of data they used to 10 years ago with UA, Universal Analytics. Which was what we were, most of us were used to when we said Google Analytics, that&#8217;s what we had for a very, very long time, and then Google Analytics 4 came out.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I would say the platforms, some are better than others. There&#8217;s definitely some that have a lot more advanced features than others. Fathom, for example, is pretty straightforward. I wouldn&#8217;t say it&#8217;s very well geared towards detailed conversion tracking and getting good, detailed, in-depth insights. It&#8217;s good at getting page views, where they came from, what country they&#8217;re at. Something you would hand to a client so they could look at a nice little dashboard.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And Universal Analytics, it used to be great. I used to say, hey, here&#8217;s Universal Analytics, go check it out. Didn&#8217;t even have to walk them through any of it. They could look at the screen, understand the data, it made sense. Now, Google Analytics 4 is a cluster. It is for professional level marketers, and that is it at this point. You have to really know the software. There&#8217;s week long classes on how to use Google Analytics 4 these days, because it is so overwhelmingly complex. And I think it went almost too far in that regard.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But anyway, I think these modern platforms can get most site owners the data they need to make good decisions about, are my ads working if I&#8217;m doing Facebook ads? Or am I doing Google ads? Are they working for me? You know, if I&#8217;m doing link building from another site and you can tag those same UTM codes, that might be something, if you&#8217;re familiar. There are codes that you can add to the URL, with the little query and the query variables, to kind of identify that this link came from this source.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then that can track that user throughout the process. You know, the add to cart, checkout and complete the purchase. And then know that that user came from that UTM tracking code from either somewhere on your own website or from an external website. So it can do all those great things.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So for a lot of mom and pop, WooCommerce stores I think can get a lot of great, useful data. It&#8217;s really when you are more an enterprise company, and maybe you&#8217;re doing like a million dollars a week in ad spend, you&#8217;re going to want something that is really, these crazy reports that you can run. And it&#8217;s more about the reporting than anything that you can do in GA 4 that maybe these modern platforms can&#8217;t quite do yet.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so, like I said, for my clients, any of the clients that I&#8217;ve built sites for over the last 20 years, they don&#8217;t need any of that stuff. They would be very happy with the reports from, say, Plausible. Many of them would be happy with even Fathom, which I said, which isn&#8217;t the most conversion oriented platform. Even they would be great with those ones.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:34:14] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So your plugin, which is called Conversion Bridge, what does it do? It feels from the outside as if it&#8217;s almost like a Zapier for analytics meets website, if you know what I mean. You bind your website to the analytics platform, and then you can give it, I don&#8217;t know, if this, then that kind of functionality to figure out, okay, what are the conversions?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And also it just feels like you are stripping out the technical burden of learning those platforms. Is that basically what it&#8217;s doing or have I missed the target?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:34:46] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> That&#8217;s very close. The idea is, when I was building sites for clients, I didn&#8217;t set up any conversion tracking for a lot of them. One, because it&#8217;s just the cost, because you go buy Gravity Forms well, this site we&#8217;re going to use WS Form. Well, this site we&#8217;re going to use Ninja Forms, or this site we&#8217;re using WooCommerce, this other one we&#8217;re going to use this other, you know.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>There&#8217;s so many different ways that you could do a form, do a purchase. Page builders, what button? How do I add a click tracking? Like, every time someone clicks on the buy now button on my homepage and goes to that. So we want to really track all this kind of stuff. It was a challenge of, how did you add that to your WordPress site? And so oftentimes it just didn&#8217;t happen because it was such a pain in the butt to do it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So what Conversion Bridge tries to do is makes it easy to add the analytics tracking codes. A lot of people just cut and paste it into the header, footer, code snippets, type plugins and all this kind of stuff. That is a way to do it. It&#8217;s not really the ideal way. But it does allow you to quickly and easily add one of, I think I have 12 different analytics platforms, whether it&#8217;s Google Analytics, Fathom, all that kind of stuff. Toggle, copy and paste your just like little ID number. And then the analytics code has been added to the site where it needs to. Make sure it does it for the right users. Like, I don&#8217;t want to track admin users, let&#8217;s make sure we don&#8217;t track admin users. Stuff like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But the real benefit is, is that conversion tracking. So say you have a form that you&#8217;re using, and it&#8217;s just a simple, yes, add conversion tracking, done. That&#8217;s all I had to do. Click a toggle. I didn&#8217;t have to think about code snippets. How do I do it? Researching the form plugin, where does it need to get output? When does it need to get output? All this kinda stuff, it just was a pain in the butt.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then the real benefit for agencies is that, regardless of what site they&#8217;re doing, whether they&#8217;re using Bricks Builder or Beaver Builder, using WS Form, Gravity Forms, it&#8217;s all one plugin that works for any site that you would need, because it integrates with 50 plus different WordPress plugins to just have one click toggle conversion tracking.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And websites really need conversion tracking. They need to know what users are doing on their site. And I think it&#8217;s a huge value that especially professional site builders could add to their plugin stack that they put on every client site to just, oh, all I have to do is copy, paste the little ID number from Fathom, and then I just need to check one little box in WS Form, and suddenly I have, not only analytics on the site, but I&#8217;m also tracking every single form submission.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And we can see where they&#8217;re coming from and which ones generate the most contact form leads on this website that is for a landscaper to fill out forms and get lead quotes. And now I can tell my client, these resources, whether it&#8217;s this external blog that linked to us, oh my God, we got mentioned in this blog, and all of a sudden they&#8217;re generating 50 leads a month from us. We need to do more outreach to all these blogs. And to really understand where your leads are coming from. It&#8217;s a huge value to add to client sites.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:37:28] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I have a couple of questions following on from that. The first one is, have you got any examples, like curious examples, maybe unexpected examples? Because everybody gets the, okay, I want to convert, I want to track that a person arrived at the website, looked at this product and then ended up buying it, you know? Brilliant.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But are there any quirky ones that people have reached out to you that they&#8217;ve used and you thought, oh gosh, I never imagined people would want to track that conversion?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:37:52] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Not yet. It is pretty straightforward, you know, the things that you need to track. Form submissions, email newsletter signups are a good one. I mean purchases, stuff like that. What buttons on your page? You know, maybe you have a homepage and you want to know which button on that page actually got them to go to the buy now?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So maybe you have one in the main banner. Maybe you have one near the FAQ section. Maybe you have one near the testimonials. Which one actually got people to actually go to that page. So button tracking, link tracking is good ones. Yeah, there&#8217;s not too many surprises on that regard.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:23] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> And then the other one is about the plugins that you work with. So, and again, it sounds like your UVP really is that, look, we&#8217;ve looked at how their plugin works, how the code works, and you just tick the button. You say, I&#8217;ve got WS Form, I&#8217;ve got Gravity Forms, or whatever it may be, and now it&#8217;s just done. That&#8217;s part of the deal. You&#8217;re buying it so that you don&#8217;t have to do any coding.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:45] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, because that&#8217;s, you know, what everyone wants these days. There&#8217;s no code. And they don&#8217;t even want to, even cutting and pasting code snippets. Before it was, a lot of plugins were like, add this, you had to use this hook, and then add this code. I mean, they provided this snippet, and then you had to kind of customise it and all this kinda stuff. It&#8217;s no. Just toggle and it&#8217;s done.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, like for WooCommerce, it&#8217;ll send all the detailed data about the purchase. What product they purchased. How much it cost. What the order total was. So you can get all that good data in there so you can do some advanced reporting in Google Analytics or even Plausible and some other, Pirsch, and stuff like that. So these alternatives you can do as well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:39:18] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> No code solution. Yeah, that&#8217;s nice. And the other one I suppose would be, where do you feel your audience is? Is it kind of agencies, or do you have customers who are, I don&#8217;t know, just building their own website and really don&#8217;t have any technical background? Or is it more, like I said, is it more kind of agencies who are deploying this for their clients and they have an understanding of how to set these things up?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:39:39] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> You know, I&#8217;m doing my own market research and learning that as a business owner of how to do your, what is ICP? Ideal Customer Profile. And I&#8217;m kind of identifying that it, I think agencies would, so far, I think are the top of the list.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I know there&#8217;s some people that have bought it that are single site owners, but then I&#8217;ve learned, you know, they bought a one site license, but then I learned that they were just trying it on one site to see how it worked.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And they&#8217;re like, okay, yeah, this makes sense, and then they&#8217;re going to upgrade to, you know, a 20 site license because then they&#8217;re like, now I&#8217;m going to use this on all my client sites. This is what I&#8217;ve noticed those one site license purchases have been so far. So yeah, I think agencies do get the best of it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But it&#8217;s also a great tool to try out because I can actually, and I have it on my development test site, but I can enable 12 different analytics platforms at once. It&#8217;s obviously not something that you would do, but you technically could. And it&#8217;s great because you can actually test different things.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Say, if you&#8217;re using Google Analytics, I want to test out Plausible. Let me try it out. Well, let me just add Google Analytics and Plausible, and everywhere you&#8217;ve checked that box on WS Form to do conversion tracking, it&#8217;ll send it to every single platform for you. You don&#8217;t have to then do a different snippet or code for, okay, now let me cut, do this snippet for WS Form in Plausible. Do this snippet for WooCommerce and Plausible. This snippet for Google Analytics and WooCommerce. It just takes care of all that for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So you could try, do the free trial for a week for three or four different analytics platforms. Look at the data. Okay, we ran it for a week, let&#8217;s see which one I actually do like. So it&#8217;s one little side benefit. I allowed multiple analytics platforms to make it easy for me to develop, but then I quickly realised, this is actually an advantage to test out these different platforms and see if I can get good data, and data that is usable without losing Google Analytics data while you keep maintaining that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:41:13] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It feels like there&#8217;s very few parts of our industry where politics gets in. There&#8217;s just no politics in the kind of things that I deal with. You know, what I mean by that, international politics. Not the kind of politics within the kind of baseball of WordPress, but the international politics.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It feels like this is a bit of a moving target at the moment. And it&#8217;d be curious to see if we were to do this episode again in a year&#8217;s time, whether or not the sand has shifted, and you&#8217;ve had to pivot your product because it&#8217;s moved in one direction or another. Yeah, just absolutely fascinating.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wish you all the best. Just before we wrap it up, where do people find you? What&#8217;s the URL or the social network or both? Where can we find you? And of course, Conversion Bridge.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:41:55] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> Yeah, conversionbridgewp.com is the Conversion Bridge plugin, and then I am pretty active on Twitter. You can find me @derekashauer on Twitter or X, I guess, sorry.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:42:05] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah. As is always the case, I will drop all of the links for anything that we discuss today, including the host of analytics platforms and what have you that we mentioned. I&#8217;ll put all of those into the show notes. If you head to wptavern.com, search for the episode with Derek in, all of the links will be right there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, Derek, it just remains for me to say thank you very much for chatting to me today. I really appreciate it. It.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:42:24] <strong>Derek Ashauer:</strong> It&#8217;s been a pleasure. Thanks for having me on.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>On the podcast today we have <a href=\"https://x.com/derekashauer\">Derek Ashauer</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Having spent over 15 years in the WordPress arena, Derek has transitioned from building client sites to creating specialised WordPress plugins. Today, we get to hear about his journey creating <a href=\"https://conversionbridgewp.com/\">Conversion Bridge</a>, a tool specifically designed to streamline the process of implementing analytics platforms and conversion tracking on WordPress websites.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We start with an overview of analytics, tracing its evolution from the simple server logs of the early internet days, to the sophisticated data gathering mechanisms provided by Google Analytics and others.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We explore how the introduction of European privacy laws has significantly impacted the data landscape, challenging marketers and businesses to adapt to a new era, where data privacy is regarded differently in different locales.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Derek offers his perspectives on this rapidly changing field, discussing the rise of modern, privacy-focused analytics platforms like Fathom, Plausible, and others. He explains how these technologies employ cookieless tracking techniques to respect user privacy, while still providing valuable insights for website owners.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We also address the problem of data accessibility and user privacy. Derek, sharing his personal views as a marketer, acknowledges the complexity of balancing effective marketing strategies with ethical data use. He explains his thoughts on why modern solutions might strike a better balance, ensuring that user data remains private while allowing businesses to glean just the insights they need.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Whether you&#8217;re managing a WooCommerce store or building sites for clients, Derek’s insights into conversion tracking will be of interest. He talks about some of the hurdles site builders face with traditional systems and how Conversion Bridge simplifies conversion tracking across various platforms and plugins without the need for extensive coding.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re an agency, developer, or digital marketer, this discussion will help equip you with knowledge and strategies to navigate the ever-evolving landscape of web analytics.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Useful links</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://x.com/derekashauer\">Derek on X</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.sunshinephotocart.com/\"> Sunshine Photo Cart</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://conversionbridgewp.com/\">Conversion Bridge</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://usefathom.com/\">Fathom Analytics</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://plausible.io/\">Plausible Analytics</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://pirsch.io/\">Pirsch Analytics</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://usermaven.com/\">Usermaven</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://support.google.com/analytics/answer/10089681?hl=en\">Introducing the next generation of Analytics, Google Analytics 4</a></p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 12 Feb 2025 15:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:14:\"Nathan Wrigley\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:20;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:70:\"Do The Woo Community: Cami MacNamara Joins the Do the Woo Hosting Team\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:43:\"https://dothewoo.io/?post_type=blog&p=90706\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:74:\"https://dothewoo.io/blog/cami-macnamara-joins-the-do-the-woo-hosting-team/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:330:\"Here at Do the Woo we are thrilled to announce that Cami McNamara is joining WP Agency Tracks as a co-host with Marcus. Cami, a long-time WordPress professional and the founder of WebCami Agency, brings years of experience in running a successful solo agency. As the creator of the Web Designer Habits newsletter and the [&#8230;]\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 12 Feb 2025 13:24:23 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:21;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:55:\"WordPress.org blog: WordPress 6.7.2 Maintenance Release\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:35:\"https://wordpress.org/news/?p=18445\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:71:\"https://wordpress.org/news/2025/02/wordpress-6-7-2-maintenance-release/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:8485:\"<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">WordPress 6.7.2 is now available!</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>This minor release includes <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/tag/6-7-2/\">35 bug fixes</a>, addressing issues affecting multiple components including the block editor, HTML API, and Customize.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>WordPress 6.7.2 is a short-cycle release. The next major release will be <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/6-8/\">version 6.8</a> planned for April 15, 2025.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have sites that support automatic background updates, the update process will begin automatically.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You can <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/wordpress-6.7.2.zip\">download WordPress 6.7.2 from WordPress.org</a>, or visit your WordPress Dashboard, click “Updates”, and then click “Update Now”. For more information on this release, please <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/support/wordpress-version/version-6-7-2\">visit the HelpHub site</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Thank you to these WordPress contributors</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>This release was led by <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jorbin/\">Aaron Jorbin</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>WordPress 6.7.2 would not have been possible without the contributions of the following people. Their asynchronous coordination to deliver maintenance fixes into a stable release is a testament to the power and capability of the WordPress community.</p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"is-style-wporg-props-long\"><a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jorbin\">Aaron Jorbin</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ajlende\">Alex Lende</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/alexandrebuffet\">Alexandre Buffet</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/bowedk\">Andreas Pedersen</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/azaozz\">Andrew Ozz</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ankitkumarshah\">Ankit Kumar Shah</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/apermo\">apermo</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/benniledl\">Benedikt Ledl</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/bernhard-reiter\">bernhard-reiter</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ironprogrammer\">Brian Alexander</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/cbravobernal\">Carlos Bravo</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/poena\">Carolina Nymark</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/coquardcyr\">Cyrille</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/danielpost\">Daniel Post</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/darerodz\">darerodz</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/dpcalhoun\">David Calhoun</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/get_dave\">David Smith</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/dmsnell\">Dennis Snell</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/dhewercorus\">dhewercorus</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/dd32\">Dion Hulse</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/dougwollison\">Doug Wollison</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ellatrix\">Ella</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/im3dabasia1\">Eshaan Dabasiya</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/fabiankaegy\">Fabian Kägy</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/gaambo\">Fabian Todt</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/flixos90\">Felix Arntz</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ffffelix\">Felix Renicks</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/franciscabusas22\">Francis Cabusas</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/frankbiganski\">Frank B.</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mamaduka\">George Mamadashvili</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ghinamt\">ghinamt</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/glynnquelch\">Glynn Quelch</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/gziolo\">Greg Ziółkowski</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jameskoster\">James Koster</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jsnajdr\">Jarda Snajdr</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/audrasjb\">Jb Audras</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jdnd\">jdnd</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jeryj\">jeryj</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/joedolson\">Joe Dolson</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/joemcgill\">Joe McGill</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jonsurrell\">Jon Surrell</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/desrosj\">Jonathan Desrosiers</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/juanwp22\">juanwp22</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/jrf\">Juliette Reinders Folmer</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/karthickmurugan\">Karthick</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mt8biz\">Kazuto Takeshita</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ryelle\">Kelly Choyce-Dwan</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ketanniruke\">Ketan Niruke</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/0mirka00\">Lena Morita</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/levskipg\">levskipg</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/maciejmackowiak\">Maciej Ma?kowiak</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/santosguillamot\">Mario Santos</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mboynes\">Matthew Boynes</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mayanktripathi32\">Mayank Tripathi</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/czapla\">Michal Czaplinski</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mcsf\">Miguel Fonseca</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/presstoke\">Mitchell Austin</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mreishus\">mreishus</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mukesh27\">Mukesh Panchal</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/assassinateur\">Nadir Seghir a11n</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/narenin\">Narendra Sishodiya</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/nareshbheda\">Naresh Bheda</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/neotrope\">neotrope</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/ndiego\">Nick Diego</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/oglekler\">Olga Gleckler</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/parthvataliya\">Parth vataliya</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/swissspidy\">Pascal Birchler</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/paullb\">paullb</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/peterwilsoncc\">Peter Wilson</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/pitamdey\">Pitam Dey</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/redkite\">redkite</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/rishavdutta\">Rishav Dutta</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/robertstaddon\">robertstaddon</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/rvoigt\">rvoigt</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/mi5t4n\">Sagar Tamang</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/sainathpoojary\">Sainath Poojary</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/seanlanglands\">seanlanglands</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/SergeyBiryukov\">Sergey Biryukov</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/coffee2code/\">Scott Reilly</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/shyamkariya\">Shyam Kariya</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/smerriman\">smerriman</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/sabernhardt\">Stephen Bernhardt</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/sukhendu2002\">Sukhendu Sekhar Guria</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/TobiasBg\">TobiasBg</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/hellofromTonya\">Tonya Mork</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/vishy-moghan\">Vishy Moghan</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/westonruter\">Weston Ruter</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/wongjn\">wongjn</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/yogeshbhutkar\">Yogesh Bhutkar</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/zaoyao\">zaoyao</a></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How to contribute</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>To get involved in WordPress core development, head over to Trac, <a href=\"https://core.trac.wordpress.org/report/6\">pick a ticket</a>, and join the conversation in the <a href=\"https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C02RQBWTW\">#core</a> and <a href=\"https://wordpress.slack.com/archives/C080HLPP2Q6\">#6-8-release-leads</a> channels. Need help? Check out the <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/\">Core Contributor Handbook</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-right\"><em>Props to <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/joedolson/\">@joedolson</a>, <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/joemcgill/\">@joemcgill</a> and <a href=\"https://profiles.wordpress.org/audrasjb/\" class=\"mention\"><span class=\"mentions-prefix\">@</span>audrasjb</a> for proofreading.</em></p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 11 Feb 2025 16:52:23 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:12:\"Aaron Jorbin\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:22;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:79:\"Do The Woo Community: Inside the WooCommerce Release Process with Julia Amosova\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=90545\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:78:\"https://dothewoo.io/inside-the-woocommerce-release-process-with-julia-amosova/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:214:\"In this episode, James and Julia discuss WooCommerce\'s enhanced release process, focusing on improved testing, community involvement, and future goals like faster fix releases and compatibility tools for merchants.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 11 Feb 2025 10:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:23;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:26:\"Matt: Ed Catmull on Change\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:23:\"https://ma.tt/?p=137101\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:43:\"https://ma.tt/2025/02/ed-catmull-on-change/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:1839:\"<p>I&#8217;ve been really enjoying the book <a href=\"https://www.amazon.com/Creativity-Inc-Overcoming-Unseen-Inspiration/dp/0812993012\">Creativity Inc by Ed Catmull of Pixar</a>, it was recommended to me by my colleague <a href=\"https://davemart.in/\">Dave Martin</a> a while back and I finally got around to it. There&#8217;s an interesting story in it where George Lucas had asked him to develop a film editing system that was digital.</p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>While George wanted this new video-editing system in place, the film editors at Lucasfilm did not. They were perfectly happy with the system they had already mastered, which involved actually cutting film into snippets with razor blades and then pasting them back together. They couldn&#8217;t have been less interested in making changes that would slow them down in the short term. They took comfort in their familiar ways, and change meant being uncomfortable. [&#8230;] If left up to the editors, no new tool would ever be designed and no improvements would be possible.</p>\n</blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>This made me think a lot about the early days of <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/\">Gutenberg</a> and the huge resistance it had in the community, including causing the fork of ClassicPress. Now that we&#8217;re much further along there&#8217;s a pretty widespread acceptance of Gutenberg, and it&#8217;s responsible for the vast majority of all WP posts and pages made, however if we had taken a vote for whether it should happen or not, it probably wouldn&#8217;t have ever gotten off the ground.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What’s funny is if you go back even further, using a visual WYSIWYG editor in the first place was very controversial, and many people didn’t want the classic editor brought into WordPress.</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Mon, 10 Feb 2025 05:38:10 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4:\"Matt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:24;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:110:\"Gutenberg Times: WordPress 6.8 Roadmap, Advanced Debugging Course,  Invoker Commands —   Weekend Edition 319\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:35:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?p=37577\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:112:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-8-roadmap-advanced-debugging-course-invoker-commands-weekend-edition-319/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:21606:\"<p>Hi there, </p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I&#8217;ll be off next week to Manila, Philippines. After a 15 hrs flight to a  seven-hour time difference, I need a couple of days to acclimate, and I also want to get some sightseeing in before immersing into WordCamp Asia. The next weekend edition will be published after my return to Munich.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I will be sharing <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/bph.social\">photos on Bluesky</a> if you would like to follow along my adventures.  I&#8217;m excited about an infinite  amount of 3D interactions with my fellow WordPressers. Sending virtual hugs to you. 🤗</p>\n\n\n\n<p> Have a wonderful weekend, and if you are coming to Manila, too, have a safe journey! </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yours, 💕</p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Birgit</em></p>\n\n\n\n<p>PS: <a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/getting-ready-for-wordcamp-asia-2025-in-manila-philippines/\">Getting ready for WordCamp Asia 2025 in Manila, Philippines</a></p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<p><strong>Table of Contents</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<ol><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-8-roadmap-advanced-debugging-course-invoker-commands-weekend-edition-319/#0-word-press-release-information\">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-8-roadmap-advanced-debugging-course-invoker-commands-weekend-edition-319/#0-p\">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</a><ol><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-8-roadmap-advanced-debugging-course-invoker-commands-weekend-edition-319/#five-newest-block-themes-in-the-wordpress-repository-are\">Six newest block themes </a></li></ol></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-8-roadmap-advanced-debugging-course-invoker-commands-weekend-edition-319/#2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled\">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/wordpress-6-8-roadmap-advanced-debugging-course-invoker-commands-weekend-edition-319/#3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press\">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor. </a></li></ol>\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<p>In the 407th episode of WP Build, titled <a href=\"https://wpbuilds.com/2025/02/03/407-at-the-core-with-birgit-pauli-haack-and-anne-mccarthy-episode-2/\"><strong>“At The Core” with Birgit Pauli-Haack and Anne McCarthy</strong></a>, we had a fun chat with <strong>Nathan Wrigley</strong> about all the cool updates and features from the last three months. We dove into the neat experimental features aimed at making collaborative editing in WordPress a reality, which feels a lot like using Google Docs! Plus, we covered some handy tools and resources spotlighted on the Developer Blog, from nailing light and dark modes in block themes to figuring out data views and form components. And let’s not forget about &#8220;WordPress Playground,&#8221; an awesome tool that lets you whip up a site right in your browser without any hassle!</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://wpbuilds.com/2025/02/03/407-at-the-core-with-birgit-pauli-haack-and-anne-mccarthy-episode-2/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"343\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/WP-Builds-Podcast-Episode-407.jpg?resize=652%2C343&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37668\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"0-word-press-release-information\">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Aaron Jorbin </strong>announced<strong> <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/2025/02/04/wordpress-6-7-2-rc1-is-now-available/\">WordPress&nbsp;6.7.2&nbsp;RC1 is now available</a></strong>&nbsp;for testing. Final release is expected next week on February 11, 2025. The post has the list of all the bug fixes from trac tickets and GitHub pull requests. With the minor release, we will also see a new version of the default theme, Twenty-Twenty-Five.</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>George Mamadashvili</strong> worked on this week&#8217;s Gutenberg plugin release. Here is the <a href=\"https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/releases/tag/v20.2.0\">changelog of Gutenberg 20.2</a>. At first glance, two enhancements stood out for me:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Details block: Add name attribute for exclusive accordion. (<a href=\"https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/pull/56971\">56971</a>)</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Post-content block header color support. (<a href=\"https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/pull/67783\">67783</a>)</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Krupal Lakhia</strong> published the <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/2025/02/06/roadmap-to-6-8/\">Roadmap to WordPress 6.8</a>. WordPress 6.8 is dropping on April 15, 2025, and it&#8217;s all about making site building smoother and faster. Expect an improved editing flow with an enhanced “Zoom Out” mode, better style controls, and more typography options. The update also introduces “Write” and “Design” modes, so you can focus on content or layout separately. Under the hood, new tools like Block Hooks and Block Bindings make it easier to customize, while performance boosts—like speculative loading—help sites run faster. Plus, accessibility upgrades and continued PHP 8.x support keep WordPress user-friendly and future-proof. Lakhia goes into much more detail in his post and shares corresponding PRs from the tracking systems.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/2025/02/06/roadmap-to-6-8/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"326\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/image-3.png?resize=652%2C326&ssl=1\" alt=\"Change section design from style variations\" class=\"wp-image-37666\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Did you know that you can use Playground to test single Gutenberg PRs? </em></p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"124\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Screenshot-2025-02-07-at-18.50.20.png?resize=652%2C124&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37682\" />\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p>🎙️ Latest episode: <a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-114-reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo/\">Gutenberg Changelog #114 – Reflections on Gutenberg Times and Do the Woo</a> with Bob Dunn aka BobWP as host and guest Birgit Pauli-Haack, each publication started 7 years ago. </p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"328\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Gutenberg-Changelog-114-Bob-Dunn-Birgit-pauli-Haack-edited.png?resize=652%2C328&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37614\" />\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"0-p\">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>After building multiple extensions for Gravity Forms, <a href=\"https://x.com/johnofhousejohn\"><strong>Johnathon Williams</strong>,</a> owner of Odd Jar, has released his first plugin for the Block Editor – <a href=\"https://oddjar.com/wordpress-plugins/quicklink-pro/\"><strong>QuickLink Pro</strong></a>, a link management solution designed specifically for the block editor. It adds external links to the standard link dialog in the block editor for easy linking after you manage your link library on a settings page. This is a great tool to manage your affiliate links, subscription links, or documentation pages you keep referencing in your tutorials. It&#8217;s not free, and hopefully, there are a few more features added later this year. Williams also has some <a href=\"https://oddjar.com/five-tips-for-making-wordpress-plugins-with-ai/\">helpful tips on coding with AI</a>. <em>Hat tip to Davinder Singh Kainth from the WP Weekly for finding the plugin.</em></p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://oddjar.com/wordpress-plugins/quicklink-pro/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"346\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Screenshot-2025-02-08-at-12.06.01.png?resize=652%2C346&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37686\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Eric Karkovack</strong>, The WP Minute, dives into <a href=\"https://thewpminute.com/how-wordpress-block-patterns-improve-your-workflow/\"><strong>How WordPress Block Patterns Improve Your Workflow</strong></a>. WordPress block patterns are pre-designed sections that enhance your workflow by offering a quick way to build websites. Karkovack explains the value of patterns because they save time and offer ready-made reusable designs for common content. Multiple patterns can be combined to create landing pages and shorten their production time.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"five-newest-block-themes-in-the-wordpress-repository-are\">Six newest block themes </h3>\n\n\n\n<p>in the WordPress repository are: </p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/hr-management/\"><strong>HR Management</strong></a> by Peter Williams &#8211; helps you showcase HR services with eleven patterns and five Style variations</li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/gutenify-bold/\"><strong>Gutenify Bold</strong></a> by Code Yatri, a child theme of Gutenify Starter, comes with 10 Style variations and 16 patterns.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/edugrove/\"><strong>EduGrove</strong></a> by Theme Grove &#8211; designed to meet the needs for educational institutions of all kinds. It entails 30 (!) patterns and 7 style variations.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/wens-food-palette/\"><strong>WENS Food Palette</strong></a> by WEN Solutions, a child theme of WENS Haelo, for food related business with 20 patterns.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/healthy-food-blogger/\"><strong>Healthy Food Blogger</strong></a> by Creta Themes &#8211; for passionate food bloggers, recipe creators, and culinary enthusiasts, with 10 patterns and a slider.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/nas-construction-build/\"><strong>NAS Construction Build</strong></a> by Template House a theme for a construction company with 9 style variations and 16 patterns.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The total number of Block themes in the repository is <strong>1,130 as of today</strong>.</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"385\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Screenshot-2025-02-08-at-15.35.55.png?resize=652%2C385&ssl=1\" alt=\" Six newest block themes\" class=\"wp-image-37691\" />\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled\">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>In his post <a href=\"https://haurand.com/circles-wp-developing-a-block-theme/\"><strong>Block Theme Circles WP – Developing and Customization</strong></a>, Hans-Gerd Gerhards takes you along his development journey of the block theme <em>Circles WP</em>, which is available in the WordPress repository. Gerhards characterizes his theme as &#8220;lightweight and therefore extremely fast.&#8221; <em>Circles WP</em> is already prepared for an accessibility-ready website. The font used is <a href=\"https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Lexend\">Lexend</a> – an accessible font – as standard. Alternatively, the <a href=\"https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Atkinson+Hyperlegible\">Atkinson Hyperlegible Font</a> – Braille Institute (also accessibility-ready) or “System Font” are available. <em>Circles WP</em> was deliberately developed without any additional CSS, i.e., he only uses the settings of the block editor.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://haurand.com/circles-wp-developing-a-block-theme/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"285\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/circles_height-1024x448-1.jpg?resize=652%2C285&ssl=1\" alt=\"Screenshot CirclesWP in the block editor\" class=\"wp-image-37670\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>The co-founder of <em>simplenet</em>, a hosting and web development agency from Romania, <em>Andrei Chira</em>, announced that their first theme, a block theme called <strong><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/simplenet/\">Simplenet</a></strong>, was accepted into the WordPress repository. Chira also shared the genesis of the theme and its features. It&#8217;s meant to be used as a base theme to get started building a website with WordPress. &#8220;The <strong>Simplenet</strong> theme is the result of this learning process. I was inspired by other existing themes and tried to understand how the structure of a block theme works,&#8221; he wrote. The theme is also <a href=\"https://github.com/andreik6v/simplenet\">available on GitHub</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://simplenet.io/introducing-simplenet-wordpress-block-theme/\"><img width=\"650\" height=\"427\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/style-variations-simplenet-650x427-1.webp?resize=650%2C427&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37679\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>&nbsp;<a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&#8220;Keeping up with Gutenberg &#8211; Index 2024&#8221;</a>&nbsp;</strong><br />A chronological list of the WordPress Make Blog posts from various teams involved in Gutenberg development: Design, Theme Review Team, Core Editor, Core JS, Core CSS, Test, and Meta team from Jan. 2024 on. Updated by yours truly. The previous years are also available: <strong><strong><a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2020/\">2020</a>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2021/\">2021</a></strong>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<strong><a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2022/\">2022</a></strong></strong>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<strong><a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/gutenberg-index-2023\">2023</a></strong></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press\">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor. </h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Geoff Graham</strong> created a <a href=\"https://css-tricks.com/baseline-status-in-a-wordpress-block/\"><strong>WordPress block Baseline Status</strong></a> of a web feature base, meaning its browser compatibility. It&#8217;s the baseline status component formatted as a WordPress block. Graham then takes you along the journey of how he built it and what design decisions he made along the way. The <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/plugins/baseline-status/\">plugin is available in the WordPress repository</a></p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"582\" height=\"150\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Screenshot-2025-02-08-at-15.14.20.png?resize=582%2C150&ssl=1\" alt=\"Baseline Status block \" class=\"wp-image-37687\" />\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>A new course for WordPress developers is now available: <a href=\"https://learn.wpvip.com/course/advanced-wordpress-debugging/\"><strong>Advanced WordPress Debugging Course</strong></a>. Although published by Learn VIP, the learning site of WordPress VIP, the course is open and free to the public. &#8220;Debugging is a critical skill for any software developer. We understand how important it is to quickly find and resolve issues, reducing downtime and ensuring users have a seamless experience on your site. For your organization, this means saving time, avoiding unnecessary costs, and having the flexibility to grow and adapt without worrying about technical hiccups,&#8221; Rick Hurst wrote on <a href=\"https://lobby.vip.wordpress.com/2025/01/21/new-advanced-wordpress-debugging-course-for-vip-learn/\">the announcement post</a>. And the course is a &#8220;comprehensive exploration of advanced WordPress debugging techniques, equipping learners with the skills and tools needed to troubleshoot and resolve complex issues in WordPress applications.&#8221; The estimated course completion time is 5 to 8 hours. Other courses from the same team are:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https://learn.wpvip.com/course/enterprise-wordpress-security/\">Enterprise WordPress Security</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://learn.wpvip.com/course/enterprise-performance/\">Enterprise WordPress Performance</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://learn.wpvip.com/course/wordpress-vip-architecture-and-tooling/\">WordPress VIP Architecture and Tooling</a></li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>In his post, <a href=\"https://www.briancoords.com/getting-the-block-editor-ready-for-ai/\"><strong>Getting the Block Editor Ready for AI</strong></a>, Brian Coords discusses his conversation with Matt Medeiros about the shortcomings of AI and then offers a few strategies on how to help AI become smarter about WordPress.</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>So there is a new thing called <a href=\"https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/API/Invoker_Commands_API\"><em>Invoker Commands API</em></a> coming to browsers. It&#8217;s so new, it&#8217;s only available in pre-release browsers like Chrome Canary, Firefox Nightly, or Safari TP (Technical Preview) behind a feature flag that you need to enable. So if you are not interested in these new experimental browser features, you can skip this paragraph. <strong>Pascal Birchler</strong>, WordPress core committer sponsored by Google, explored what <a href=\"https://pascalbirchler.com/invoker-commands-api-wordpress/\"><strong>Invoker Commands in WordPress</strong></a> would look like. He explains what the Invoker Commands API tries to accomplish and how, and then he switches to what this would mean for Blocks and how it relates to the Interactivity API. Then Birchler introduces the Block Invokers plugin and how you can provide Invoker commands to a custom block in WordPress.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/need-a-zip-from-master/\">Need a plugin .zip from Gutenberg&#8217;s master branch?</a></strong><br />Gutenberg Times provides daily build for testing and review. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now also available via <a href=\"https://playground.wordpress.net/?blueprint-url=https://gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/playnightly.json\">WordPress Playground</a>. There is no need for a test site locally or on a server. Have you been using it? <a href=\"mailto:pauli@gutenbergtimes.com\">Email me </a>with your experience</p>\n\n\n\n<p><img alt=\"GitHub all releases\" src=\"https://img.shields.io/github/downloads/bph/gutenberg/total?style=for-the-badge\" /></p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\"><em>Questions? Suggestions? Ideas? </em><br /><em>Don&#8217;t hesitate to send <a href=\"mailto:pauli@gutenbergtimes.com\">them via email</a> or</em><br /><em> send me a message on WordPress Slack or Twitter @bph</em>.</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" />\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\">For questions to be answered on the <a href=\"http://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast\">Gutenberg Changelog</a>, <br />send them to <a href=\"mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com\">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a></p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>Featured Image: Photo by <a href=\"https://unsplash.com/de/@mbcaptures?utm_content=creditCopyText&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=unsplash\">Michael Buillerey</a> on <a href=\"https://unsplash.com/de/fotos/stadtbildfotografie-von-gebauden-und-booten-KwgEwVEsao8?utm_content=creditCopyText&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=unsplash\">Unsplash</a></p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-css-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left\"><strong>Don&#8217;t want to miss the next Weekend Edition? </strong></p>\n\n\n<form class=\"wp-block-newsletterglue-form ngl-form ngl-portrait\" action=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/feed/\" method=\"post\"><div class=\"ngl-form-container\"><div class=\"ngl-form-field\"><label class=\"ngl-form-label\" for=\"ngl_email\"><br />Type in your Email address to subscribe.</label><div class=\"ngl-form-input\"><input type=\"email\" class=\"ngl-form-input-text\" name=\"ngl_email\" id=\"ngl_email\" /></div></div><button type=\"submit\" class=\"ngl-form-button\">Subscribe</button><p class=\"ngl-form-text\">We hate spam, too, and won&#8217;t give your email address to anyone <br />except Mailchimp to send out our Weekend Edition</p></div><div class=\"ngl-message-overlay\"><div class=\"ngl-message-svg-wrap\"></div><div class=\"ngl-message-overlay-text\">Thanks for subscribing.</div></div><input type=\"hidden\" name=\"ngl_list_id\" id=\"ngl_list_id\" value=\"26f81bd8ae\" /><input type=\"hidden\" name=\"ngl_double_optin\" id=\"ngl_double_optin\" value=\"yes\" /></form>\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-css-opacity is-style-wide\" />\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Fri, 07 Feb 2025 23:42:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:18:\"Birgit Pauli-Haack\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:25;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"Matt: On Logan Bartlett Show\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:23:\"https://ma.tt/?p=136823\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:37:\"https://ma.tt/2025/02/logan-bartlett/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:551:\"<p>You may not have heard of <a href=\"https://x.com/loganbartlett\">Logan Bartlett</a>, but he&#8217;s one of the most hilarious people on Twitter and does a really interesting podcast. (<a href=\"https://pca.st/9p91u5lv\">He had a cool episode with Marc Benioff recently</a>.) We sat down for a discussion on managing through crisis, open source and AI, employee liquidity, future of WordPress, and more. You can watch on YouTube below or <a href=\"https://pca.st/j368ze4b\">listen on Pocket Casts</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n\n</div>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Fri, 07 Feb 2025 20:50:34 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4:\"Matt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:26;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:57:\"Gravatar: How to Set Up a Custom Domain Handle on Bluesky\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:32:\"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=2814\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:52:\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2025/02/06/bluesky-handle/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:13865:\"<p>&#8220;<em>Why does everyone on Bluesky have cooler handles than me?</em>&#8220;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;ve joined <a href=\"https://bsky.app/\">Bluesky</a> recently, you might have noticed something different about the usernames. While you&#8217;re stuck with @yourname.bsky.social, others are rocking handles like @sarah.cool or @team.company. These custom domain handles are one of Bluesky&#8217;s standout features – but until recently, getting one meant diving into the complex world of domain registration and DNS configuration.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>With <a href=\"https://edition.cnn.com/2024/11/13/tech/x-musk-bluesky-users-post-election/index.html\">Bluesky&#8217;s user base doubling in just 90 days</a>, standing out matters more than ever. But who has time to become a DNS expert just to get a better username?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Here&#8217;s some good news: <a href=\"https://gravatar.com/\">Gravatar</a> now offers free domains that connect directly to Bluesky. No complex setup required. These domains come pre-configured, so you can skip the technical hurdles and start using your custom handle right away.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let&#8217;s explore how to <a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/06/26/link-your-gravatar-profile-with-a-free-custom-domain/\">claim your free domain from Gravatar</a>, connect it to Bluesky, and get a verified custom handle in minutes.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://wordpress.org/plugins/gravatar-enhanced/\"><img width=\"3243\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/gravatar_enhanced_cta.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2634\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Why custom domain handles make your Bluesky profile stand out</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>A custom domain handle on Bluesky (@yourname.cool instead of @yourname.bsky.social) signals that you&#8217;ve taken an extra step to establish your presence on the platform. This verification proves you own the domain – something that adds credibility to your profile, no matter your title or type of profile.</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Creators and professionals: </strong>Writers like @sarah.ink and artists like @studio.art are using custom handles to build recognizable personal brands.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Small businesses:</strong> Local shops are claiming handles like @cafe.place to stand out in their communities.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Teams and organizations:</strong> Companies use handles like @news.company for announcements and @support.company for customer service.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Early adopters: </strong>Tech-savvy users are grabbing memorable handles like @me.cool before they&#8217;re gone.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The best part? While others are still struggling with complex DNS setups, you can claim your free domain from Gravatar and have your custom handle running in minutes.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Until now, getting a custom handle meant:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Finding a domain registrar.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Paying yearly fees (usually $10-30).</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Figuring out DNS records.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Adding TXT entries.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Waiting for verification.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Hoping you didn&#8217;t mess anything up.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Gravatar&#8217;s solution? Skip all that. Our domains come pre-configured for Bluesky, and your first year is free. Here&#8217;s everything you need to know:</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>The simplest way to get a custom Bluesky handle: Gravatar domains</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Getting a custom Bluesky handle just got much easier. Gravatar now <a href=\"https://support.gravatar.com/profiles/custom-domains/\">offers free domains</a> that come pre-configured, removing all the technical setup typically needed for custom handles.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>These free domains work with Bluesky right out of the box – no DNS configuration required. When you sign up for a Gravatar profile, you can choose from fifteen different domain extensions:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Classic options like .info, .pro, and .link</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Personal branding choices like .guru, .ninja, and .bio</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Social media-focused extensions like .social and .cool</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Professional options like .contact and .place</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>The best part? <strong>These domains are free for the first year.</strong> After claiming your domain through Gravatar, you&#8217;ll get full details about renewal pricing during checkout. This makes Gravatar&#8217;s solution perfect for anyone who wants a custom Bluesky handle without dealing with domain registrars or DNS configuration.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Step-by-step: Connect your free Gravatar domain to Bluesky</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Ready to set up your custom Bluesky handle? Follow these simple steps to claim your free Gravatar domain and connect it to Bluesky in minutes:</p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Head to <a href=\"https://gravatar.com\">Gravatar</a> and click the <em>Get Started Now</em> button in the top right corner. Fill in your details and complete your profile setup.</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1350\" height=\"998\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/get-started-now-button-gravatar.png\" alt=\"Button to create a new Gravatar profile\" class=\"wp-image-2818\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"2\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>From your Gravatar dashboard, find the <em>Claim Domain</em> option in the top left menu. If you can’t find it, go to <em>Settings &gt; Profile URL </em>tab.&nbsp;</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1351\" height=\"957\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/gravatar-claiming-custom-domain.png\" alt=\"Profile URL settings in Gravatar\" class=\"wp-image-2820\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"3\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Choose a domain extension that fits your style from the available options (e.g., .cool, .bio, .social). In this section, you can see how much the renewal would cost for each domain option.&nbsp;</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1363\" height=\"1254\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/custom-domain-options.png\" alt=\"Choosing a custom domain through WordPress.com\" class=\"wp-image-2821\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"4\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Want a more personalized touch? Click the <em>Change</em> button next to your profile URL to adjust your domain before finalizing.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>You’ll be redirected to a <a href=\"http://wordpress.com\">WordPress.com</a> checkout page to register the domain, but don’t worry – your first year is free.&nbsp;</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"660\" height=\"294\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/domain-purchase-checkout-page.png?w=660\" alt=\"WordPress checkout page for a custom domain\" class=\"wp-image-2822\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"6\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Complete the checkout, and you’ll receive an email confirming that your domain is active.</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1218\" height=\"925\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/domain-confirmation-email.png\" alt=\"Confirmation email for an activated custom domain by WordPress.com\" class=\"wp-image-2823\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"7\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Open the Bluesky app or website, navigate to <em>Settings &gt; Account &gt; Handle</em>, and select <em>Change Handle</em>.&nbsp;</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"871\" height=\"573\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/settings-handle.png\" alt=\"Handle settings in Bluesky app\" class=\"wp-image-2825\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"8\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Click <em>I Have My Own Domain</em>.</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"660\" height=\"357\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/choosing-personal-domain-for-bluesky.png?w=660\" alt=\"Changing the Bluesky handle with a custom domain\" class=\"wp-image-2826\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"9\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Enter your Gravatar domain (make sure it’s activated), and when you get the <em>Domain verified! </em>message, click on <em>Update to [domain name]</em>.&nbsp;</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1219\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/domain-updated-confirmation.png\" alt=\"Confirmation for the changing of the Bluesky domain\" class=\"wp-image-2828\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"10\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>You’re done! Enjoy your sleek, verified custom handle on Bluesky!</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Common questions on Gravatar’s custom Bluesky handles with Gravatar&nbsp;</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Q: How long does it take to verify my custom domain handle on Bluesky?</strong><strong><br /></strong>A: Verification is quick and usually completes within a few minutes. However, if the system is busy, you might experience a short delay. Don’t worry – your handle will be ready shortly.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Q: Will I lose my original .bsky.social handle?</strong><strong><br /></strong>A: No. As of December 12, 2024, your previous .bsky.social handle is reserved for you. You won’t need to create a new account to keep it, and you can switch back to it anytime if you decide to stop using your custom domain.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Q: What happens to tags and mentions associated with my old handle?</strong><strong><br /></strong>A: All tags and mentions linked to your old .bsky.social handle will automatically point to your new Gravatar-powered handle. There’s no risk of losing connections or conversations.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Q: Is the handle change permanent?</strong><strong><br /></strong>A: Not at all. You can change your handle again or revert to your original .bsky.social handle anytime. Your Gravatar domain will still belong to you, even if you stop using it on Bluesky.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Q: What else can I do with my Gravatar domain?</strong><strong><br /></strong>A: Your Gravatar domain links directly to your Gravatar profile, which acts as a universal online identity. You can use it to <a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/11/11/how-to-list-social-media-handles/\">showcase your other social media profiles</a> and build a cohesive online presence.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Using your existing domain? Here&#8217;s how to verify it&nbsp;</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>If you already own a domain and want to use it as your Bluesky handle, you’ll need to verify it by adding a <strong>DNS TXT record</strong>. Here’s how:</p>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>When you initiate the handle change on Bluesky, the platform will provide the specific TXT record you need. This record includes three key fields: <strong>host</strong>, <strong>type</strong>, and <strong>value</strong>.</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1091\" height=\"767\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/dnx-records-for-custom-domain.png\" alt=\"DNS record for changing the Bluesky handle with a custom domain\" class=\"wp-image-2827\" />\n\n\n\n<ol start=\"2\" class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Log in to your domain provider’s DNS management panel (or a third-party service like <a href=\"https://www.cloudflare.com/\">Cloudflare</a>). Locate the section for adding DNS records.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Input the host, type, and value provided by Bluesky into the appropriate fields. Save the changes.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Wait for propagation. While DNS propagation can take up to 24 hours, it usually completes within a few minutes if everything is configured correctly.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Return to Bluesky and click <em>Verify DNS Record</em>. Once verified, your profile will automatically update to use your domain as the handle.</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<p>This process adds a layer of credibility to your handle and ensures it’s uniquely tied to your domain ownership.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Managing multiple handles and subdomains</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Organizations often benefit from managing multiple handles under a single domain. For example, a company could use <em>@news.gravatar.com</em> for announcements and <em>@support.gravatar.com</em> for customer service. This creates a cohesive, professional identity across departments or teams.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>To set up multiple handles efficiently, it’s recommended to use HTTP verification instead of DNS TXT records. This involves creating a file in the <code>/.well-known/</code><strong> </strong>directory on your web server, which Bluesky checks to verify ownership of the subdomains.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Bluesky provides a detailed guide on <a href=\"https://bsky.social/about/blog/4-28-2023-domain-handle-tutorial\">verifying multiple handles under a single domain</a>. Since the process requires some technical know-how, it’s best suited for developers or IT teams.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Get started with your custom Bluesky handle</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Using a free Gravatar domain for your Bluesky handle offers plenty of advantages:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Choose from a variety of TLD extensions, like .bio, .social, and .link.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Enjoy your domain free for the first year, with no need for complex DNS configuration.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Manage your online identity from a centralized Gravatar profile, making it easy to stay consistent across platforms.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Gravatar domains also help <strong>future-proof your digital identity</strong>. As more platforms adopt domain-based verification, having your own domain now ensures you’re ready for the next phase of social media.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>To get started, visit <a href=\"https://gravatar.com\">Gravatar</a> and claim your free domain from the available options. While Gravatar simplifies the setup process, remember to complete Bluesky’s handle change steps to activate your custom domain handle.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>With just a few clicks, you’ll have a unique, verified handle on Bluesky – and a free domain for the next year!</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://gravatar.com/connect/?gravatar_from=blog\"><img width=\"3243\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/free_profile_cta.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2616\" /></a>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Thu, 06 Feb 2025 20:24:34 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:11:\"Ronnie Burt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:27;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:81:\"Do The Woo Community: Developer Takes, From Code to Connections with Tess Kriesel\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=90490\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:79:\"https://dothewoo.io/developer-takes-from-code-to-connections-with-tess-kriesel/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:222:\"In this episode of DevPulse’s \"Expanding the Stack,\" hosts Carl and Zach explore diverse developer backgrounds, emphasize networking and soft skills, and discuss challenges in today\'s job market with guest Tessa Kriesel.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Thu, 06 Feb 2025 10:02:24 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:28;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:84:\"WPTavern: #155 – Anthony Jackson on Trying to Figure Out His Way in the Tech World\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:48:\"https://wptavern.com/?post_type=podcast&p=187096\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:98:\"https://wptavern.com/podcast/155-anthony-jackson-on-trying-to-figure-out-his-way-in-the-tech-world\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:53794:\"Transcript<div>\n<p>[00:00:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Welcome to the Jukebox Podcast from WP Tavern. My name is Nathan Wrigley.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jukebox is a podcast which is dedicated to all things WordPress. The people, the events, the plugins, the blocks, the themes, and in this case, trying to figure out a way through the tech world.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;d like to subscribe to the podcast, you can do that by searching for WP Tavern in your podcast player of choice, or by going to wp tavern.com/feed/podcast, and you can copy that URL into most podcast players.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a topic that you&#8217;d like us to feature on the podcast, I&#8217;m keen to hear from you and hopefully get you, or your idea, featured on the show. Head to wptavern.com/contact/jukebox and use the form there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So on the podcast today we have Anthony Jackson.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anthony is a true technophile whose journey has been shaped by a constant pursuit of understanding new technologies.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>From a young age, Anthony&#8217;s curiosity about technology laid the foundation for a lifetime of exploration. Starting from modest beginnings in computer repair, he steadily transitioned into the world of WordPress, and the complexities of server management.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This episode really is a story, the story of trying new things, being creative, and always following curiosity wherever it may lead.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anthony talks about his early experiences describing the moment computers first sparked his interest, and the subsequent path he charted in the technology space. Despite hurdles and frustrations, particularly with initial web development and WordPress hosting, his story is a testament to determination and resilience.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>As you&#8217;ll hear, Anthony learned the ropes of many technologies from grappling with CSS for website customization, to exploring cloud computing, and the command line in Linux.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>His journey took a big turn when he discovered automated Bash scripts that facilitate the deployment of open source applications like WordPress. This is what Anthony is doing right now, but you&#8217;re going to hear many stories of different pathways that led to this situation.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Throughout the episode, Anthony sheds light on his philosophy of embracing technology. He speaks about the numerous technologies he&#8217;s explored, the trials he faced along the way, and the value of cultivating his technical skills. With his Bash scripts ready to streamline server setups and deployments, Anthony envisions a future where technology is not just a tool, but a powerful ally for businesses and personal projects alike.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re keen to hear some inspirational stories about overcoming tech challenges, resilience and learning, this episode is for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re interested in finding out more, you can find all of the links in the show notes by heading to wp tavern.com/podcast, where you&#8217;ll find all the other episodes as well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so without further delay, I bring you Anthony Jackson.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am joined on the podcast today by Anthony Jackson. Hello.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:32] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Hello, Nathan. How are you?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:33] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, great. I&#8217;m very, very pleased to chat with you today, not only because you&#8217;ve got some really nice audio equipment, which makes you sound amazing, but also it&#8217;s very nice to meet new faces, new people for the first time ever. That&#8217;s what&#8217;s happening here. I&#8217;ve never met Anthony before.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But in order that both you, dear listener and I, the interviewer, get to know a bit about Anthony, would you mind giving us your little potted bio. I guess it would be best to keep that in the sphere of technology, perhaps WordPress. But just tell us a little bit about yourself, but not too many spoilers about the episode to come.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:03] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Yeah, so my name is Anthony Jackson. I&#8217;m a technical person by nature. I&#8217;ve always loved technology, always had a thing for it. Went to school for computer technology. I have my own computer repair business. So I do that on the side, part-time, while I work a full-time job, as well as grow the business that you&#8217;re going to learn about here in a little bit.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I stay pretty busy, obviously. I love technology, I feel that it can help a lot of people. I don&#8217;t think you should ever be afraid of it. I think you should always embrace it. It&#8217;s one of those things, if you don&#8217;t get on the bandwagon now, you kind of get punished for it later.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I&#8217;m just really excited to share with your audience my journey because it hasn&#8217;t been easy, and I&#8217;m really glad I took the leap of faith because if I didn&#8217;t I certainly wouldn&#8217;t be where I am now. So I&#8217;m just really excited to get started and talk about it and share it with you guys.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:47] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Okay, that&#8217;s great. Thank you so much. Can I just ask, I don&#8217;t know your age, but when I was at school, so I&#8217;m now in my very, very early fifties, but when I was at school, a child at school, computers were just starting to be something that was in the market, it wasn&#8217;t the domain of universities occupying an entire room. It was something which you could hold in both arms, but they weren&#8217;t ubiquitous.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You know, maybe the school had one. It was very rare for an individual to own a computer. And so it wasn&#8217;t really until I was much older and had left school that computers became a bit of a thing which people could tinker with.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What was the experience for you? Again, I&#8217;m not trying to wrangle your age out of you, but just give us an insight into how much computing had progressed by the time you were sort of at school?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:05:28] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Oh my gosh, Nathan, I&#8217;ll tell you a little backstory. So my mom left me when I was younger. My dad had passed away. It was kind of just me and I lived with my aunt. She had given me a computer to go live with my mom. She had found my mom is what happened.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I turned it on and it was just an old compact, it booted up so slowly. I had no idea what it was, how it worked, what the purpose of it was. All I knew was I wanted to be on the internet. At that time it was AOL, that was the place to be.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I remember turning it on and I pressed the button on the DVD player and the tray opened, and I was like, wait, what is the sorcery? Like, and I&#8217;m like, oh, that&#8217;s cool. Okay, we&#8217;ll go with that. And the neighbor knocked on the door and said, hey, you&#8217;ve got some mail, and she gave me this disk, remember the AOL 3.0 Running Man disk? And I was like, what is this? Like, 30 minutes of the free internet. I&#8217;m like, what is the internet, right?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I put it in this tray and I ended up setting up my account and the first words I heard were, welcome, you&#8217;ve got mail. And I&#8217;m like, no I don&#8217;t, I just checked it. And I got totally hooked immediately on this whole email thing. And I just, it blossomed, man, and I&#8217;ve been doing computers for, God, 20 years now.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I love the backstory on it because it really changed my life. Like, I discovered the internet, email. I spent five years homeless without the internet. I never would&#8217;ve known like who to ask for help, how to get help. It truly changed my life, Nathan. It really did.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:06:40] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I think there&#8217;s something quite addictive about it, but also I think, and this is from personal experience, I have no reference to psychology of the human race in general, but it would seem that some people really from a very, very early age are drawn to it on a level which is indescribable. You just have this desire to be in close proximity to a computer that&#8217;s switched on, and to be tinkering with it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I have that, but I know people who are very dear to me that if you put them near a computer, the first thing they want to do is get out the chair and walk away. You know, there&#8217;s just no interest in it whatsoever. But I think it is something that you can be passionate about in a heartbeat.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So in your case, you know, you press the DVD button, something happened, you did it on a keyboard and something happened elsewhere over there. It&#8217;s like, ooh, these two things are connected. There&#8217;s something clever going on there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And all of a sudden alarm bells are ringing. Like, wow, I&#8217;ve got to dig deeper into this. I know already though that you are younger than I am because you joined the computer world at a time when the internet existed. When I was playing with the first computers, basically, you switched it on and a cursor blinked, and that was it. That was the fun that you had, you had to type things in.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:07:45] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> My first experience was Windows 3.1, back when the briefcase was around.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:07:49] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Okay, so as a child leaving school, you&#8217;ve got this interest in computers and what have you. So where did the journey go from there? What were the next steps from Windows 3.1? What are some of the things that began early on? What were the dominoes that fell?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:08:00] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Well, I discovered Windows XP, it was the hottest thing since sliced bread. I loved XP. Vista was a hot mess. Fast forward, seven was good, eight was terrible. And then Windows 10, and now Windows 11. I figured if I learned Windows 3.1, I kind of had to follow the journey. So I started Googling the different features of Windows, realised quickly that an operating system is an operating system, it&#8217;s just where you find stuff, right?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I love the fact that I could see it progress, that I could be a part of that and help people. And that&#8217;s what really turned me onto it. So the technology thing is what really kind of gets me. I love technology. I love the fact that we can use it to have a good time, to leverage it, to grow our businesses, to do a lot of things, like podcasting and other things.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:08:40] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Are you the kind of person that upon receiving a computer, desktop computer, do you like to take it apart and see what the bits are inside there, or assemble your own? Or are you purchase it from the store and let the dust gather on the inside and then dispose of it at some point, 5, 10 years later whatever it may be?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:08:55] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> The thing that I love the most, Nathan, this is going to sound so crazy, I don&#8217;t enjoy building them. I actually don&#8217;t know how to build them. I tried once and failed miserably. But what I love nothing more in my computer repair business is when somebody comes to me and says, Tony, I need to buy a new one, I don&#8217;t know what to do, where do I start?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I love that conversation because it&#8217;s so overwhelming for a lot of people, and I have a unique way. I took a Tony Robbins class a long time ago for personal development, and they did this whole assessment on me and the results yielded that I had a way of breaking down technical information into a manner that someone can understand.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So when someone comes to me and says, I need a new computer, I&#8217;m like, okay, I got you, it&#8217;s okay. What do you need? What are you looking for? What are your concerns? And I can have a nice conversation and ease them into making a confident purchase instead of buyer&#8217;s remorse. It makes such a difference.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:09:43] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I&#8217;m firmly on the Mac side of things, and when you purchase a Mac, you really only have three or four decisions to make, one of which is color. What color do you want the computer to be? But beyond that, it&#8217;s things like how much memory, how much ram, there&#8217;s very few components that you really get to choose about that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But on the Windows side of things, for a family member, I have recently built a computer and I was actually fairly alarmed at how many choices there were for every single thing. And it really did make me realise that there&#8217;s a whole career in just being able to understand what range of graphics cards there are, what range of CPUs there are, what kind of panel could you have as a display, what the keyboards are, what the mouse are.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that was really interesting to me. Is that something that you nerd out on then? Do you know all of the kind of serial numbers of the different graphics cards which are available?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:32] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> I&#8217;m not that big of a nerd. My nerd comes out when I started Learn WordPress, that&#8217;s when the nerd came out.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:38] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Okay. Well, we&#8217;ve established your nerd credentials. That&#8217;s lovely. Let&#8217;s move on to WordPress then. When did you, firstly, when was the first time you came across WordPress, and in what context? What did you need it for?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:48] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> So a long time ago I started my computer repair business, probably about eight or nine years ago. And the first thing that came to mind was a website. I was like, I have to have a website. I have a business, it&#8217;s a known fact you have to have a website, right?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, I didn&#8217;t know WordPress had never heard of WordPress, so I went where any other person would go, and that was to the internet to find web hosting, and I found godaddy.com. And I was like, GoDaddy it is.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I had a budget of around $3,000, and what happened was they ended up coding me a really nice HTML, CSS, web development website. But I realised quickly that I&#8217;m a picky person. I wanted things changed. I didn&#8217;t like how things aligned. OCD, like the CSS and stuff wasn&#8217;t aligning. And I wanted more control. I wanted to be able to control that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I remember Googling how to control your website and it said WordPress, the number one platform. I&#8217;m like, what the hell is WordPress? Okay. And I clicked, best decision of my life. I ended up going back to GoDaddy to get hosting, WordPress hosting. I didn&#8217;t know what it was, I had to kind of figure it out. And I realised quickly about shared hosting, and what it was, and how it acted, and I didn&#8217;t like the fact that I was being shared with people, it made me very angry.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I went through seven different hosting providers, 15 different WordPress for Dummies books, trying to figure things out. Was very, very hard. One day I ended up going to like, I think it was Namecheap or something, and getting a little bit better WordPress hosting with more resources because I thought that would help. And I was sitting there so frustrated because I saw a template but had no idea what to do.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And all of a sudden after tinkering with WordPress in the back end, I put the word home in what we call the primary menu. And at that point it clicked. I was like, oh my God, I can build a fully fledged website with content that&#8217;s branded to me without having to pay extra to add revisions and stuff like that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so for like two weeks straight, I learned how to install WordPress. I learned the art of the primary menu. I had so much fun just adding the same buttons every time, home, about, services, contact. And then I discovered page builders. That&#8217;s when things really turned. Divi was my first love, and always will be.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:12:50] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Did you have to really persevere then, because it sounds like you&#8217;ve got all of the equipment in your head for dealing with technical problems. You&#8217;ve got that sort of passion to see it through to the end. I think I get quite frustrated with certain tasks and give up fairly quickly, but it sounds like you&#8217;ve got all of the bits and pieces.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>10 years ago when you installed WordPress, I&#8217;m guessing it was a much more difficult enterprise than it is now. You know, you&#8217;ve got these hosting companies that you basically click one button and not only will they set your WordPress website up, they&#8217;ll send you the login links, you can probably just click a button to log in on the backend and what have you. Was it fairly frustrating, and do you think that, if you&#8217;d had a different personality type, you would&#8217;ve just thrown the baby out the bathwater and gone, nope?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:13:29] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> A hundred percent. If I did not have my technical background, I would&#8217;ve gave up years ago. I called GoDaddy so many times for support. I can&#8217;t even begin to tell you how many times I called them. And I enjoyed calling them because when I did call them, I got to give them some great feedback because they understood completely what I was trying to do. So it was really cool. I got to see them improve and I got to see myself improve. But it was also nice to be able to call them and get it fixed because I didn&#8217;t have to explain what I was trying to do. I knew what I was trying to do.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the design element stuff did not come until later. I spent so much time tinkering with WordPress, buying plugins. Nathan, I&#8217;ve got a repository on themeforest.net of plugins and themes that I haven&#8217;t even touched. I bought anything from caching plugins, to improve performance, to membership plugins, not knowing any idea what they&#8217;ve been. I just went on as spending spree and just bought everything. And now I&#8217;m like, what do I do with it all? Like, I don&#8217;t even know what I want to build.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:14:27] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> There&#8217;s a definite learning curve there. Just dealing with the nature of the internet. I don&#8217;t know quite how to put this. When I talk to people about how interesting I think the internet is, I can very often sense that people&#8217;s eyes are glazing over. You know, oh Nathan, dear Nathan, what&#8217;s the matter with you?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I think on a very profound level that it is amazing that we live in a time where you can download free software, and with a few dollars invested in hosting, and it doesn&#8217;t have to be a lot, you can have something that the entire world, well, by that I mean people who have access to the internet, the entire world can see.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And conceptually, I just think that&#8217;s utterly remarkable. And I don&#8217;t know if it ever sort of hits you in the same way that it hits me. But you said, you know, you put the word home on your webpage, or you put something for your home screen and you have that moment of, I can do the internet. I can be on the internet.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think that is something which gets lost so quick. But occasionally I stare at what I&#8217;m doing and think, I just click publish and there it is, and everybody can see it. And I think that&#8217;s phenomenal.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:35] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> That hit me when I discovered the actual blog portion of WordPress. When I discovered that my content could go out to anybody and everybody with a click of a button. I was a little blown away. I was a little overwhelmed because I was like, this is really cool. I&#8217;ve created a piece of content for somebody that might need my help. They can just click a button and within a few seconds potentially see it. Like that is, you&#8217;re right, it&#8217;s remarkable. But it&#8217;s also really overwhelming for somebody who&#8217;s never experienced it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:16:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, and I guess, you&#8217;ve got to be a little bit careful about what you publish and what have you. But I still think we are in an age where I think it&#8217;s easy to forget how privileged we are that we have access. Well, you and I, for example, we&#8217;ve never met. We&#8217;ve only communicated on the internet via a social network. I messaged to say would anybody enjoy coming on this podcast? You contacted me. Here we are. We&#8217;re using a browser based application to communicate with each other. And this is just totally normal now. And yet my 14-year-old self staring at the computer in the school, what we&#8217;re doing now was the realm of Star Trek.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This was the kind of thing that people in spaceships did, and yet now it&#8217;s totally normal. And sometimes I try to sort of impress upon my children how remarkable it is, but for them it&#8217;s just, no, no, no, this is what all humans have had for all time. And it just gets lost.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:16:49] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> It is remarkable.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:16:50] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Where from there then? So we&#8217;ve reached the point where you&#8217;ve discovered WordPress. What&#8217;s happened subsequently since then? It sounds like you&#8217;ve got your business all pivoted around WordPress as well. What&#8217;s the next step in the story?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:01] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Well, I went through multiple page builders, never really learned another one because I got so comfortable with Divi. I tried Elementor, didn&#8217;t really like it all that much. Tried every block builder. Discovered Gutenberg was the worst thing known to mankind. Tried buying Astra, some other, I forget the other company that has the block builder.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:20] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Kadence maybe.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:21] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Kadence, yes, I tried them. But the thing that I didn&#8217;t like about WordPress, I loved the page builders, they made things easy, but the one thing that I hated the most is I never really had control of where to put stuff. It always was just like, this is your block, this is where it goes. I didn&#8217;t know CSS. I didn&#8217;t know HTML. I did not know how to move things, and I hated that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because the whole point of me going to WordPress was to have control. And when I lost control, it turned me off. I was the person who built the entire website and canceled my hosting because I wanted more control. That&#8217;s how I learned. I canceled, and bought, and canceled, and bought and thought it would get better and it didn&#8217;t, and I just pushed, and pushed, and pushed and learned.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I started to just Google how to move things with CSS. I taught myself the basics of CSS and HTML, and a little bit of JavaScript. Not a lot, just enough to be dangerous. But I wanted control, Nathan. I wanted to be able to do things, and when I discovered that I could do that, that put me in another whole new rabbit hole. Then I discovered plugins that control CSS, selectors and all of that, so it gave me an opportunity.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:18:20] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, I always think that WordPress kind of has been pitched at me by other human beings as this kind of catchall, easy to use solution. I think maybe you&#8217;ll get lucky and you&#8217;ll be satisfied in a way that you clearly are not, you know, if you want every pixel to be mapped perfectly from your head onto the screen, that&#8217;s not going to be the case. But maybe for many people it&#8217;s enough.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Okay, I&#8217;ve got this templated layout, it&#8217;s fine, I&#8217;m happy with that. I&#8217;ll click publish and whatever&#8217;s there is fine. But if you do want to move things around, and you do want to have a particular layout, and you want to show only these posts here and these posts here, but you want it to look entirely different from the theme that you&#8217;re using, I think it&#8217;s still very confusing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I think the underlying languages of HTML, CSS and JavaScript, which really these days are the underpinnings of certainly the front end of web development, they&#8217;re fairly difficult to acquire if it&#8217;s not your job. If you&#8217;re just doing this evening, weekend, it&#8217;s a bit of a hobby, I still think those things are really difficult to acquire and they&#8217;re not slowing down. You know, in the year 2025 when we&#8217;re recording this, CSS is really on a clip, it&#8217;s really modifying itself quickly. All these different sort of layout systems, flex, grid to learn and what have you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I think the promise of the page builders in WordPress is probably why it&#8217;s as successful as it is. If you rewind the clock 10 years, when they just started to come about, you mentioned Divi and there was Beaver Builder and, oh, all sorts of other ones. I would imagine that if you could chart the growth of WordPress, it would&#8217;ve been the novice user wanting a sort of what you see as what you get, point, click, drag, save solution that meant that WordPress grew. And it sounds like you fitted into that niche quite nicely.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:19:56] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Yeah, I wanted to know why. Why it wasn&#8217;t working. Why the block couldn&#8217;t move. I was very irritated by that because I had certain expectations for my logo to be correct. And what really got me into WordPress was the fact that it was drag and drop. And I love the word drag and drop, because if you don&#8217;t know how to code, well, drag and drop is the alternative, and it&#8217;s your best friend. But it&#8217;s not a true, genuine, drag and drop experience.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because to me, drag and drop genuine experience means to put things where I want to put them. I don&#8217;t want to be limited by the block builder, you know, the blocks that you&#8217;re provided. I want to be able to move it, control it, customise it. Because at the end of the day, people buy into you and not your products and services. But at the same time, your website never gets built because you spend way too much time customising, Googling the 20 best page builders of 2025, and buying a whole bunch of stuff you never needed in the first place, right?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:20:45] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So have you doubled down on your page builder of choice and your website building experience is based upon the UI, and becoming an expert and having the perfect muscle memory for doing things in that? Is that how you build your pages, and themes, and structures for web pages now?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:21:00] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> So, ironically enough, Nathan, I&#8217;ve actually got away from doing WordPress. I transitioned into something different, which we&#8217;re going to get to here in a minute. I learned everything about WordPress. I wanted to learn. The only thing I didn&#8217;t learn was WooCommerce. I understand what it is, I just didn&#8217;t want to learn it. I didn&#8217;t have a need for, my business didn&#8217;t sell digital products.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I got out of it because it just became frustrating because I just couldn&#8217;t do what I wanted to do, and I didn&#8217;t have the budget to pay someone to fix it. I knew if I did, I would probably just cancel anyways because I wanted it to look even better. So I just stopped because I didn&#8217;t want to do it. I discovered that I wanted to learn how to actually deploy WordPress for myself instead of using a hosting provider because that&#8217;s the easy way.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So one day I was Googling and I came across the word Linux. I was like, Linux, okay, that sounds like a fun rabbit hole. Let&#8217;s check it out. I discovered my first cloud computing company, which was Linode. I called them up and, you know, I got to be honest with you, I wasn&#8217;t super impressed with them, because the one thing that I realised quickly is that there&#8217;s no support at all. It is all community driven. If you think about WordPress, the open source, there&#8217;s no support. It&#8217;s all just learning community based forums, podcast episodes, wherever you can get content. Thank God WordPress, the audience is so big that you can get help. But to this day, there&#8217;s still things that I still want to know the answers to about WordPress, but I just can&#8217;t find anymore.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I discovered Linux and I had a very, very difficult time of spinning up a server. I struggled so badly with the command line, so badly. And then I discovered that Linode had one click apps and one of them was WordPress. I was like, here we go again. I installed WordPress. I grew a little bit of a fascination with trying to find my credentials inside the terminal, realised quickly that shared hosting was not the only option to deploy WordPress.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>My biggest problem with the server stuff was there was no support. I struggled very badly. Everything I Googled said, copy this, copy that. I&#8217;d copy and paste, I wouldn&#8217;t get the result. I was throwing things around, spinning up servers left and right, getting so frustrated. I&#8217;m like, what do I need to do?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I ended up buying a course on Udemy, and went through this very, very great course for absolute beginners and discovered quickly what I was doing wrong. Completely stopped the course and started learning again, because I&#8217;m not that type of person who takes the course. I find my fix, and then I go back to like tinkering with things. I spun up, I don&#8217;t know, probably 300 little VPSs trying to figure things out. Needless to say, I&#8217;m a master of installing WordPress with Linode now.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:23:24] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Have you got into Linux server admin, sort of sys admin as a way, well, that was just the fun that you were having at the time, and then discovered that, okay, WordPress can bolt on top of that. And so now the two things have combined and you are back to WordPress, or have you entirely stopped with WordPress?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:23:40] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> I never got into the sys admin stuff, but the next journey for me was, I Googled Linux and I had WordPress. I hated the command line, Nathan. The commands, the black and white was so overwhelming. As it turns out now it&#8217;s like my best friend. I can&#8217;t live without it because it&#8217;s so much easier if you know what you&#8217;re doing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I discovered something called cPanel, and when I got into cPanel I was like, okay, this is cool. I got a GUI, I can look at something, and lo and behold, guess what I found first? Install WordPress. I&#8217;m like, it&#8217;s back again, right? Everywhere I turn, WordPress kept coming back.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I learned how to install cPanel on my own server, trials galore, WordPress. Ended up getting super frustrated with cPanel, because cPanel is extremely technical, if you are not in a shared hosting environment where it&#8217;s managed. It&#8217;s extremely technical. They started giving me questions, I started asking for commands. I started taking notes of those commands, so when I broke something, I would know what to do.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I learned cPanel pretty proficiently, but got overwhelmed with it just because the technical. There&#8217;s a difference between documentation and technical documentation. Documentation is, click here, do this. Technical documentation is, before you get started, make sure that cPanel&#8217;s installed properly on your server. It&#8217;s like, okay, first of all, what is cPanel and how do you install it properly? Is there such a thing?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Like it feels so overwhelming and you couldn&#8217;t contact Linode, you had no support. The only thing you had was cPanel. So I went through hundreds of cPanel trials trying to figure things out. Grew a fascination with the command line and installing cPanel. And I discovered pretty quickly that, even though I didn&#8217;t want to learn WordPress anymore, I wanted to provide hosting for WordPress.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I wanted my own hosting provider. I wanted to be the guy who said, you know what you need, WordPress hosting, I got you. But as it turns out, hosting WordPress on your own server is difficult because you don&#8217;t have that system admin background to fix things. Makes it extremely challenging and it, your confidence goes way, way, way down, because you cannot provide that quality of hosting that you want to provide.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So upon Googling more, I discovered something called WHMCS, Web Host Master Complete Solution. Loved this concept. This was a dark rabbit hole. I went down this rabbit hole, and discovered quickly that I would have to install it on my own server, which I lacked knowledge of. Biggest problem was the file manager, figuring out the file structure, how to navigate to the path, trying to figure all that out.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I finally got that installed and I learned about WHMCS. And through some Googling and YouTube, I hooked up my first server and I click install and it provisioned an instance of WordPress inside of WHMCS. I saw a button that said, log into WordPress. And I was like, oh my God. There&#8217;s a button.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I clicked this button and I was like, oh my God, it just launched WordPress. I was blown away, so I was like, let&#8217;s get a business going. So I started writing documentation and yeah, it wasn&#8217;t that easy.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:26:26] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Boy, I mean, you get the prize for commitment though. I mean, I don&#8217;t know if you&#8217;ve got just bucket loads of time on your hand, or if you are just the kind of person that, once you&#8217;ve set yourself a task, it&#8217;s going to annoy you until you finally cross that Rubicon. But you&#8217;ve got a lot stickability.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:26:42] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> I&#8217;m a determined individual. I went through multiple attempts at WordPress hosting, but I discovered that I was going to need help. I was going to have to find a way to provide this because I didn&#8217;t have the system admin background. So I discovered reseller hosting. And this is kind of where things blossomed.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Reseller hosting was great, because they not only provided the WHMCS license free, they provided a cPanel license and I didn&#8217;t have to manage it. It was the perfect setup. I was like, oh my God, this is perfect. So I really started to dig into my business then. But then I discovered really quickly that without customers, this is going to be really difficult.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:14] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, that&#8217;s the crucial bit that you have to have somebody to resell it to.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:17] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> So after three, four months of messing with tech and mastering the art of cPanel, WHM and WHMCS, I stopped because I didn&#8217;t have any customers. Why pay 40 bucks a month if you&#8217;re not making any money, right? Didn&#8217;t make sense. So I was like, well, I need to figure out a different way to provide hosting. I came across something in Linode called Bash. Bash scripting.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I did a little Googling, looked at some images, and I&#8217;m like, okay, it&#8217;s coded. I&#8217;m not a coder. How am I going to do this? And I went back and looked at cPanel, because I had installed it one day and I noticed that the word Bash was in their installation command. And I was like, what the hell is Bash? And what is it doing in this command?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So Google, Google, Google. I discovered some commands, curl, Wget in Linux, all the stuff, and realised that I could pull a file down from the internet and run it as Bash. I was like, this is wicked cool. And I wanted to be able to deploy WordPress, but I wanted to be able to provide it to somebody else so that I didn&#8217;t have to deal with the server side. I wanted to be able to give them a script and say, you can download this script, click a button, add your domain, make sure your DNS is set up and you&#8217;re golden. And I was like, this is cool.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But then I realised like, I need a way to deploy WordPress because I can&#8217;t use Linode because then I&#8217;m doing it. I don&#8217;t want to help them get to where they need to be because I don&#8217;t know how. So how do I offer WordPress hosting in a manner that they can do it in a session that they can understand? So what I ended up doing was I discovered Docker.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:28:35] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You have been everywhere.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:28:36] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> I discovered Docker, and I was like, okay, this is overwhelming, right? Docker Hub, command line. I installed my first WordPress image and I saw the welcome screen. So what we know as WordPress, when we log in, we just log in with our credentials and we&#8217;re good. This brought me to the actual installation screen of WordPress. Pick your language. And I was like, oh, this is where it really begins, right?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So when I discovered Docker, I found the first image and I launched my first instance of WordPress using Docker, and it was local. And I went to go do everything and it said, error, database not found. I was like, this isn&#8217;t good, because I knew that the database was the core, right?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I learned in Docker how to set up a database with my SQL. And after some serious frustration around coding YAML files, I got with a guy on Fiverr and I said, listen, I said, I need you to make me a script.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I need a Docker install that can install WordPress, have a database, and also be able to get an SSL on the domain, because adding SSLs in Linux is a pain in the butt. I don&#8217;t know if you&#8217;ve ever been down this road. One of the biggest things about cPanel and the shared hosting is the automatic SSL feature is flipping amazing. It&#8217;s one of the things you&#8217;ll fall in love with, because your site has to be secure for multiple reasons.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But regardless, he ended up using something called Caddy server. Reverse proxies, all that stuff. He ended up just creating the script. And he goes, just run it. I&#8217;m like, how do I run it? I have no idea. He&#8217;s like, just make a file, do this. And I put the code in and all of a sudden I hit enter and this thing started running. It started updating packages, and servers, installing Docker, Docker Engine, Docker Compose, running and running and running and running. And I&#8217;m just watching it running. My eyes are just lighting up the whole time. I&#8217;m like, oh my God, what is doing?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:14] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It&#8217;s like watching the Matrix or something, isn&#8217;t it?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:17] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> It would pause, it would extract, it would unzip files. I thought it was broke. I restarted like seven times. And all of a sudden it stopped, Nathan, and said, your WordPress instance is ready, go here. And I was like, no way. No way. And I&#8217;ll be damned, man. I clicked the link and there it was on my own domain secure, and I was blown away.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I didn&#8217;t even log in because I knew it right then and there that I could deploy WordPress and everything would be fine, right? And so I saw this WordPress and I was like, oh my God, I just deployed WordPress in minutes, not hours, on my own server with nearly no technical knowledge.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:51] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I don&#8217;t know, I think you&#8217;ve acquired quite a lot of technical knowledge on the way.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:55] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Well, thank God, right? Because running that script was extremely challenging, but I was just, you know that moment when you discover something and you&#8217;re clapping and you&#8217;re smiling and you&#8217;re putting your hands over the air? I was clapping away. That&#8217;s where my mind was at. And when I did that, that&#8217;s when the business really started, because I wanted to be able to offer WordPress hosting without having to worry about the sys admin stuff. So I figured if I just provided a script.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So now I have a script that&#8217;s made in Bash that you just copy and paste a command and the script runs and does what it needs to do. All you need to do is just add your A record for the DNS and your SSL and you&#8217;re good to go.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:28] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So is that, dare I ask, is that where you&#8217;re at now? Or is there another sort of, I don&#8217;t know, you just sort of, quick, pivot left? Is there something else coming?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:36] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> No, there&#8217;s more. So Bash is kind of where I stopped. I didn&#8217;t really learn Bash, but as you know there&#8217;s a lot of drama in the WordPress community, and it seems to shine on X. And I made a decision that it&#8217;s going to be really hard to market because of all the competition with WordPress. And I kind of stopped.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so the business now, this is where I&#8217;m at, I&#8217;m creating Bash scripts for popular open source applications. Because if there&#8217;s one thing that I&#8217;ve learned through my journey with WordPress and learning servers and Linux, it&#8217;s that the open source community is so powerful. Your privacy, your focus, your respect, your content, your everything is so important. So I&#8217;m actually creating Bash scripts that automate the process of those popular open source applications like WordPress, Plausible Analytics, Nextcloud, all those popular ones.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I&#8217;m in the process of making scripts for all those, and it makes the process easy because when I first started deploying open source applications, my biggest challenge was the documentation. Trying to understand it, trying to read it, trying to make sense of it. And when I saw that WordPress script run, man, I was like, oh my God, I can make anything run, and now I&#8217;ve got five scripts.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:32:46] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> And so is that going to be the business in the future there? Where you come along and you, I don&#8217;t know, you want Moodle or something, or you want Joomla or WordPress or whatever it may be, and you&#8217;ve got a script which you basically just put it on your server, run it, find the path to it, run it, and you&#8217;re off to the races.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>That&#8217;s an interesting business model and not one, well, I mean, obviously, that business model is encapsulated in many, many, many hosting companies and hosting solutions like cPanel and what have you, but yours is going to be just, buy the script, off me, run the script, and then you&#8217;re on your own.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:33:16] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> Because the biggest issue that I&#8217;m finding with people, it&#8217;s not so much the command line, it&#8217;s tying the SSL into it. And a lot of people are hosting these open source applications locally, but there&#8217;s a problem with that. There&#8217;s a big problem. We talked about at the very beginning of this podcast episode, it&#8217;s not on the internet. It&#8217;s local to your computer, nobody can see it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What Caddy does is creates that reverse proxy and puts it on your own domain so that the world can see it. It solves a big problem. Because Linux is so big, you not only have to learn the operating system. You not only have to learn the command line. You&#8217;ve got to learn the commands itself. You&#8217;ve got to have serious patience. You&#8217;ve got to be able to do a lot of things to get to where you need to be with Linux to be comfortable.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>These scripts make it super easy. Literally, like you point your A record, you let it propagate, you press a button and it goes. And I went as so far to this, this is really cool, I had someone else create a script that secures your server as well. So when you run this WordPress script it disables root login, it does all the security best practices, uses public key authentication, the whole nine yards. Then it installs Docker, Docker Compose, Docker Engine, runs the file, runs Caddy, installs WordPress, and you have a secure server set up in 10 minutes with your own WordPress instance on the internet ready to go.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:34:27] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, I remember the famous five minute install for WordPress, but this is more like five minute install for all the stack. Click the button, go off, make yourself a coffee, and by the time you&#8217;ve come back everything is done. That&#8217;s so interesting.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:34:40] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> There&#8217;s a couple of manual processes because of the way the script is built. But if you have a technical background, you&#8217;re good to go. And one of the reasons I did this, Nathan, was because I realised there was no support as we discussed, right? Well, I didn&#8217;t know everything about Linux. There&#8217;s no way I could be a system admin, no way in hell.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I wanted to make a way to where I could give it to someone and say, hey, here it is. Heads up, we&#8217;re not responsible. This is your server. You break it, you fix it. I&#8217;m here to give you the script, I&#8217;m here to troubleshoot why it&#8217;s not working and that&#8217;s it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:35:10] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, you&#8217;re just the beginning. You are the first step on the journey, and then it&#8217;s hands off from your perspective, and then it&#8217;s over to you. I&#8217;ve got it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:35:17] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> The scripts are all one-time fees. So you own it, do whatever you want with it. Remodify it, I don&#8217;t care. Make it better, improve it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:35:22] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Where do you sell them then? How has that as a business idea gone down? Have you managed to find customers for that?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:35:28] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> I have not found customers yet. That&#8217;s part of the reason I&#8217;m on here, to help get exposure. I&#8217;m still trying to kind of validate the business idea. Anybody that knows anything about Bash scripts knows that they&#8217;re not sold. They&#8217;re free. I&#8217;ve put a lot of money into having these things created for me, so I want to get a little bit of return on them.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And they&#8217;re not, I mean, the WordPress one is 27. It&#8217;s nothing crazy. You can deploy WordPress as many times as you want, SSLs, et cetera. It&#8217;s a slow process. I&#8217;m very much, my business in a phase where I&#8217;m building my audience. I&#8217;m trying to find out who that audience is, what their pain points are, what their problems are. And things will probably progress from there. So right now my biggest challenge is just trying not to learn anything else because I&#8217;ve learnt so much.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:36:11] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, it would seem that your history is littered with, well, not dead ends, but kind of temporary dead ends where it leads you to the next thing, and it leads you to the next thing. But actually the thread running through your story that I&#8217;m picking up is that each time you drop a piece of technology and move on to another one, it&#8217;s kind of elevating you towards something a bit more difficult.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The technologies that we&#8217;re using at the beginning, the next one was a little bit more difficult to manage, and the next one, and the next one, and the next one. And it was that inexorable kind of rise to now where you are doing the full nine yards in this one script. That&#8217;s really interesting. What a fascinating story.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I tell you what, you have more patience than I have. And I don&#8217;t know how many times you&#8217;ve thrown things at walls, but I suspect if it was me, it would&#8217;ve been quite a few. When those moments of clarity that I don&#8217;t really know what&#8217;s going on here, but I&#8217;m going to persevere. Remarkable.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We kind of hit the sweet spot in terms of time. So we&#8217;ll sort of wrap it up. What a fascinating journey. I love that story. Tell me, Anthony, where would people find what it is that you are mentioning here, these Bash scripts? Where would we find those? And then another question, very much the same really is, where would we find you? Where do you hang out online, and where could people discover you?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:37:19] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> So my primary home is x.com. I really like X. You can visit my bio, there is a link to the website. Please note the website is being updated from what it is to something else. I was going to do the whole WordPress thing, but things changed a little bit. So I&#8217;ll leave you a link, Nathan, with a link to the shop and you can take a look at the scripts and decide if you want to purchase one. If you do, just know that I truly appreciate your support. Running a small business is extremely challenging on a very tight budget.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I really feel that this is something that can help a lot of people get where they need to be because there&#8217;s a lot of digital scams in the world. And the one script that I love that I have is the Nextcloud script. And I love the fact that I can store my data securely and not have to worry about privacy and my data being sold. So if you&#8217;re looking for an alternative to keep your stuff safe, definitely a robust option.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I&#8217;ll send you a link, Nathan, to the scripts. I&#8217;m still in the middle of updating links and things like that. I&#8217;m just excited to finally have it off the ground and finally have a business after learning nine different technologies in a matter of two years.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:17] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> It sounds like a lot. So what I&#8217;ll say is, when Anthony sends me the link, I will embed it into the show notes. So if you head to wptavern.com/podcast, if you search for Anthony Jackson, then you&#8217;ll be able to find that episode and I will make sure that all of the links that he sends me finally end up on the show notes over there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What a fantastic and interesting story. Anthony Jackson, I really hope that your endeavor, all of that hard work pays off. Good luck for the future. Thanks for joining me on the podcast today.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:38:46] <strong>Anthony Jackson:</strong> It was great to meet you, Nathan. Thank you everyone for listening. I hope you enjoyed this story. I hope that it inspires somebody. Technology is an amazing thing. Remember, never fear it, always, always embrace it. It can take you places you&#8217;ve never imagined.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>On the podcast today we have <a href=\"https://x.com/wphasslefree\">Anthony Jackson</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anthony is a true technophile whose journey has been shaped by a constant pursuit of understanding new technologies. From a young age, Anthony&#8217;s curiosity about technology laid the foundation for a lifetime of exploration. Starting from modest beginnings in computer repair, he steadily transitioned into the world of WordPress, and the complexities of server management.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This episode really is a story, the story of trying new things, being creative and always following curiosity, wherever it may lead.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anthony talks about his early experiences, describing the moment computers first sparked his interest, and the subsequent path he charted in the technology space. Despite hurdles and frustrations, particularly with initial web development and WordPress hosting, his story is a testament to determination and resilience. As you’ll hear Anthony learned the ropes of many technologies, from grappling with CSS for website customisation, to exploring cloud computing and the command line in Linux.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>His journey took a big turn when he discovered automated Bash scripts that facilitate the deployment of open-source applications like WordPress. This is what Anthony is doing right now, but you’re going to hear many stories of different pathways that led to this situation.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Throughout the episode, Anthony sheds light on his philosophy of embracing technology. He speaks about the numerous technologies he&#8217;s explored, the trials he faced along the way, and the value of cultivating his technical skills. With his Bash scripts ready to streamline server setups and deployments, Anthony envisions a future where technology is not just a tool, but a powerful ally for businesses and personal projects alike.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you’re keen to hear some inspirational stories about overcoming tech challenges, resilience and learning, this episode is for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Useful links</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://wphasslefree.com/\">Anthony&#8217;s website</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.elegantthemes.com/gallery/divi/\">Divi</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.wpbeaverbuilder.com/\">Beaver Builder</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://elementor.com/\">Elementor</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.cpanel.net/\">cPanel</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.linode.com/\">Linode</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.whmcs.com/\">WHMCS</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://www.docker.com/\">Docker</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://hub.docker.com/\">Docker Hub</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://yaml.org/\">YAML</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://caddyserver.com/\">Caddy Server</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://plausible.io/\">Plausible Analytics</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://nextcloud.com/\">Nextcloud</a></p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 05 Feb 2025 15:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:14:\"Nathan Wrigley\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:29;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:76:\"Gutenberg Times: Getting ready for WordCamp Asia 2025 in Manila, Philippines\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:35:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?p=37593\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:86:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/getting-ready-for-wordcamp-asia-2025-in-manila-philippines/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:15919:\"<p>Promoted as the <em>premier open-source summit of Asia</em>, <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/\">WordCamp Asia 2025</a> will take place from February 20 to 22nd, 2025 in the great capital of the Philippines, Manila. The organizing team has published a ton of information over the last four months. If you, like me, are more a just-in-time preparer it might be overwhelming to get through all the posts and see the forest for the trees.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>First things first: If you haven&#8217;t purchased your ticket, it&#8217;s high time. You need to <a href=\"https://login.wordpress.org/register?locale=en_US&redirect_to=https%3A%2F%2Flogin.wordpress.org%2F%3Ffrom%3Dasia.wordcamp.org%26redirect_to%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fasia.wordcamp.org%252F2025%252Flp%252F%26locale%3Den_US\">register for a WordPress.org account</a> and login, before you can buy a ticket.</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons is-layout-flex wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button has-custom-width wp-block-button__width-50\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link wp-element-button\" href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/tickets/\">Get your ticket now! </a></div>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>The <em>WordCamp Asia 2025</em> is not one event but three: <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/contributor-day/\">Contributor Day</a>, a<a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/schedule/\"> conference with talks, and workshops</a>, and <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/youthcamp/\">YouthCamp</a>, with a schedule for kids 8 &#8211; 17 years old. It will happen at the Philippines International Convention Center (PICC). That&#8217;s also where the <strong>After Party </strong>will take place on Saturday night that concludes this marvelous event. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>I like to get at least a few days of sightseeing in before I enter the convention center for all the fantastic WordCamp activities. The two posts from the local organizing team about <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/ultimate-guide-philippine-culture-travel-etiquette-phrases/\"><strong>Philippine Culture</strong></a> and <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/guide-to-filipino-food/\"><strong>Filipino Food</strong></a> gave me a great insight into what I can expect and how I can blend in. Or at least don&#8217;t make a fool out of myself and others. <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/bph.social\">I&#8217;ll share photos on Bluesky</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p>Hey friends! 🌴✨ Get ready for an epic adventure at&nbsp;<strong>WordCamp Asia 2025</strong>&nbsp;in vibrant Manila!</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I’ll be diving deep into the WordPress universe – hanging out at Contributor Day (February 20th) and rocking both conference days (February 21-22nd). Want to connect? I’m totally open to grabbing&nbsp;<strong>coffee, lunch, or catching up</strong>&nbsp;between sessions at the Philippine International Convention Center.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://bit.ly/bph-wcasia\">Check out my public calendar</a>&nbsp;and snag a slot – let’s turn this tech gathering into an unforgettable networking experience! Can’t wait to swap stories, share insights, and soak up the incredible WordPress community energy in the Philippines. Who’s in? 🚀🇵🇭 #WordCampAsia2025</p>\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s not all about grinding away! Alongside the <strong><a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/after-party/\">After Party</a></strong>, sponsors have got some cool <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/side-events/\"><strong>Side events</strong></a> lined up. Check out the list to see how you can join others for a fun run, a chill sunset hangout, Google&#8217;s Site Kit plugin workshop, or Omnisend&#8217;s agency meetup.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just today, WooCommerce announced its <a href=\"https://www.eventbrite.com/e/woo-community-meetup-wcasia-2025-registration-1226560478409?aff=oddtdtcreator\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>Woo Community Meetup @ WCAsia 2025</strong></a>. </p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Contributor Day</h2>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"434\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Contributor-Day-WordCamp-Asia-2024.jpg?resize=652%2C434&ssl=1\" alt=\"Contributor Day at WordCamp Asia\" class=\"wp-image-37621\" />NATIONAL THEKTE PIRAUR\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/contributor-day/\"><strong>Contributor Day</strong></a> is always such a fun kickoff for me at a regional WordCamp. I finally get to hang out with the folks I&#8217;ve been teaming up with on Slack and GitHub for years, and now we can actually chill face-to-face. Some of them are old pals, while others are fresh faces who are already making waves in the open-source scene. Plus, it’s a lot easier to catch up with friends before we’re all swamped by 2,000 more people flooding into the conference center—otherwise, it’s just a nod, a smile, and a quick wave as we pass by each other!</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Make sure you check out the chance to connect with a <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/human-library-books/\"><strong>Book in the Human Library</strong></a>! This awesome event lets you chat face-to-face with “<strong>Human Books</strong>,” folks who have some pretty amazing stories, unique viewpoints, and cool skills to share. You can ask me anything about Site Editor, Playground, Block development and contributing. My time slot is from 10:30 am to noon (12).</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a hard time selecting one of the 20 team tables, check out our&nbsp;<a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/contribute/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>Contributor Wizard</strong></a>&nbsp;. It is a step-by-step wizard to help you decide which team might be a good fit for you!&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>On Contributor Day, you will find me at the <strong>Test Team table</strong>, and I will enjoy working with the table leads <strong>Krupa Nanda</strong> and <strong>Olga Gleckler</strong>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-accent-color has-light-background-background-color has-text-color has-background has-link-color wp-elements-f1b325b7cd203bbfaf0660781c26212b\">🚨 <strong><em>Note:</em></strong><em> Appropriate attire is required for entry to PICC. Guests wearing shorts, undershirts (sando),or slippers/flip-flops will not be allowed to enter. PICC reserves the right to refuse entry to any person who is not appropriately </em>dressed.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Selected talks from the presentation schedule</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The WordPress community totally crushed it with over 250 proposals for talks and workshops! We’ve got three tracks lined up, and if you can’t swing by, no worries—everything will be livestreamed on YouTube. Since everyone’s got their own interests, it’s tough to pick just a few talks to mention in one go, so I&#8217;m sticking with my own favorites. All in all, the program team has put together a <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/schedule/\">fabulous schedule</a> featuring <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/speakers/\">awesome speakers</a> and cool topics. </p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Friday, February 21, 2025</h3>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Matias Ventura</strong> kicks off the talks with his <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/keynote/\"><strong>Keynote about the future of WordPress and Gutenberg.</strong></a>Ventura has been the lead architect of the Gutenberg project.  <em>TIL<a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/feed/#79eea268-d46c-461a-8637-58e2a4c62d19\">1</a> that Ventura was one of the co-designers of the <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/twentyeleven/\">Twenty Eleven default theme</a>.</em></p>\n\n\n\n<p>The rest for Friday morning I will spend at <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/the-block-developer-cookbook-wc-asia-2025-edition/\"><strong>Ryan Welcher&#8217;s Workshop: The Block Developer Cookbook</strong></a>. Welcher collected a few more real life examples on how to tackle topics like block transforms, adding editorial notes, creating a custom format and more. This year, I hope the keynote won&#8217;t go over, so everyone interested in the workshop has the opportunity to start it at the beginning.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Christy Nyiri</strong>, design lead at Special Project&#8217;s at Automattic, talk is next on my list. <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/redefining-wordpress-design-innovating-block-themes-on-automattics-special-projects-team/\"><strong>Redefining WordPress Design: Innovating Block Themes</strong></a>. Nyiri will showcase front and back end of a range of websites, highlighting how the team uses the latest WordPress feature to push the boundaries of block theme design. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the re-run, I will watch <strong>Abhishek Rijal</strong>&#8216;s lightning talk on <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/getting-started-with-wp-interactivity-api/\"><strong>Getting started with the Interactivity API.</strong></a> The senior software developer from Awesome Motive, explores the new possibilities this API brings to your Gutenberg blocks. I heard from quite a few developers who have a hard time finding a use case for the new API. </p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/wordpress-speed-build-challenge/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"368\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Speed-build-challenge-WordCamp-Asia-2025.jpg?resize=652%2C368&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37631\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<p>The <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/wordpress-speed-build-challenge/\"><strong>WordPress Speed Build Challenge</strong></a> between <strong>Nick Diego </strong>and <strong>Jessica Lyschik,</strong> hosted by <strong>Jamie Marsland</strong>, starts us into the afternoon of the first day. If you are in Manila, I highly recommend being in the room for this spectacle! <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/open-your-possibilities-by-learning-from-the-experts-wordpress-speed-build/\">See also the article in the news</a> </p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\"><div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"652\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Do-the-woo-icon.jpg?resize=652%2C652&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37630\" /></div>\n\n\n<p class=\"has-light-background-background-color has-background\">I’m wrapping up my first day by hanging out with <strong>BobWP</strong> and some other cool hosts from the <strong><a href=\"https://dothewoo.io/\">Do The Woo Network</a></strong> at their sponsor booth. I’d totally love to see you there between 2 and 3 pm. Swing by and say hi! Can’t wait to meet you!</p>\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<p>The rest of the afternoon, I’m planning to wander around the <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/sponsors/\">Sponsor hall</a> and chat with everyone at the booths. I’m truly interested to see which AI tools have popped up in the WordPress scene and what cool new products the plugin developers have come up with.</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"435\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Sponsor-hall-2024.jpg?resize=652%2C435&ssl=1\" alt=\"Sponsor hall WordCamp Asia \" class=\"wp-image-37629\" />Photo by Ryonosuke Kaneko\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Solutions Spotlight</h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Another kind of presentation is listed under <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/solutions-spotlight/\"><strong>Solutions Spotlight</strong></a>;  short presentation from selected sponsors. Here is the schedule as of today. It might fill up more as we get closer to the event. </p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"236\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Screenshot-2025-02-05-at-13.55.41.png?resize=652%2C236&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37620\" />\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Saturday, February 22, 2025</h3>\n\n\n\n<p>After breakfast, I&#8217;m kicking off my Saturday with <strong>Riad Benguella</strong>&#8216;s talk on the <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/dataviews-and-dataforms-the-future-of-structured-content-in-wordpress/\"><strong>new DataViews and DataForms and the future of structured content in WordPress</strong></a>. Benguella&#8217;s gonna share the story of how these two cool APIs came to be and give us the scoop on how they’ll fit into the wp-admin redesign project, plus what we can look forward to down the line.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Autumn Fjeld and Candy Tsai</strong> are going to take the audience on a fun ride into <strong><a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/content-modeling-custom-post-types-and-custom-fields-in-the-block-editor/\">Content Modeling, Custom Post Types, and Custom Fields.</a></strong> Both of them have been playing around with block bindings and patterns. They’re aiming for a totally Editor-based way to manage custom data, and they even thought about creating a “take it to go” data model plugin. I mean, who else is wondering: is there life after the Advanced Custom Fields plugin?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Alongside the Data Model talk, <strong>Isotta Peira</strong> and <strong>Hari Shanker</strong> will chat about <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/wordpress-contributions-building-a-transparent-system-for-a-stronger-community/\"><strong>WordPress Contributions: Building a Transparent System for a Stronger Community</strong></a>. It’s a topic I really care about, so I might just head over there instead and catch the other talk later on YouTube.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>After the lunch break I will get ready for my presentation to <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/session/create-a-demo-with-playground/\"><strong>Create a demo with Playground</strong></a>. I chatted the other day with <strong>Roger Williams</strong> of Kinsta about the talk. </p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<p>The last speaker slot goes to <strong>Matt Mullenweg</strong> who might again hold an AMA. So prepare your questions. </p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-cover alignwide is-light has-parallax is-repeated\"><div class=\"wp-block-cover__image-background wp-image-37639 size-large has-parallax is-repeated\"></div><span class=\"wp-block-cover__background has-background-dim\"></span><div class=\"wp-block-cover__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-cover-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-large-font-size\"></p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"490\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Matt-Mullenweg-WordCamp-Asia-2024.jpg?resize=652%2C490&ssl=1\" alt=\"Matt Mullenweg at WordCamp Asia\" class=\"wp-image-37634\" />Photo by chiharu nagatomi\n</div></div>\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<p>The <strong><a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/after-party/\">After Party</a></strong> will be a great place to unwind from three days of the WordCamp and to make more new friends at a true Filipino fiesta.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>On Sunday, the folks from WordCamp Asia will head out all over the globe, bringing along all the good vibes, tons of community energy, fresh ideas, and new pals to team up with, united in the purpose of democratizing publishing with WordPress. As they take their experiences and inspiration back home, you can bet they&#8217;ll be sharing stories about the incredible sessions they attended, the amazing connections they made, and the innovative projects they’re excited to launch. Together, they’ll work on spreading knowledge and fostering a collaborative spirit, ensuring that the power of WordPress continues to thrive in communities everywhere.</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"92\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/horizontal-long-rgb.png?resize=652%2C92&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37639\" />\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 05 Feb 2025 14:39:15 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:18:\"Birgit Pauli-Haack\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:30;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:76:\"Do The Woo Community: Woo Gets a Fresh New Look and a Bold Product Direction\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:43:\"https://dothewoo.io/?post_type=blog&p=89642\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:80:\"https://dothewoo.io/blog/woo-gets-a-fresh-new-look-and-a-bold-product-direction/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:180:\"Woo has unveiled a new branding identity, featuring a modern logo and colors, enhancing its support for over 4 million online stores while prioritizing customization and ownership.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 05 Feb 2025 09:26:18 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:31;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:71:\"Akismet: Version 5.3.6 of the Akismet WordPress plugin is available now\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"http://akismet.com/?p=284301\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:39:\"https://akismet.com/blog/version-5-3-6/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:751:\"<p>Version 5.3.6 of <a href=\"http://wordpress.org/plugins/akismet/\">the Akismet plugin for WordPress</a> is now available. This update contains the following&nbsp;improvements:</p>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>We&#8217;ve improved how the &#8220;Mark as Spam&#8221; and &#8220;Not Spam&#8221; API requests work, making them more useful for improving&nbsp;accuracy.</li>\n\n<li>The styles for the much&#8209;beloved Akismet widget have been&nbsp;modernized.</li></ul>\n\n\n<p>To upgrade, visit the Updates page of your WordPress dashboard and follow the instructions. If you need to download the plugin zip file directly, links to all versions are available in <a href=\"http://wordpress.org/plugins/akismet/\">the WordPress plugins&nbsp;directory</a>.</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 04 Feb 2025 21:30:03 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:17:\"Christopher Finke\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:32;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:91:\"Do The Woo Community: Balancing Features and Focus: Avoiding Feature Creep with Bryce Adams\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=89322\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:89:\"https://dothewoo.io/balancing-features-and-focus-avoiding-feature-creep-with-bryce-adams/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:199:\"In this episode, Katie and Adam discuss feature creep in product development with guest Bryce Adams. They address balancing new features with core integrity and engaging customer support effectively.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 04 Feb 2025 16:28:14 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:33;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:96:\"Do The Woo Community: Marketing Across the Stages of Your Woo Biz with Emma Young and Adam Weeks\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=89528\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:95:\"https://dothewoo.io/marketing-across-the-stages-of-your-woo-biz-with-emma-young-and-adam-weeks/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:192:\"In this episode, Emma and Adam discuss marketing strategies across business stages, emphasizing the importance of owned, earned, and paid media, audience understanding, and confident branding.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Mon, 03 Feb 2025 13:54:46 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:34;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:91:\"Gutenberg Times: Gutenberg Changelog #114 – Reflections on Gutenberg Times and Do the Woo\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:53:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?post_type=podcast&p=37567\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:105:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-114-reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:48976:\"<p>As Gutenberg Times celebrates its 7th anniversary, we discovered an amazing coincidence: Bob Dunn, better known as BobWP, launched the DoTheWoo network in the exact same week back in 2018. Today, Bob and I take you behind the scenes to share the origin stories of our WordPress journeys, explore how key ideas took shape, and reveal the unexpected lessons we learned along the way.Today, Bob Dunn is the host, and I am Bob’s guest.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-69-gutenberg-releases-wordpress-6-0-1-the-create-block-theme/#shownotes\">Show Notes</a> / <a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-69-gutenberg-releases-wordpress-6-0-1-the-create-block-theme/#transcript\">Transcript</a></p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Editor:&nbsp;<a href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandy-reed/\">Sandy Reed</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li>Logo:&nbsp;<a href=\"https://markuraine.com/\">Mark Uraine</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li>Production:&nbsp;<a href=\"https://icodeforapurpose.com\">Birgit Pauli-Haack</a></li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-larger-font-size\" id=\"shownotes\"><strong>Show Notes</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https://dothewoo.io/\">Do The Woo</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://dothewoo.io/reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo-with-birgit-and-bobwp/\">Reflections on Gutenberg Times and Do the Woo with Birgit and BobWP</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://bobwp.com/\">Bobwp.com</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/about-us/#why-gutenberg-times\">About us > Why Gutenberg Times</a></li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-large-font-size\">Stay in Touch</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Did you like this episode? <a href=\"https://lovethepodcast.com/gutenbergchangelog\"><strong>Please write us a review </strong></a></li>\n\n\n\n<li>Ping us on X (formerly known as Twitter) or send DMs with questions. <a href=\"https://twitter.com/gutenbergtimes\">@gutenbergtimes </a>and <a href=\"https://twitter.com/bph\">@bph</a>.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>If you have questions or suggestions, or news you want us to include, send them to <a href=\"mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com\">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a>. </em></li>\n\n\n\n<li><em>Please write us a review on iTunes! <a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/itunes/\">(Click here to learn how)</a></em></li>\n</ul>\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-large-font-size\" id=\"transcript\"><strong>Transcript</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, I&#8217;m here with one of my favorite people in the WordPress world. Well, actually outside WordPress. You may know her from Gutenberg Times. How are you doing today?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, hey, Bob. Oh, that&#8217;s so sweet. Yeah, well, I remember that we did some luncheon in Torino, and there was outside the workroom, we were talking about so many other things. Yeah, well, I&#8217;m really glad that we can do the show together.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. So I happen to see, and I don&#8217;t know if you had mentioned it somewhere or something, and I saw that you were coming up on seven years or something like that. And I thought, well, I wonder when that is. And it was in January, the same as what we&#8217;ve just celebrated. So I thought, wow. Then we can say 14 years combined. It sounds even more impressive.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, and if you do it times three, seven times three, it&#8217;s 21. That&#8217;s WordPress celebration. Yes, it&#8217;s the 21st.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I just thought we&#8217;d get on here and talk a little bit about, I don&#8217;t want to go into the whole journey, but some of the things maybe we&#8217;ve learned or whatever along the way. And I always wonder when somebody comes up with something, is it more or less a name that comes across in your brain, you think, oh, you just think of this and you wonder what I could do with that? Or is it a concept you have? I want to start this. I want to know which way you did it, and if it was what you wanted to do first—the concept of the idea—and then how did you come up with the name? Was it easy to come up with?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, yeah. So I started at the end of June 2017 to curate news about this new thing that everybody hated—kind of the block editor. And I said, it can&#8217;t be that everybody hates it, but it&#8217;s really amazing and it&#8217;s going to be changing WordPress so much. And I saw it at WordCamp Europe in Paris, and it was kind of a really great—it wasn&#8217;t a live demonstration; it was just kind of a video showing how you do blocks and how you can add &#8217;em to a post and all that. It was very early on. I think the first Gutenberg commit on GitHub was just in February, four months earlier. So it wasn’t really, but it was absolutely fascinating to me. And I wanted to learn what other people do with it, what the plugin developers—if they are interested in it—what they&#8217;re talking about, what the developers are talking about, and where this is going and what the new features are. And I was really trying it out and seeing what’s coming up, and I wanted other people to know about it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I put a Storyfy out. I dunno if some of you might remember Storyfy. That’s kind of a curation tool where you can embed things like posts and pictures and have just a running list of things. And that was very easy to do. And just when they published a blog post or showed off one of the little things that they found cool about the block editor or where a new feature was showcased, I just put it into the Storyfy. And there was up until probably October of 2017, and then I heard the news: Adobe had bought Storyfy and announced that they would end its life in May of 2018.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I said, well, I&#8217;m not going to wait that long. I need to put it on a website. Well, I’m a web developer. There was this fun thing, WordPress; I should use that. It&#8217;s kind of the first one of many lessons I learned: that you have to put it on your own grounds and not do it on rented land.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I thought about it, and then I also had some requests from users in the space that they would like to have a newsletter—like an email newsletter that comes every week or something like that—because they cannot always go to a page. It’s just something new, typical publishing problems that people are not coming to your website to see what&#8217;s new. You need to pull &#8217;em over there. And so that was kind of the thing that came together.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because it was all about Gutenberg, I kind of just thought about, okay, what are names of things? And Gutenberg Times came up. Somebody else at the same time had a Gutenberg Hub—that was Munir Kamal—and then there were other people out there. But I really liked the Gutenberg Times kind of name, and it was available. So I registered it in January of 2018, and that&#8217;s how it came about. Then I migrated all the Storyfy updates into the site, and it took a while and I had some people to help me with that. And then I started the newsletter. It was actually pretty easy to kind of follow along because it was kind of that vision that I had.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, for sure. Mine was kind of erratic when I started focusing. I think I actually dabbled in WooCommerce when it first came out—2011 or something like that. I think it was 2011, I’m pretty sure. Anyway, so I was writing a lot of stuff about it. I actually found on my blog, when I was more into affiliates, people were more willing to buy and spend for their e-commerce site on the plugin. So I just started writing about it, and I did a podcast in 2014 for a little over a year called *The WordPress Breakdown*.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>*The WordPress Breakdown.* And I did it with kind of a twist on words. I was breaking down stuff, but then some of them had a WordPress breakdown.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, it’s troubleshooting.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And what I did basically was I was just doing 15-20 minute podcasts with just myself. I was talking about plugins or themes and stuff like that—some of the stuff I came across. I did it for, like I said, about 13 or 14 months. And it was just becoming&#8230; I just felt like this is boring. I&#8217;m on there by myself. I&#8217;m talking about this stuff, and it’s really stuff I’m already writing about, and I’m just kind of regurgitating it now through a microphone. And I thought, okay, I’m just going to quit it. I stopped it and I told myself that I wouldn’t start something until I had a really good idea.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So in 2016, I thought of *Do the Woo*. I thought, okay, what’s out there in the landscape? What would be good to talk about? And I thought, well, there’s really nothing that focused on WooCommerce. And I knew the team there. I knew a lot about it. And so I thought, well, why don’t I go ahead? I got the name. It was one of those things—I wanted something a little bit fun.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, definitely it is. But it’s also that creation in there—*Do the Woo.* I really love it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so the name just came to me. So I contacted WooCommerce and I said, “I want to do this. Is it cool to have Woo in the name?” And so we kind of verbally agreed on it. And so I started that. And about three or four episodes into it, I thought, well, is there enough to talk about with just WooCommerce right now? So I actually changed it to *The WP eCommerce Show* and ran that for two to three years, did quite a bit with that. So I was talking about a lot of stuff, and it was a lot of Woo in it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then in 2018, I decided to kick *Do the Woo* back up in January, and I was actually doing both podcasts at the same time. And it just was becoming too much. So I said, I’ve got to drop one of these. And the WP eCommerce seemed like the one to drop. And so I just took off with *Do the Woo* again. And by episode—I was just saying on the episode before we started doing this one—I think it was episode five, I had Brad Williams come in as co-host because I realized I needed a co-host. It was more fun, whether we have a guest or not. And then it just kind of went from there.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the interesting thing is, when I actually came up with the site itself, what, two, three years ago? Whenever. Because it was all done under BobWP.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>There&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>At that point, I wanted to get the domain, and *Do the Woo.io* was available. So I went back to Woo and I said, I wanted to buy this domain, but I’m stepping into another space here as far as having that in a domain. And so they said, “What was the agreement before?” And I can’t remember who it was at Woo, but we made an agreement—basically a verbal agreement—and they were cool with it and everything. But then when, like I said, I got the domain, it became a little bit more of a legal thing. So I negotiated with their attorney. They came up with a contract and something that was an agreement of what I could or couldn’t do, or should or shouldn’t do, or something like that. And it was perfectly fine. It was great. So I signed that, and then I was able to use that for the domain.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It’s quite the journey.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, yeah. Well, you know me too well. My journeys are never nice, straight, narrow journeys with nothing happening.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Nice, quiet, but that’s perfectly okay. You need to stay in the moment, and then all of a sudden creativity strikes.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was, so in April of 2019, I started thinking&#8230; I had a podcast in the nonprofit space. So all my life before that was nonprofit space. I had just founded three years earlier a nonprofit technology company—a 501(c)(3)—to help nonprofits with technology because the social justice people are not equipped in doing technology. It’s all self-taught, and they needed a little bit more strategic approach to it. And I was really helping, trying to help with that. And I had a show called *What’s New in NP Tech*, with Ruth, a co-host, and Jim O’Reilly. And he had this wonderful radio voice as well, and he was very polished.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I’m more about talking off the cuff, starting sentences and never finishing them. And he was very polished. So it was a very good contrast. And I said, okay. And in 2018, he had to stop doing the podcast. And by 2019, I was missing that energy—that you have somebody to talk through things and what’s new and what you want to kind of try out and what’s the purpose of it, then why that and not that?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I thought, okay, Gutenberg has a two-week release cycle, and every time there’s so much in it beyond what’s in the release post. In the release post, the release lead—whoever leads it—highlights six, four, or five things, but there’s so much other stuff in there that might be good for developers or theme builders. So I talked with a design director from Automattic at that point, and asked if he would spend every two weeks, two and a half hours or something like that, on our changelog. We’d go through the changelog, highlight things that we want to talk about that are very important, and talk about more than the six things that are highlighted in the release post.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that was really fantastic to put it together. We had a certain rhythm to it; we had a certain outline. We also talked about what other people do in the space—if there was a great plugin coming along or a question from listeners. So that was really a great start. We started—I think the first, the zero episode—was in June 2019.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Since then, I&#8217;ve had a most regular biweekly kind of rhythm. Mark Re did about 40 episodes with me, and then he left Automattic—that was, I think, December 2020 or something like that, after a year of the pandemic kind of thing, or January. And then Greg Ziolkowski from Poland, who was also a Gutenberg developer, kind of came on for another 25 shows or 20 shows.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then I started to rotate co-hosts, and that made it much more fun to think about what other people are doing in this space. Can I bring that into the show and still talk about the changelogs? Yeah. We had Tammie Lister and Fabian Kägy, Ryan Welcher, Nick Diego, or Peter Tasker. One show was actually also with Mathias Ventura when he had this new phase of the site editor to announce.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And with all the phases in Gutenberg, we always had something to talk about. And it was funny—this friend with whom I did the previous podcast, he&#8217;s still a very good friend of mine—and he kind of had the question for me: “So you call it the Gutenberg Times, so when Gutenberg is done, what do you do then?”&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I said, well, once Gutenberg is merged to Core, wouldn’t your site be completely obsolete? I said, no, I don’t think so. There are a lot of other things that are going to come along. But it was really interesting to see how that, in other people&#8217;s minds, kind of made it, okay, it’s done now. But we all know it’s not done.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>In December 2018, it came into Core. And what are we now, 2025? And we are still working on phase three of the Gutenberg project. So it was kind of interesting to see.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, I think a lot of people, they think of not an end in sight, but they don’t think of how to now twist it to this way or twist it to that way. Some people are very, I’m going to go to this point, and then this is the point I feel like there’s nothing else to be said, at least from my perspective.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But you’re like me. I mean, when I had Brad come on—I don’t know how long it was just Brad and me—and then I had Jonathan Wold and Mendel Kurland from GoDaddy back then. They came on. So we started rotating because, again, like you said, it was fun. And then we were bringing in guests too.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then just after a while, I started thinking, well, could I build on this? And the more I got into it, the less I wanted to be on the podcast. I just thought—because it started coming to the point where it was, yeah, we’re talking about this and that and all these different things—but also I was seeing people that come on a podcast for the first time as a guest and, after, I mean, they were freaking out at the beginning. But then at the end, or later on, they said, “Wow, that was so much fun and stuff.” And I thought, well, I’d like to get more other voices and have other people talk about stuff, and pick out hosts to have their own specialty and their own knowledge and stuff.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it’s been kind of crazy. Some people look at me like&#8230;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. When did you start with the network of shows? Was that two years ago? Three years?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Brad came on. Then, on January 9th, 2020, I brought Jonathan in, and Mendel came in. And then, I think it was January 30th, 2021, I brought Zach in, and Ronald joined. Then after that, I just kept thinking, how far can I take this?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then, I think it was when I actually launched it as its own site. I had somebody design it. And then after about two years of that, I started doing some other stuff, and I thought, I want to make this more of a—I want to call it, I don’t really know—a network, but a collection of shows with all these different people. So then I had to look at redesigning everything.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But yeah, it was just&#8230; for me, I mean, I’m at a point where I’ve got to kind of just deal with what I have here now. And all the hosts are volunteers, so they always know. We’ve had a few that have had to leave for one reason or another. They’re getting busy with their business, and they just said, I don’t have the bandwidth anymore. And I say&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thank you for what you’ve done. And I have a hall of fame on my post page and stuff for those that were on before and moved on. So it’s been very flexible with them, scheduling everything. Everybody’s busy and stuff, so we just kind of deal with stuff. We get things all scheduled in for a year, but then we move things around and people have times they can’t show up. Sometimes it’s a little crazy, but they all seem to enjoy doing it, and I’m lucky for that.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, I have started rotating through. Well, I started to see, okay, the WordPress space is still a little bit more male-oriented, and I see it also in my audiences. Yeah, it’s all 65% male, between 35 and older, or it’s 80% on the podcast. I said, well, I guess I’m in a situation where I can actually also bring some more female voices, especially female engineer voices, to the space.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it’s a real joy for me to work with the engineers at Automattic, or other agencies, or other hosting companies. And I kind of want the person who comes on to not only be a one-time guest—if they want to, that’s okay—but if they are on multiple times, they get their own routine for that. And it’s much easier for them to say yes now than for the first time when they don’t really know what to expect.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I am really happy to have about 10 to 12 women engineers that kind of rotate through. Most of them are actually in the community. They’re all very knowledgeable about the subject anyway, but then they’ve also put in the grind in theme development or plugin development.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it’s really interesting to see what they do, and they bring a different perspective to the whole thing. When I was having a conversation with Greg, who is on the development team, I said, well, I could bring the user questions. What were you thinking? And then he would explain it quite nicely, and I learned a lot when talking with the volunteers—what software development is actually about. It’s&#8230; you have the architecture, but there’s so much behind the scenes that you can’t bring to the forefront. And if somebody says to content creators, it’s just, “What? Just change?” If I hear somebody say, “Well, it’s just an easy fix&#8230;” Yeah, that was kind of&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;what I had when I was running my agency. It was never just an easy fix.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Never.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It’s always more. Yeah. So it’s interesting to see and bring other voices in there.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. Yeah, definitely. I know for me, the hosting has always been&#8230; I try to keep some kind of balance in some way, but I’m also asking—the person has to be willing to commit. Somebody. I’ve approached a lot of different people, and a lot of people just don’t have the time to commit or they just don’t. And also, it does take a certain comfort level to be a host. I mean, you want to be able to do it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And if you’re almost on the edge just going in as a guest—I mean, I give them the benefit of the doubt. Some of them have come in a little bit reluctant, and they ended up just loving doing it after a bit. So it’s kind of&#8230; And yeah, it’s good. All the different voices. I mean, I’ve had a lot of guests on. I swear that probably 65%, 70%, or maybe it’s higher—I don’t know—are first-time podcast guests. They’ve never been on. And sometimes I have to talk them into it a little bit, and often they’re surprised how much they can talk when they don’t think they can, and they get going.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, it really depends on the questions.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, for sure.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Want to be a hero when it comes to your clients? You’ve built a site, and now you want to make sure that with your client’s Woo shop, they are ensured that they have accurate sales tax rates in place, especially in case of an audit. Avalara is a leader in automating sales tax and compliance for businesses selling online, both big and small.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you’re setting up a new WooCommerce site, get your client set for sales. If you currently manage several client sites, it may be time to make that recommendation. Either way, get their WooCommerce extension and let your clients take advantage of a 60-day free trial. There are also great resources for either you or your clients on their site, where you can learn more about sales tax calculation, among other services like returns and exemptions. So for peace of mind, Avalara.com has you covered.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I have found that everybody brings something to it, and even if they’re missing knowledge, you can fill that in a conversation. It fills knowledge gaps for other people who are listening. And so I always have appreciation for things that don’t go well because those are the most important moments when you learn things.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Exactly. And I never really had anything that didn’t go well. Sometimes it was just&#8230; yeah, we had one the other day where we had 20&#8230; that’s a horror story. If you have a rundown that’s 29 pages because you have a changelog from three plugin releases because you had a holiday break.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Oh, geez.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. That is kind of the horror story where you say, okay, you need a special guest for that, who deals with that. And even then, you sometimes get lost. Am I on page 15 or 25? Where am I? Because you scroll so fast. Yeah, we cut that out and regrouped and then came back to it. So it’s great.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I had somebody&#8230; a couple of times this happened. One of the guests didn’t get recorded in the track. It just wasn’t there. It looked like it was recording and everything. So when I went to play it back, they were out.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It looked like it was recording and everything. So when I went to play it back, they were out. And I believe one time, one of the hosts actually said, “Well, send me the episode, and I’ll fill in those spots. I’ll listen to it, and then I’ll reply, and then I’ll see what I asked next.” And they did it, and it worked fine, but it was a nightmare for them. Then I had to go in and put everything in.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I did have a guest once, and I felt so sorry for them. We don’t do a lot of upfront questions on ours, and sometimes people will request it. And this plugin developer was really pretty nervous about being on. So I said, “Well, let me send you a few questions about what I’ll talk about.” Well, I could tell even when we started, it wasn’t for them.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So brilliant.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I always tell my guests, if you need to start over on something, it’s recorded. So I’m not live. I can go in and edit. And this poor person actually had created the answers for all the questions and was reading them. But he was so nervous that when he was reading them, he kept stopping and saying, “Oh, I got to start over.” And I could just feel his tenseness. And I wanted to say, if this isn’t comfortable, but then I didn’t want to. So we did it. I went in and did some editing, and it turned out fine, but I felt for him.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I thought, oh, I know that feeling when you think something might be easier for you or something, and you get in there and you just don’t have it in you or something. And I don’t blame them. There are a lot of people that just refuse to come on the podcast. They’ll just say, “Ah, no, I can’t do it.” And I’m like, “Yeah, cool.”&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, I take that no very seriously because you don’t want to&#8230; yeah. But the other part was the horror stories only start when I screw up.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, that’s when I did.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So at the beginning, I think I missed the record button with my mouse, and we had to do the show again.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I had one of those.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think everybody has. But I have a very good editor who goes through that. She’s been a radio producer all her life, and she helps me with that. So now I just kind of record and record on QuickTime as a backup. So even if I screw up the Zoom recording&#8230; but now with Zoom, you actually get two tracks. And that’s really helpful because sometimes we just talk over each other. It happens when you’re in the moment and you want to—it’s something you’re excited about—then you talk over each other, and it’s hard.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I have a few people that have been that stuck almost. And I’ll shift tracks, then I shift them and stuff. And I did have the one that I forgot to record—it was when I was doing my other e-commerce podcast. And she ran this company that sold cosmetics, and she was in Ghana. And it was just—she had a Woo online store. That’s why I brought her on. But she would give jobs to local women to go out because they would have to get the ingredients for it. So she provided jobs for a lot of the women there.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was a fascinating story, and I finally was able to get her on. And the most embarrassing thing is when you find out in the middle—I looked down, I thought, wow, that record button isn’t going. And I thought, now I have to tell her this right in the middle. Which is&#8230; I don’t know what’s worse: going through the whole thing and then saying, “Oh, sorry, it didn’t record.” So I kind of paused. I said, “Well, I have an interesting situation here. Obviously, I didn’t push the record button.” And she actually laughed, and she said, “Well, go ahead. We can do it again. Just send me your calendar again.” And she was real cool about it, but my heart just sunk.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, imagine no recording, especially when it was a good show and there was a good groove, and then all of a sudden I destroyed it. Oh, man.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It’s interesting too because some people, when you were talking about somebody asking, “Well, what about when it goes into Core and the goal’s over?” It sounds like you’ve been through a lot. I have been over the seven years. You flex with whatever works. It’s like, okay, is this going to continue? Yeah, well, I can continue it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And you’ve tried different hosts and you’ve found that sweet spot. So I think both of us—I was going to ask about, did they ever change for our sites during the seven years? And they probably did in the sense that, yeah, we shifted to this a bit and nothing real maybe. I know that when I moved it to its own domain and kind of focused more on the bigger group of hosts, that was probably a big shift. But it was in my brain for nine months. I was working on stuff.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, there wasn’t really a big shift. So I think I changed the theme once, and it’s definitely overdue for a new one because I’m still on a classic theme and I should go on a block theme because then you can do a lot more. But I just didn’t have the time yet to migrate over.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But I think I’m also&#8230; up until 2021, in summer 2021, it was all a hobby kind of thing. I did it alongside my agency work, and it was up and down in terms of how much time I could spend there. During the pandemic, I had about six—well, four—months of burnout because I had so much work to do, and I didn’t have a break. I had to take my break.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the only thing that I did during that break was keeping up with Gutenberg, keeping the Weekend Edition going, and keeping the podcast going. But I wasn’t doing any agency work. The developers and freelancers that I worked with—they were so good at taking over. I said, “I can’t deal with it, and if I have to step in, I’ll step in. But you know how we work.” And they were all many years with me.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So it was between November 2020 and February 2021. I was only doing the Gutenberg Times, and I was really amazed to see how that always kept my excitement going. And there’s a lot of personal stuff that got in the way afterward. So we moved to Sarasota; we sold the house in Naples, renovated the house. There was a lot of non-work and non-publishing kind of stuff getting in the way.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then we organized our house in Sarasota, and after two years of not seeing our parents, we traveled to Europe in 2022. We met in Porto, and you were also moving. So I think we did this pretty much at the same time—moving back to Europe.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I was really happy that I got a job at Automattic. And part of that job is keeping Gutenberg Times and the Gutenberg Changelog going as a Developer Advocate. So having that was a real blessing for myself and for me because I couldn’t migrate my agency. I closed the agency when I knew I was going to Europe. And so keeping that going was really good. I’m very grateful for working with Automattic on that.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. Yeah, I didn’t know that part of it. I mean, how that just seamlessly all worked, and you were able to bring that right into it. Yeah, that’s cool. And I think the big change for me probably was when I went to the bigger network of shows and everything, and started bringing more people in.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then at the same time, I was given the gift of a redesign of the site from the Special Projects team at Automattic. Matt gave that to me, which was phenomenal. For a few days, I was just thinking, is this really happening?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Is this real?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, it took us quite a few months to put it together and stuff. And I have one funny story about the launch. We had kind of a soft launch because&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I was at CloudFest, and I got a message that said, “Your site is live.” And I’m like, oh, really? I had not planned for that.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the ironic part of it—we got such a kick out of it—was my site prior to that had Beaver Builder on it. And I was hanging out with Robbie from Beaver Builder when I got the message, and I told him. And we took this picture. We were having a beer, celebrating and everything. But it was so funny—he just got a kick out of that. I basically removed Beaver Builder, and here he was celebrating with me and stuff. But Robbie’s great.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The new websites&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But yeah, it still is amazing—the support and everything I get with that side of stuff. A couple of times I’ve really messed it up. I keep saying, maybe I should just let you do more things. I shouldn’t be touching stuff.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>You don’t know where the boundaries are unless you kind of push past them. So yeah, what’s your own knowledge—you want to kind of kick it a little bit.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, yeah. I poke around a bit to kind of understand. Some of the stuff is custom work, so I don’t want to mess that up. But some of it’s adding stuff. I’ve probably learned more about the block editor and everything than I ever thought I would be—just getting in to try to figure out, okay, this has to be a small change. And it’s like, okay, an hour later&#8230; now what happened there?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, I was doing that actually on WordPress.org. I am part of the editor of the Developer Blog that launched in late 2022. And then I got the note from the Meta team that the Developer Blog now has a block theme, and I have access to it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then I said, “Oh, I can change the navigation.” And I went in there, changed the navigation, and it kind of dropped the whole navigation and added all the navigation to the top-level navigation too. One is the overall WordPress.org, and then on the subsites, you have the own navigation. All of a sudden, my UI was jammed. So it took about two days to fix it. But I said, okay, I’m not going to touch that anymore.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, yeah. I’ve kind of learned now that I did screw something up recently again, and having them look at it&#8230; I even tried revisions, and it seemed like the more revisions I went back to, the worse it got. So it was like, okay, this is hopeless. I don’t know where this stuff went, but it’s not here anymore.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And here goes a half a day of your life.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, yeah.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But that’s web development. I think it has&#8230; yeah, it’s always happened. Since when are you doing web pages? How far back is that going?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Oh, so actually I started doing&#8230; let’s see, when did I first do? We still had our previous marketing and design business around in 2000—I dunno—2005, 2006, somewhere around there.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;somewhere around there. I started doing—well, actually, it might’ve been even earlier than that—doing little HTML sites. We were doing print design. We started in 1993, the business. And so I had to kind of kick and scream and be pushed into it. And I made these godawful HTML sites with&#8230; oh, was it Adobe—what was it called? It was one of the&#8230;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Was it Dreamweaver or was it FrontPage?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dreamweaver, yeah.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dreamweaver, yeah.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And I remember I made one of our first sites, and I had Flash on there. Oh, it was just horrifying—bouncing letters, dancing around, or some crazy thing. And then, 2008 or 2009—I think 2008 or 2009—I got into WordPress, started dabbling in playing around with the blogging stuff. And I went to iThemes and got one of their themes there, and we did our business site.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it was like, wow, that took me one-hundredth of the time it took me to do any other site because it was&#8230; I mean, it actually looked good, and it would function well and stuff. So yeah, I did that till about 2014 or 2015, I think, when I finally quit designing. I was into content, and I knew what I wanted to focus on. I was tired of the design client side of things.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So what was your first?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Oh, yeah. Well, I don’t want to say&#8230; this was 1996. Yeah, I did a German site. It was all HTML tables—kind of horrible. Well, it’s still out there because it’s a reference site for books and all kinds of things in Germany. But yeah, so that was in 1996. I started—that was as a citizen in Munich—and I learned about it, and I learned about HTML.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I found it so fascinating that you can put it up on the web and everybody can see it almost immediately. And that’s such a different experience from printing, where you have to wait till it comes from the printer and then you need to distribute it. That was instant distribution, and I really loved it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But then what I found was that all the neo-Nazis and Holocaust deniers were all on the German part—they were all in America on servers—and there was nothing in Germany that holds against it, what really happened. And we were a group of two people, each one of us had our site and started a site about the Holocaust and all that information.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And mine was called *Shoah Project Internet.* And we collected information about the concentration camp in Dachau, before the concentration camp had their own website in 2000 or something like that. I connected with authors who had published poems and also some nonfiction about the wealth of Jews that was taken away by the government, and about the resistance in Germany.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It was all in German, but there was no equivalent otherwise from private citizens to actually put this out. That really made me&#8230; and then there was this big discussion—there was an exhibition, a traveling exhibition. There was this myth that the German army had nothing to do with the concentration camps, but that was a myth, and it wasn’t true. And there was an exhibition that actually showed all the facts, and there was a big brouhaha and uproar.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it was traveling, so everywhere I was kind of picking up the snippets from the online sites, from websites. So it was kind of an interesting&#8230;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I think I started using computers in the early 80s—or probably mid-80s. And I actually went to community college in the States in, I think, maybe the mid to late 80s. I took a year of computer programming, and I did learn—what was it?—BASIC, COBOL, Assembly&#8230;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wow, yeah.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>There was one other thing. And after a year, I remember we had this great guy from&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Fortran?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah. Oh no, that was another one. Yeah, we had to dabble in all those in 12 months. And at the end of the 12 months, the instructor—he was great—he was a Brit, and he just had the craziest sense of humor. He said, “Well, now you’ve learned all this. It’s all going to be obsolete by the time you step out this door.”&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And we were like, “What?” And I discovered after a year of that, that was not what I was going to become—a computer programmer, I thought. But it gave me the comfort level to use computers. I was really comfortable with that. So that was good. But yeah, crazy times.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So what’s going to happen in the next year for you, do you think?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, the Weekend Edition is going to be quite interesting every time. And I see that in the community—that the block editor is more in the forefront more and more. And there’s some great stuff coming out with Playground and with Studio to do staging sites and to just play around with WordPress.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I know that Gutenberg—the Core contributors of Gutenberg—are still going to do the biweekly releases. So we are going to do maybe a monthly release podcast. And we’ll invite a few more people from the space that work with Gutenberg. There is now also&#8230; quite a few people have adopted the block theme space quite a bit on multiple levels.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>It’s for enterprise levels, which started very early. But on the agency level, WebDevStudios, for instance—Jesse Palm was on the show recently, who had the starter theme that’s a block theme for WebDevStudios—and they start every project with it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So these kinds of things show me that there’s quite another level of adoption happening about the Gutenberg project. And of course, I’m still hoping for a Google Docs-like real-time collaboration or async communication with comments.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are some great experiments in the Gutenberg plugin that I want to dive into quite a bit as well. So we’ll see what happens.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we’ll see what happens. Yeah, WordCamp Asia is going to be more of a research trip for me—to talk with the plugin developers and talk with some of the engineers and kind of see what’s next for them. And I’m sure I’ll find a few interview partners that I can make a show with in the space, because I already have. Some of them have left the space; some of them are coming back. So it’s really interesting to see.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Very cool. Yeah, it’s interesting because I think of&#8230; there was a point where I started adding some shows that were more WordPress-based. What I’ve found with some of these shows is, everything always comes back to WordPress or WooCommerce. And a lot of it—the similarities kind of weave in and out of all this stuff. It’s good to be knowledgeable of other things, no matter what you’re doing.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I’m hoping we’re going to be stepping more into videos. I’ve been talking about it—we’re going to be doing more video with some of the shows, and we might do a little bit of live stuff here and there. I’ve kind of kicked and screamed into that, so that’s another piece that’s going to hopefully grow. I’ll be trying to focus a little bit on that part of it—what I do with that and how I present it and all that stuff.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I have heard from quite a few people that there’s a generation out there that doesn’t read anymore.&nbsp; I know. They want to go on YouTube and be entertained or at least shown things. And of course, with software, if you want to teach somebody, you need to show it. That’s very hard to do on the podcast.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, it is. Yeah. So who knows what? Maybe we should make this a tradition now—every January.&nbsp; We come in and catch up and see what we did, what we blew, everything—what broke and what didn’t work.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I would love to do that. Yeah, sure. Absolutely.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We’ll make it a January tradition. So anyway, we have WordCamp Asia coming up. Like you said, you and I will both be there. In fact, you’re going to be joining—you’ll be coming and co-hosting the table, doing the little booth, I believe, for an hour.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yes, absolutely. Yeah. Friday, I think.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you haven’t caught up with her, you haven’t caught up with me. I’ll post when she’s going to be at the table, and that way you can tie her down because sometimes chasing people around&#8230; you know how that goes.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, no, no, absolutely. Yeah, no, I’m looking forward to WordCamp Asia. Also, I’ll be at CloudFest this year for the first time, so I’m not going to be at the hackathon. But there are too many people from Automattic going already that actually have a project. And then WordCamp Constance—that’s a camp with German speakers. So it’s really going to be interesting.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So you’ll be at the regular CloudFest event and stuff? Yeah, I know there’s going to be a little bit more WordPress stuff going on, and that’ll be fun. So yeah, we’ll be seeing each other next month and the month after.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, yeah, yeah. I appreciate it. I’m really loving it.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Okay, well, we’ve said it enough times, but Gutenberg Times—and probably the URL is very easy and stuff—but do check that out. Is it *gutenbergtimes.com*?&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dot com. And yeah, you can also find me on the Twitters and on the Bluesky and the&#8230; I still call it Twitter.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sorry.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8230;on the Bluesky and also on Mastodon. And of course on the WordPress Slack and WooCommerce Slack. So I’m everywhere.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, everywhere.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, thank you so much. It was wonderful chatting with you.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, well, thank you. Yeah, this was definitely a must-do show for January, so I appreciate everybody listening and&#8230;&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Happy anniversary.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yeah, happy anniversary. And come back next January for our second Nova. I’m sure you’ll see Birgit more than—or sooner than—next January, for sure.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**Birgit:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, thank you.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>**BobWP:**&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Well, take care. Bye-bye.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sun, 02 Feb 2025 14:50:31 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:18:\"Birgit Pauli-Haack\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:35;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:22:\"Matt: My First Million\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:23:\"https://ma.tt/?p=136139\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:39:\"https://ma.tt/2025/02/my-first-million/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:223:\"<p>I had a great chat with <a href=\"https://linktr.ee/thesamparr\">Sam Parr</a> and <a href=\"https://www.shaanpuri.com/\">Shaan Puri</a> on their podcast, My First Million.</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n\n</div>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sun, 02 Feb 2025 01:18:13 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4:\"Matt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:36;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:108:\"Gutenberg Times: The anatomy of a CMS, the state of block themes and WordPress 6.7.2 — Weekend Edition 318\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:35:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?p=37524\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:114:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:17358:\"<p>Howdy, </p>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s already February. 8.33% of 2025 is done. Phew. 91.67% to go. Most of my week I spent testing things. Maybe I jinxed it with  my mind set, I didn&#8217;t come across something really cool.  I am excited about WordCamp Asia where I can browse this huge sponsor hall and go exploring all the cools things there. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>What saved me a ton of time, this week, was using Claude AI. I used it to audit Playground blueprints in the Gallery. I pasted the description of the merged PR of modification on how blueprints work,  then fed it code to rewrite using the new way. Doing this a few times, I created a tracking issue with the necessary changes to implement next week. I felt really lazy. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>That was all off-set by trying to have Cursor AI write a block with some user input sections. It made great progress, but for some reason, it still doesn&#8217;t work. Sometimes debugging the AI is even more tedious than looking at your own code. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>This week, we have a few strategic posts and practical tips for you in this newsletter. Enjoy! </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yours, 💕<br /><em>Birgit</em></p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<p><strong>Table of Contents</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<ol><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/#0-word-press-release-information\">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/#0-p\">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</a><ol><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/#upcoming-events-beyond-wordcamps\">Upcoming events beyond WordCamps</a></li></ol></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/#2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled\">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/#3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press\">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor. </a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/the-anatomy-of-a-cms-the-state-of-block-themes-and-wordpress-6-7-2-weekend-edition-318/#what-s-new-in-playground\">What&#8217;s new in Playground</a></li></ol>\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"0-word-press-release-information\">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>George Mamadashvili</strong> made <a href=\"https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/releases/tag/v20.2.0-rc.1\"><strong>Gutenberg 20.2 RC1</strong></a> is available now for testing. Final release will be on February 5, 2025. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Aaron Jorbin</strong> announced that <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/2025/01/22/wordpress-6-7-2-release-planning/\"><strong>WordPress 6.7.2 </strong>will be released soon</a>. RC will be released on February 4 and final release will hit the WordPress site near you on February 11. </p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p>🎙️ Latest episode: <a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-114-reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo/\">Gutenberg Changelog #114 – Reflections on Gutenberg Times and Do the Woo</a> with Bob Dunn aka BobWP as host and guest Birgit Pauli-Haack, each publication started 7 years ago. </p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"328\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Gutenberg-Changelog-114-Bob-Dunn-Birgit-pauli-Haack-edited.png?resize=652%2C328&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37614\" />\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"0-p\">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Darren Ethier </strong>and <strong>James Kemp</strong> from WooCommerce talk about <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2CXOsMwBF4&t=5s\"><strong>Building WooCommerce in Public</strong></a> in the latest episode of <em>DoThe Woo</em> Network They explore WooCommerce&#8217;s current state and future direction, with Darren highlighting his connection between Gutenberg and WooCommerce. They stress the importance of community and communication in development, discuss the significance of WordCamps, the need for key features, and WooCommerce&#8217;s evolution for better experiences. They also mention how changes in WordPress affect WooCommerce’s plans and the need for flexible, no-code solutions for developers. This conversation provides insights into WooCommerce’s development approach and plans.</p>\n\n\n<div width=\"100%\" class=\"wp-block-newsletterglue-showhide ng-block\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<div class=\"toolbelt-video-wrapper\"></div>\n</div>\n</div>\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>On <em>Learn.WordPress.org</em>, <strong>Wes Theron</strong> published the lesson: <a href=\"https://learn.wordpress.org/lesson/explore-synced-pattern-overrides/\"><strong>Explore synced pattern overrides</strong></a>. It&#8217;s part of the Intermediate WordPress User course and covers what&#8217;s patterns are, and how you can maintain stylistic control while the  content of a pattern. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>In his post, <a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2025/01/26/wordpress-author-page/\"><strong>Create a Custom Author Page</strong></a> Ronnie Burt introduces you to multiple ways how you can make use of the Gravatar profile for your website. He also explains why spending a moment on  the design of an author page is very important for a company blog. Then he walks you through the various method how you can use the user information stored on a self-hosted site can be used to expand on the normally neglected and thinly populated author information. </p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"upcoming-events-beyond-wordcamps\">Upcoming events beyond WordCamps</h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Apart from <a href=\"https://central.wordcamp.org/schedule/\"><strong>WordCamps,</strong></a>  additional conferences are on the schedule for this year. </p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>February 24 &#8211; 28 2025</strong> The 2nd Annual <a href=\"https://www.stateofdigitalpublishing.com/wp-week/\"><strong>WP Publisher Success Week</strong></a>&nbsp;will take place. You can learn best practices from leading experts in the field of WordPress for publishers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>March 17 &#8211; 20, 2025 <a href=\"https://www.cloudfest.com/\">CloudFest</a>,</strong> Europa Park, Rust, Germany. As Bob Dunn, DoTheWoo <a href=\"https://dothewoo.io/blog/do-the-woo-is-a-media-partner-for-cloudfest-2025-and-the-hackathon/\">reports</a>, there will be a <a href=\"https://www.cloudfest.com/wp-zone\">WPZone</a> and a WPDay. </p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>April 23 &#8211; 26, 2025</strong> <a href=\"https://pressconf.events/\"><strong>PressConf</strong></a> a conference for WordPress professionals will take place in Tempe, Arizona, USA. Speakers are among others Mary Hubbard, Matias Ventura, Rich Tabor, and Tammie Lister. </p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>September 25, 2025</strong> <a href=\"https://loopconf.com/\"><strong>LoopConf</strong></a> returns to London, UK as a conference for WordPress developers. </p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled\">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>In his latest blog post, <strong>Nick Diego</strong> wants theme developers to <a href=\"https://nickdiego.com/stop-struggling-with-cumbersome-theme-json-files/\"><strong>stop struggling with cumbersome theme.json files</strong></a>. He shares how he and his new buddy, <em><a href=\"https://www.cursor.com/\">Cursor AI</a></em> succeeded in building a compiler/bundler to combine separate json file into an overall theme.json for a theme. Diego shares a video of the process and the final script, you can adopt for your workflow. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Hendrik Lührsen</strong> found that <a href=\"https://kraut.press/2025/crisis-of-themes/\"><strong>WordPress themes are facing a crisis.</strong></a> &nbsp;The introduction of Full Site Editing (FSE) has brought about complexities that are causing challenges in the WordPress theme ecosystem.&nbsp;This situation appears to be related to the rapid evolution of WordPress technology, particularly the implementation of the site editor, which is impacting how themes are developed and used. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>While calling it a crisis makes the post viable for the successful spread via outrage advertising economies, Lührsen is not wrong, lamenting about all the short-comings of block themes. His suggested paths to improve the situation can be walked by every theme developer building sites for clients on top of WordPress, except the discoverability of themes on the repository. A standardized onboarding process, was discussed among Themes team members. Turns out that the many, many use cases are not easily pulled into a cookie-cutter closed system. It&#8217;s the nature of the 21-year legacy of WordPress. It also means, any developer can fill the gaps for their clients, and if they want to go the extra mile, share it all back to the community. WordPress is not a one-size fits all system. Flexibility and extensibility is a feature, not a bug.</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>In his YouTube video, <strong>David McCan</strong> looks into<a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WtZ3yZ7HPvE\"><strong> the current state of block themes</strong></a>, reviewing popular themes available in the WordPress repository, Then he looked under the hood to understand block themes. &#8220;I have a better understanding of block themes after going through this process.&#8221; McCan wrote in the description. If you rather read a blog post reader than watch a video, <a href=\"https://www.webtng.com/the-current-state-of-block-themes-and-a-reassessment/\">got here to read McCan&#8217;s thoughts</a></p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>In his post <a href=\"https://humanmade.com/wordpress-for-enterprise/transitioning-to-fse-a-low-risk-high-reward-move-for-enterprises/\"><strong>Transitioning to FSE: A low-risk, high-reward move for enterprises</strong></a> HumanMade&#8217;s account director, <strong>Adam Jones</strong>, tells the story of how Human Made, &#8220;guided enterprise organizations through this process and seen the transformative benefits firsthand.&#8221; Adapting to the site editor and block themes allows businesses to enhance digital capabilities with minimized risk through careful planning and testing. Key benefits include improved scalability, workflow, and reduced reliance on developers, making full-site editing a valuable investment in digital infrastructure. Also on that topic: <a href=\"https://humanmade.com/wordpress-for-enterprise/enterprise-wordpress-the-3-competitive-advantages-of-fse/\">The three competitive advantages of full-site-editing</a> by senior account manage, <strong>Lorna Lim. </strong></p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>&nbsp;<a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&#8220;Keeping up with Gutenberg &#8211; Index 2024&#8221;</a>&nbsp;</strong><br />A chronological list of the WordPress Make Blog posts from various teams involved in Gutenberg development: Design, Theme Review Team, Core Editor, Core JS, Core CSS, Test, and Meta team from Jan. 2024 on. Updated by yours truly. The previous years are also available: <strong><strong><a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2020/\">2020</a>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2021/\">2021</a></strong>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<strong><a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index-2022/\">2022</a></strong></strong>&nbsp;|&nbsp;<strong><a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/handbook/references/keeping-up-with-gutenberg-index/gutenberg-index-2023\">2023</a></strong></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press\">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor. </h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Riad Benguella</strong>, architect on the Gutenberg projects, explains in his latest post <a href=\"https://riad.blog/2025/01/31/the-anatomy-of-a-cms/\"><strong>The anatomy of a CMS</strong></a> and why any web developer should attempt to build a CMS just once. The magic happens through four key parts: how content is stored, how it looks, how you edit it, and how it gets shown to the world. Whether you want to create a personal blog, an online store, or a company website, a good CMS adapts to your needs. Benguella took a detailed view into the various parts of the WordPress CMS: block rendering, style engine and the fields system. If you wish to know how it all fits together, grab your favorite beverage and start reading.  </p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"392\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/CMS-1-by-Riad-Benguella.webp?resize=652%2C392&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37531\" />\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"what-s-new-in-playground\">What&#8217;s new in Playground</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Check out this article by Ján Mikláš, <a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/24/demo-your-woo-extension-with-wordpress-playground/\"><strong>Demo your Woo extension with WordPress Playground</strong></a>, where he breaks down how to set up WordPress Playground just for your needs. You’ll find out how to tweak your blueprint.json file with settings and steps, plus how to create a custom landing page and hide those pesky WooCommerce onboarding screens.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong><a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/need-a-zip-from-master/\">Need a plugin .zip from Gutenberg&#8217;s master branch?</a></strong><br />Gutenberg Times provides daily build for testing and review. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now also available via <a href=\"https://playground.wordpress.net/?blueprint-url=https://gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/playnightly.json\">WordPress Playground</a>. There is no need for a test site locally or on a server. Have you been using it? <a href=\"mailto:pauli@gutenbergtimes.com\">Email me </a>with your experience</p>\n\n\n\n<p><img alt=\"GitHub all releases\" src=\"https://img.shields.io/github/downloads/bph/gutenberg/total?style=for-the-badge\" /></p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\"><em>Questions? Suggestions? Ideas? </em><br /><em>Don&#8217;t hesitate to send <a href=\"mailto:pauli@gutenbergtimes.com\">them via email</a> or</em><br /><em> send me a message on WordPress Slack or Twitter @bph</em>.</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity\" />\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center has-small-font-size\">For questions to be answered on the <a href=\"http://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast\">Gutenberg Changelog</a>, <br />send them to <a href=\"mailto:changelog@gutenbergtimes.com\">changelog@gutenbergtimes.com</a></p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>Featured Image: AI generated. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-css-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left\"><strong>Don&#8217;t want to miss the next Weekend Edition? </strong></p>\n\n\n<form class=\"wp-block-newsletterglue-form ngl-form ngl-portrait\" action=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/feed/\" method=\"post\"><div class=\"ngl-form-container\"><div class=\"ngl-form-field\"><label class=\"ngl-form-label\" for=\"ngl_email\"><br />Type in your Email address to subscribe.</label><div class=\"ngl-form-input\"><input type=\"email\" class=\"ngl-form-input-text\" name=\"ngl_email\" id=\"ngl_email\" /></div></div><button type=\"submit\" class=\"ngl-form-button\">Subscribe</button><p class=\"ngl-form-text\">We hate spam, too, and won&#8217;t give your email address to anyone <br />except Mailchimp to send out our Weekend Edition</p></div><div class=\"ngl-message-overlay\"><div class=\"ngl-message-svg-wrap\"></div><div class=\"ngl-message-overlay-text\">Thanks for subscribing.</div></div><input type=\"hidden\" name=\"ngl_list_id\" id=\"ngl_list_id\" value=\"26f81bd8ae\" /><input type=\"hidden\" name=\"ngl_double_optin\" id=\"ngl_double_optin\" value=\"yes\" /></form>\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-css-opacity is-style-wide\" />\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sat, 01 Feb 2025 01:26:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:18:\"Birgit Pauli-Haack\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:37;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:76:\"Do The Woo Community: Friday Shares Fadeout. Sign Up for Our New Newsletter.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=89485\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:74:\"https://dothewoo.io/friday-shares-fade-out-sign-up-for-our-new-newsletter/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:339:\"In this episode of On WPCommunity, BobWP announces the conclusion of his regular Friday share posts on the blog due to time constraints and his new plans. He explains that after WordCamp Asia in February, a new newsletter will be launched alongside the release of version 5.0 of their site. The newsletter will feature actionable [&#8230;]\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Fri, 31 Jan 2025 13:30:05 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:38;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:98:\"Do The Woo Community: State of Enterprise WordPress 2024 Report with Brad Williams and Tom Willmot\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=89448\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:97:\"https://dothewoo.io/state-of-enterprise-wordpress-2024-report-with-brad-williams-and-tom-willmot/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:208:\"In the latest Scaling Enterprise podcast episode, Tom and Brad discuss the 2024 State of Enterprise WordPress Report, highlighting trends in adoption, usage, and decision-making dynamics within organizations.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Thu, 30 Jan 2025 13:12:24 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:39;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:67:\"WPTavern: #154 – Anna Hurko on Managing a Growing Plugin Business\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:48:\"https://wptavern.com/?post_type=podcast&p=185997\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:81:\"https://wptavern.com/podcast/154-anna-hurko-on-managing-a-growing-plugin-business\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:39823:\"Transcript<div>\n<p>[00:00:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Welcome to the Jukebox podcast from WP Tavern. My name is Nathan Wrigley.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Jukebox is a podcast which is dedicated to all things WordPress. The people, the events, the plugins, the blocks, the themes, and in this case managing a growing plugin business.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;d like to subscribe to the podcast, you can do that by searching for WP Tavern in your podcast player of choice, or by going to wptavern.com/feed/podcast. And you can copy that URL into most podcast players.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a topic that you&#8217;d like us to feature on the podcast, I&#8217;m keen to hear from you and hopefully get you, or your idea, featured on the show. Head to wptavern.com/contact/jukebox, and use the form there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So on the podcast today, we have Anna Hurko.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna is the CEO of Crocoblock, a company with a suite of dynamic plugins designed to help developers build complex websites. With a background in computer science, Anna transitioned from support roles to leading Crocoblock, and has been with the company for over 11 years.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna quickly rose through the ranks due to her technical knowledge and effective communication skills. Crocoblock, which started with just a handful of team members, has now grown to 85 employees. They offer a wide range of specialized plugins, such as JetEngine, JetSmartFilters, JetBooking, and more, primarily aimed at agency and freelance developers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna shares her journey and discusses the growth of Crocoblock. She highlights the company&#8217;s flexibility and commitment to meeting developers&#8217; needs, adapting to both the rapid changes within WordPress and the increasing demand for dynamic site capabilities.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna also talks about the company&#8217;s marketing strategies and their active, and growing, participation in the WordPress community through WordCamps and Meetups.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re interested in how a company evolves within the WordPress ecosystem, and the challenges and successes that come with it. This episode is for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re interested in finding out more, you can find all of the links in the show notes by heading to wptavern.com/podcast, where you&#8217;ll find all the other episodes as well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And so without further delay, I bring you, Anne Hurko.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I am joined on the podcast today by Anna Hurko. Hello Anna.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:02:53] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Hi Nathan.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:02:54] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Very nice to connect with you. I should probably say at the outset, Anna has several names. So if you know Anna better as Vanessa, or any combination thereof, it&#8217;s the same person. So do you just want to clear that up? How is it that you&#8217;ve got two different names?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:09] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> So it&#8217;s from the beginning. I have started to work as a supporter, and it was like tradition to choose a nickname for support agent. And I decided like okay, I&#8217;m already Anna, I want something other, but which will suit me. And I decided to be Vanessa.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And for a few years I was Vanessa, but somehow all my colleagues remembered me as Vanessa, and we used it till now, even if I don&#8217;t need it anymore. And that&#8217;s how it works. But now I feel more Vanessa than Anna because in whole work, so even financial departments, they say Vanessa, not Anna. Even the ex coworkers who are not anymore working with me, but they&#8217;re my friends, even their children say I&#8217;m Auntie Vanessa.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:03:46] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So several names, but hopefully by the time this podcast is finished, you&#8217;ll have figured out, dear listener, who it is that we&#8217;re talking to. But I&#8217;m going to go with Anna because that&#8217;s probably the easiest thing for me to say.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So Anna, we are a WordPress podcast, so I guess it would be a good idea right at the outset to give you an opportunity to just tell us who you are, where you come from in terms of the geography and maybe the company that you work for, things like that. So really it&#8217;s a short bio moment. So could you just tell us a little bit about yourself?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:13] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Yes, sure. So I&#8217;m from Ukraine, from south of Ukraine, and the company is the Crocoblock is project I&#8217;m working with now, and it&#8217;s located in Ukraine as well. All our team members are in Ukraine, in one city actually. So now a little bit different. So I&#8217;m CEO of Crocoblock and I work for the holding company about 11 years for now.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:32] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So, what is Crocoblock? And I hope I&#8217;ve pronounced that correctly. By the way, everything that we mention will be linked in the show notes. So if you head to wptavern.com/podcast and look for the episode with Anna in it, then you&#8217;ll be able to find all the show notes. But, what is Crocoblock and what does it do?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:04:49] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> So Crocoblock, I have always a long and short answers. Crocoblock is project who is making plugins for developers to build dynamic complex websites. And the idea was to have ecosystem which has all tools for developers needs.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But for me as a CEO, Crocoblock is a team. So it doesn&#8217;t matter which technology will come tomorrow and what happened to WordPress, we are a team who can build products. So that&#8217;s why I have two answers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:05:14] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Now, you mentioned at the outset that you are from the Ukraine originally, but just before we hit record, you talked about the fact that you are no longer in the Ukraine. But maybe that would be an interesting way to begin this podcast properly.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I&#8217;m guessing that from the description, living in the south of Ukraine, that you moved against your will, possibly. You&#8217;ve had to move because of the situation over there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:05:36] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> So the are three years of the situation. I was in Ukraine, I just moved in September after WordCamp US. I just didn&#8217;t come home and then stayed in Europe because I am trying to visit more WordCamps and WordPress meetups. And if you&#8217;re in Ukraine, it takes too long time to get out, because you don&#8217;t have planes and you need to go with a bus to Europe and to take plane, and every country in Europe takes me two days to move.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I decided to stay in Romania because it&#8217;s kind of in the center and then can visit more events. So last year I visited about seven WordCamps, because I want to go closer to community, to customers, to speak offline with them, and we have results. So we have already ran a little bit growing in comparison.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:06:20] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> The situation in Ukraine in terms of web development and tech, it always seems like Ukraine punches above its weight. I don&#8217;t know if there&#8217;s a particular kind of, I don&#8217;t know, like drive in school or anything like that to head towards technology and software development. But it seems, when I look at the about page of a lot of products, especially in the WordPress space, but technology more generally, it always feels like Ukraine is overrepresented with the amount of companies. I don&#8217;t know if that&#8217;s something that you think is true or if that is true.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:06:53] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> It is true, but I think it&#8217;s not because of good reasons. Somehow we didn&#8217;t have good factories and job places, and web was very easy for people to just find a job and to have good salary because a lot of companies working as outsource, or they have customers from US and Europe. For example, like Crocoblock, we don&#8217;t work with Ukrainian market actually, we work with Europe and US.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it&#8217;s not something, we have good studying in school and university. Unfortunately it should&#8217;ve developed better. For example, I have studied computer science, but it was like old technologies in university. Just because we don&#8217;t have normal working places, people starting to self-educate and they work in IT. And somehow it&#8217;s very good now. So even government programs, they&#8217;re all digitalised.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So from my phone, I can pay taxes, I can marry now from phone, but only with Ukrainians, of course. I can get any document I need, I don&#8217;t need to go anywhere. So now, for example, I&#8217;m outside of Ukraine, but I can have any document, new driver license. I can sell car with one application. So it&#8217;s somehow built in us.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:07:59] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So the propensity of Ukrainian web developers is as a result of people looking to improve their own lives and finding that distributed work was something that they could do, and they could earn a good, in air quotes, good salary if they took the initiative and did, what? Self-taught learning, that kind of thing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:08:17] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Yes, yes. Because in university, school, it&#8217;s really bad now, I&#8217;ll say. It&#8217;s not practical. But, for example, as I have studied computer science, it was all technologies. It was like Pascal Delphi, if you even know, C++. Something very difficult and not attached to WordPress, for example. But it gives me understanding how database works, for example. And it helps me a lot, even now, I don&#8217;t work with WordPress itself, so I don&#8217;t build product, I mean. I work with a team. It helps me to understand my developers and how it works.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:08:46] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Okay. Yeah, well, it&#8217;s a nice idea that the CEO of the company actually has a background in technology. I think that&#8217;s interesting to be able to speak to the developers on their level.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>How did you start in the WordPress space then? I think you said that you started working with the support side of things over at Crocoblock. And if that&#8217;s the case, going from support to where you are now, CEO, that&#8217;s a pretty big move. How did it all begin?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:09:09] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> First I need to say that I didn&#8217;t realise it&#8217;s a big move before attending WordCamps. Because it&#8217;s for me everyday life and it was kind of 10, 11 years. So when I have studied computer science, by side I was in NGO and Youth Politic. And I told, I will never have anything with programming languages, or with IT, or even with websites because we had website building in university as well, but it was, you know, when it was on the tables and HTML and so on. And the teacher was so awful. So I told, I will never do it, and now I&#8217;m here.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So after I finished with Youth Politic, I have started to just looking for a job which need English language. So because I didn&#8217;t want IT and I sent a CV for everyone with English knowledge, and they picked up me in the holding company as a support member because I knew English. But somehow as I knew computer science, it was very easy for me to deal with WordPress. And in three months I was already a night shift team leader and I have started to mentor people and so on. So I have started with support, but my background with computer science helped me to be very good, very fast.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So until now, I think it was the best thing I can do in my life is to be a supporter. Even now I think so. And because I have done Youth Politic, I had soft skills which helped me to communicate with customers in a nice way. And we have started to rebuild the support team as well, and there are rules in support and so on.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:31] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So you started out in support, and fairly quickly you rose through the ranks. And you mentioned just there that, you called it the, what did you call it?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:38] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Holding company.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:39] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> The holding company, that&#8217;s it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:40] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Yeah, we have holding company, it has several projects on side. And now Crocoblock is totally separated project.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:45] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So what&#8217;s the holding company, and is it a sort of WordPress thing, or is it just technology in general?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:10:50] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> It&#8217;s a recent WordPress thing. So we have started as a team in Template Monster. And, yeah, I was a support member in Template Monster first. Our developers started as well with templates before the templates were starting to die.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:11:04] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> And do you have a background in using WordPress, or has your experience with WordPress been on the journey in Crocoblock?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:11:12] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> I don&#8217;t have my private experience, so I never worked for an agency. But what I need to say is that in support, when I have started support, it was not like just us answering general questions. I was very technical support member, very quick. And customers in Crocoblock even now, but even before when I was working, they come with the real projects. And they just come and say, I don&#8217;t know what is wrong, just do something. And you log in on the website and you start building it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And that time, to start working in support, we had training for one month. About four hours theoretical training, and then five hours of homework. And this first month, I never went out of my house, only for my grandmother&#8217;s birthday. And what we have done, we haven&#8217;t learned WordPress, we have learned CSS, JavaScript and HTML. We have built websites, and working with database was as well. So somehow I started to work with the websites first, but just I don&#8217;t have commercial experience, I think.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:12:07] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> And what&#8217;s the structure of Crocoblock then? How many people do you have deployed into that project? If you are the CEO, I guess you&#8217;re at the top of that pyramid, how many people are working with you, for you? However you want to describe it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:12:18] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> We have started six years ago with five people, five, seven people. We don&#8217;t know exact number. All of us have different story of it. Now it&#8217;s 85.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The story begins when we were in Template Monster and we have built templates. In some point we had new people for it and we needed more amount of it and so on. And we have started to build frameworks to speed up the process, and to have less errors because if every quarter developer makes it in own style, we have too much issues with it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And then we started to sell it. So because it was product for ourself, but it was too good and we have started to like, okay, can we just start to sell plugins? And then we have started it, it was enough, seven people. It was developers, one support member, and guy who was before me, the CEO.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:13:00] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So if I go to the Crocoblock website, which is crocoblock.com, and I look at the products that you&#8217;ve got. It opens up a fairly giant mega menu, and there&#8217;s literally dozens of things in there.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>When I first heard the word Crocoblock, firstly I assumed that it was plural, that it was Crocoblocks, and my assumption was that, okay, that&#8217;ll be a suite of WordPress blocks. So you&#8217;ll download a plugin, and then you&#8217;ll have a bunch of blocks that you can put into the block editor.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And you go to the website and you realise, no, that&#8217;s really not what it is. That&#8217;s not even close to what it is. So what is it that you are offering into the market? What are the different products that I can find in your product section? I mean, there&#8217;s too many to talk about, but maybe just pick your favorites or a few that are particularly popular.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:13:47] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Yeah, so short answer is, well, it will be JetEngine and JetSmartFilters. But the issue is that we have invented the Crocoblock name before Gutenberg. There were no blocks, it was Crocoblock, and we have it because it was an old project that we had already some traffic and we left it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now we have actually two names, Crocoblock and JetPlugins because all of our plugins are JetPlugins.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And the issue is that the project was started with supporters and developers. We didn&#8217;t have marketer for a few years. So I have a head of marketing only last one year. That means we didn&#8217;t thought about the things like name, and now we have a lot of difficulties with it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And when I had started Crocoblock we have the first document with idea about what Crocoblock is, and it was one sentence that will make us laugh for even now. Crocoblock is not about dynamic, it&#8217;s only about static and nice design. And what is fun about it? Because it&#8217;s now only about dynamic plugins. So now we have big menu with a lot of plugins because it&#8217;s like our history and we can&#8217;t delete them, because people use them.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But our main focus is on dynamic websites, and that means JetEngine, which is a competitor for ACF, but it has much more inside. JetSmartFilters, JetThemeCore, and all plugins, which helps you to create complex structured websites, like real estate, multi-vendor and so on. You can track user data, and you can manage what to show to different users, or see the user behavior and connect to it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:13] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah, there really is a lot in there. You really do run the whole gamut of what WordPress can do. So for example, there&#8217;s something called JetBooking, which I&#8217;m imagining helps you with booking. And JetGridbuilder, again, it speaks for itself. JetProductTables, JetWooBuilder, JetProductGallery, Jet Appointments, JetFormBuilder. You get the idea. You&#8217;ve got your fingers in everything.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:15:35] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> The idea was to build this structure where developer has ever seen. We have started with Elementor. When Crocoblock was invented, it was few builders on the market, new builders. Elementor, Oxygen, and maybe, I don&#8217;t remember, Brizy or something like that. And they were on the equal stage. And our previous CEO came to us, I&#8217;m like, what will we choose? He asked me, and he asked our CTO. And we choose, both of us choose Elementor because of user experience and because of the cleanness of the code.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Our idea was to build everything except hosting and page builder for building websites. So we have tried, at the beginning, to close all the tasks for users and it was very fresh. So we appeared at the same time when Elementor was developing. And Elementor had less features inside of it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So first of all, we have tried to close all tasks, and now we&#8217;re more specifically working on dynamic. For example, Elementor, in JetElements we haven&#8217;t added any new features for few years, but it&#8217;s still our best plugin in sellings. But we don&#8217;t develop it because we don&#8217;t like to develop, so I mean we&#8217;re fixing bug issues or compatibility issues, but we don&#8217;t add new features because Elementor has added all new features, HappyAddons. And we don&#8217;t want to build, if it&#8217;s already on market, we don&#8217;t build it. It&#8217;s a philosophy of Crocoblock. We don&#8217;t want to build anything which already exists.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:16:54] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So over there I can see, what is it? 21 on the mega menu, there&#8217;s 21 things there. I&#8217;m guessing that, probably started with 1 went to 2, 3, 4, and we&#8217;re up to 21 at the minute. How do you keep this going? Are you intending to go from 21 to 22, 23, 24? Do you keep adding products, or is this more a case of, okay, we&#8217;ve got what we&#8217;ve got. We&#8217;ve covered everything? How are you making decisions about what it is that you&#8217;re going to do in the future?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:17:18] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> So as I came from support, when we invented Crocoblock, we had only one support member, and all developers were supporting as well. We have very tight connection with customers and what we&#8217;re building, we&#8217;re building after customer&#8217;s request. So it depends. If it will be need on market to build one more plugin, we&#8217;ll build it. If not, then not.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So I can tell you we have strategy for number of plugins. We have strategy to cover developers&#8217; needs. So now, for example, we have user interviews, some pools, research and market to find what else developers need. So it&#8217;s not about number of plugins, it&#8217;s about to close the needs.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>For me, I don&#8217;t want more plugins, so it&#8217;s not the goal. But if it would be better to build it as a separate plugin, we&#8217;ll build it. For example, the JetProductTables, it&#8217;s a new plugin. It was a result of R and D departments, I would say. We have new department, new for one year and they made resource. It&#8217;s like an experiment. So we don&#8217;t have any goals and number of plugins. It&#8217;s just to make developers life easier.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we have some projects, for example, we have ideas for projects not related to plugins itself, but to developers. I can&#8217;t tell you now what will it be.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So for me it&#8217;s, you know, like CEO, I don&#8217;t like a lot of plugins and I don&#8217;t want to have more team members. It&#8217;s always something you don&#8217;t want, to have more, because it&#8217;s easier to focus on one plugin. And as you say, it would be easier to focus only on JetEngine, but somehow Crocoblock can&#8217;t stop.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:18:44] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You mentioned at the start that you began the business with Elementor in mind, and Elementor, if you haven&#8217;t been keeping a track, dear listener, Elementor really has had just the most astronomical growth since its inception, and I think really is singularly responsible for a large proportion of WordPress&#8217; rise.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, I don&#8217;t know if that is the sort of page builder of choice that you&#8217;ve hooked yourself into, or if you&#8217;ve got into the sort of more WordPressy way of doing things. And what I mean by that is, you know, the Block Editor and Full Site Editing and things like that, because that&#8217;s obviously where the Core of the WordPress project is focusing its energy. But obviously on the periphery of that, you&#8217;ve got all these different page builders.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What do you do with all of that? Do you hunker down and stick with Elementor, or do you decide you&#8217;re going to go with like the Core way of doing things? How does that all fit in?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:19:33] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> So we of course love Elementor and it helps us in the beginning so much. We have the same philosophy as Elementor in a lot of things, like treating customers and so on. And I think it was right choice to start with. But once it was announced, the Gutenberg project, and then WordPress started with Gutenberg, the same in half a year or something like this, we have started to rebuild our plugins.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So all our main plugins, not design plugins, but all our main plugins for dynamic websites. So when the Gutenberg project was started, we rebuilt them, and they all are working with Gutenberg as with Bricks now and Elementor. So Elementor is just one of the builders customers need. And then Gutenberg is the core. So we have rebuilt inside the plugin, the code in the way it can work with Gutenberg and we can easily add other integrations. And we always perform something with WordPress and Gutenberg native features. It&#8217;s in the core. So of course Elementor has grown up.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So the company itself, it&#8217;s 20 years in market and we have all the 20 years experience. And we know it can shine as a star and it can die next day. But WordPress, we believe will stay for a long time with us. That&#8217;s why all our main plugins are built for WordPress and Block Editor. And we try to connect it more natively.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The issues we have, it takes a long time. For some of our projects, for example, we have JetThemeCore, it&#8217;s a plugin which builds templates for archive pages, WooCommerce card, profile page, so all sorts of pages you can make the structure with it. And for some time we haven&#8217;t developed it because we were waiting for FSE, for some new features from WordPress itself. But it take too long time, and we didn&#8217;t want to build something that WordPress will build natively. Or you need to wait or you build it, and then users will have it twice, once in Crocoblock and then in WordPress.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So we have these issues, but we&#8217;re trying to work around. For example, we have JetStyleManager, it&#8217;s a free plugin. It was created specifically for Gutenberg, because when we have made integration and compatibility for our plugins, Gutenberg was very new and it didn&#8217;t have a lot of style options. And we have built separate plugin just for Gutenberg to make styles possible. And now users have this solution from every plugin provider different, and we will rebuild it because WordPress have changed and so on.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So what I wanted to say, and it took a long time, even if you use Bricks, Elementor, and we will add some other integrations for Builder, WordPress is in Core and we would never ignore it. We&#8217;re part of WordPress, first of all.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:22:04] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> You mentioned a few sort of little frustrations there with the pace of WordPress. So for example, you may want a particular feature, and you know it&#8217;s coming, but you take your foot off the pedal of your own project so that you&#8217;re not building it twice as you said. But what about the way that Gutenberg and Full Site Editing, but Gutenberg in particular has changed over the last six or seven years?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I mean, there must have been times when, the fact that it was altering so rapidly, and in such a drastic way, you know, from one release to the next it might be an entirely different UI for a particular thing. And then you&#8217;ve got to scratch your head and think, okay, we just shipped something, and we did the documentation, and it all looked like that, and now it looks like this, we&#8217;ve got to redo all the documentation.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Being honest, has it been a straightforward process or has it been a fairly frustrating process? I mean, it could have been a bit of both, I guess.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:22:53] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> It&#8217;s both. It was frustrating because we so believe in WordPress, and we have waited for some changes before, early, and it took too much time from our opinion. But it&#8217;s part of WordPress life. So it&#8217;s part of probably open source and so on, so we&#8217;re okay with it. And I can say that probably we don&#8217;t feel that frustration all the time because Crocoblock itself, growing and changing so quick as well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>In six years we started with five people, now 85. You can imagine how quick changes processes inside our team as well. Because every time, in marketing, you have few new people, you need new process. Or in developers teams, they have started like three, four developers and now 15. Every two, three, developers, you need to change the process. So what I mean, in our philosophy of Crocoblock, we are okay with changes. It doesn&#8217;t frustrate us. What frustrates us, if nothing happens.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:23:44] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Yeah. And over the last decade or more, we&#8217;ve just seen the line of market share for WordPress go up and up and up. And if I was a product maker in the WordPress space, that would&#8217;ve made me feel great. I&#8217;ve got a credible product, it works. We&#8217;ve got a load of people using it. And look, the amount of people who might use it just keeps rising. And then we get to about 43% of the web, whatever that means, I mean, we can ignore exactly what that means, but the point is the line just kept going up.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>More recently there&#8217;s more discussion about stagnation in the marketplace, and maybe that line tapers a little bit and it goes flat. Or, and I don&#8217;t really want to get into that, we&#8217;ve got this period of change at the moment, there&#8217;s a lot of politics inside of WordPress. I&#8217;m just wondering what your thoughts are on where the business is pitched. The fact that you are using WordPress is great, but do you have any concerns about the market share sort of stagnating, or do you feel that you still have a massive audience in WordPress that you&#8217;re still yet to reach?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:24:41] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> We have different periods. For example, last years were very challenging for us. Because Crocoblock started, when we started it grows in geometrical progress, it was very quick growing. And then of course as a five, six years project, you have not so big changes in your revenue, but it&#8217;s good, it works. And last few months we have very good results. So I think we don&#8217;t feel that stagnation so much because we have started Crocoblock without marketing, it was selling itself, and of course with help of community influencers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And we have just started last year to build a brand and to work with marketing. It means we have a lot of potential yet. So if market is stagnating or it still feels for us to develop our customer base and so on, because we didn&#8217;t use it before. You know what I mean? So if you haven&#8217;t selling in right way, then now we have started. So we still have a lot customers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:25:32] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Oh I see what you mean. So it was more kind of organic growth, or maybe it was social media or YouTube or what have you.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:25:38] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> We have started with product team, and that&#8217;s why we didn&#8217;t have real marketing. No one from us really understood the marketing itself, because we have just done what people need. And somehow the product was built first for ourselves and for our needs. That means we know our customers, not only from support team or interviews, they know them because they are we. So we didn&#8217;t need marketing.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it was a time in our Crocoblock life when we didn&#8217;t believe in marketing. And we thought like, okay, marketing is just wasting of money. It changed. So last year we had head of marketing and I developed a marketing team as well. That&#8217;s why it&#8217;s very new for us and we still have where to grow.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And about market share, we could say something about stagnation, but after we see new numbers of Elementor, and we can see where is no stagnation. And about the drama and the situation with WordPress, which we had since September, we don&#8217;t feel it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So for me, it was surprising that my life was only about the drama and no one in Crocoblock community talked about it. So we have 30,000 people in Crocoblock community in Facebook, and it was only two posts asking about what happens, that&#8217;s it. With five comments. So I think the companies care, but customers not so much.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>We have some feedback from agency customers. So our customer is an agency or freelance developer. They had few issues from clients, but not so much. So the main reason is to keep ecosystem healthy and that&#8217;s it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:05] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> And now that you&#8217;ve moved into marketing, by the way, I think you were right about marketing. If you spend your marketing money badly, it probably is an absolute waste of money, but if you spend it wisely, it&#8217;s probably the most effective money that you can ever spend. So where are you pitching that then?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So if I just rewind and re-ask that question, who is your audience? Who are the people that are using this? Is this a product which is used by agencies to deploy to their client websites? Do you find that you are being purchased by, I don&#8217;t know, people who&#8217;ve just got one or two websites? Maybe it&#8217;s just a solopreneur, something like that. Is there a segment of the market that you identify with?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:27:41] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Yes, of course. First, when we have started, we were growing just naturally and we didn&#8217;t ask ourselves these questions. Now, we have made a lot of researches, and it&#8217;s the same answer. Our customers are agencies and freelance developers. They&#8217;re about 30, 35, 40 years old with five, six years experience.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The issue is the Crocoblock is quite complicated solution. It gives you total freedom. You can build from admin panel anything, we have query builder where you can use SQL and other complicated stuff. You don&#8217;t need to go to database. You can reach your SQL database from the admin panel, or complex relations and so on.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>But to use it, even from admin panel by clicking buttons, you need to understand how it works. The learning curve is complicated. And our developers building product quicker is that all other 80 people can produce a content for it and tutorials. That means, so if you need one website, it&#8217;s not a marketing answer, but if you need one, two websites, you don&#8217;t need Crocoblock. It&#8217;ll be too complicated for you. But Crocoblock will save your time and 50, 60% if you have more websites, if you&#8217;re an agency.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:28:47] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Right, I understand. So if you&#8217;ve got a portfolio of websites and you&#8217;re willing to put the time in to learn over 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, 20 projects, you&#8217;ll get a return on your time back. But if it&#8217;s just one website, maybe the learning curve, unless you really into that kind of thing and you just want to learn for the sake of it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:29:04] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> I have visited a lot of WordCamps last year and meetups, just to talk to our customers. And we have a lot of fans who paid us once lifetime, but they&#8217;re still our fans and they talk about us on meetups and so on. Even unpaid, it&#8217;s so pleasure when someone talked about you, about meetup, and had presentation and you never paid for it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>And it&#8217;s always about four or five people in agency who are building websites. And because of Crocoblocks, they can build one website in a week, starting from design into the launch. It&#8217;s very nice because we have components and query builder and glossary, so you can make some predefined elements and then reuse it all the time if you have some websites you built then, for example, booking and so on.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:29:47] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> So do you sell your products separately? So all of the different ones that I mentioned, plus all ones that I didn&#8217;t have time to mention. Do you sell them as individuals or do you tend to sell it as a sort of bundle that people buy? How do you pitch that?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:29:58] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> You can buy them separately or a bundle. So it&#8217;s a subscription for one year, but you can buy one plugin, we have custom subscription, you can choose a few plugins, so you can buy a lifetime with all the plugins or all inclusive yearly for all plugins. So it depends what you need. So of course the most popular is lifetime.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:16] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Do you get yourself involved in the community? I know personally you said you&#8217;d been to a load of WordCamps and things. Does Crocoblock give back? Do you sponsor events maybe locally or some of the bigger ones? I don&#8217;t know, maybe you even contribute time to Core in terms of developers or something, I don&#8217;t know.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:30] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> So it was our plan. Honestly, we haven&#8217;t started to contribute into Core, but we sponsor WordCamps and we attend a lot of WordCamps. We have started from last year, I think, but because of the war, we couldn&#8217;t start before. So I mean, the Crocoblock started with all of these things. But from last year we started to sponsor big WordCamps and small WordCamps.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:30:50] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> I mentioned the URL earlier, but I&#8217;ll say it one more time. It&#8217;s crocoblock.com, so C-R-O-C-O-B-L-O-C-K dot com. That&#8217;s where you can find all of the different bits and pieces that Anna&#8217;s been talking about. If anybody wants to speak to you, Anna, personally, do you hang out on any social media platforms, or have a thing that you&#8217;d like to mention where people can find you?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:10] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Yeah, Facebook or Twitter, but I&#8217;m as well in LinkedIn. And I can tell you the secret, and if you write in Facebook room community, you can find our CTO Andrew. And if you write him in DM, he will answer you as well.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>In all WordCamps I told to customers if they have complicate, but interesting case, they come to contact Andrew, and if it&#8217;s really interesting, he will help you. And even make some changes to plugin sometimes because of customer requests. So we are very reachable. I mean, all Crocoblock team will answer you if you write in DM.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:42] <strong>Nathan Wrigley:</strong> Well, thank you very much for chatting to me today, Anna. I really appreciate it. One more time, if you want to find out what they&#8217;re doing, crocoblock.com is the URL. Anna, thanks so much for chatting to me today, I really appreciate it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>[00:31:52] <strong>Anna Hurko:</strong> Thank you.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>On the podcast today we have <a href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/in/anna-hurko-25aa368a/\">Anna Hurko</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna is the CEO of <a href=\"https://crocoblock.com/\">Crocoblock</a>, a company with a suite of dynamic plugins designed to help developers build complex websites. With a background in computer science, Anna transitioned from support roles to leading Crocoblock, and has been with the company for over 11 years.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna quickly rose through the ranks due to her technical knowledge and effective communication skills. Crocoblock, which started with just a handful of team members, has now grown to 85 employees. They offer a wide range of specialised plugins such as JetEngine, JetSmartFilters, JetBooking, and more, primarily aimed at agencies and freelance developers.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna shares her journey, and discusses the growth of Crocoblock. She highlights the company&#8217;s flexibility and commitment to meeting developers&#8217; needs, adapting to both the rapid changes within WordPress, and the increasing demand for dynamic site capabilities.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna also talks about the company&#8217;s marketing strategies and their active, and growing, participation in the WordPress community through WordCamps and meetups.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you&#8217;re interested in how a company evolves with the WordPress ecosystem, and the challenges and successes that come with it, this episode is for you.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Useful links</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://crocoblock.com/\">Crocoblock website</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p>Anna on <a href=\"https://www.linkedin.com/in/anna-hurko-25aa368a/\">LinkedIn</a></p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 29 Jan 2025 15:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:14:\"Nathan Wrigley\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:40;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:77:\"HeroPress: Building a WordPress Career Without a Map: Lessons from My Journey\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:56:\"https://heropress.com/?post_type=heropress-essays&p=7760\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:204:\"https://heropress.com/essays/building-a-wordpress-career-without-a-map-lessons-from-my-journey/#utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=building-a-wordpress-career-without-a-map-lessons-from-my-journey\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:7830:\"<img width=\"1024\" height=\"512\" src=\"https://heropress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/012825-1-min.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"Pull Quote: Be open to change, focus on what you do, and don’t fear big goals.\" />\nHere is Anna reading her own story aloud.\n\n\n\n\n\n<p>I never dreamed of being a CEO. Even now, when I am introduced as such, I feel a little shy. But every time I start thinking, &#8220;<em>Am I enough? Doesn’t the company deserve someone more qualified?</em>&#8220;—I return to my journey.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I want to share this to inspire those who are just starting out, changing their path, or feeling lost along the way.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>My career path looks like this:</strong><br />Senior Technical Support Specialist → Shift Support Manager → QA Manager → Release Manager → Project Manager → Product Owner → COO → CEO</p>\n\n\n\n<p>I started as a chat operator in technical support and quickly advanced to Senior Technical Support Specialist and mentor, later becoming Shift Support Manager. I transitioned to the production department as a QA Ma</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Soon after, my responsibilities grew to include roles like Release Manager and Project Manager.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>When we launched Crocoblock, I focused on product and strategic issues, working as a Product Owner, then COO, and finally, CEO.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, my journey began even earlier.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-a-story-that-inspired-me\">A story that inspired me</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>When I was a teenager, my father changed careers. He worked as a land-line network engineer, but as technology advanced, the role became obsolete. At 42, he started from scratch in the gas industry. His persistence and willingness to learn left a lasting impression on me. A few years later, he became the CEO of a company in a completely new field.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Later, in 2014, due to war, he lost his job and started over again. Now, in 2025, after yet another wave of war, he has taken on a new role, proving to himself and others that it’s never too late. This story ingrained in me the belief that <strong>“you can always find a new beginning.”</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-how-i-entered-it\">How I entered IT</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>While studying at university, I promised myself, “<em>I will never work with websites!</em>” Before WordPress, web development with pure HTML didn’t appeal to me.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>However, in 2014, as the war began and tanks rolled past my house toward Crimea, I was looking for any job that required English. That’s how I ended up in technical support. The training lasted a month, with me spending 5 hours on mentorship and about the same amount of time on homework every single day. During that time, I left the house only once to celebrate my grandmother’s birthday—I was that captivated.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>My technical education, understanding of databases, and soft skills from public activities helped me adapt quickly. I chose to work a six-day schedule to fully immerse myself in the new world.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-a-defining-moment\">A defining moment</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>After my internship, I was introduced to the KPI system that affected salaries: 30 metrics and a calculation formula. Instead of analyzing the formula, I focused on the tasks at hand. My goal was simple: solve customer problems as effectively as possible.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Two months later, I became the top chat operator. Within three months, I mentored newcomers, and in six months, I helped revamp the support system.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This experience was key for me. I realized it’s not about chasing ratings or recognition—it’s about focusing on the value you create, which ultimately leads to success.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-the-transition-to-production\">The transition to production</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>After a year and a half in support, I wanted a broader impact. Thanks to regular reports and feedback I shared with the production team, they invited me to join their department. I didn’t know which role suited me or cared about titles—I simply did what was needed.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Over time, I held several roles: QA Manager, Release Manager, Project Manager, and Product Owner. But none of them confined my scope of responsibilities.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-my-approach-to-work\">My approach to work</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the most important principles I followed was <strong>a willingness to help</strong>—without letting it hinder my main work.</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>If I knew the answer to a question, I responded immediately.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>If I didn’t know but knew where to find it, I searched quickly.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>If expert input was needed, I contacted the right person.</li>\n\n\n\n<li>If I was short on time, I guided colleagues on where and whom to ask.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>I always ensured the problem was solved and remembered the solution. This helped me build a broad network within the company and become the go-to person who &#8220;knows everything.&#8221;</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-why-i-grew-with-the-company\">Why I grew with the company</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Throughout my career, I have never feared uncertainty. When responsibilities changed, I took them as challenges. My philosophy was simple: “<em>I need to do everything to help the project grow, and I’ll grow along with it.</em>”</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Of course, there were periods of anxiety and doubt. <strong>Remembering my goal helped me push forward, work harder, learn faster, and adapt to changes.</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-how-i-became-a-ceo\">How I became a CEO</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>With each new role, my understanding of the WordPress market and products deepened. My vision broadened, and my goals became more ambitious. This inspired me to build a strong team and take on more responsibility for decision-making.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>As COO, I honed my skills in achieving goals. However, the key to transitioning to CEO was realizing I was ready to take responsibility for defining the goals themselves. As a CEO, your work results in the work of your team. The main tasks of a CEO are to maintain the vision, support the team, and create conditions for growth.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>For me, being a CEO is about constant development, solving new challenges, and creating growth opportunities—not only for the company but also for the team. This role isn’t the ultimate goal but a tool for achieving results that matter to us all.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"h-key-takeaways\">Key takeaways</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Over this journey, I’ve learned that it’s important to focus on tasks rather than how one is evaluated. <strong>Good work speaks for itself.</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<p>When you do what you love and constantly strive for new challenges, time flies unnoticed. That’s what happened to me: 10 years passed in the blink of an eye. And then, one day, I find myself still the same girl fighting in the name of customer happiness—but now, I’m also setting the budget for the entire project for the next year.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>During this time, I’ve observed my colleagues and subordinates build their careers, and I strive to share my experience. At Crocoblock, we actively help support team members grow into developers, managers, and marketers, taking on new roles. This path is open to anyone willing to work, learn, and aim higher.<br /><strong>My lesson is simple:</strong> Be open to change, focus on what you do, and don’t fear big goals. If you work toward them daily, they will become a reality.</p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https://heropress.com/essays/building-a-wordpress-career-without-a-map-lessons-from-my-journey/\">Building a WordPress Career Without a Map: Lessons from My Journey</a> appeared first on <a href=\"https://heropress.com\">HeroPress</a>.</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Wed, 29 Jan 2025 06:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:10:\"Anna Hurko\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:41;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:25:\"Matt: Boom &amp; Deepseek\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:23:\"https://ma.tt/?p=135630\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:36:\"https://ma.tt/2025/01/boom-deepseek/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:1317:\"<p>What an exciting time to be alive. I was <a href=\"https://x.com/karpathy/status/1872362712958906460\">hipped to Deepseek by Andrej Kaparthy&#8217;s tweet the day after Christmas</a>, it was clear then that something big had happened and that it was truly open source and open weights (not this fake Llama stuff). It&#8217;s been fun to see the rest of the world catch up to it, and how radically accessible and deployable these models will be for people to hack on. I don&#8217;t have any comment on public markets or stocks.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The other super inspiring thing today was Boom&#8217;s first supersonic flight. It&#8217;s <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qisIViAHwI\">worth watching the video</a>. We&#8217;re 4-5 years away from halving flight times with supersonic flight. In that same timeframe we might have something even more dramatic from SpaceX, like Houston to Tokyo in 30 minutes. Really cool to see the spirit of entrepreneurship and innovation around all of these things. It&#8217;s tempting to get distracted by drama (WPE and legal battles), but there&#8217;s such freedom and joy in just continuing to build, to engineer, to solve problems. I&#8217;m so grateful I get to do so every day with such incredible colleagues at Automattic.</p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n\n</div>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 28 Jan 2025 20:15:42 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:4:\"Matt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:42;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:113:\"Do The Woo Community: AI, WooCommerce Changes, and the WordPress Community in 2025 with 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2025.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 28 Jan 2025 12:38:28 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:43;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:88:\"Do The Woo Community: Do the Woo is a Media Partner for CloudFest 2025 and the Hackathon\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:43:\"https://dothewoo.io/?post_type=blog&p=89382\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:92:\"https://dothewoo.io/blog/do-the-woo-is-a-media-partner-for-cloudfest-2025-and-the-hackathon/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:135:\"We are excited to partner with CloudFest again, featuring over 8,700 attendees and 250+ speakers at Europa-Park from March 17-20, 2025.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Tue, 28 Jan 2025 10:00:00 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:44;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:92:\"Do The Woo Community: Reflections on the WooCommerce Releases from 2024 with Marcel and Mike\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:28:\"https://dothewoo.io/?p=89403\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:104:\"https://dothewoo.io/exploring-woocommerce-2024-new-features-and-developer-insights-with-marcel-and-mike/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:137:\"In this episode of Woo DevChat, Marcel and Mike discuss significant WooCommerce updates from 2024, AI\'s impact, and their personal goals.\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Mon, 27 Jan 2025 11:20:17 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:5:\"BobWP\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:45;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:62:\"Gravatar: Create Unique Avatars With Backgrounds and Stickers!\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:32:\"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=2772\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:73:\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2025/01/22/new-background-and-sticker-features/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:2777:\"<p>Has it been a while since you gave your Gravatar a fresh look? We just rolled out some fun new editing tools that let you remove backgrounds, add new ones, and decorate with stickers. Your avatar travels with you across the web — now it can show even more of your personality.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Background Magic</h2>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-contrast-background-color has-background has-global-padding is-layout-constrained wp-container-core-group-is-layout-2 wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<img width=\"1200\" height=\"849\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/cleanshot-2025-01-22-at-11.08.30.gif\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2779\" />\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>Take any photo and instantly remove its background. Drop yourself onto a beach, in front of a cityscape, or keep it clean with a solid color. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>That quick selfie can now look like a professional headshot.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Sticker Time</h2>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-contrast-background-color has-background has-global-padding is-layout-constrained wp-container-core-group-is-layout-3 wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<img width=\"1200\" height=\"850\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/cleanshot-2025-01-22-at-11.13.25.gif\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2780\" />\n</div>\n\n\n\n<p>Add some flair with our collection of stickers. From sunglasses to speech bubbles, you can layer on elements that match your style. Use the search feature to find the perfect additions.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">How to Use the New Features</h2>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Head to <a href=\"https://gravatar.com/profile\">gravatar.com/profile</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li>Click on <strong>Avatars</strong></li>\n\n\n\n<li>Upload a new photo or click the three dots to edit an existing one</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Look for the <strong>Background</strong> and <strong>Stickers</strong> menus</li>\n\n\n\n<li>Start creating!</li>\n</ol>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Pro tip:</strong> Try the search button in both the background and sticker menus – you might find something unexpected and perfect. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Backgrounds come from <a href=\"https://www.pexels.com/\">Pexels</a> and stickers from <a href=\"https://giphy.com/stickers\">Giphy</a>. Or you can upload your own.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Why Update Your Avatar?</h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Remember, your Gravatar shows up automatically on millions of sites like WordPress, Slack, and Zapier. It&#8217;s the face you show the world across the web. With these new tools, you can make sure that face is exactly how you want it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Share your new look with us <a href=\"https://x.com/gravatar\">on X</a> or <a href=\"https://bsky.app/profile/gravatar.bsky.social\">Bluesky</a> — we can&#8217;t wait to see what you create!</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sun, 26 Jan 2025 16:30:04 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:11:\"Ronnie Burt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:46;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:66:\"Gravatar: Enhance Your WordPress Blog: Create a Custom Author Page\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:32:\"http://blog.gravatar.com/?p=1863\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:59:\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2025/01/26/wordpress-author-page/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:16651:\"<p>Author pages contain information about a person who has written, edited, or contributed to an article. This usually includes things like their name, picture, short bio, social media links, and then a list of all their published posts on the same domain.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If you have a blog, it’s generally always a good idea to have dedicated authors and pages to accompany them. This is important for many reasons, but one of the main ones is that it instantly improves the credibility of the content. It’s one thing to read a technical piece written by a credible software engineer than an anonymous user with no name!</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Author pages not only encourage users to read and interact with your content (because they know a real person is behind it), but they are also great for improving your search engine rankings, along with E-E-A-T (Expertise, Experience, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness).&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now that you’re convinced how important author pages are, you’re probably wondering: “Is there a way to customize them, make them look better and more engaging?”</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Absolutely!&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>To help you do just that, we’ve created this useful guide that will explore the different ways of customizing the author template in <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/\" rel=\"nofollow\">WordPress</a>, show you how you can create a custom page, use template tags, and take advantage of tools like <a href=\"https://gravatar.com/\">Gravatar</a> to take your author pages to the next level.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://docs.gravatar.com/getting-started/\"><img width=\"3242\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/gravatar_integration_cta.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2632\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Customizing the default author template vs. creating a custom page</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>There are two main approaches when it comes to improving your author pages: Customizing the default author page template and creating a custom author page from scratch.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let’s take a look at both methods.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Customizing the default author template</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Before we dive into this, it’s important to mention that there is a difference between the author of an article and the ‘Author’ user role that exists in WordPress. Technically, the author of a blog post can also be the administrator, an editor, a contributor, as well as an author. So take into account that when we mention author, we mean any person who has written the specific piece of content.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now, with that out of the way, let’s get into the default author pages. The information they include is the data of the specific user profile, which looks like this:&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1289\" height=\"1170\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/author-page-backend.png\" alt=\"User information settings in WordPress\" class=\"wp-image-1864\" />\n\n\n\n<p>You can add information like names, websites, and bio, along with the profile picture linked to their specific Gravatar profile. If they don’t have a Gravatar profile, their profile picture displays as a mystery person.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>On the front end, the author page will look different depending on the theme of your choice. For example, this is how it would look with the <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/themes/bloghash/\" rel=\"nofollow\">Bloghash WordPress theme</a>:&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1493\" height=\"949\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/bloghash-theme-author-page.png\" alt=\"Example of the default author page in WordPress with the theme Bloghash\" class=\"wp-image-1865\" />\n\n\n\n<p>Customizing the default author template is suitable for minor changes and maintaining a consistent design across your WordPress site. By utilizing template tags, you can modify the default template regardless of the theme you&#8217;re using, without the need for additional plugins or custom code.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The benefits of customizing the default template include:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Ease of implementation:</strong> Making changes to the existing template is relatively straightforward and doesn&#8217;t require extensive technical knowledge.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Maintaining a unified look:</strong> By working with the default template, you ensure that your author pages blend seamlessly with the rest of your site&#8217;s design.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>However, there are some limitations to this approach:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Less flexibility:</strong> Customizing the default template may not provide as much flexibility as creating a custom author page from scratch. You&#8217;re limited to the structure and elements already present in the template.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Potential conflicts with theme updates:</strong> If your theme receives an update that modifies the author template, your customizations may be overwritten, requiring you to reapply them.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Despite these limitations, customizing the default author template can be a quick and effective solution for those who want to make minor improvements to their author pages while maintaining a consistent design across their WordPress site.</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Creating a custom author page</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>A custom author page gives you full control over the design, the amount of information, and how it’s displayed, and it also comes with extra opportunities for user engagement. It’s a separate page that is then linked to this specific user and shows up when you click on their name.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Unlike the default author page, you’re not restricted to the information fields on the back end and can add virtually anything. For example, you can include customized links to guest post contributions, client testimonials, extra information about services, a donation block, share buttons, and much more.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The only possible downfall of these pages is that they require more effort to set up and maintain, and depending on your goals, you might need technical knowledge or external tools and plugins for the job. The payoff, however, is worth it.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>How to use template tags to customize the author template</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The design of your WordPress blog is defined by the theme you are using, and themes are made of different templates. Template tags PHP functions built into WordPress to fetch and display dynamic content allowing you to customize your blog and make the pages look exactly how you want them to.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this next section, we’ll guide you through the process of using template tags for author page customization, including code snippets.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Creating the author.php file</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The first step is to check whether there is an author.php file in your theme directory and create one if that’s not the case. This is the file you’ll be using to customize the layout and the content of the author pages.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Basic template tags for author information</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>There are a couple of tags you can use to access author information, including:&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><code><strong>the_author_meta</strong>()</code>: Use this to simply display author information.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><code><strong>get_the_author_meta</strong>()</code>: Use this if you want to return a value and save it to a variable. Values you can request include <code>admin_color, first_name, last_name, user_url, </code>and<code> nickname.</code></li>\n\n\n\n<li><code><strong>get_the_author_posts</strong>()</code>: Use this to retrieve the current author’s total number of posts.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Combining template tags with HTML and CSS</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>You can display this data on the frontend of your website using the echo command, like in the example below:</p>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-code\"><code>&lt;div class=\"author-info\"&gt;\n	&lt;h2&gt;About the Author&lt;/h2&gt;\n	&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Name:&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;?php echo get_the_author_meta (\'display_name\'); ?&gt;&lt;/p&gt;\n	&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Email:&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;?php echo get_the_author_meta (\'user_email\'); ?&gt;&lt;/p&gt;\n	&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Bio:&lt;/strong&gt; &lt;?php echo get_the_author_meta (\'description\'); ?&gt;&lt;/p&gt;\n&lt;/div&gt;</code></pre>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Using conditional statements</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<p>The <strong>is</strong>_author function introduces conditional logic, where you can check whether a page has an author, and display their information if it does. Use the following format:</p>\n\n\n\n<pre class=\"wp-block-code\"><code>&lt;?php if ( is_author() ) : ?&gt;\n// Your code here if it returns true\n&lt;?php endif; ?&gt;</code></pre>\n\n\n\n<p>This is ideal for sites with a very simple URL structure where, say, a landing page and a blog post would have the same structure.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Pair this with the <code>get_the_author_meta()</code> command to retrieve the author’s ID and display their information on the frontend, as shown above.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Building a custom author page on WordPress through Gravatar integration</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1473\" height=\"918\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/gravatar-profiles-as-a-service-1.png\" alt=\"Gravatar homepage\" class=\"wp-image-1871\" />\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://gravatar.com/\">Gravatar</a>, a service built by <a href=\"https://automattic.com/\">Automattic</a>, offers a powerful solution for creating feature-rich and dynamic author pages on your website with minimal effort. While WordPress already uses Gravatar profile pictures for users logged in with the same email, you can take this integration a step further by leveraging Gravatar&#8217;s Profiles-As-A-Service REST API to import entire user profiles and create fully customized author pages.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>For example, all the blog posts written by yours truly (me, Ronnie) have a link to my <a href=\"https://gravatar.com/burtrw\">Gravatar page</a>:&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"821\" height=\"353\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/link-to-gravatar-profile.png\" alt=\"Example of author link in a Gravatar blog post\" class=\"wp-image-1872\" />\n\n\n\n<p>This is so that when people click on my name, they are redirected to my Gravatar profile where I’ve put all important information about myself.</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1032\" height=\"776\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/ronnie-gravatar-profile.png\" alt=\"Ronnie Burt Gravatar\'s profile\" class=\"wp-image-1873\" />\n\n\n\n<p>However, the benefits of Gravatar integration go beyond simply linking to an author&#8217;s Gravatar page. By utilizing the <a href=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/2024/06/03/profiles-as-a-service/\">Profiles-As-A-Service</a> REST API, you can create custom author pages on your website that display information imported directly from Gravatar. This offers several advantages:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Automatically synced author data: </strong>When a new author or contributor signs up to your site with their Gravatar profile, all their data is automatically imported. This includes name, location, job title, pronouns, bio, important links to their other work, verified social media accounts, and contact information. This streamlines the process for everyone, especially the author, as they don&#8217;t need to input their entire information from scratch.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Simplified author page creation:</strong> With Gravatar&#8217;s API, you have access to pre-populated data, allowing you to build custom author pages quickly without the need to collect information manually. Everything falls into place seamlessly.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Data consistency:</strong> Since the custom author page is connected to the Gravatar profile, any changes made to the author&#8217;s information on Gravatar are automatically reflected on your website. This eliminates the need for admins and IT support to constantly update author information manually.</li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Pre-verified author information:</strong> Gravatar validates and vets certain user data, such as linked social media accounts and payment links. This ensures that authors are who they claim to be, making it easier for readers to connect with them and enhancing the credibility and accuracy of your articles.</li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<p>So, if you want to leverage Gravatar to build a custom author page, check out our <a href=\"https://docs.gravatar.com/api/profiles/\">documentation for developers</a>.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Customizing the WordPress author box with Jetpack and Gravatar</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the most important parts of the author&#8217;s profile is their bio – it’s what gives the article credibility and entices readers to check out more posts or even connect with the author. Besides ensuring it’s written well, you can enhance the bio’s design even further with the <a href=\"https://jetpack.com/\" rel=\"nofollow\">Jetpack</a> plugin and its <a href=\"https://jetpack.com/support/gravatar-hovercards/\">Gravatar hovercard integration</a>.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Customizing author info with Jetpack</strong></h3>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1317\" height=\"724\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/jetpack-homepage.png\" alt=\"Jetpack homepage\" class=\"wp-image-1875\" />\n\n\n\n<p>Jetpack comes with many additional features, that allow you to customize and add new functionalities to the author pages.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>First, it fully integrates with Gravatar to pull author information and update it automatically. Besides that, it lets you enable the display of the author’s name and bio or their Gravatar profile on single post pages with all the information directly pulled from their WordPress profile.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this example, we’ve added a Gravatar profile widget to the sidebar next to the blog post.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1992\" height=\"1017\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/gravatar-widget-jetpack.png\" alt=\"The Gravatar widget in Jetpack\" class=\"wp-image-1876\" />\n\n\n\n<p>With <a href=\"https://docs.gravatar.com/sdk/web-components/hovercards/\">Gravatar Hovercards</a> enabled, when people hover over the profile with their mouse, they’ll see a mini version of the profile as a hovercard.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<p>This is how it would look in our example:&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"1283\" height=\"848\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/example-hovercards-sarah.png\" alt=\"Example of a Gravatar hovercard\" class=\"wp-image-1878\" />\n\n\n\n<p>You can easily enable that by going to <em>Jetpack &gt; Settings &gt; Discussion </em>and then enabling the option named “<em>Enable pop-up business cards over commenters’ Gravatars</em>”</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"660\" height=\"404\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/enable-hovercards-in-jetpack.png?w=660\" alt=\"Enabling Hovercards in the Jetpack settings\" class=\"wp-image-1879\" />\n\n\n\n<p>There are many other customization options, especially with <a href=\"https://jetpack.com/support/extra-sidebar-widgets/\" rel=\"nofollow\">Jetpack widgets</a>. Still, we recommend keeping it simple and not cluttering the page with too many elements, as this may overwhelm readers. As always, balance is key.&nbsp;</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Transform your WordPress site with a stunning custom author page</strong></h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Custom author pages are essential for showcasing your authors&#8217; expertise, fostering reader connections, and enhancing user experience. While there are various approaches to creating custom author pages on WordPress, integrating with Gravatar&#8217;s Profiles-As-A-Service REST API is the most efficient and effective solution.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>By leveraging Gravatar&#8217;s API, you can save time and effort, ensure data accuracy and consistency, provide a seamless user experience, and boost your blog&#8217;s SEO and E-E-A-T.&nbsp;<a href=\"https://docs.gravatar.com/api/profiles/\">Learn more about how you can integrate Gravatar</a> with your WordPress website and begin your journey toward a more connected and personalized user experience.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://docs.gravatar.com/getting-started/\"><img width=\"3242\" height=\"729\" src=\"https://blog.gravatar.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/gravatar_integration_cta.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-2632\" /></a>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sun, 26 Jan 2025 16:24:42 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}s:32:\"http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/\";a:1:{s:7:\"creator\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:11:\"Ronnie Burt\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:47;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:11:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:1:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:66:\"HeroPress: ‘Support Inclusion in Tech’ Grant Program Expansion\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:29:\"https://heropress.com/?p=7742\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:165:\"https://heropress.com/support-inclusion-in-tech-grant-program-expansion/#utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=support-inclusion-in-tech-grant-program-expansion\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:2501:\"<img width=\"1024\" height=\"501\" src=\"https://heropress.com/wp-content/uploads/3025/01/includsion_in_tech_banner2-1024x501.jpg\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"Support Inclusion In Tech Grant Program Banner\" /><p><a href=\"https://supportinclusionintech.com/\">SiNC (Support Inclusion In Tech)</a> in 2024 launched a grant program, supporting those who have contributed to the WordPress project.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>From the Open Collective:</p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>The grant program remains open to all WordPress contributors who have demonstrated significant contributions to the community through their involvement in local meetups, WordCamps, or code contributions. WordPress contributors can opt into a named directory starting in January 2025, and selections will be made in March 2025. Names will be entered into a random name picker for selection.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://opencollective.com/support-inclusion-in-tech/updates/sinc-expands-grant-program-to-empower-wordpress-contributors-across-north-and-south-america\">https://opencollective.com/support-inclusion-in-tech/updates/sinc-expands-grant-program-to-empower-wordpress-contributors-across-north-and-south-america</a></p>\n</blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>At the time of its announcement the grants were only available in Europe, Asia, and Africa.</p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://supportinclusionintech.com/\">SiNC</a> is now pleased to announce that this grant program is also available in North and South America!  If you&#8217;d like to apply for a grant, <a href=\"https://www.jotform.com/243518481147055\">fill out this form</a>.</p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"kt-adv-heading7742_b006f6-13 wp-block-kadence-advancedheading\">More Information</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://supportinclusionintech.com/sinc-expands-grant-program-to-empower-wordpress-contributors-across-north-and-south-america/\">Official Press Release</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://opencollective.com/support-inclusion-in-tech/updates/sinc-expands-grant-program-to-empower-wordpress-contributors-across-north-and-south-america\">Open Collective Announcement</a></p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://wptavern.com/support-inclusion-in-tech-expands-grant-program-to-north-and-south-america\">WPTavern Article</a></p>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https://heropress.com/support-inclusion-in-tech-grant-program-expansion/\">‘Support Inclusion in Tech’ Grant Program Expansion</a> appeared first on <a href=\"https://heropress.com\">HeroPress</a>.</p>\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:7:\"pubDate\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:31:\"Sat, 25 Jan 2025 21:32:03 +0000\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}}}}i:48;a:6:{s:4:\"data\";s:13:\"\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n	\n\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";s:5:\"child\";a:2:{s:0:\"\";a:5:{s:5:\"title\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:102:\"Gutenberg Times: Cursor AI, Block Themes, Fediverse, WordCamp Asia and more —   Weekend Edition #317\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"guid\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:35:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/?p=37397\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:4:\"link\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:103:\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/cursor-ai-block-themes-fediverse-wordcamp-asia-and-more-weekend-edition-317/\";s:7:\"attribs\";a:0:{}s:8:\"xml_base\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"xml_base_explicit\";b:0;s:8:\"xml_lang\";s:0:\"\";}}s:11:\"description\";a:1:{i:0;a:5:{s:4:\"data\";s:19573:\"<p>Hi there, </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Did you start well into the new year? The first month is almost over. Working from home, I am really looking forward to seeing my WordPress friends at <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/\">WordCamp Asia</a> in Manila. The team facilitates meeting contributors in one-on-one sessions and to ask questions: It&#8217;s called the <a href=\"https://asia.wordcamp.org/2025/human-library-books/\">Human Library and contributors are call Books</a>. My shift is from 10:30 to noon on Contributor Day. You can also meet Ryan Welcher, Nick Diego, Milana Cap, Hari Shanker to mention just a few.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>If FOMO (fear of missing out) is real for you, rest assured you can always ping me for a chat, email pauli@gutenbergtimes.com, or message me on Slack or <a href=\"https://bsky.app/messages\">Bluesky</a>. I would be delighted! </p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this week&#8217;s edition, you&#8217;ll find quite a few tutorials,  plugins, and podcast episodes and nowadays also AI. I hope you&#8217;ll enjoy ready and listening to it all as I did. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Have a fantastic weekend! </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Yours, 💕<br /><em>Birgit</em></p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<p><strong>Table of Contents</strong></p>\n\n\n\n<ol><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/cursor-ai-block-themes-fediverse-wordcamp-asia-and-more-weekend-edition-317/#0-word-press-release-information\">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/cursor-ai-block-themes-fediverse-wordcamp-asia-and-more-weekend-edition-317/#0-p\">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/cursor-ai-block-themes-fediverse-wordcamp-asia-and-more-weekend-edition-317/#2-word-press-6-0-1-and-6-1-scheduled\">Theme Development for Full Site Editing and Blocks</a></li><li><a class=\"wp-block-table-of-contents__entry\" href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/cursor-ai-block-themes-fediverse-wordcamp-asia-and-more-weekend-edition-317/#3-building-themes-for-fse-and-word-press\">Building Blocks and Tools for the Block editor. </a></li></ol>\n</div></div>\n\n\n<div width=\"100%\" class=\"wp-block-newsletterglue-showhide ng-block\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p>Hey friends! 🌴✨ Get ready for an epic adventure at&nbsp;<strong>WordCamp Asia 2025</strong>&nbsp;in vibrant Manila! </p>\n\n\n\n<p>I&#8217;ll be diving deep into the WordPress universe &#8211; hanging out at Contributor Day (February 20th) and rocking both conference days (February 21-22nd).Want to connect? I&#8217;m totally open to grabbing&nbsp;<strong>coffee, lunch, or catching up</strong>&nbsp;between sessions at the Philippine International Convention Center. </p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://bit.ly/bph-wcasia\">Check out my public calendar</a> and snag a slot &#8211; let&#8217;s turn this tech gathering into an unforgettable networking experience! Can&#8217;t wait to swap stories, share insights, and soak up the incredible WordPress community energy in the Philippines. Who&#8217;s in? 🚀🇵🇭 #WordCampAsia2025</p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"433\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/proud-banner-speaker-2-smaller.png?resize=652%2C433&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37428\" />\n</div></div>\n</div>\n\n\n<p>As mentioned last week, <em>DoTheWoo</em> and <em>Gutenberg Times</em> were founded around the same time. <strong>Bob Dunn aka BobWP</strong> and I chatted about our starts in our 7th anniversary episode: <a href=\"https://dothewoo.io/reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo-with-birgit-and-bobwp/\">The Evolution of WordPress Content: Insights on Gutenberg, Podcasting, and Community Growth</a>. Bob is the astounding supporter of the WordPress community and raises diverse voices with his network of 12 podcast and hosts. You will always find something or someone interesting to listen to or about.</p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://dothewoo.io/reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo-with-birgit-and-bobwp/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"367\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Do-the-Woo-Podcast-On-WPCommunity-Epiosde-600-edited.jpg?resize=652%2C367&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37480\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"0-word-press-release-information\">Developing Gutenberg and WordPress</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Aaron Jorbin</strong> announced <a href=\"https://make.wordpress.org/core/2025/01/22/wordpress-6-7-2-release-planning/\">WordPress 6.7.2 Release Planning</a> with RC 1 on February 4 and final release on February 11, 2025. </p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group has-light-background-background-color has-background\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p>🎙️ Latest episode: <a href=\"https://gutenbergtimes.com/podcast/gutenberg-changelog-114-reflections-on-gutenberg-times-and-do-the-woo/\">Gutenberg Changelog #114 – Reflections on Gutenberg Times and Do the Woo</a> with Bob Dunn aka BobWP as host and guest Birgit Pauli-Haack, each publication started 7 years ago. </p>\n\n\n\n<img width=\"652\" height=\"328\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/Gutenberg-Changelog-114-Bob-Dunn-Birgit-pauli-Haack-edited.png?resize=652%2C328&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37614\" />\n</div></div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"0-p\">Plugins, Themes, and Tools for #nocode site builders and owners</h2>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://x.com/Copons\"><strong>Jacopo &#8220;Copons&#8221; Tomasone</strong></a> wanted you to know about <a href=\"https://wordpress.com/blog/2025/01/22/interface-update/\"><strong>an Update to WordPress.com’s Interface</strong></a>: &#8220;The updated interface is the latest release in a larger project to bring the experience on WordPress.com much closer to a “core” WordPress experience.” Tomasone wrote and continued &#8220;This is just the beginning of a gradual process that will continue over the next few months as we continue to create a more unified and familiar experience across our products.&#8221;</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Brian Coords</strong> published a new episode of the <em>Webmasters</em> podcast.  He chatted with <strong><a href=\"https://x.com/iansvo\">Ian Svoboda</a> </strong>of Generate Blocks, how the plugin<a href=\"https://webmasters.fm/how-generateblocks-adds-modern-design-tools-to-gutenberg/\"><strong> adds modern design tools to Gutenberg</strong></a>. They also discussed all about building on top of the block editor and crafting tools that supercharge your site-building workflow. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p>In <a href=\"https://wordpress.com/blog/2025/01/16/fediverse-reactions-block/\"><strong>Improving Fediverse Engagement With the Reactions&nbsp;Block</strong></a>, <a href=\"https://x.com/mattwiebe\"><strong>Matt Wiebe</strong></a>  introduced&nbsp;Likes,&nbsp;Reposts, and the&nbsp;Fediverse Reactions block, and expanding the ActivityPub plugin. With the Reactions Block, likes and reposts from Mastodon and other Fediverse platforms are automatically added to the end of your posts (if you’re using the Site Editor).</p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Jeremy Holcombe</strong> discussed <a href=\"https://kinsta.com/blog/wordpress-dark-mode/\"><strong>WordPress dark mode: key benefits and how to set it up</strong></a> on the Kinsta blog. You’ll discover the advantages of dark mode, such as better accessibility, a healthier visitor experience, lower energy use, and meeting user preferences. He also shows you different ways to add dark mode to WordPress with plugins or custom code. </p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator has-alpha-channel-opacity is-style-wide\" />\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https://x.com/aliaghdam\"><strong>Ali Aghdam</strong></a> from Istanbul, Turkey, and his team soft-launched <strong><a href=\"https://wordpress.org/plugins/blockera/\">Blockera</a></strong> &#8211; a plugin to add supposedly missing features to the Block editor for designers. The current version feels like a beta of the Pro-version. You&#8217;ll find a lot of &#8220;coming soon&#8221; or &#8220;upgrade now&#8221; prompts around the interface. It gives you a good indication where the various features will be placed. </p>\n\n\n\n<p>I test the additional text features, and they seem to be solid, adding enhanced text shadow and orientation capabilities. An already <a href=\"https://community.blockera.ai/\">active community</a> and the process of building public, allows for a fairly fast update cycle. It&#8217;ll be interesting to see how this compares to other tools, once the free and pro versions are more progressed. With 195 blocks, it&#8217;s definitely not for the faint of heart. You can join the waitlists for the pro version as well as for the Blockera One block theme on <a href=\"https://blockera.ai/\">blockera.ai.</a> The <a href=\"https://wordpress.org/plugins/blockera/\">plugin is available</a> in the WordPress repository. </p>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://wordpress.org/plugins/blockera/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"318\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Screenshot-2025-01-24-at-11.36.23.png?resize=652%2C318&ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-37462\" /></a>\n\n\n\n<p>WooCommerce 9.6 was released and <strong>Stephanie Pi</strong> highlight in the release announcement <a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/20/woocommerce-9-6-fresh-new-tools-and-modernizing-classics/\"><strong>WooCommerce 9.6: Fresh new tools and modernizing classics</strong></a>, she highlights: </p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/20/woocommerce-9-6-fresh-new-tools-and-modernizing-classics/#h-brands-has-landed\">Brands has landed</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/20/woocommerce-9-6-fresh-new-tools-and-modernizing-classics/#h-smarter-defaults-for-measuring-unit\">Smarter defaults for measuring unit</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/20/woocommerce-9-6-fresh-new-tools-and-modernizing-classics/#h-product-summary-block-enhanced\">Product Summary block, enhanced</a></li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/20/woocommerce-9-6-fresh-new-tools-and-modernizing-classics/#h-more-new-features-and-updates\">More new features and updates</a></li>\n</ul>\n\n\n\n<a href=\"https://developer.woocommerce.com/2025/01/20/woocommerce-9-6-fresh-new-tools-and-modernizing-classics/\"><img width=\"652\" height=\"501\" src=\"https://i0.wp.com/gutenbergtimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Sc