WP Mainline Episode 13 – Surviving the Acquiregeddon

Speaker 1 00:00:19 Welcome everybody to episode 13 of the WP mainline podcast for Friday, September 24th, 2021. I’m your host. Jeff chiller joined us by Malcolm Peralta, sir. How you doing?
Speaker 2 00:00:30 I’m doing well and yourself.
Speaker 1 00:00:32 Uh, you know, today’s better than Monday. I had a, I had a pretty tough week, you know, people, you know, and I, you know, I had a tough week when there was no post on Monday. There was no post on the BP line lineup Tuesday and it was, and then people start wondering what what’s going on with this guy. Well, it’s not like for lack of trying, it’s just, I know that I know it’s my job. It’s place of employment. I gotta get, if I’m going to turn WP mainline into a destination, I gotta write stuff. I gotta have things for people to see and read, but sometimes, you know, the, the mental health and some of the anxiety is debilitating to the point, right? Can’t I can’t do what I want to do. And, uh, it’s very frustrating, but I’m happy to report that, uh, ended up talking to my doctor this week.
Speaker 1 00:01:11 I got some, some new meds. In fact, uh, I learned that for the anxiety, for the attacks, I take a federally regulated drug and apparently she’s not supposed to be giving those out anymore. So she’s going to give me 15 to get me by, but now I have to start seeing a behavioral therapist, which is kind of like a psychologist or something. And if I’m going to get a renewed prescription of those pills that I take during the anxiety attacks, I have to get them to that person. And then I have to go see the doctor in person. So it’s like, it’s like, okay, I guess they just want to double check and make sure I’m not, you know, on the street selling drugs that I need to get by. I don’t know, but I guess I’m going to have to make a call and talk to a behavioral therapist, which probably probably isn’t going to be a bad thing in the long run. We’ll see.
Speaker 2 00:01:59 Yeah. I mean, my, my wife is currently, um, finishing her undergrad in psychology and I’m sure she would jump at the chance to tell you yes, very good thing to have. Um, and uh, someone who deals with depression and anxiety myself. Um, yes, it’s a very good thing to have. So yeah, the one, two punch of medication and a mental health support is the best way forward for a lot of people.
Speaker 1 00:02:22 Absolutely. So without further ado, you, uh, let’s talk about acquire getting jeez, which is what I’ve seen. What’s been going on in the WordPress space being referred to it’s clear again, and that’s, let’s start off with, um, liquid web with their stellar WP brand of WordPress products. Liquid web is actually acquired learn dash. And if you don’t know what LearnDash is over the years, it’s become like the go-to a WordPress plugin. It’s a learning management system for WordPress that actually can tie into a WooCommerce other e-commerce products. You can create a content like quizzes or dynamic content. It’s a subscription-based plugin. So you can create like these classes or how tos or whatnot. And it’s all these things are built in. And I have never used it personally, but I’ve heard that it’s like, that’s what you go to. If you want to create classes or create opportunities to learn and then tie it into a subscription type service.
Speaker 1 00:03:21 Well, you use LearnDash, that’s what it is. So, uh, to ask would be joining the whole LearnDash and the team involved will be joining the stellar WP brand under liquid web. And what stellar WP is. It’s actually, it’s like a super team to, to be honest, if you look at, and this is something I want to talk about, it kind of ties into the acquisition that took place with e-commerce, which we’ll get into in our next story. But if you read the acquisition notes from a stellar WP, they actually describe what it is they’re doing. And I don’t think a lot of people have taken note of this, uh, this particular way of acquisitions. Because when I think of an acquisition of what we’ve covered before, it’s usually company buys company B that founder has a transition period in the founder disappears, and the product gets absorbed into something, whatever else, but what stellar WP is doing.
Speaker 1 00:04:15 And they’ve done this with, let’s see, I themes restrict content pro the events, calendar, cadence, WP, give WP and iconic WP. All of those companies that they have acquired, they’ve acquired intact, they’ve left intact. They have not bothered him. Uh, so they have allowed the teams to retain autonomy. And now what they’re doing is they all learn and gain from each other. It’s a super team of people. And what these acquisitions are doing for these companies is providing them with a unbelievable amount of resources, knowledge, and, um, uh, uh, a great platform to continue on, to evolve. And, uh, I think, I think that’s a key thing that’s missing in some of these discussions about all of these acquisitions that are taking place, that this is and WooCommerce, and our next story, they’ve done the same thing. They’ve acquired, uh, some extension developers and they’ve kind of Aqua hired and they’ve absorbed them into automatic, but they’ve managed to keep the team for those, uh, products.
Speaker 1 00:05:14 In fact, it’s somewhere warm. If you’re familiar with that somewhere warm, um, they’ve been doing, uh, uh, product bundles, composite products, gift cards. They’ve been, they’ve been some of the most popular extension developers for WooCommerce since 2011, they’ve been around for 10 years. So what they’ve done is they’ve will commerce has added them into the team. And the team is going to remain as is the products will remain as is, uh, things are not going to be sunsetted. Uh, they’re just, you know, it’s just commerce saying, we love what you’re doing. Uh, how would you like to have an awesome amount of people helping you out, you know, backed by a company. You don’t have to worry about that. How would you like all these other resources to continue what it is you’re doing? You’re obviously doing something right now, because look at the success you had in some.
Speaker 1 00:05:58 Now the team is going to be part of automatic and the WooCommerce team. So with all that said, you know, I, I pretty interesting to see these types of acquisitions take place. And as a, as a customer, I would very much rather see these types of acquisitions take place where the team is in place. And the autonomy is there instead of, uh, products being absorbed into something else. And now you have no idea what the vision for the product is. Who’s going to be maintaining it. Is it going to be sunset that I’d rather have this happen to me than the alternative? If I was in,
Speaker 2 00:06:32 It feels a little bit like you drank the Kool-Aid before we jumped on the episode. I mean, I remember us having a discussion not too long ago, where you were like, all these acquisitions are brutal. They’re horrible. Why are we letting these things happen? Why are they happening
Speaker 1 00:06:44 Before I read about these types of acquisitions?
Speaker 2 00:06:47 But I mean, you say that these types of acquisitions, but when I look at it, I see, okay, now learn dash is going to have a different general manager now will commerce automatic.
Speaker 1 00:06:58 That’s something we didn’t, that’s something I actually didn’t mention the general manager.
Speaker 2 00:07:02 Yeah. So Chris lemma, who is an amazing authority and kind of like WordPress, um, marketing, branding, um, and speaks very well of it, uh, is going to be running the, the learn dash product. He’s going to be kind of determining the direction that it goes in. Um, I would be remissed to point out like lifter LMS is another great LMS system for WordPress.
Speaker 2 00:07:27 And, uh, again, the founders they’re like, oh, the nice thing about WordPress is the community of interaction, right? Like the founders chat with each other and they all talk to each other and they’re all kind of pumping each other up. So, um, it’s great to see that they’re all excited for each other, but, um, I don’t know, Chris is, he’s, he’s kind of a competitive guy, right? So like, he’s not gonna ignore any of the advantages that other LMS systems have. Uh, and now with this additional capital, so to speak, to kind of progress this LearnDash project forward, I’ll be very interested to see what happens there in terms of its direction over the, over the long haul, um, liquid web, wouldn’t be acquiring these people, acquiring these projects. If there wasn’t a profit motivation there. Um, so, you know, you kind of have to wonder what that means in terms of how things move forward and, and just to kind of give it a bit more of a critical eye, right? Like if these things were doing fine on their own, they wouldn’t need these acquisitions potentially. Um, they wouldn’t need new leadership. They wouldn’t need new resources. So like what don’t we know, so to speak, right? Like if we could peek behind the curtain, what would we really see?
Speaker 1 00:08:34 I think what you would see as a founder saying, well, we want to go further. We want to, we want to raise the bar. We want to go to the next level, but we can’t do it without investment capital or maybe going that way, or we’re doing this and doing that. So why not get acquired?
Speaker 2 00:08:49 I’ve worked for multiple VC backed companies. You know, what always ends up happening with acquisitions and VC companies, the profit motivation becomes the key motivation and it, it drives the product or service forward. And, you know, most of my experience has been when your key focus is profit, the project dies or the product dies. So I hope that’s not the case with either of these, but I mean, I always, whenever there’s an acquisition, I always kind of nervous because you never know.
Speaker 1 00:09:19 I mean, who, who wouldn’t, I mean, it just means a change, you know, something that you’ve been okay, so you want to, you want to be nervous. You want to talk about acquisitions. I get nervous. How about Pippin? Retiring Pippin, Williamson retiring from WordPress, you know, then his partners created Sandhills development, LLC, which is the parent company of plugin, such as affiliate, WP, easy, digital downloads, sugar calendar, WP, simple pay, and the payouts service. All of these things under sand Hills development will be joining the awesome motive collection of WordPress products and services. Awesome. Motive of course, founded by a said bulky. Whew, you may know of WP forms, a WP beginner. That com is probably the big one. Anytime you Google a question on Google question about WordPress, usually a post from WP beginner shows up, he’s got that market cornered, but yeah, this, this is, um, I would say this type of announcement, this type of acquisition is a bit of a watershed moment just because of the people and who’s involved and Pippin Williams. He’s been doing this for like 10 years now. At least
Speaker 2 00:10:28 More probably. Yeah, for sure. And to have someone like that, you know, honestly in his personal posts, he was basically like, you know, wiping his hands, going. I’m done guys, I’m going to focus on beer, see ya, you know, and it’s great that he took care of his team and made sure that like the business can go on without him. And he was very clear in that, you know, a lot of what’s been happening, um, with his company. He’s been kind of letting happen without direct involvement from him to kind of have that proof, so to speak that this can, this can run and move and do things without his interaction.
Speaker 1 00:11:00 I mean, he actually built the company in a way to sell it and
Speaker 2 00:11:03 Yeah. Yeah. And so he’s
Speaker 1 00:11:06 Always, forward-thinking there.
Speaker 2 00:11:08 And there’s been a bit of transparency about that with his like yearly updates about how the company is doing. And, you know, I think we always knew that this could happen. And as his, as his like brewery has kind of gotten going and the end, you know, the, the capital concern was no longer there to kind of keep that running. I think a lot of people might’ve had little tickers over his head wondering how much longer until he leaves. Um, but I don’t know that any of us really understood what Pippin leaving would mean for all of the great products that have been created over this last like decade plus,
Speaker 1 00:11:42 I mean, think about, okay, so easy digital downloads. What does that do? It allows individuals to sell products. It’s an e-commerce solution pretty much. And then you, you also have lightweight, lightweight e-commerce solution. And then you also have like an add on, you can get for selling software licenses. So what, what does this entail? This means it’s an easy solution for budding theme and plugin developers in the WordPress space to be able to sell their products and sell licenses for support or updates or what have you. And there’s been some controversy that has been brought up by Mr. Carl Hancock on the founder of gravity forms, rocket genius on Twitter. And, uh, I’ll just read his, uh, his tweak as you know, there’s no beating around the Bush about it. I think he says a quote, imagine using an e-commerce system that provides all of your sales data to your competition or potential competition on a silver platter, competitive analysis made easy.
Speaker 1 00:12:42 I hope WordPress plugin theme developers are paying attention. And then I’ll just secretary is that he says, want to hand over your affiliate performance data and top affiliates to a director, potential competitor, depending on how your affiliate software or choice you might be doing it right now, how they may even be handling the payments for you. And I ended up there. So this created quite a conversation on Twitter and I was talking to him about it. And I, I finally got to the point where I understood what you’re saying is that, you know, if you’re, if you’re a plugin or theme developer using easy digital downloads does is awesome motive. Now, a competitor, or do you want to, as a, as a business owner, should you be concerned? Should you take a look in the mirror and say, do I want to continue using these solutions knowing that the founder or not the founder, but the new owner, awesome motive now has the potential to see sales data or information related to your business that may be that you wouldn’t feel comfortable sharing otherwise, regardless.
Speaker 1 00:13:45 And I don’t, I looked at the data that, um, easy digital downloads, uh, uh, takes in it’s basically for usage tracking for customer support and all that other stuff. But I think the crux of the data, like they were mentioned, I think it was the payment gateways. I think Stripe connect, I think might be the one that was brought up where, uh, these people, I shouldn’t say these people, but the company handling, handling that can look into or get access to these payment processing gateways. And that’s where you get the crux of the information about who’s buying what, and that’s how you can analyze trends and see what’s going on with your competition, if that’s what you want to do. And I think, I think it’s a valid concern. I don’t know how big of a concern it is. I think it’s, I think what Carl Hancock brought up is definitely valid and something for conversation. And I also think that with this concern that maybe it would be beneficial for awesome motive to actually come out and make a statement that’s specific to this saying, we understand that our competitors are now using this product or potential competitors, and we want to continue having your business. And this is our pledge not to use this data in a way that affects that relationship.
Speaker 1 00:15:00 You say that like I’m asking for some kind of utopian thing that’s not going to happen.
Speaker 2 00:15:05 Well, I mean, in a way it isn’t
Speaker 1 00:15:08 Chapter so fun. You’re so positive. It’s funny. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:15:11 Yeah. I don’t know what’s up with you today. It’s it is kind of funny to me because, I mean, let’s, let’s, let’s play devil’s advocate here and assume that please do,
Speaker 1 00:15:21 That’s your role.
Speaker 2 00:15:23 Let’s say they’re going to do everything above board, right? They’re not taking this data to, uh, to try to, um, take their development talent and now like ruin a product that’s using like easy digital downloads, um, for their plugin or theme to kind of copy that and take their market share. They can still use that data for gap analysis, uh, and have market information about where there are holes in the WordPress market that don’t currently exist, that they can fill. And,
Speaker 1 00:15:48 And if they do use that data, how are we going to know, how do we know about it? How do we know
Speaker 2 00:15:53 Exactly? And so, I mean, whether or not they say they’re going to do it, whether or not they actually do it, um, we will never truly know for sure. And, uh, I guess at the end of the day, we kind of, it, it doesn’t really matter what they say or do we have to either decide to trust them or not. So if you’re a plugin developer and you’re concerned about this, then find another solution. And if you’re a plugin developer and you don’t care, then just keep doing what you’re doing. I guess that’s really the only advice we can give anyone. Right.
Speaker 1 00:16:24 Yeah. Right. I mean, I, I mean, it just awesome motive. We just so happened to release this plugin that solves this need. And we don’t know about, we didn’t know that there was, this need existed, but I don’t. I mean, I’m just throwing some surprise. None of this has happened. This is all speculation. So, you know, I don’t want, I don’t want to get in trouble there, but it’s just, it’s just something that could happen. And I, I dunno, I was kinda thinking of it. I remember, you know, you, you kind of said that, um, we were talking about payment gateways. Uh, what was it? Uh, uh, Shopify, right? They, they, they have like an API that leaks data. And if you were, if you were really winning some market share market analysis on certain stores or certain websites, you could actually kind of get access to that data through the
Speaker 2 00:17:10 Yeah. And there’s entire like businesses websites, where you can pay to have a tool to filter through that data, to give you like how many stores are selling product X, right. To start to understand kind of the competition that exists, um, an estimate of how many transactions they receive an estimate of how much traffic they receive. And now you can kind of go and, you know, you paid this service to access this data that filters it down in a way that you can actually act on it and you can go and create a store to kind of like either take your piece of that market share or, um, like again, do that gap analysis and figure out like what mistakes they’re making or what kind of keywords they’re not targeting. Um, and so a lot of this already happens in, um, and then, you know, Shopify itself could easily, um, as we’ve seen kind of Amazon do create its own storefront and sell its own products from like print on demand or third-party solutions. Um, and again, think about the amount of data that they have to be able to do that and do it well.
Speaker 1 00:18:07 Well, let’s say we don’t know the terms of the acquisition, but all of that data that EDD has, uh, you know, all of that stuff is now going to be ownership of awesome motive. You know, they paid for that. So what’s, why should we be upset if they actually use that information to improve their business?
Speaker 2 00:18:29 I mean, you and I have no reason to be upset, but
Speaker 1 00:18:31 Oh yeah. Obviously if you’re using EDD or their products and all of a sudden awesome model comes out with a product, that’s just, you know, what you’ve already been offering, but because of the data they have, they know that there’s a huge demand. And instead of going through you, they could just, they could become first person to that market. Uh, yeah. I, I would, I would be living.
Speaker 2 00:18:53 Yeah. And, and I mean, we have to wonder as these acquisitions happen more and more, if that they would either acquire that product or if they would build a competitor. Right. And we don’t know for sure which way anyone will go. Um, I know in some like cost per action spaces or affiliate spaces, um, the brand will kind of come down from on high and say, Hey, we’re going to give you a bunch of money to buy this product or your company, because we know that it’s popular and we know that we could do X, Y, and Zed with it. So I hope that they would use that data for more acquisitions, um, rather than just trying to kind of push people out by using the amazing talent that they now have and already had, um, to build out competitors using again, think about the number of installs that these plugins, uh, in aggregate have and how easy it would be for them to put a little simple advertisement, even just not, not everywhere in WordPress administration bound, but even just in their, like in their settings page, let’s say, um, what that uptake might look like
Speaker 1 00:19:54 Now, I use monster insights, which is a, I think it used to be the Google analytics plugin by Yoast. If I remember correct, I know they acquired a Google analytics plugin, but allows me to look at my stats and Google analytics stuff within a dashboard. And it’s by awesome motive. Uh, and it, I got to tell you, it’s very aggressive in trying to get me to become a paying customer. It gives me these alerts and it gives me these things. It’s always reminded me about what I could be looking at or what I could be doing if I just paid for the pro version of the plugin. I mean, it’s, it’s very aggressive. And I, one of my fears is I hope that type of aggressive cross promotion and marketing does not find its way into the various products that Sandhills development created. Cause I, I think, I think it’s just going to piss a lot of people off if they ended up doing that, I believe that would be the opposite of what you would want to achieve, uh, as a company acquiring those products. I, I think there’s going to be some type of cross promotion in there somewhere, but I really hope it’s nowhere near as aggressive as what I’ve experienced as a, as a user of one of their free plugins.
Speaker 2 00:20:59 Yeah. Another thing that just came to my mind is, um, the staff and like the benefits that they were used to Sandhills, right?
Speaker 1 00:21:09 The four day work week experiment, I’ve talked to a number of employees that loved the four-day work week experiment and who wouldn’t. I talk to people. So they were working Monday through Thursday, 32 hours getting paid for 40 and they didn’t have to, they weren’t doing like 10 hour shifts every day to make up for that lack of eight. It was a straight 32 hours a week. And right across the, across the company, people loved it and now it’s gone. Right?
Speaker 2 00:21:36 Yeah. And then you’ve got to wonder about like, um, bonuses, parental leave, paid time off laptops, seniority, all, all of those things. Um, when you go through an acquisition change and as more and more larger and larger organizations exist in the WordPress space, we’re gonna have to think about these things more and more.
Speaker 1 00:21:54 So let me ask you, if you were an employee of Sandhills development and you got word of this acquisition that took place, uh, and you had two weeks to look over review and sign a contract is two weeks enough time for you, or would it depend on how long you’ve been at the company?
Speaker 2 00:22:11 No, two weeks is probably enough time for me to figure out whether or not I’d want to go forward.
Speaker 1 00:22:16 Um, cause that’s, that’s, that’s what I heard through the grapevine that they, the employees at two weeks to look through the contract and decide whether they want to move over to awesome motive or not.
Speaker 2 00:22:26 Yeah. And I mean, let’s say I picked the, or not. What does that look like? I mean, do I get a payout of a certain amount of money for the amount of time I’ve been there? Like, is there a severance package? Like again, we’re getting more corporate in WordPress than ever before. So these questions are going to start coming up where people are curious about what these exits and what these, these acquire acquisitions look like.
Speaker 1 00:22:48 Now. Uh, I did mention in the post, when I wrote about this acquisition, I’ve spoken to a few Sandhills development employees and I got it. They were reluctant to move over to automotive. They had no idea. They had no inclination that they would ever be working for. SIADH bulky. They loved what Pippin and his four other partners created and develop there at Sandhills development. They love the company they work for. They love the products. Um, but a few of those people have decided to give Saya bulky, a chance, you know, continue on with their jobs. Let’s see what it’s like over there. Let’s experience it firsthand because there’s a lot of it. There’s I talked to a lot of people. There’s a lot of rumors and things that go on around about side bulky and his business practices and his ego and how he conducts business and, and all those things.
Speaker 1 00:23:36 And let me stress again, rumors, I have tried to find online. I’ve tried to search, in fact, in the history of WP Tavern, we have not published any posts, specifically criticizing the ways I had bulky does business. He’s done a lot of philanthropy work over the years. I want to make that clear from, from the people I’ve talked to her who have made the switch. They have told me that the onboarding process from Sandhills to awesome motive has been smooth. They’d been welcomed with open arms. They’ve been treated with kindness, and I’ve also spoken to a few people who already work at awesome motive. And none of them have a bad thing to say about the company. So, Hey, you know, as far as I’m concerned on that front, it looks like this is all a great thing, you know, but, but only time will tell me,
Speaker 2 00:24:19 Well, wouldn’t it be nice to get him in the hot seat? I mean, if he’s listening, he’s got to reach out to you on Twitter or something, man. And come on the show and, and talk through, I would love to know his reasoning, like what he saw in doing this acquisition, um, how involved he was in that process, uh, what he thinks about, you know, these products that he’s going to be taking over, how he’s going to integrate these teams. Like there’s a whole cultural side here that you and I keep touching on. And I would just love to hear it from the horse’s mouth on, on how they’re going to make this work and function and be positive.
Speaker 1 00:24:51 Th the nitty gritty, how do we make everything smooth, transition and benefit? Not only employees, but the users as well.
Speaker 2 00:24:57 Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 1 00:24:58 All right. So there’s a, and by the way, kudos to, I, I kind of admire Pippin for the way. I mean, he talks about once the last time you write an acquisition in the WordPress space where the owner says, one of the reasons I sold it to spend more quality time with my family. That was one of the reasons why Pippin Williamson decided that this was the time to sell. In addition to just losing his passion for the web, he lost his passion to create software products. And he basically said, my time is spending late nights in front of the screen are done. No, I don’t want to do that anymore. Uh, so if we can all be so
Speaker 2 00:25:33 Lucky, right, someday,
Speaker 1 00:25:35 Uh, yes. Yeah. So, but, but his father recently had a heart attack and it was that heart attack that kind of gave him a reality check that, that pay, you know, um, life is precious and he’s getting older and his, his dad’s getting to the point of, you know, uh, uh, SUNY in the chair while they cut firewood and he can’t really participate. And he wants to spend quality time with, with this family and doing the things that he enjoys doing. And one of those includes brewing beer. And man, if he could ever nationally distribute that thin mint style, it was such a great beer. I swear it was him that brought a few bottles too. I think it was word camp St. Louis, that might’ve been the place. Oh man, that beer was good, but so he’s going to be working on Sandhills brewing.
Speaker 1 00:26:19 He’s going to be doing whatever he wants to do. And, uh, he also mentions in his posts that I learned that they tried to turn Pippin into like a silent partner. So Hey, okay. We understand you don’t have a passion for the business and what you’re working on, but instead of selling the company, why not become a silent partner. So you step out of the role that other people step in, take care of the company, you know, switched from personnel around some titles around him and do it that way. But I think Pippin Bimini actually said, no, I can’t do that because once I’m in, I’m in a hundred percent and I can’t just stand by and, and get involved. And plus, you know, there’s that lack of passion. So that, that played a role as well, told as to know, sign up partners and just transitioning everything to a new owner, into a new company, just, just sever all ties so he can move about his life.
Speaker 2 00:27:09 Yeah. And I think it’s, it’s probably the best for mental health, right? You don’t need that extra weight, um, to kind of keep you chained to this whole system and set up. So I think, I think he made the best choice possible. Um, I think that, you know, it’s not like it is. I mean, thankfully it’s not another web host that he sold to. I mean, that would give him some kudos for that. Right. So I think, I think this is going to be, it’s interesting, it’s complicated, it’s complex, but it also is kind of exciting and kind of, um, fun to see how these things play out. And so I’m, I’m super stoked and I, I can’t wait to see how it goes and how it develops over time. And I wish them all the best.
Speaker 1 00:27:54 So easy digital downloads acquired, you know, I never, and I think it was because of the name and I never really, it doesn’t pop out at me immediately as an E WordPress e-commerce solution. And I think it’s just because it’s it’s play, but we still have, I think you still have WP e-commerce that’s out there. That’s independent. Is the shop plugin select, I think shot might still be out there shop with two PS that might still exist out there. Uh, and then of course, you’ve got WooCommerce. That’s the big dog you’ve got Shopify that doesn’t count. That’s a service has nothing to do with really kind of WordPress, but those are the big dogs and making the commerce space.
Speaker 2 00:28:30 And then you also have like big commerce, big commerce,
Speaker 1 00:28:33 Exactly. Magento. That’s still out there. That’s still, they’re still doing everything big commerce, uh, spoken to tofa Daraja to him about that. And they’re making big inroads into the WordPress space with big commerce. So definitely keep an eye on them if you’re looking at different, uh, a different solution or, uh, uh, an alternative to maybe easy digital downloads or one of these other e-commerce plugins. But man, I, you know, when I, when I wrote that tweet about family run businesses that would be passed on that would run for so long in the WordPress space that you could pass them on. And I thought, I thought Pippin was up there. You know, as a, as a, you could pass it onto a little Pippin or something. I don’t know, you know, easy digital downloads, 20, 30 years from now, but, um, Hey, kudos to him, man, for, for being able to put himself in a position to build something that allows him to spend quality time with his family.
Speaker 1 00:29:25 I th I think that, I think that there’s so many people would, would want and would want to do, um, I’ve I I’m still available. I can be echo hired or acquired a lot of money. I would love to spend more time with smokey and my wife. I think they would appreciate that. But, uh, but yeah, I mean, it’s kind of a watershed moment end of an era. And I’m in a Pippin was always the kind of guy that put people first before like software and before the things, people were, was always a priority dam. And, and I really enjoyed his year and review posts. I’m glad to see that he’s going to continue doing that. As he mentioned, this year’s re your review review post is probably gonna be a little different based on, you know, things that have happened, but he he’s, uh, he always seemed like the kind of Tyner, but kind of guy kind of person that I would enjoy working for. Now. I say that and also realize that, well, your interactions with someone in the WordPress community is a whole lot different than them being your boss and working for them. You know? So who knows what my, what, my perspective, how it would have changed if, if I became an employee under Pippin, but from the outside looking in, he sure he sure was. And definitely looked like a standup guy.
Speaker 1 00:30:39 So, I mean, that’s, I’m sad to see him go, but, um, I’m glad to see why he went and, and hopefully he can get his brew, his, uh, his beer nationally distributed. Cause I, I wouldn’t mind, you know, like I said, then minced out God, but that’s the stuff was so good. I remember it all these years later. So with that, that was the big news of the week and oh, uh, let’s see, what else? Uh, we’re camp, U S if you haven’t gotten your tickets are still available, it’s online, it’s free, it’s a virtual event. All of the recordings have been pre recorded. Are you going to watch, I’m going to try and watch a few. Um, but if the past is anything to go by, I’ll either forget about it during the day, or I won’t watch anything or I won’t participate, which is, seems like it’s criminal based on who I am and what I do for a living and, and all that stuff.
Speaker 1 00:31:35 But I just, like I said, it’s a virtual event. I just, I have such a hard time concentrating on 30 to 40 minute presentation. I mean, it’s like being in the meeting. I just, I don’t want to be there. I’m off somewhere else, mentally. And I, and I’m, and I’m, I could put all these different things in different tabs on different screens. And next thing, you know, they’re 10 minutes went by in the video and I have no idea what was said. So yeah, I don’t know. I’ll probably be there. I’ll see what I, when I’m interested in seeing is the, uh, I think they’re going to have like a hallway chat. That’s going out while these quarter sessions are taking place. I might hang out there, talk to some people, see what’s going on. Um, but for folks who, if you look at the word camp us schedule, you may notice that at the end of the event, there’s no state of the word you might. Yeah. Oh, no. Cue that sound. In fact, it’s been replaced with a, uh, a session by Joseph has caught a chat with Josepha who is the, um, kind of the WordPress executive, uh, what’s what’s executive
Speaker 2 00:32:40 Director of the WordPress project.
Speaker 1 00:32:41 Yeah, there you go. There you go. Um, my apologies for not knowing that offhand, it’s a, it’s a nice title. Um, but you’re going to, it’s a chat with her and she’s probably going to outline everything that’s going on with WordPress. It’s going to be like a mini state of the word is, is, is my guests. No, I don’t know, but we’ll see. And I’m looking forward to that. And my guess is that maybe later on in the year, because he’s able to do it, it’s probably going to be prerecorded or maybe he’ll do it live that at, at the actual end of the year, you know, he’s not tied to a specific day or time because it’s not going to be tied to an event. Maybe Matt will do something on his own for a state of the word. You know, maybe he’ll have a Christmas head-on, he’ll be by a fire and we can all have a fire, actual fireside chat with Matt about the state of WordPress.
Speaker 1 00:33:29 And yeah, that would be cool. And, uh, I want to give a shout out to the folks over at the WP cooler, uh, that con uh, Jason Tucker and his, uh, his gang of misfits. I say that Joel can lean in that misfits. No, I don’t need anybody getting offended here, but they’ve got a great group of people there who do a WordPress podcasts. Uh, it’s, it’s kind of like a YouTube show, but it’s also an audio based podcast about WordPress. I wanted to say congratulations to Jason and them for their nine years and 400 episodes. That is an incredible amount of dedication and longevity. And I think that longevity is not bought it’s earned and they have certainly earned it. And it’s one of the long, I think it’s, I got to say it’s probably the longest running podcast about WordPress that we have, and they’re going strong. So if you want to check them out, visit WP watercooler.com and let’s see that’s oh, what is this? Ooh. And advertisement.
Speaker 2 00:34:29 It’s funny. So everyone should know that I threw this in the show notes because I wanted to make sure that that Jeff brought it up. That Jeff mentioned it.
Speaker 1 00:34:37 No, why don’t you mention it? Oh, perfect.
Speaker 2 00:34:39 I can do that. That’s not a problem at all. So join me and other people and support WP main line, if you want the show to keep going. And if you want Jeff to be able to keep publishing content and you want to raise his mood and make him a happy camper, let’s go ahead and, and, uh, support him through, uh, the rail fan option $49 for an entire year, 12 months of Jeff.
Speaker 1 00:35:01 I love it. Okay. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:35:03 So go over to WP main line and subscribe today, please.
Speaker 1 00:35:06 Wow. Thank you. Thank you for you. That was great. I very much appreciate it. Appreciate that, Mr. Malcolm, uh, and let’s see, that’s going to wrap it up for this week’s edition of acquire getting in the WordPress space. Uh, it’s not that bad. It’s things are happening. Things are shaking. So we’ll S we’ll be back here next week to let you know, and anybody else who’s gotten purchased or decided to just ride off into the sunset. Um, man, that sounds so good. You know, get up in my, uh, uh, stagecoach, take the Oregon trail and right off to the west, on my son into a sunset, it sounds like something I could do.
Speaker 1 00:35:45 All right. So that’s going to do it for this edition of the WP mainline podcasts. You can find show notes for this show and every other episode on WP mainline.com. Oh, I almost forgot. Uh, I interviewed the you weren’t here, you know, you and John kind of screwed me over, uh, uh, it wasn’t like that these two were busy. So I actually interviewed, uh, Erin, Erin Edwards and Joseph Joshua daily, uh, the folks who were behind the wahoo NFT project checked it out. It’s episode 12 tomorrow, they’re starting the minting process. So if you want to get in, if you want to have a chance to mint a watt poo tomorrow is the day you have to set up a crypto wallet, which I did and met a mask. There’s other ones out there. Then you have to transfer money into ether room, which is the cryptocurrency used a mint while poos and Joshua daily was so awesome.
Speaker 1 00:36:41 He created a, he designed a WP mainline Lapu poo. That’s going to be a special edition, and that’s going to be part of the 2,222, otherwise who’s that you can mint. And so it’s just so odd. The design is cool, the way he designed it is really cool for me. And so if you meant a lot poo tomorrow, there’s a chance that you can mint a special edition WP mainline while pool. It starts tomorrow. So you have to go to, uh, or you find I’ll have a link to it in the show notes. It’s better that way, but, uh, I’m very excited about this and, and thank you so much to the, to the guys over there. That’s, that’s part of this experiment for allowing WP mainline to participate in this way. It’s just an awesome why pu uh, okay. Now show notes for every other episode, Assan WP mainline.com, uh, and where you can follow me on Twitter at Jeff J E F F R zero, where it’s just all kinds of shenanigans. You can follow Doobie few mainline on Twitter at WP mainline, uh, and Malcolm,
Speaker 2 00:37:40 You can find me on Twitter at find purpose. And if you’re looking for what I do for my work, I’m at press sign.com and Canberra creative
Speaker 1 00:37:48 Capital T, dang it. And any, any, any major developments, any major things going on with press tightened lately, I’m getting ready to launch any major projects.
Speaker 2 00:38:00 All of this stuff that we’re interested in is not necessarily interesting to the WordPress community. We’re behind the scenes guys. We’re behind the curtain guys, so we’re just keeping things running.
Speaker 1 00:38:10 Alright, awesome. So that’s going to do it for this week. Everybody have a safe, enjoyable weekend. Talk to you again next week. Everybody’s so long