The Future of the WordPress Community

A couple of weeks ago I was at WordCamp Lisboa and ended the day with my talk called, “20 Years of WordPress Community“. Of course in the 30 minutes or so that I had, I could only say so much about two decades of the community alone.

At the end of my talk I closed it out by giving my perspective of the future of the WordPress community. Now this year, even more so with the 20 year anniversary there have been a few posts and other things out there with various community members and their perspective of the future. Of course a lot of this was bigger than just the community. It was about the entire open source project. Jonathan Wold, a host here at Do the Woo wrote a post. Co-founders Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little got together and that was part of their chat. Or Oneal Rosero will be speaking at a WordCamp in July about the”Children and the Future of #WordPress.”  I’m sure there are others I am forgetting and will add them here if I come across them or someone calls me out for forgetting their post, bless their little hearts.

Now in the past, over the years, I have been asked numerous times in podcasts and other interviews what I predicted for the future of WordPress, and yes, WooCommerce. It’s always been a hard one to answer. There are visionaries that can perceive through logic what we are likely to see. Maybe there are others who use tea leaves. I don’t know. But I have always tended to avoid that question as, to be honest, I just didn’t freaking know.

So when it comes to the future of the community, respectfully I would feel the same way. Others have talked about the next generation of WordPressers and that is where the future lies. That of course is the obvious answer and plays a huge part in it. But often that next generation doesn’t come by WordPress simply through osmosis. There has to be awareness, education, poking and prodding and sometimes even a convincing argument. Which brings me to what I spoke about two weeks ago.

You may be surprised what the future of the WordPress community looks like

When you are in a room, look into the mirror. When you are at a meetup, turn to the person next to you. If you are at a WordCamp, put your attention on the speaker at a session, someone contributing next to you, or a conversation you are having. In other words, you and everyone involved with the WordPress community, no matter who you are, how well you are known or what you do with WordPress. We are all the future. It’s that simple, although it’s really not. Because we have to work at it to make sure the future of this community stays viable, alive and true to open source.

• The person that answers a question in the forums on WordPress.org is part of the future.
• The individual who stands up to make sure that the community is diverse and inclusive is the future.
• The developer who sits and hammers aways at code to build that next website or product, is the future.
• The parent who sits down with their kid and shows them what they do for a living with WordPress is the future.
• The designer who elevates their voice at the next WordPress event or on a podcast, is the future.
• The senior citizen who discovers WordPress for the first time and publishes their first post is the future.
• All the thousands and million voices and minds that are part of this open source community is the future.

See where I’m going with this?

I’m optimistic about the future of the WordPress community

When I was at WordCamp Lisboa, I had the opportunity to meet and become friends with Raffaella Isidori. We were having this great conversation at the after-party. Talked about cats and yes, WordPress. When I told her I hadn’t spoke at a WordCamp for sometime, she reminded me that those of us who are a generation filled with experience must continue to speak at WordCamps. It’s a must.

Then on the flip side I see two teenage speakers at WordCamp Europe coming up. One is talking about their generations perspective on WordPress and the other on a generational social proof of shoppers. The point is it’s in the works and the fact they are speaking, well, speaks loudly about that part of the future. Obviously whether you are in my generation or their generation, we all need to listen to each other and learn.

Think about it.

There are a lot of things to ponder as we move forward. There is the direction of open source. The tackling of challenges to make tech easier rather than more complex. And the community itself as it learns to find ways to make it more diverse and inclusive. These are not things to take lightly. What we sometimes have is a mix of what people like to call WordPress drama and then there are things we just need to make sure that we continue to have healthy conversations to, well, make things better. Sometimes these get muddied up and are labeled wrong. That is both human nature and sometimes a matter of perspective.

Well, I could actually continue this conversation for much longer, but I think you get the point. Myself, I am optimistic about the future of this community. In fact I’m just an optimistic type of person. I see a lot more positive than others might see. I hear it in voices that are on this podcast, in conversation both online and in-person. We have work to do yes. And no community is perfect. But hey, that is life.