What on God’s green earth is this?
TLDR. This is Mr. Mullenweg recruiting people to work for his company.
But let’s back up a bit to provide some context for those curious to know how we got here.
I don’t care about the context. Please take me to the kindness example.
On 20 September 2024, nine days before the text message in the screencap, Mr. Mullenweg started attacking hosting company WP Engine in public. He said he did that because WP Engine were not contributing enough back to the WordPress project and because WP Engine were abusing WordPress trademarks.
EDITOR’S NOTE. We believe that is not the real reason why Mr. Mullenweg started attacking WP Engine.
On 23 September 2024 WP Engine sent a Cease and Desist letter to Automattic, Mr. Mullenweg’s company, asking them to stop:
Automattic replied with their own Cease and Desist letter the same day:
On 25 September 2024 Mr. Mullenweg blocked all WordPress sites hosted on WP Engine from accessing wordpress.org. One important reason WordPress sites communicate with wordpress.org is to receive alerts for updates in the core WordPres software and in any plugins they use, and, depending on the site’s settings as configured by the site owner, to automatically install the updates. This is not just a convenience. It is also a security feature, as updates are often fixes for security issues.
EDITOR’S NOTE. The reason why Mr. Mullenweg the person was able to do this is that wordpress.org and the infrastructure it hosts belong to him. They are his personal property.
On 27 September 2024 Mr. Mullenweg granted WP Engine a “reprieve” so that they could work on a solution to protect their customers from risks. (We don’t know whether he did this out of magnanimity or because his lawyers managed to get his ear long enough to explain that blocking 1.5 million sites like this was not good.) The reprieve ended on 1 October 2024.
On 29 September 2024 Mr. Mullenweg did a live interview with Theo t.3.gg. In it he invited WP Engine to “please sue me”:
Please sue me, make a lawsuit. They haven’t; so do that.
Transcript of interview with Theo t.3.gg
On 1 October 2024 Automattic published some terms they had offered WP Engine on 20 September 2024. In short, Automattic wanted 8% of WP Engine’s gross revenue for a period of 7 years. The Automattic post also included this ominous sentence: “Given WP Engine’s behavior, deception, and incompetence since September 20th these terms are no longer sufficient.”
The no longer sufficient terms
On 2 October 2024 WP Engine filed a legal complaint against Automattic and Matthew Charles Mullenweg. The complaint is for:
(1) Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations;
(2) Intentional Interference with Prospective Economic Relations;
(3) Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, 18 U.S.C. § 1030 et seq.;
(4) Attempted Extortion;
(5) Unfair Competition, Cal. Bus. Prof. Code § 17200, et seq.;
(6) Promissory Estoppel;
(7) Declaratory Judgment of Non-Infringement;
(8) Declaratory Judgment of Non-Dilution;
(9) Libel;
(10) Trade Libel; and
(11) Slander.
The complaint has been since amended and expanded to include 20 claims.
The complaint included things we knew about, and a few titbits we didn’t. These were mainly screencaps of what WP Engine says were written messages by Mr. Mullenweg.
One of those messages was sent to Heather Brunner, the CEO of WP Engine. It was sent on 29 September 2024.
We have extracted the text from the screencap, to make it easier to read:
EDITOR’S NOTE. PT is Pacific Time, the time zone in the west coast of the United States (where Mr. Mullenweg lives). Greg Mondre (without the s) is the CO-CEO and a managing partner of Silver Lake, the owners of WP Engine. Lee is Lee Wittlinger, managing director of Silver Lake, and also managing director of the board of WP Engine.
Heather, after our extensive discussions about you joining Automattic, the offer you negotiated with me is still on the table.
• You can join Automattic and match all of your compensation economics, as we discussed in January.
• I will extend that matching to anyone from WPE who wants to follow you. (You said you wanted to do right by your team; this addresses it.)Let me know by midnight PT if you decline or accept this offer.
If you decline, on Monday morning, I tell Greg Mondres:
• Lee’s refusal to negotiate terms to resolve our conflict.
• Your interviewing with Automattic over the past year.
• I will possibly tell the press all of the above.
As far as we know, Mr. Mullenweg did not succeed in persuading Heather Brunner to join his company. Heather Brunner is still the CEO of WP Engine.
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