Automattic’s Lawyer Falsely Claims Automattic Doesn’t Control What Code is Labeled WordPress
In a couple of previous posts, we have looked at claims coming from an associate general counsel at Automattic. This person is claiming that there is a never before disclosed non-proft that controls the WordPress website, which runs counter the claim by Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg that he owns it. They also are claiming, in direct contradiction to Matt Mullenweg, that the WordPress trademark was not donated to the WordPress Foundation.
Now he apparently is replying on the Hacker News. The responses are strange and you might reasonably believe that it is an impostor. But the account‘s username is the same as his name and is listed as being created in February 2017.
In one of his responses, he claimed that Automattic does not have control of what code is included in WordPress releases:
The WordPress community operates on an open source, non-commercial basis. The community decides what is included in each release of WordPress, how it’s tested, what documentation accompanies it, etc.
Because the WordPress Foundation, not Automattic, owns the WordPress trademarks for non-commercial use, Automattic has no control or veto of what code is stamped with the WordPress label.
By contrast, if Automattic retained non-commercial control over the WordPress trademarks it could refuse to affix the WordPress label to work done by and released by core contributor groups.
If you are somewhat familiar with WordPress’ lack of governance, the idea that Matt Mullenweg doesn’t control that is odd. Looking closer confirms that the claim is false.
The lawyer said the community decides on what is included. But who in the community actually decides “what is included in each release of WordPress.” According to the WordPress website, there is a Release Lead who is “The community member ultimately responsible for the Release.” Who is that?
We found that the WordPress website has been listing that information in a standardized location since 2019. Including the upcoming 6.7, that gets you the Release Lead for 15 releases. Matt Mullenweg has been the Release Lead for 12 of those releases. The now departed Executive Director of WordPress Josepha Haden Chomphosy, was the Released on two releases. She was actually an employee of Automattic, not an employee of some WordPress entity. The other Release Lead was Matías Ventura, who is also an Automattic employee.
So the going back to 2019, the Release Leads have been the CEO of Automattic or another employee of Automattic. So Automattic does in fact have “control [and a] veto of what code is stamped with the WordPress label.”
Here are the Released Leads going back to version 5.3:
2024
2023
2022
2021
2020
2019
- 5.3: Matt Mullenweg