What is the WordPress Drama All About?
Two major WordPress companies, WP Engine and Automattic, are in a legal battle over a trademark dispute. This has caused a lot of negative publicity for the WordPress community.
Automattic, founded by WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg, owns the exclusive commercial rights to the ‘WordPress’ trademark. They requested that WP Engine enter a licensing agreement involving either payments to Automattic or increased contributions to the open-source WordPress project. When negotiations failed, Mullenweg publicly criticized WP Engine at the WordCamp US conference, claiming the company, which generates over $400 million in revenue, doesn’t contribute enough to the free WordPress project.
The situation escalated with both companies issuing cease and desist letters. Due to the legal threats, Mullenweg banned WP Engine from accessing WordPress.org servers, preventing users with websites hosted on WP Engine from receiving updates. This ban was temporarily lifted to protect users and allow WP Engine to build their own update servers.
However, the server block was reinstated on October 1st, and shortly after, WP Engine filed a lawsuit against Automattic and Mullenweg. As a result, the WP Engine team was banned from accessing their WordPress.org accounts, preventing them from releasing updates to their WordPress plugins.
One of WP Engine’s plugins, Advanced Custom Fields (ACF), is popular among developers and used by over 2 million websites. To ensure security updates for users, the WordPress.org team forked the ACF plugin, renamed it to Secure Custom Fields (SCF), and took over the original ACF plugin directory page without WP Engine’s consent. This decision was met with negative reactions from developers, influencers, and the press.
At the time of writing, other WP Engine plugins remain available for download on the WordPress.org plugin directory, but the WP Engine team is still banned from using WordPress.org servers to issue updates. The lawsuit between WP Engine and Automattic is ongoing, and the courts will likely decide the outcome unless the parties reach a settlement.
Is this the End of WordPress?
The answer is no. WordPress powers over 43% of websites on the internet and is bigger than any one company. The vast majority of WordPress users are unaffected by this drama.
The WordPress software used to build websites remains unchanged. Popular plugins such as Elementor, WPForms, WooCommerce, AIOSEO, Duplicator, and thousands more are still available.
This trademark dispute is not a threat to the existence of WordPress. While a small percentage of users are impacted, the majority of users are unaffected. The core development of WordPress continues, and version 6.7 is expected soon.
Is My Website Affected by This?
If you are using a free plugin developed by WP Engine and are not hosted on their platform, your websites are impacted because you won’t receive updates for those plugins from WordPress.org. Popular free plugins affected include:
* Advanced Custom Fields
* Nitropack
* Better Search Replace
* WP Migrate Lite
* WP Offload SES Lite
* Frost
* Genesis Blocks
* Genesis Custom Blocks
For a complete list, refer to the [plugins built by WP Engine](https://wpengine.com/support/installing-and-updating-free-wp-engine-plugins-and-themes/).
What Can You Do to Protect Your WordPress Site?
If you are not using plugins developed by WP Engine, you don’t need to take any action. Your WordPress site is safe.
However, it is always recommended to have regular [WordPress backups](https://www.wpbeginner.com/beginners-guide/how-to-backup-your-wordpress-site/) and use a firewall like Cloudflare. You can find more [WordPress security tips](https://www.wpbeginner.com/wordpress-security/).
If you are using WP Engine plugins, you can install the [WP Engine updater plugin](https://wpengine.com/support/installing-and-updating-free-wp-engine-plugins-and-themes/) to continue receiving updates or find alternative plugins.
What Should I Do as a WordPress Agency with Concerned Clients?
You can reassure your clients that WordPress is still safe and the best open-source CMS option available. This legal dispute does not change the fact that WordPress powers 43% of all websites and offers over 60,000 free plugins and themes. The core development of WordPress continues with WordPress 6.7 expected soon. You can also refer your clients to this blog post.
My Final Thoughts
Despite the ongoing drama, the WordPress community remains strong. We hope that the companies involved in the lawsuit can reach an amicable agreement soon so we can focus on growing WordPress and making it accessible to everyone. Thank you for your continued support of WPBeginner, and we look forward to serving you for many years to come.
This is a summary of the original article: [WordPress Drama Explained (and How it May Affect Your Website)](https://www.wpbeginner.com/news/wordpress-drama-explained-and-how-it-may-affect-your-website/).