"I Take No Pride in This, as It Means The...  🔗 **Source:** ["I Take No Pride in This, as It Means The...](https://twitter.com/DuaneStorey/status/2098915763369161085/?rw_tt_thread=True) > [!note]+ Document Notes > tags: > - automattic > - wordpress-governance > - wp-engine-lawsuit > - open-source-governance > - matt-mullenweg > author: Duane Storey (quote-tweeting Trent Lapinski) > source: https://twitter.com/DuaneStorey/status/2098915763369161085/?rw_tt_thread=True > reference: https://twitter.com/DuaneStorey/status/2098915763369161085/?rw_tt_thread=True > date created: 2026-09-13 > > [!info] Generated analysis — not the author's words. Sections below are machine-written > > from the captured source. Only text inside `> [!quote]` blocks is verbatim from the author. > > Do not quote or attribute any other line to the named author. > <!-- deep-read:sections start --> ## 🏷️ Title Duane Storey on the Automattic board vote: "we should have solved open source governance" — a quote-tweet of Trent Lapinski's worst-case scenario for Automattic and WordPress ## 🧭 Table of Contents - Who is speaking (two voices in one capture) - Summary - Main Content and Notes - References - Paraphrase - Newsletter - Action Items - Hypotheses, Methodology, Questions, Future Research - Implications - Learning Styles, Accessibility, DEIB - Logical Validity and DARVO - Conclusion - Refactor Appendix (literature atoms, zettel candidates, fleeting queue) ## 🔗 References (in-page) - Trent Lapinski profile: https://twitter.com/trentlapinski - Trent Lapinski's original post (Sep 12, 2026, 7:14 PM): https://twitter.com/trentlapinski/status/2098852701475946687 - Duane Storey's quote-tweet (this capture): https://twitter.com/DuaneStorey/status/2098915763369161085/?rw_tt_thread=True **Attribution note.** The Readwise capture flattens two accounts into one document. The first three paragraphs (beginning with a quoted sentence, then "Guys like Morten...", then "I personally don't know...") are Duane Storey's own words. Everything from "Thoughts on Automattic and WordPress:" through the closing "I take no pride in this..." paragraph is Trent Lapinski's post, which Storey is quoting. The opening quoted sentence at the very top is Storey re-quoting Lapinski's closing line. ## 📝 Summary **What happened.** On September 12, 2026, Trent Lapinski published a long post reacting to the Automattic board vote that placed CEO Matt Mullenweg on leave, and Mullenweg's return days later. Lapinski lays out a chain of consequences he expects: shareholder litigation if the board was replaced to reinstate Mullenweg, an 83 percent valuation decline he attributes to weak revenue, a likely loss in the WP Engine lawsuit, being cut off from venture capital, cash-flow and payroll stress, and, for WordPress itself, fewer developers and less leadership at the moment AI is reshaping the web. He closes with a personal lament that the open web he helped build is being destabilized and that open source governance should have been solved earlier. Duane Storey quote-tweeted that closing line and added his own commentary: people like Morten Rand-Hendriksen tried to bring governance to WordPress and were pushed out for it; twenty years of goodwill has been burned in record time; enterprises may now doubt open source generally; and after the ACF plugin takeover he sees no basis for trusting WordPress.org, with more turbulence expected as the lawsuit reaches a September 30 spoliation hearing. **Why it matters.** This is a snapshot of how two long-tenured WordPress builders are processing the board episode in real time. Neither is a neutral observer, and much of Lapinski's post is explicitly speculative, but the emotional register (grief, exhaustion, loss of trust) is the same one many contributors are voicing. For anyone doing DevRel, OSPO, or community work in the WordPress ecosystem, this document is a useful barometer of sentiment among developers who have already partially exited. **Stakeholders.** Automattic employees and shareholders (named in the post: major VC firms, BlackRock, Salesforce); the fired or reconstituted board; WP Engine and the court; WordPress.org contributors and plugin authors (the ACF/Secure Custom Fields episode is invoked); hosting companies; enterprise adopters; the broader open source community whose reputation Storey says is being damaged by association. **Risks.** Reputational contagion from one project to open source as a category; contributor attrition; enterprise procurement hesitation; the possibility that speculative financial claims are repeated as fact; and the risk that the governance conversation becomes only about one person rather than about structures. **Bottom line.** Two builders who once had deep skin in the game are saying, in different registers, that the WordPress project's dependence on a single decision-maker has become its central liability. Lapinski's financial and legal forecast is heavily speculative and should be treated as a scenario, not a report. Storey's governance point is the durable takeaway. ## 📖 Main Content ### 🗒️ Notes - **Structure of the capture.** Storey's commentary is short and pointed; Lapinski's post is a numbered-feeling cascade of "if this, then that" steps. Read them as two documents. - **Storey's three moves.** (1) Governance advocates were ostracized. (2) One person destroyed twenty years of goodwill and made open source look risky to enterprises. (3) Trust in WordPress.org is gone since the ACF takeover; the September 30 spoliation hearing may bring more instability. - **Lapinski's chain.** Board stacking risks a class action; fired directors still represent shareholders and could seek an injunction; valuation down 83 percent implies bad revenue; the WP Engine case is likely lost and could carry penalties or even criminal referral; the board's leave decision was probably a pre-trial rescue attempt; former directors will sue; VC funding is closed off; the only paths are a down-round buyer, a settlement plus deep layoffs, or Mullenweg stepping aside so a new team can bring investors back; WordPress must pivot to an agentic AI stack but nobody can drive that change. - **What is evidenced in the body vs. asserted.** The body links only to Lapinski's profile and post. No filings, valuations, or financial statements are linked. The 83 percent figure, the CFO firing, the interim CEO, and the criminal-referral possibility all appear without sources inside the captured text. - **What lands regardless of the speculation.** The emotional close ("I take no pride in this") is the part Storey chose to amplify, and it is the part that resonates across factions: builders mourning a commons. - **Named references worth verifying elsewhere.** Morten Rand-Hendriksen's WordPress Governance Project (2018 to 2019); the October 2024 Advanced Custom Fields to Secure Custom Fields takeover on WordPress.org; the WP Engine v. Automattic litigation in the Northern District of California; the September 30 spoliation hearing. ## 📚 References Primary sources linked in the captured body: - Trent Lapinski, post of Sep 12, 2026: https://twitter.com/trentlapinski/status/2098852701475946687 - Duane Storey, quote-tweet: https://twitter.com/DuaneStorey/status/2098915763369161085/?rw_tt_thread=True Context the reader should locate independently (not linked in the body; verify before citing): - WordPress.org News, "Secure Custom Fields" (October 2024) announcing the ACF fork on the plugin directory: https://wordpress.org/news/2024/10/secure-custom-fields/ - WP Engine, Inc. v. Automattic Inc. and Matthew Mullenweg, N.D. Cal., case no. 3:24-cv-06917 (docket via CourtListener or PACER). - WordPress Governance Project (Morten Rand-Hendriksen and Rachel Cherry, 2018 to 2019), archived project site and its WordCamp US 2018 origin. - Automattic company communications regarding the September 2026 board action and CEO status (official statements should be preferred over secondary commentary). ## 🗣️ Paraphrase **Storey, paragraph 1 (re-quoting Lapinski).** Storey opens by lifting Lapinski's closing lament: none of this is something to be proud of, because it amounts to the open web being taken apart, and better governance could have prevented it. **Storey, paragraph 2.** People such as Morten worked hard to introduce governance structures into WordPress and were pushed to the margins for their trouble. Storey says he has never watched anyone unravel twenty years of goodwill this quickly, leaving a bad taste that spreads to open source as a whole. A large company watching this might reasonably reconsider open source when one individual can inflict so much harm so fast. **Storey, paragraph 3.** After the ACF takeover, Storey cannot see how anyone trusts WordPress.org, and Automattic's internal situation compounds that. He expects further instability as the lawsuit proceeds, especially after the September 30 spoliation hearing. **Lapinski, paragraphs 1 to 2.** If Mullenweg regained his title by replacing the board, holding an emergency meeting, and installing directors who would reinstate him and remove the interim CEO, he has invited a shareholder class action. The ousted directors still represent large shareholders and could seek an injunction to remove him again. **Lapinski, paragraph 3.** Automattic's value has fallen 83 percent over five years, which Lapinski takes as a sign that revenue is very weak. **Lapinski, paragraph 4.** The WP Engine case resumes at month's end. Lapinski believes the facts favor WP Engine, that the penalties could run to millions, and that criminal exposure for extortion is even possible. **Lapinski, paragraphs 5 to 6.** He speculates the board tried to sideline Mullenweg before trial to protect the company and maybe settle, and that the board and Mullenweg disagree on litigation strategy. He predicts former directors and insiders will sue for breach of fiduciary duty and negligence. **Lapinski, paragraphs 7 to 9.** With a lost case plus a shareholder suit involving major VC firms, BlackRock, and Salesforce, Automattic would be shut out of venture capital. The only rescue is a down-round buyer, and the existing investors may prefer to litigate rather than sell. Without one, the company runs on declining revenue with no CFO, and payroll could become a problem, meaning more layoffs. **Lapinski, paragraphs 10 to 11.** The realistic path to new money is Mullenweg stepping down so a new executive team can win back investors, but those investors will not act until he is gone. If he stays, the choices are settle and absorb the hit, or lose, cut to a skeleton crew, hoard cash, and fend off investor lawsuits that can bleed the company through legal fees. **Lapinski, paragraphs 12 to 14.** For WordPress this means fewer developers, resources, and leaders while AI erodes the business. WordPress must become an agentic system, not just a data store, but nobody can drive that change and Mullenweg would block it because it breaks two decades of legacy. With lawsuits pending and investors alienated, the outlook is poor. **Lapinski, closing.** He takes no pride in any of this; it is the destabilization of something he spent years building, and he wishes governance had been solved so it could never have happened. ## 📰 Newsletter **Subject line: Two builders, one grief, zero governance** If you wanted a single screenshot of how the WordPress old guard feels about the September board saga, Duane Storey's quote-tweet of Trent Lapinski is it. Lapinski wrote the doom spreadsheet: shareholder suits, an 83 percent valuation slide, a WP Engine case he expects Automattic to lose, no venture money, and a WordPress that must somehow become "agentic" with nobody at the wheel. Storey skipped the spreadsheet and went straight for the wound: the governance people were ostracized, twenty years of goodwill are gone, and after the ACF episode he does not know why anyone would trust WordPress.org. Here is the thing. Almost every number in Lapinski's thread is unsourced and much of it is explicitly labeled speculation. Treat it as a scenario, not a balance sheet. But the sentence Storey chose to amplify, "I wish we had solved open source governance more effectively so this never could have happened," is the one that will still be true whether or not the finances play out that way. The WordPress Governance Project was proposed in 2018. It is 2026. Links: Lapinski's post (https://twitter.com/trentlapinski/status/2098852701475946687), Storey's reply (https://twitter.com/DuaneStorey/status/2098915763369161085), and, for the ACF background, the WordPress.org announcement of Secure Custom Fields (https://wordpress.org/news/2024/10/secure-custom-fields/). What to actually do this week: read the primary docket before repeating any claim about the trial; note the September 30 spoliation hearing; and if you run a community program, have a plan for what you say to contributors who are grieving rather than arguing. ## ✅ Action Items ### DevRel - Draft a "what we know, what we do not" explainer that separates confirmed events (board leave, return, September 30 hearing) from speculation (valuation, payroll, criminal exposure) so advocates do not amplify unsourced numbers. - Prepare talking points for enterprise developers who ask whether the WordPress episode says anything about open source broadly; the answer is about governance design, not about the license. - Monitor sentiment among long-tenured developers; Storey and Lapinski are bellwethers for a cohort that has already reduced involvement. ### OSPO - Add "single-controller risk" to open source intake assessments: who can unilaterally change a project's package registry, trademark enforcement, or directory listing? - Document the ACF/Secure Custom Fields precedent as a supply-chain governance case study for internal training. - Review dependence on WordPress.org-hosted distribution (plugins, themes, updates) and map alternatives, including FAIR-style federated distribution. ### Community - Create space for contributors processing loss; both posts read as grief more than argument. Facilitated listening sessions outperform rebuttals. - Revisit the history of the WordPress Governance Project and what happened to its proponents; make that history accessible to newer contributors. ### WordPress subteams (as relevant) - **Core / Core Program Team:** publish a plain-language statement on decision-making authority for releases so contributors know who decides what during leadership turbulence. - **Core AI:** Lapinski's "agentic system" claim is a prompt to publish an actual roadmap for agent-facing capabilities (Abilities API, MCP adapters) so the pivot is not framed as impossible. - **Core Performance / Mobile / Playground / CLI:** no direct action; note that funding uncertainty at Automattic could affect sponsored contributor hours and plan for continuity. - **Community / Training / Marketing:** coordinate messaging that distinguishes the WordPress project from any single company; Training should have a module on how the project is governed today. - **Support / Documentation:** anticipate user questions about whether WordPress.org is trustworthy after ACF; write a factual FAQ. - **Design / Photos / TV / Polyglots / Accessibility / Themes / Plugins / Openverse / Tide / Meta:** Plugins and Meta teams should clarify the current directory takeover policy; other teams have no direct action from this source. - **Hosting:** hosts should prepare customer communications and evaluate mirror or fallback update infrastructure. ### The WPOCC - The WP Open Community Collective is positioned to convene the governance conversation Storey says was suppressed; consider publishing a governance principles draft with an explicit "no single point of control" clause. ### FAIR - Federated and independent distribution (FAIR) directly addresses Storey's trust concern about WordPress.org; publish a status update and migration guide aimed at plugin authors. ## 🧪 Hypotheses 1. **H1 (contributor attrition):** Long-tenured WordPress contributors who publicly express governance grievances in September 2026 will show measurably reduced Trac and GitHub contribution activity over the following two quarters compared with their prior baseline. Testable via public contribution logs. 2. **H2 (enterprise hesitation):** Enterprise RFPs mentioning WordPress will increasingly include governance or "key person" risk questions within twelve months. Testable via procurement document sampling and agency surveys. 3. **H3 (speculation propagation):** Unsourced figures from Lapinski's post (for example, the 83 percent decline) will appear in at least three secondary news pieces without independent verification within thirty days. Testable via search and citation tracing. 4. **H4 (governance demand):** Proposals for formal governance structures (WPOCC, FAIR, or similar) will see increased signatories or participation in the month following the board episode. Testable via public membership counts. 5. **H5 (agentic roadmap):** If Core AI publishes a concrete agentic roadmap within six months, the "nobody can drive this change" framing will decline in developer discourse. Testable via discourse sampling before and after. ## 📊 Methodology - Source: a single Readwise Reader capture of a quote-tweet thread, approximately 890 words, two authors. - Method: close reading with speaker attribution, separation of evidenced claims (links present in the body) from asserted claims (no links), paragraph-by-paragraph paraphrase, informal-logic review, and DARVO screening. - Limitations: no access to the replies, likes, or downstream discussion; no independent verification of financial or legal claims; the capture may have lost formatting (numbered points, line breaks) from the original. - Bias disclosure: both authors are former or peripheral WordPress insiders with public grievances; the analysis treats their emotional claims as data about sentiment, not as findings about Automattic's finances. ## ❓ Questions - Was the board actually replaced, or did Mullenweg return through a different mechanism? Lapinski frames his first paragraph conditionally. - What is the source of the 83 percent valuation figure, and does it reflect revenue or simply market multiple compression? - Who is the interim CEO Lapinski references, and was the CFO departure confirmed by Automattic? - What specifically is at issue in the September 30 spoliation hearing, and which party is accused? - What did the ostracism of governance advocates concretely look like, and is there a documented record? - Is "agentic system" a technical roadmap gap or a narrative framing? ## 🔮 Future Research - Build a timeline of WordPress governance proposals from 2018 to 2026 and their outcomes. - Compare Automattic's situation with other founder-controlled open source companies that faced board conflict (for example, cases involving dual-class or founder-majority structures) to test whether the pattern is unique. - Survey enterprise WordPress adopters on whether the episode has changed procurement criteria. - Track whether FAIR or other federated distribution efforts gain measurable adoption in the six months after the board episode. - Analyze the discourse: which claims from this thread propagate, and through which accounts. ## 💡 Implications - **Practice:** Developers and agencies should reduce single-point dependencies on WordPress.org infrastructure where feasible and document contingency plans. - **Policy:** The episode is a live case for open source foundations and OSPOs on why project governance and trademark control should be structurally separated from any one individual or company. - **Security:** The ACF takeover is invoked as the trust-breaking precedent; supply-chain policy should treat registry-level takeover as a threat model, not an edge case. - **Education:** Training and onboarding materials should explain how WordPress is governed today in plain terms, including what is and is not formalized. - **Funding:** If Automattic-sponsored contributor time contracts, the project needs diversified funding for core work; this strengthens the case for pooled or foundation-style funding. ## 🧠 Learning Styles Assessment - **Visual:** Weak. Text only; no diagrams. A timeline or cause-effect chart of Lapinski's chain would help visual learners. - **Aural:** Moderate. Conversational, first-person voice reads well aloud. - **Verbal:** Strong. Dense, argumentative prose suited to readers who process through language. - **Kinesthetic:** Weak. No hands-on component; a reader could reconstruct the causal chain on cards as an exercise. - **Logical:** Moderate to strong in form (explicit if-then chain), weak in evidence. - **Social:** Moderate. It is a public conversation that invites reply and debate. - **Solitary:** Strong. Reflective, personal tone in both authors' closing thoughts. - **Naturalistic:** Not applicable. - **Reading level:** Roughly grade 10 to 12 (Flesch-Kincaid estimate); business and legal vocabulary (fiduciary duty, injunction, spoliation, down round) raises the barrier for general readers. ## 📊 Accessibility Assessment Mapped to WCAG 2.2 AA where a social post can be assessed: 1. **Text alternatives (1.1.1):** The capture includes a profile image with no alt text. Fails as captured. 2. **Structure and headings (1.3.1):** No headings; a wall of paragraphs. The quote boundary between Storey and Lapinski is visually implied, not programmatically marked. Partial. 3. **Readability and plain language (3.1.5, advisory):** Legal and finance jargon without definitions. Partial. 4. **Link purpose (2.4.4):** Links are to profile and post; link text is a handle or date, which is acceptable but not descriptive. Partial. 5. **Contrast and presentation (1.4.3):** Depends on the platform rendering; not assessable from the capture. 6. **Consistent identification of speaker (1.3.1 / 3.2.4):** Two speakers without a clear programmatic label; screen reader users may not know where Storey ends and Lapinski begins. Fails. 7. **Language and tone accessibility (3.1.1):** English, informal, with profanity; no language attribute issues but tone may be a barrier in professional settings. Pass with note. ## 🌍 DEIB Assessment - **Cultural breadth:** Narrow. The perspective is North American, venture-and-legal framed, and assumes familiarity with US corporate governance. - **Inclusive language:** "Guys like Morten" defaults to masculine framing; profanity is present. Otherwise no exclusionary language. - **Neurodiversity support:** Long, unbroken cascade of conditionals with no signposting; hard for readers who need structure. Storey's short paragraphs are more accessible. - **Representation:** Only named individuals are men (Morten, Matt); institutional investors are named as entities. No contributor voices from outside the founder-adjacent circle. - **Psychological safety:** Both posts are candid but not personally abusive; Lapinski's criminal-charges speculation about a named person is the sharpest edge and could chill discussion for readers who fear retaliation in either direction. ## ✅ Logical Validity **Strong reasoning.** - Storey's core claim (governance advocates were sidelined, and the absence of governance is now the visible cost) is coherent and consistent with the public record of the 2018 to 2019 governance project. - Lapinski's structural point that fired directors may still hold shareholder rights and remedies is legally plausible in general terms. - Both authors correctly identify that the underlying issue is concentration of control rather than any single decision. **Fallacies (named, located, explained, fixed).** 1. **Hasty generalization (Storey, paragraph 2).** "If I were a large enterprise, I might be having doubts about open source now seeing how one person can cause so much damage." Generalizes from one project with an unusual concentration of control to open source as a category. *Fix:* limit the inference to projects that lack independent governance, and note that many open source projects are foundation-governed precisely to prevent this. 2. **Non sequitur (Lapinski, paragraph 3).** "Automattic has declined in value 83% in 5 years. Their revenue is likely bad, like really bad." A valuation markdown does not entail revenue decline; multiples compressed across the sector after 2021. *Fix:* cite a revenue figure or label the inference as a guess. 3. **Slippery slope (Lapinski, paragraph 9).** From "no investor" to "no CFO" to "won't make payroll" to "more layoffs," each step is asserted rather than evidenced. *Fix:* present as one possible scenario with named assumptions. 4. **False dilemma (Lapinski, paragraph 11).** Mullenweg's "only choice" is settle or lose and gut the company; other paths (partial settlement, asset sale, restructuring, new debt) are omitted. *Fix:* acknowledge the option space is wider. 5. **Appeal to speculation stated as fact (Lapinski, paragraph 6).** "Now everyone who was on Matt's board and inner circle will now be suing him." Prediction phrased as certainty. *Fix:* "may sue." **Tone of voice.** Storey: weary, bitter, mournful. Lapinski: analytic-sounding cascade with an elegiac close; confident in tone, speculative in substance. Neither is trolling; both are grieving. ## 🛡️ DARVO Analysis - **Deny:** Not present. Neither author denies wrongdoing on their own part; Lapinski's "I take no pride in this" is the opposite of denial. - **Attack:** Mild. Lapinski's criminal-charges speculation about Mullenweg is an attack on a named individual, though framed as a legal possibility rather than an accusation. Storey's "self destruct" language is critical but not ad hominem. - **Reverse victim and offender:** Not present. Both authors position the community and the open web as the injured party and locate responsibility with a single leader; they do not cast themselves as victims of criticism. - **Assessment:** DARVO patterns are not the operative dynamic here. The document is better read as lament plus scenario-forecasting. ## 🎯 Conclusion **Bottom line.** Strip out the unsourced finance and the legal speculation and what remains is a clear, shared diagnosis from two long-time builders: WordPress's dependence on one person is now its defining risk, the people who warned about it were pushed out, and trust in WordPress.org's infrastructure was already damaged before the board episode. **Next steps.** (1) Verify every factual claim against primary sources (docket, Automattic statements) before repeating. (2) Note September 30 as a date to watch. (3) Use the governance framing, not the doom framing, in any community-facing communication. (4) Feed the "single-controller risk" and ACF precedent into OSPO and FAIR planning. ## 🧱 Refactor Appendix ### Literature Split Pad ### h1 — Governance advocates were ostracized (Storey) > [!quote] > Guys like Morten tried really hard to get some type of governance in the WP ecosystem, and they were effectively ostracized for it. #atom/literature/h1 ### h2 — The lament Storey amplified (Lapinski, closing) > [!quote] > I take no pride in this, as it means the destruction of the open web as we know it. Something I contributed many years of my life to building is now being destabilized and destroyed. It’s a shitty feeling, and I wish we had solved open source governance more effectively so this never could have happened. #atom/literature/h2 ### h3 — The agentic pivot claim (Lapinski) > [!quote] > As the Internet moves towards becoming an agentic AI Internet, WordPress’s only hope is to become an agentic system. Merely using WordPress as a data store is not enough. #atom/literature/h3 ### Fallacy anchors > [!quote] > If I were a large enterprise, I might be having doubts about open source now seeing how one person can cause some much damage in such a short amount of time and destabilize the ecosystem.. #fallacy/hasty-generalization > [!quote] > Automattic has declined in value 83% in 5 years. Their revenue is likely bad, like really bad for such a decline to happen. #fallacy/non-sequitur > [!quote] > If Matt cannot find another investor all he has left is the companies revenue which is in major decline but he just fired the CFO. There’s a good chance they won’t be making payroll sooner rather than later. Which means more layoffs. #fallacy/slippery-slope ### Atomic Split Pad #### z1 — Governance debt is paid in goodwill The cost of not formalizing project governance shows up later as a sudden loss of goodwill rather than as a gradual one; the 2018 governance proposal and the 2026 board episode are two ends of the same debt. #atom/zettel/z1 #### z2 — Valuation is not revenue A percentage decline in private valuation says little about revenue without multiples data; forecasts that skip that step are scenario-writing, not analysis. #atom/zettel/z2 #### z3 — Registry takeover as the trust-breaking precedent For plugin authors, the ACF to Secure Custom Fields takeover, not the board fight, is the event that reset trust in WordPress.org; distribution governance is upstream of leadership governance. #atom/zettel/z3 ### Fleeting Queue - Pull the September 30 spoliation hearing docket entry and note what is actually at issue. #atom/fleeting/f1 - Find the archived WordPress Governance Project proposal and list its named proponents. #atom/fleeting/f2 - Check whether Core AI has a published agent-facing roadmap to answer the "nobody can drive it" claim. #atom/fleeting/f3 <!-- deep-read:sections end --> 📄 **Full text:** [[Full Document Contents/Tweets/I Take No Pride in This, as It Means The...-2.md|"I Take No Pride in This, as It Means The... by Duane Storey]] ## Highlights - I take no pride in this, as it means the destruction of the open web as we know it. Something I contributed many years of my life to building is now being destabilized and destroyed. It’s a shitty feeling, and I wish we had solved open source governance more effectively so this never could have happened. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01m2dr0c01npcqqw2tyf75na94)) - Note: Lapinski's closing lament, the line Storey chose to amplify; the durable takeaway regardless of the speculative finance. - Tags: atom/literature/h2 - Guys like Morten tried really hard to get some type of governance in the WP ecosystem, and they were effectively ostracized for it. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01m2dr0a29j2yng7srrkk8yc3y)) - Note: Storey's core claim: governance advocates were pushed out, and the missing governance is now the visible cost. - Tags: atom/literature/h1 - If I were a large enterprise, I might be having doubts about open source now seeing how one person can cause some much damage in such a short amount of time and destabilize the ecosystem.. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01m2dr0g70abcx4pz8k7j356mc)) - Note: Hasty generalization: extends one project's single-controller problem to open source as a category. - Tags: fallacy/hasty-generalization - Automattic has declined in value 83% in 5 years. Their revenue is likely bad, like really bad for such a decline to happen. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01m2dr0jd73aaa6v9wz618zbv1)) - Note: Non sequitur: a valuation markdown does not entail a revenue decline; multiples compressed sector-wide. - Tags: fallacy/non-sequitur - If Matt cannot find another investor all he has left is the companies revenue which is in major decline but he just fired the CFO. There’s a good chance they won’t be making payroll sooner rather than later. Which means more layoffs. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01m2dr0m6ev73zy7ep6kh91xw0)) - Note: Slippery slope: no investor, no CFO, missed payroll, layoffs, each step asserted without evidence. - Tags: fallacy/slippery-slope - As the Internet moves towards becoming an agentic AI Internet, WordPress’s only hope is to become an agentic system. Merely using WordPress as a data store is not enough. ([View Highlight](https://read.readwise.io/read/01m2dr0e0ghcmwq88w13k3c26g)) - Note: Lapinski's agentic-pivot claim; a direct prompt for Core AI to publish a real roadmap. - Tags: atom/literature/h3