The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation with Matt Mullenweg

The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation with Matt Mullenweg 🔗 **Source:** [The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation with Matt Mullenweg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIo01LO3VpM) > [!note]+ Document Notes > tags: [woocommerce, e-commerce, open-source] > author: Do the Woo > source: YouTube > reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIo01LO3VpM > date created: 2025-01-27 11:30 > > # 🏷️ Title: The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation with Matt Mullenweg >  ## 🧰 Action Inbox - [H1] Increase WooCommerce talks at WordCamps — submit e-commerce focused presentations #community - [H2] Explore Claude Code for development workflow — AI agent capabilities improving #ai - [H3] Focus on merchant daily experience optimization — reduce clicks and friction #ux ## 🧭 Table of Contents - [📝 Summary](#-summary) - [📖 Main Content](#-main-content) - [🗒️ Notes](#️-notes) - [📚 References](#-references) - [🗣️ Paraphrase](#️-paraphrase) - [📰 Newsletter](#-newsletter) - [✅ Action Items](#-action-items) - [🧪 Hypotheses](#-hypotheses) - [📊 Methodology](#-methodology) - [❓ Questions](#-questions) - [🔮 Future Research](#-future-research) - [💡 Implications](#-implications) - [🧠 Learning Styles Assessment](#-learning-styles-assessment) - [📊 Accessibility Assessment](#-accessibility-assessment) - [🌍 DEIB Assessment](#-deib-assessment) - [✅ Logical Validity](#-logical-validity) - [🛡️ DARVO Analysis](#-darvo-analysis) - [🎯 Conclusion](#-conclusion) ### 🔗 References - [WooCommerce.com](https://woocommerce.com) - [WordPress.com](https://wordpress.com) ## 📝 Summary - Matt Mullenweg discusses WooCommerce's future with hosts Katie Keith and James Kemp - Key themes: open source freedom vs. proprietary platforms, AI impact on commerce, community collaboration - WooCommerce serves 8% of all websites globally with $30+ billion GMV - Biggest threat is internal execution, not external competition - 2026 priorities include performance, accessibility, merchant experience, and AI integration ## 📖 Main Content Matt Mullenweg, CEO of Automattic, shares his vision for WooCommerce's future in this comprehensive discussion. The conversation covers competitive positioning against platforms like Shopify, the role of open source in providing merchant freedom, and how AI will reshape e-commerce development. Key insights include WooCommerce's massive scale (8% of global websites), the importance of community-driven innovation, and upcoming priorities around performance and user experience improvements. ## 🗒️ Notes #### ⏱️ [00:00](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=0) — [H1] Introduction and Matt's Role with WooCommerce - Key idea: Matt explains his involvement as CEO of Automattic and WooCommerce's place within the company - Evidence: "I work really closely with Bo Leens who leads he's the artistic director of the WooCommerce maison" #### ⏱️ [02:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=150) — [H2] WordPress as Operating System Analogy - Key idea: WooCommerce represents the "killer app" for WordPress, similar to Microsoft Office for Windows - Evidence: "I always have thought about WordPress as an operating system... we hadn't yet found the killer app on top of it" #### ⏱️ [05:45](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=345) — [H1] WooCommerce Acquisition Story (2015) - Key idea: Automattic acquired WooCommerce team of 43 people, only 3 developers, for community and UX strengths - Evidence: "automatic has like some of the best engineers in the world. So we can definitely fix all the engineering stuff" #### ⏱️ [08:20](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=500) — [H1] WooCommerce's Massive Scale - Key idea: WooCommerce now powers 8% of all websites globally - Evidence: "I think it's something like 8% of all websites in the world now run WooCommerce" #### ⏱️ [10:15](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=615) — [H2] Commerce Complexity Lessons - Key idea: E-commerce has multifactorial complexity especially internationally with payments, shipping, inventory - Evidence: "commerce has like a multiffactorial complexity especially as you go international" #### ⏱️ [12:40](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=760) — [H1] Biggest Existential Threat: Internal Execution - Key idea: Products at WooCommerce's scale aren't killed by competitors but by internal execution failures - Evidence: "with a product like at the scale of WooCommerce they're never actually killed by competitors" #### ⏱️ [15:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=930) — [H1] Open Source Freedom as Core Differentiator - Key idea: Primary competitive advantage is freedom - choosing software that increases rather than decreases autonomy - Evidence: "the first question you have to ask yourself when you're choosing anything is am I choosing software which increases my freedom or decreases my freedom" #### ⏱️ [18:45](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1125) — [H2] AI Impact on Feature Differentiation - Key idea: AI will make feature gaps less important, making platform and community choice more critical - Evidence: "I think feature differentiations are going to start to fade a little bit" #### ⏱️ [22:10](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1330) — [H2] Malleable vs Generated Software - Key idea: Future belongs to malleable software that can be customized rather than one-shot generated applications - Evidence: "where we'll see the plurality of usage and commerce and interaction is going to be with malleable software" #### ⏱️ [26:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1590) — [H1] Education as Key Opportunity - Key idea: Biggest opportunity is education through see-do-teach cycle, not competitor features - Evidence: "one of the biggest opportunities for WordPress and WooCommerce is education" #### ⏱️ [30:20](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1820) — [H2] Ideal Customer Journey for $5M Retailer - Key idea: Mid-size retailers have choice between DIY with AI assistance or hiring developers/consultants - Evidence: "AI is raising people's ability to make it through these things" #### ⏱️ [35:15](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=2115) — [H2] Community Collaboration Examples - Key idea: Healthy collaboration shown through accessibility project with Equalized Digital and shipping fulfillment scoping - Evidence: "WooCommerce is now fully accessible, which is awesome on the front end" #### ⏱️ [40:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=2430) — [H1] WordCamp Coverage Gap - Key idea: Nearly 25% of WordPress sites use WooCommerce, so similar percentage of WordCamp sessions should cover commerce - Evidence: "maybe something like a quarter of sessions at WordCamp should be about WooCommerce" #### ⏱️ [45:20](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=2720) — [H1] Unlimited Developer Resources Priority - Key idea: Would focus on merchant daily experience optimization and reducing friction in store management - Evidence: "if you're running a store every day what what do you do 10 times or 100 times and how can we make that like a little bit smoother" #### ⏱️ [50:45](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=3045) — [H2] Agentic Commerce Protocol Reality Check - Key idea: Despite hype, agentic commerce protocols see almost no real usage after a year of announcements - Evidence: "almost a year after some of the stuff was first announced, there have been almost no one talking about how many transactions have gone through this" ## 📚 References - [WooCommerce Official Site](https://woocommerce.com) - [Automattic](https://automattic.com) - [WordPress.com Hosting](https://wordpress.com) - [Claude Code AI Tool](https://claude.ai) ## 🗣️ Paraphrase - WooCommerce's primary strength lies in providing merchants with freedom and control over their e-commerce platform, unlike proprietary solutions that limit customization and autonomy - The biggest risk to WooCommerce isn't competition from platforms like Shopify, but internal execution challenges in delivering on community needs and roadmap promises - AI will democratize development capabilities, making the choice of platform and community more important than specific feature sets, as technical gaps become easier to fill ## 📰 Newsletter **WooCommerce's Open Source Advantage in the AI Era** Matt Mullenweg shared fascinating insights about WooCommerce's future, highlighting how open source freedom becomes even more valuable as AI democratizes development. With WooCommerce powering 8% of all websites globally, the platform's focus shifts from competing on features to empowering merchant autonomy and community innovation. Key takeaway: The real competitive advantage isn't having the most features, but providing the most freedom to customize, extend, and truly own your e-commerce platform. Resources: [WooCommerce](https://woocommerce.com), [WordPress.com](https://wordpress.com), [Developer Docs](https://developer.wordpress.org/) ## ✅ Action Items #### WordPress - Core: Increase WooCommerce integration and performance optimization - Community: Expand e-commerce track presence at flagship WordCamps - Training: Develop merchant-focused education programs and meetup content - Documentation: Create tailored onboarding paths for different merchant segments #### DevRel - Developer advocacy: Promote WooCommerce as platform for economic opportunity - Education: Create "see-do-teach" programs for e-commerce developers - Developer experience: Improve extensibility documentation and hook references - Community management: Foster collaboration between core team and extension developers #### Community - Maintainers: Support dedicated WooCommerce events and meetups - Contributors: Encourage e-commerce plugin developers to contribute upstream - Ecosystem: Facilitate knowledge sharing between commerce-focused developers ## 🧪 Hypotheses - AI will reduce feature differentiation between e-commerce platforms, making freedom and extensibility more important competitive factors - Malleable software architectures will outperform generated solutions for complex commerce requirements - Community-driven development will accelerate innovation faster than proprietary platform development - Education and developer experience improvements will drive platform adoption more than feature additions ### 📊 Methodology - Track adoption rates of new e-commerce platforms vs. established open source solutions - Measure developer productivity gains from AI assistance vs. platform extensibility - Survey merchant satisfaction correlation with platform customization capabilities ### ❓ Questions - How will agentic commerce protocols evolve beyond current limited adoption? - What merchant experience improvements would have highest ROI for the ecosystem? - How can WordCamps better balance general WordPress content with specialized tracks? ### 🔮 Future Research - AI agent integration with existing e-commerce workflows and interfaces - Open source community collaboration models for complex software platforms - Educational program effectiveness for technical skill development in commerce ### 💡 Implications - Practice: Developers should focus on platform expertise over feature-specific skills - Policy: Open source platforms may gain regulatory advantages around merchant data ownership - Education: Technical education programs need to balance DIY capability with expert consultation - Funding: Community-driven platforms require different investment models than proprietary solutions ### 🧠 Learning Styles Assessment Reading level estimate: Grade 12-14 (technical discussion with business context) #### 👀 Visual learners - Present: Platform comparison context, ecosystem scale visualization - Improve: Architecture diagrams, development workflow charts, market share visuals #### 🔊 Aural learners - Present: Podcast format with natural conversation flow - Improve: Audio summary of key strategic points, developer interview series #### 🗣️ Verbal learners - Present: Clear analogies (WordPress as OS, Office as killer app), defined terminology - Improve: Glossary of commerce-specific terms, platform comparison narratives #### 🧩 Kinesthetic learners - Present: References to hands-on development experience, practical examples - Improve: Step-by-step setup guides, interactive platform comparisons #### 🧠 Logical learners - Present: Clear strategic reasoning, data-driven insights (8% market share) - Improve: Decision frameworks for platform selection, ROI analysis templates #### 🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Social learners - Present: Community collaboration examples, WordCamp discussions - Improve: Discussion forums for strategic questions, peer mentoring programs #### 🧘‍♀️ Solitary learners - Present: Long-form strategic discussion format - Improve: Self-assessment tools for platform needs, independent learning paths #### 🌿 Naturalistic learners - Present: Ecosystem thinking, platform evolution patterns - Improve: Community health metrics, sustainable development practices ### 📊 Accessibility Assessment #### Screen reader semantics - Present: Clear speaker identification, structured conversation flow - Improve: Timestamped navigation, topic-based section headers #### Keyboard navigation - Present: Standard video player controls - Improve: Transcript navigation, searchable content sections #### Contrast and readability - Present: Clear visual presentation - Improve: High contrast transcript options, adjustable text sizing #### Text resizing and reflow - Present: Responsive video player - Improve: Scalable transcript interface, mobile-optimized viewing #### Media and captions - Present: Video discussion format - Improve: Full transcript with speaker attribution, searchable captions #### Forms and interactions - Present: Basic video interaction - Improve: Accessible comment submission, topic-based discussion threads ### 🌍 DEIB Assessment #### Cultural breadth - Present: Global commerce perspective, international complexity discussion - Improve: Multi-regional success stories, localization considerations #### Inclusive language - Present: Technical discussion accessible to business audiences - Improve: Plain language summaries, avoided insider terminology #### Neurodiversity support - Present: Long-form discussion format allows processing time - Improve: Structured topic sections, key point summaries #### Representation - Present: Business leadership and technical expertise perspectives - Improve: Diverse merchant success stories, varied use case examples #### Psychological safety - Present: Respectful discussion of competitive landscape - Improve: Community guidelines for strategic discussions ### ✅ Logical Validity #### Strong reasoning - Deductive strength: Open source principles lead to platform freedom (strong) - Inductive strength: Historical patterns predict AI impact on features (moderate) - Causal reasoning: Internal execution drives platform success more than competition (strong) - Analogical strength: WordPress/WooCommerce to Windows/Office comparison (moderate) #### Fallacies - Appeal to popularity: Using 8% market share as primary success metric - market share doesn't guarantee quality or future success - False dichotomy: Framing choice as purely "freedom vs. constraint" - many factors influence platform selection #### Tone of voice - Overall tone: Strategic and optimistic, balancing confidence with acknowledgment of challenges and competition ### 🛡️ DARVO Analysis - Deny: No defensive denials present - Attack: No attacks on competitors or critics - Reverse victim/offender: No victim/offender reversal - Emotional cues and rhetoric: Confident but collaborative tone, acknowledges competition strengths ## 🎯 Conclusion WooCommerce's future success depends more on execution and community collaboration than competitive feature battles. As AI democratizes development capabilities, the platform's open source foundation and extensible architecture become increasingly valuable differentiators. The focus should be on merchant experience optimization, developer education, and community-driven innovation rather than trying to match proprietary platforms feature-for-feature. ## 🧱 Refactor Appendix ### 📚 Literature Split Pad Purpose: Stage CEE units that become Literature notes. Split level: H3 ### [H1] Open source provides competitive advantage through freedom > [!quote] The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation --- ## Full Transcript [00:00] I'm Katie Keith, founder and CEO at Barn [00:03] 2. [00:04] >> And I'm James Kemp, core product manager [00:06] at Woo Commerce. Uh, and as you can see, [00:09] we we were going to do a fancy reveal, [00:12] but Matt is in the room already. So, our [00:15] special guest today is Matt Mulleng. Uh, [00:18] and we're going to be talking to him [00:19] about his vision for the future of Woo [00:21] Commerce. [00:23] >> Yeah. So, thank you, Matt, so much for [00:25] coming on. I'm sure that everybody [00:27] watching already knows who you are. So [00:30] could you introduce yourself in the [00:32] context of your work with Woo Commerce? [00:34] Because people know you're the CEO of [00:37] the company that Woo Commerce is now [00:39] part of, but they don't necessarily know [00:40] the details of your involvement and the [00:43] history of it. [00:45] >> Sure. So um gosh, yes, as you said, I'm [00:49] the CEO of Automatic and Woo Commerce is [00:51] one of the products of Automatic. Uh so [00:53] I work really closely with uh Bo Leens [00:55] who leads uh he's the artistic director [00:59] of the Woo Commerce maison. [01:02] We have some funny titles inside of [01:03] automatic. Um the uh gosh how it started [01:08] was um you know I always have thought [01:11] about WordPress as an operating system [01:13] and so uh I wanted to study like [01:16] previously successful operating systems [01:18] and so I read a lot of computer history [01:20] books and of course study the history of [01:22] Microsoft and I felt like WordPress was [01:25] our Windows you know we had the platform [01:28] but we hadn't yet found the killer app [01:30] on top of it the thing that both you [01:34] there's a ton of demand for and also [01:35] elevates the platform itself. So, um so [01:39] that was Microsoft Office for Windows, [01:41] right? Like when Office came along that [01:43] sort of like blew up Windows and um as I [01:47] so I just started like really digging [01:49] into the you know tens of thousands of [01:51] plugins and themes that were out there [01:54] and looking for trends and seeing what [01:56] people were using and like listening to [01:58] the community at work camps and things [01:59] like that. and commerce as a category [02:01] started to stand out and within that [02:03] category because there were a number of [02:05] commerce solutions. Woo Commerce um [02:08] really started to be like something yeah [02:11] I'd known about and automatic I had [02:12] actually looked at before but started to [02:15] take pretty seriously and um in I [02:18] believe 2015 you know we we reached an [02:21] agreement with the uh Woo founders to uh [02:24] have them you know acquire them and have [02:26] their team join. I think there were 43 [02:28] people at the time. The team was only a [02:31] few developers though. It was only like [02:32] three developers. [02:34] Um and uh honestly the some of the code [02:39] um wasn't as like performant or scalable [02:41] or other things but I was like okay well [02:43] automatic has like some of the best you [02:45] know engineers in the world. So we can [02:47] definitely fix all the engineering [02:49] stuff. Woo has nailed like the community [02:51] and the branding and the user experience [02:52] and all this other stuff which is [02:54] actually kind of harder. And so let's [02:56] bring the best of what we've learned [02:57] from building like WordPress, [02:59] WordPress.com, everything we've done at [03:01] Automatic and start to apply it, apply [03:04] that playbook to Woo. And u that was [03:07] 2015, so about a little over 10 years [03:09] ago. And it's been an exciting ride. I [03:11] think you know we don't talk about the [03:13] Woo stat as much, but I think it's [03:14] something like 8% of all websites in the [03:16] world now run Woo Commerce. [03:19] >> Wow. [03:21] >> Which is huge. Yeah. Uh yeah, I remember [03:23] the the 10 year anniversary. Uh [03:26] oh. Um, sorry. Yeah, I remember the 10 [03:30] year anniversary. Uh, I guess it was [03:32] last year now in 20125. Um, and a [03:35] surprising number of the the people who [03:38] came over with that acquisition was [03:40] still uh, you know, thriving and working [03:42] on Woo Commerce and in other areas of [03:45] automatic as well, which was nice to [03:46] see. [03:48] >> Yeah, the team hundreds of people now [03:50] obviously and [03:52] >> and the community has grown so so so [03:53] much. It's been very very exciting to uh [03:56] to be a part of and [03:59] um also it was humbling um much in the [04:02] same way I was humbled by Tumblr uh in [04:05] woo I was like oh you know we've been [04:07] doing this for a while how hard could [04:08] commerce be but commerce has like a [04:11] multiffactorial complexity [04:14] especially as you go international you [04:16] know with payments and shipping and [04:17] inventory and returns and like there's [04:20] there's so much because it it really [04:22] bridges for some stores, you know, the [04:24] physical and the digital world. [04:28] >> Yeah, for sure. And and there's so many [04:30] different combinations of, you know, [04:31] apps and plugins and things that people [04:33] are using, different hosting software [04:35] that that there's I couldn't imagine how [04:39] many different variations of WooCommerce [04:40] exist in the world. [04:41] >> No two are alike. [04:43] >> Exactly. Yeah. Um well, yeah, thanks to [04:47] everyone who has submitted questions [04:49] beforehand uh on social media for for [04:52] Matt. We're going to walk through a lot [04:54] of them and and see what you know Matt's [04:57] vision for the future of Woo Commerce [04:58] is. Uh and also feel free to ask any [05:02] additional questions as we're talking um [05:05] that you would like us to put forward to [05:07] Matt. [05:10] >> Yeah. And before we get into the Q&A, um [05:13] Do the Woo is essentially a new podcast. [05:16] It's part of the Open Channels network [05:18] um which is now much wider than just [05:20] Woo. So that's why we've relaunched Do [05:23] the Woo as a dedicated Woo Commerce [05:26] podcast within open channels. So that [05:28] means it has all of its own channels [05:30] like the YouTube and Apple and Spotify [05:32] and all of that. So wherever you watch [05:35] these things, please subscribe there um [05:37] and wherever you're watching now as [05:39] well. [05:42] >> Yeah. Uh we received a ton of questions [05:45] um which we're not going to be able to [05:46] get to all of them today, but what we [05:48] would like to do is uh put to Matt the [05:51] the most pressing uh questions that we [05:54] felt, you know, his his vision and input [05:56] would be great to hear. Uh and then Katy [05:59] and I and potentially someone else from [06:01] Woo Commerce will do a follow-up uh [06:03] episode in a few weeks to try and answer [06:06] the the remaining questions. [06:08] >> Cool. [06:09] >> Yeah. And we thought let's start with [06:11] Woo Commerce's competitive advantage and [06:14] the wider landscape that it sits in [06:16] because a lot of people are talking [06:17] about that and the big competitors that [06:20] are in the e-commerce world both within [06:22] and outside of WordPress. Now, um after [06:25] that we're going to talk about the user [06:27] experience of Woo Commerce, the [06:29] community, its features and priorities, [06:32] and finally we're going to ask Matt [06:34] about his long-term vision for it. So, [06:36] we're going to try and slot the live [06:38] questions into that structure. So, first [06:41] of all, we've got a question from Robin [06:42] Peterson from Food Plugins, which is, [06:45] "What is Woo Commerce's biggest [06:47] existential threat, internal or [06:50] external, and what are you doing about [06:52] it right now?" [06:53] >> H, [06:55] this is a good question. Um [06:59] so with a product like at the scale of [07:02] Woo Commerce um they're never actually [07:04] killed by competitors. So I would say [07:07] the biggest threat is is internal that [07:09] the that when products uh like that fail [07:12] it's always because of uh execution. [07:15] People think it's competitors but it's [07:17] it's not. Um so I would say the biggest [07:21] risk is um you know our ability to [07:24] execute against you know what we're [07:25] hearing from the community and what we [07:27] know that the software needs and the [07:29] roadmap. Um now the competitive [07:32] landscape is interesting. Uh certainly [07:34] it's um you know with a company like [07:36] Shopify and a product like Shopify um [07:39] forces us to really like bring our best [07:42] stuff because you know what Shopify is [07:45] really good. They're quite impressive [07:48] and they're, you know, six, seven [07:49] thousand people uh with a bajillion [07:52] dollars. Um, now some people might look [07:55] at that and say, "Oh, wow. You know, Woo [07:57] Commerce has no chance." But actually, [07:58] this sort of David versus Goliath thing [08:00] is exactly where WordPress was in like [08:02] 2008, 2009. [08:05] Um, you know, if if money was all you [08:07] needed to create great software, right? [08:09] Like we'd all be using Windows on our [08:13] phone. But you know it really like uh [08:16] software built for love not just money [08:18] and the community approach of something [08:20] like uh Woo Commerce uh can be very very [08:23] compelling. And then of course in 2026 [08:26] the first question you have to ask [08:27] yourself when you're choosing anything [08:29] is um am I choosing software which [08:32] increases my freedom or decreases my [08:34] freedom which is fun the question am I [08:36] choosing open source or not. So um [08:40] really before you look at any features [08:42] or anything else um I think you need to [08:45] choose like what how you'd like your [08:47] freedom scale to balance and what [08:49] direction you want to go there and open [08:51] source that what differentiates Woo [08:53] Commerce from you know others in the [08:55] market other great e-commerce things out [08:57] there e-commerce features on Wix or [08:59] Squarespace or Shopify or whatever there [09:01] is it increases your freedom and [09:04] especially in the age of AI Um, I think [09:08] feature different differentiations are [09:11] going to start to fade a little bit, [09:13] right? So, Shopify has a feature that [09:15] Woo Commerce doesn't have. Maybe before, [09:19] you know, you'd have to wait for the Woo [09:22] team to build it or someone to make a [09:23] plugin or something like that. But now [09:26] that obviously that cost is going down. [09:28] If you're pretty good with cloud code, [09:30] you could probably whip something up [09:32] yourself. And by the way, there's [09:34] thousands of other developers out there [09:36] using it. So, like I think we're going [09:38] to start to see sort of the the feature [09:40] differentiations between things start to [09:42] fade a little bit. And so, really what [09:44] you're choosing is a community, a [09:45] platform, and like I said, that freedom [09:49] stance. [09:52] >> Awesome. Yeah, that's a that's a good [09:54] answer. I think um the AI angle is is [09:58] going to change a lot of things. Uh and [10:00] it's moving very quickly and I think [10:02] those changes are just going to keep [10:04] compiling over the the coming year. So, [10:06] that'll be cool to see. [10:09] Um, the next question we have is from [10:12] Nick Mclarlin. Hopefully, I said his [10:14] surname right. Uh, he says, "What are [10:16] Woo Commerce's competitive advantages [10:18] and how do they set Woo up for success [10:21] in the next five years?" And I think [10:22] this touches on what you were just [10:25] saying about open source just then. [10:28] So, I'm going to repeat it. Biggest [10:31] competitive advantage is freedom. [10:33] If you care about freedom, if you want [10:35] more liberty, autonomy, if you want [10:37] sovereign software, um Woo is the best [10:41] e-commerce platform in the world to [10:42] provide that. And um the second I would [10:46] say is Woo's open and uh infinitely [10:51] extensible nature. [10:53] So, we're in an interesting period right [10:56] now where because you can kind of [10:58] oneshot generate software, you get kind [11:01] of this um [11:03] like it's incredible rush. Like if [11:05] you've done this with AI and you tell it [11:06] to make something or even like on TLE, [11:08] you tell it to make like a a Doom block [11:10] or something. You're like, "What just [11:11] happened? I just created Doom from some [11:14] words I typed in a box." Um and that is [11:18] very very exciting. However, I think [11:21] while there'll be like applications of [11:23] that, um I do feel like where we'll see [11:27] the plurality of usage and commerce and [11:31] interaction is going to be uh with [11:34] malleable software. And I apologize, [11:36] this isn't a term I came up with. I I [11:38] saw some designers say it. I'm [11:40] forgetting their name, but this idea [11:42] like malleable versus generated [11:44] software. So where you take something [11:46] that is already there that's you know [11:48] been built by humans and has the craft [11:51] and security and you know all the things [11:53] that come from the decades of [11:55] investments the you know tens of [11:58] thousands or hundreds of thousands maybe [12:00] at this point of person hours have been [12:02] built into the engineering the craft the [12:04] security and the platform of Woo and [12:06] then you you create malleable software [12:09] on top of that so you can customize it. [12:11] This is of course what makes WordPress [12:13] great and Woo Commerce as well is that [12:16] with the you know hooks and filters and [12:19] actions and everything you can you can [12:21] modify pretty much everything for better [12:24] and worse of course we know how this [12:25] creates complexity and everything like [12:27] that but ultimately I feel like that [12:30] that freedom and that creativity which [12:31] is enabled um just allows for faster [12:35] evolution [12:36] you know if you know for Shopify to get [12:40] better Toby has to have a good idea. And [12:42] I'm saying Toby as a standin for like [12:44] everyone at Shopify, right? Like I can't [12:47] ship a new feature to Shopify. [12:49] They have a platform as well, but it's [12:51] like more limited, right? Um, now for [12:54] Woo Commerce to get better now, I could [12:56] be the biggest idiot in the world. In [12:57] fact, I am. So, the beauty is that like, [13:01] you know, not just the Woo Commerce [13:02] developers, but everyone in the [13:03] community can make it better or just [13:05] make it better for them. This even be [13:07] better for everyone. And that sort of [13:09] personalization I think is um again the [13:12] question was the advantages. [13:15] So you know uh again there's reasons to [13:19] own to rent an apartment versus own a [13:21] house. Sometimes it's convenient and [13:24] it's nice to use something kind of off [13:25] the rack and if you fit into it but you [13:28] know more power to you. Actually, one of [13:30] my great blessings in life is I am very [13:33] much um a men's medium. [13:38] So, like I I can walk into a store and [13:40] pick up a suit. I had to the other day [13:42] um because I I was uh going to a funeral [13:44] so I didn't have a black suit. So, was [13:46] able to go in and get something off the [13:47] rack and it it fit quite well. I have [13:50] other friends who have different [13:52] proportions. You know, if they don't get [13:54] something tailored, it looks ridiculous [13:56] on them. Um, so if you can get the off [13:58] the rack, that's pretty cool. And if [14:01] you're happy with that, great. So off [14:03] therackck software can be fun, but at [14:06] the moment that you need any [14:08] personalization or you want it to be [14:09] more better fit to you and tailored, um, [14:12] that's when I think open source really [14:13] starts to shine and a platform like Woo [14:16] Commerce um, gets there. Now, what do we [14:19] need to get better at and maybe this is [14:20] existential threat is education. You [14:23] know, I think one of the biggest [14:24] opportunities for WordPress annual [14:26] commerce is education. And that's why [14:28] I'm so excited about like the WordPress [14:30] uh education credits program. You know, [14:32] what we're I'm I'm calling 26 the year [14:35] of the meetup. Actually, going to be [14:37] doing a ton to enable meetups to make [14:39] meetups better, to get meetup organizers [14:42] better uh you know, material and support [14:44] and everything like that. And of course, [14:46] media mediates ladder into work camps, [14:48] which as we know are part of the magic [14:50] of the whole WordPress community. Um, [14:53] but really what that fundamentally is is [14:54] like there's this I'm sorry this is a [14:57] long answer but we're probably hitting a [14:59] few other questions as well that I read. [15:01] Um, when you think about it [15:03] fundamentally [15:07] spreads, it's usually like a see do [15:11] teach, right? That's kind of the three [15:14] things that that are exciting. You see [15:16] something that's exciting to you. it's a [15:19] store or someone making something or [15:21] someone doing something. You're like, [15:22] "Oh, I could do that." This is how I got [15:26] started blogging, right? There are all [15:28] these blogs out there. I was like, "Oh, [15:30] this is just a normal dude like me. [15:32] Like, I could blog." I thought to have a [15:34] website or to publish, you had to be [15:36] like a journalist or like, you know, [15:38] have certifications [15:40] um or an editor. And it turns out, no, [15:43] I'm dating myself, but in like early [15:45] 2000s, like this was an innovative idea [15:47] that anyone could start a blog. And so, [15:50] um, having people see what they can do [15:53] with Woo Commerce is really, really [15:54] important. That's why things like the [15:55] showcase and demos are great. Um, then [15:58] you do it yourself, right? That's the [16:00] next level, which is very exciting. So, [16:02] you kind of learn from that what you saw [16:04] and you do it yourself. And then the [16:05] final where you reach like ultimate [16:08] status is when you teach someone else to [16:09] do it, right? when you pass it on and [16:12] when you think about it like WordPress [16:13] and Woo Commerce even hasn't grown [16:15] because like our competitors we've spent [16:17] billions of dollars on marketing you [16:19] know it's grown because of that see do [16:23] teach which is also kind of like word of [16:26] mouth you know um I'm sure many people [16:30] listening here can imagine what their [16:32] introduction to WordPress or Woo [16:34] Commerce was and it might have been you [16:37] just came across the website and figured [16:39] it all about yourself. But for a lot of [16:41] people, you probably had a friend or [16:44] maybe an influencer online who said, [16:45] "Hey, look at this. Check this out." And [16:48] that was your entree into the community. [16:52] >> Yeah. Well, you've talked about the [16:54] open-source side of things. So, that [16:57] leads us into a question that somebody [16:59] else had, which is about the [17:01] relationship uh between like Woo [17:03] Commerce and people choosing other [17:05] WordPress plugins that also are [17:07] obviously open source. So, Rulo from [17:10] Business Bloomer and Checkout um summit. [17:13] I don't know why I've written e-commerce [17:14] there. Um says, "What can we learn from [17:17] Shorecart, Fluent Cart, ED, and the [17:19] other e-commerce plugins given, I [17:21] suppose, that they equally have that [17:23] freedom of open source?" [17:26] >> Oh, well, the beauty of that is, you [17:28] know, what we can learn is they can also [17:30] exchange code. They can use Woo Commerce [17:33] code and Woo Commerce could use their [17:35] code. Um, so I think that, you know, [17:39] being able to be inspired and share and, [17:42] you know, between products is like part [17:44] of what accelerates the cycle of [17:46] innovation. [17:50] >> So if there's something specific, I [17:51] don't don't have anything specific to [17:52] say about any of those particular [17:54] products except that I'm really glad [17:56] they exist. [17:58] >> Yeah, every uh every vote. [18:03] Um I wanted to touch on uh your point [18:06] earlier about [18:09] um just the extensibility of of Woo [18:11] Commerce and you know that being one of [18:14] the main reasons that people would want [18:16] to choose it um is the kind of [18:19] flexibility and the freedom you have to [18:22] not only build on top of it but [18:23] contribute code to it. Um that's [18:26] something that we're really focusing on [18:28] uh at Woo Commerce is you know making [18:31] this the the platform the the the [18:33] underlying code of Woo Commerce to be [18:36] very uh [18:40] it should have all of the the base [18:42] features that you you would expect and [18:45] you know work in a consistent way that [18:47] you can extend on top of. So if someone [18:49] chooses uh one person's [18:52] uh you know bulk editor plugin, they [18:54] could easily switch to another one and [18:55] it would it would work in this in a [18:57] similar way with the underlying um logic [19:00] being the same. So that kind of ability [19:03] to choose to pick and choose which uh [19:06] extensions you use on top of Woo [19:08] Commerce um is something that we want to [19:10] make very reliable uh for for the people [19:14] installing WordPress and and using [19:16] WordPress and WooCommerce. [19:18] Um so yeah, I just wanted to touch on [19:21] that. But moving on to user experience, [19:24] we have a question here from Ian. Uh, [19:27] and I know he he said online how to say [19:29] his surname, and it's not how I how I [19:31] would say it. I think [19:32] >> it's Meisner, not Mizner. Meisner. [19:35] >> Ian Mesner from Kestrel WP. Um, he has [19:38] asked if a midsized retailer, say doing [19:41] around $5 million a year, lands on [19:44] WooCommerce.com, [19:46] what is the ideal path for them to get [19:48] started, and what are the biggest [19:50] obstacles? [19:54] >> Ah, that's a good question. Um [19:58] well I guess kind of the first fork in [20:00] the road there would be you know do it [20:03] myself versus do it for me. [20:06] So um you know hopefully at [20:10] woocommerce.com they they get excited [20:12] about the possibilities of the platform [20:13] and see examples of stores like them [20:15] that are very successful or increase [20:17] their business or increase their [20:18] conversions by you know utilizing some [20:20] of the things on there. Um and uh you [20:24] know so either they go the direction of [20:27] like going to one of the partner web [20:29] host which are not just automatic ones [20:31] by the way we point to others and and [20:33] get signed up with uh you know Woo [20:35] Commerce configured and everything like [20:36] that and they can start to go through [20:37] the configuring Woo Commerce process. [20:41] Um, you know, I'll be the first to admit [20:43] that that's a a bit heavier than the [20:45] WordPress process. And so, um, someone [20:49] will have to have some motivation. Now, [20:51] I'll also say that AI is raising, [20:55] uh, people's ability to make it through [20:57] these things, right? Because they just [20:59] put a a, you know, chat GBT window next [21:01] to it and say, I'm stuck. What do I do? [21:04] or gosh, even now we're having the [21:06] browsers that have these AI agents built [21:08] in which I talked about at um work [21:10] campus US and state of the word and so [21:13] like you can actually have the AI just [21:15] kind of like watch it do stuff for you. [21:17] You can say build me this and it'll [21:19] start to like navigate Woo Commerce and [21:21] do and do it and then you can see it do [21:23] it which is also kind of like again [21:26] making that do-it-yourself path way more [21:28] accessible. [21:30] Um, so [21:33] pre-I would have said probably 95% of [21:37] the time they go to a a developer or [21:39] consultants [21:41] and you know we we link to some great [21:43] things there. We have agency partners. [21:45] as great platforms like Codable and of [21:47] course the you know the big ones like [21:48] Upwork and everything like it's you know [21:50] one of the great things about the [21:51] WordPress and WCommerce community is [21:52] there's like so many people who are [21:54] fluent in it and so you can really find [21:57] someone who's who's a great match for [21:58] you whether that's in your language or [22:00] in your country or whatever it is that's [22:02] like important to you or they have a [22:03] portfolio that matches what you want to [22:05] build. Um you know there's there's a [22:08] great kind of ecosystem that two-sided [22:09] marketplace. Um so that would be one [22:13] possible path. That percentage is [22:15] probably [22:17] um going to come down in terms of total [22:19] numbers but I think the total demand for [22:23] third party developers is going to go up [22:25] right. So maybe let's say I AI makes it [22:28] so uh only you know let's just say half [22:33] so half of people can do it themselves [22:35] versus hiring a developer. So you think [22:38] okay if there's if there were obviously [22:39] a finite number of woo stores being [22:41] created that would mean less work for [22:42] third party developers but actually [22:44] what's going to happen is there'll be [22:46] more demand for stores being created in [22:48] general and so you know there might be [22:51] some dips and valleys in there but um [22:53] ultimately like if I go out 10 years [22:56] there's going to be way more like woo [22:58] jobs than there are today. [23:01] Yeah, I totally agree that it's a big [23:04] benefit of Woo, how many people are [23:06] fluent in it. Um, for example, we use [23:09] easy digital downloads on the barn 2 [23:11] site and it can be very difficult when [23:13] we need to find an expert um or hire [23:16] somebody that's already experienced in [23:18] that. With Woo, it's really, really [23:20] easy. There are so many people that have [23:22] all different skill levels, all [23:24] different price ranges, so you can find [23:26] an expert that easily. Um, which brings [23:29] us on to the community section where we [23:32] have another question from Ian who asks, [23:35] "What does healthy collaboration look [23:37] like between the platform and the [23:39] community?" [23:42] >> Oh, um, I think it looks like what Woo [23:44] has done for the past 10 years and [23:46] before even the acquisition. You know, I [23:49] I always say um I usually say this for [23:52] WordPress, but I think it applies to Woo [23:54] equally. Well, its success [23:57] has been predicated on how closely it um [24:02] it has that collaboration with the [24:03] community, what that looks like. And um [24:08] gosh, there's so many examples of things [24:10] like I talk about Wapu. I would have [24:11] never approved Wapu [24:14] and how amazing is like Wapu for the [24:15] WordPress community like that that is [24:17] something that like comes up from the [24:19] community. Um, you know, the the cool [24:22] thing about open source is that like, [24:24] you know, community happens whether you [24:26] want it to or not, [24:29] right? people because people just [24:31] publish plugins or fork the software [24:32] whatever happen like so you kind of get [24:35] um one thing I love about open source is [24:38] that it kind of uh forces you if you're [24:41] the the the steward of the software it [24:43] keeps you honest you know because it's [24:45] very natural market forces that um you [24:48] know if unless you're like the most [24:50] stubborn person in the world or blind [24:51] you'll just like wake up one day and be [24:52] like okay everyone's using this plugin [24:54] we should just build it into whatever it [24:56] is that that's happening or every time I [24:57] go to work camp 10 people tell me So, [25:00] you know, those sorts of things. Um, so [25:03] what that looks like in the future is, [25:06] uh, [25:09] you know, if I had to say something I'd [25:10] like to see more of this year in terms [25:12] of collaboration is I'd love to see more [25:14] talks at work camps around Woo Commerce. [25:17] Um, I'd love to see more either [25:19] dedicated Woo Commerce meetups, which [25:21] you know, Woo Commerce does have its own [25:22] meetup.com thing. um or like topics like [25:26] how do we you know teach more broader [25:29] WordPress developers like how they can [25:31] learn Woo and how that actually probably [25:34] increases their economic value in the [25:36] marketplace, right? Um one nice thing [25:40] about working in the e-commerce world, [25:43] like we said there's a store that's [25:44] making 5 million bucks a year. [25:47] um [25:49] they're making, let's say they're making [25:50] 5 million bucks a year from their [25:51] website, like they're going to want, you [25:53] know, feel comfortable investing in [25:55] that. So, if you think of what that [25:57] threshold is versus like, you know, [26:00] someone else building a website, a [26:01] coffee shop, you're building a website [26:02] for their coffee shop, they're making [26:04] most of the money from people coming [26:05] through the door. The website's nice to [26:06] have, but that, you know, of their [26:08] revenue, how much will they spend? [26:10] >> It's called half a percent, 1% on the [26:12] website. or like an e-commerce store, [26:15] both the revenue might be higher, but [26:16] also like the percent they're willing to [26:17] reinvest into their infrastructure and [26:19] their website and development and [26:20] customization and everything is um [26:23] probably much higher hosting. You know, [26:25] they they'll want to pay for more [26:26] performant hosting and invest in those [26:27] things. So, um uh you know, we track uh [26:32] 30 something billion of GMV happening [26:35] through Woo Commerce and actual numbers [26:37] higher than that because we don't we're [26:38] not able to track everything. So when [26:41] you imagine like the economic [26:42] opportunity for doing things in the [26:44] WordPress ecosystem, it's pretty huge. [26:48] I would say bigger than WordPress [26:50] actually. [26:52] >> Yeah, for sure. I I think it touches on [26:54] a point why um I've always said, you [26:57] know, I I started as a a WooCommerce [26:59] plug-in developer. Uh, and I chose that [27:03] route because the types of clients we [27:05] were getting were the ones that had [27:07] money to spend on this stuff because [27:09] their store relied on uh, you know, [27:12] transactions going through it. Um, and [27:14] and that's how I kind of fell into the [27:16] the e-commerce side of things. Uh, so [27:18] it's definitely true that it's a it's a [27:21] profitable area of WordPress and and of [27:24] any like online business, I would say. [27:28] Um I'll touch quickly on the the healthy [27:31] collaboration as well because there's [27:32] there's a couple of projects where we [27:34] have collaborate uh collaborated last [27:37] year. Um one being the accessibility [27:41] project that we had uh for Woo Commerce. [27:43] We collaborated with Equalized Digital. [27:46] Um, and that was just a case of, you [27:48] know, uh, myself and Amber getting in [27:51] touch and [27:53] talking about what what that might look [27:55] like and and that's, you know, came to [27:57] fruition. Woo Commerce is now fully [27:59] accessible, which is awesome on the [28:00] front end. Um, another example is we [28:04] worked with Becca at Kestrel um, on [28:08] scoping out what uh, shipping [28:11] fulfillments might look like in Woo [28:13] Commerce. And that is also a feature [28:15] that uh Becca heavily helped to, you [28:19] know, scope out what they've been [28:21] hearing from customers and and clients [28:24] uh around what people want. Uh and that [28:27] work is now also in in WooCommerce Core [28:30] uh behind a feature flag, but it's it's [28:31] there to be used and tested. Um so I'd [28:35] love to see more stuff like that. Just [28:36] more more collaboration of what people [28:38] are seeing uh in the ecosystem. Um, and [28:42] you know, just putting that out there to [28:44] to someone like me or any other products [28:47] person uh at Woo Commerce so we can talk [28:50] about it. Uh, GitHub is a a great place [28:52] to do that. [28:54] Um, the next question you actually [28:56] touched on already uh was from Rulo and [28:59] he said, "Is there going to be any more [29:01] uh WooCommer or is there going to be [29:02] more WooCommerce coverage at flagship [29:04] word camps?" Uh, it sounds like you [29:06] think there should be. [29:08] >> Oh, should is is relative. So if people [29:11] want it, they will be. So I would say [29:14] like, you know, be the change you want [29:15] to see in the world. If you want more [29:16] WooCommerce at work camps, um if you are [29:19] listening to this podcast, you probably [29:20] could be a speaker. So, you know, make [29:23] the pitch and uh if you're, you know, [29:25] helping to organize a word a word camp [29:28] um you know, understand your audience [29:31] obviously like look at who's coming and [29:33] and I do think that with you know, [29:36] almost a quarter of all WordPress [29:37] websites using Woo Commerce like you [29:40] know maybe something like a quarter of [29:43] sessions at work camp should be about [29:45] Woo Commerce or commerce more broadly. [29:47] Like you said there's other solutions as [29:48] well. Um, I think that's great. As long [29:52] as things are open source, they're [29:54] welcome at word camps. [29:56] >> Yeah. Well, that's what I would have [29:58] thought. The last few flagship word [30:00] camps that I've been to, I have [30:02] submitted a talk about e-commerce or Woo [30:04] Commerce. I've tried both. And a talk [30:07] about myself, like my story, and my [30:09] story is always the one that's been [30:12] accepted. Like, um, word come I think [30:15] Asia last year, but there's been three [30:16] or four. and nobody accepts my [30:18] e-commerce talks, which I think are [30:20] really interesting. So, I'm a bit [30:23] concerned about why that is because all [30:25] the data you said is totally correct [30:27] about how many sites use Woo Commerce [30:30] and e-commerce generally. That's where [30:32] the money is. And yet, I am finding it [30:34] really hard to spread the word about Woo [30:37] Commerce and e-commerce at word camps. [30:40] And I don't know why that is. [30:42] >> Well, Katie, your story is really good. [30:45] So, [30:46] >> but everyone's heard it. I think [30:49] e-commerce is more interesting these [30:50] days. [30:51] >> Okay. Well, then don't submit it and [30:53] just submit the e-commerce or submit it [30:55] and then when do a little bait and [30:57] switch when it's like my story actually [30:59] turn it into a e-commerce talk. [31:01] >> Yeah. But yeah, I agree that's [31:03] definitely needed. Um, whoever does the [31:05] talks, there should be much more [31:07] representation at word camps. [31:09] >> Well, and I'll keep that in mind. You [31:11] know, I the work camp I'm most active in [31:14] choosing the content for is is work camp [31:15] US. So, as that comes around and I look [31:18] at things, I'll I'll I'll keep that in [31:20] mind. [31:21] >> Yeah. [31:22] >> Awesome. [31:24] >> So, the next group of questions are [31:25] about the features and upcoming [31:28] priorities of Woo Commerce. So, the [31:30] first one there was from Ian again. Woo [31:33] Commerce has intentionally serve [31:35] merchants, product builders, and [31:37] agencies. Are their goals and targets [31:39] aligned to those segments and how are [31:42] they they prioritized? [31:45] >> Merchants, product builders, and [31:46] agencies [31:48] um yes uh there are goals tied to each [31:51] one of those. How are they prioritized? [31:54] Um [31:55] off the dome, not certain right now. Um [32:00] James might be able to answer this [32:01] better, but those are I would say some [32:04] of the big personas that as we build [32:07] things in Woo uh you try to well often [32:11] sometimes when we build things it [32:13] addresses all of them but you know as we [32:15] make it more usable or something like [32:16] that like that benefits everyone but uh [32:19] yeah there's definitely been some I [32:20] would say some more specific outreach [32:23] around like growing the agency program [32:25] or other things like that. Um, I also [32:29] saw a feedback that there's work camps [32:31] might not want pitches for a specific [32:33] product. I think I [32:36] agree and I would say that once a [32:38] product also becomes a platform itself [32:40] like WordPress and if you go to the [32:42] WordPress plugins directory, there's [32:44] hundreds or thousands of WooCommerce [32:46] plugins, it's okay, you know, you know, [32:49] once it becomes not just about itself [32:50] but actually something that a lot of [32:51] people can build on, that's uh, okay. [32:56] >> Interesting. Yeah. Yeah, that's a fair [32:58] point. You you don't want to promote a [33:00] specific product, I guess, but um yeah, [33:02] I mean, Woo Commerce is is huge at this [33:05] point, so deserves to be talked about [33:07] >> and people want solutions. So, [33:10] >> yeah, exactly. Yeah. [33:11] >> Yeah. [33:12] >> I I've always found that on on Reddit [33:14] actually, they they block a lot of uh [33:16] comments when you provide a solution to [33:18] the question because it looks like [33:20] promotion, but actually it solves the [33:22] the issue that they were having. [33:24] etc. [33:26] >> often a product does. Yeah. [33:28] >> Yeah. [33:28] >> So, we've got a couple of follow-up [33:31] comments in of people watching live [33:33] about the word count we discussion. So, [33:36] let's do that before we move on to more [33:38] presubmitted questions. [33:39] >> So, um Dave has said suggested next [33:44] flagship a separate room for e-commerce. [33:46] I would love to see that. That would [33:48] make a lot of sense actually. [33:51] >> That would be cool to see. [33:52] >> Yeah. Uh, you know what? I'll tease [33:54] something as well, which is um this [33:57] could be an interesting year to have a [33:59] dedicated woo event again. [34:03] >> Yeah. Well, we got a couple of [34:05] independent events popping up, which is [34:07] interesting. So, we've just had well, it [34:09] was kind of I think Word Camp affiliated [34:11] e-commerce day for WordPress in Porto, [34:14] which James and I uh both spoke at, and [34:17] then we've got Checkout Summit in Sicily [34:19] in April. So, it's interesting to see [34:22] that um community interest is growing in [34:25] the e-commerce side of things and [34:26] Checkout Summit is specifically Woo [34:28] Commerce rather than e-commerce as well. [34:31] Um so, I am liking that direction. [34:34] >> There hasn't been a WooCom in the few [34:36] years and I think this would be a cool [34:37] year to see another one. [34:40] >> Yeah. And we got a comment from Brent. [34:43] >> Oh, this is what I addressed earlier. [34:44] This is the one I was responding to. [34:46] >> Oh, okay. If it's a platform and there's [34:48] like hundreds of plugins in the [34:50] directory on top of it, I think that [34:52] that sort of it's a spectrum, but that's [34:54] where it makes it a little bit more [34:55] okay, I would say, to talk about or a [34:57] lot more okay to talk about a specific, [35:00] you know, plugin or solution or things. [35:05] >> Awesome. Was that all the the questions [35:07] that you had, Katie? [35:08] >> Yeah. [35:09] >> Cool. [35:11] Um, I think it's worth touching on the [35:13] prioritization uh point because I I [35:16] think I can speak to that a bit more. [35:18] Um, one of the focuses this year will be [35:23] that every release should have something [35:27] beneficial for each one of those target [35:28] groups of people. um and and to more [35:31] clearly, you know, uh put that out there [35:34] in in in writing like this this feature [35:36] or this uh enhancement is specifically [35:39] targeted at this group of uh people or [35:42] group of users. Um so I think we'll [35:45] definitely see a lot more of that this [35:48] year. Uh which which will be great to [35:50] see. [35:52] Um, we have a question from [35:57] Ian. [35:59] >> Of course, [36:00] >> our list of questions are all from Ian. [36:02] Uh, if developer resources were not a [36:04] constraint, what would you do? So, what [36:07] would you uh what would unlock the [36:09] biggest leap forward? Uh, so if you had [36:11] unlimited developer resources, where [36:14] would you put them? [36:17] >> That is a really good question. And Ian, [36:19] I'll say that it's very pressured with [36:23] this idea of intelligence being on tap [36:26] with AI agents. You know, we're seeing [36:32] if if you're listening to this and you [36:34] haven't been clawed code pill yet, [36:37] take some time. Nothing else from this [36:39] podcast. Take some time, go through some [36:41] tutorials, install claw code. By the [36:44] way, it's not just for code. You can use [36:46] it for other files on your computer. You [36:48] can use it with your notes. You can use [36:49] it with so much. Um, I saw some crazy [36:53] stuff with it being hooked up to [36:54] Playground and Beeper today. Like you [36:56] can do some really, really neat things. [36:59] Um, and that kind of is an un unlimited [37:03] developer resource in some ways that we [37:06] haven't seen. And it is the 1.0 version [37:12] and the capabilities that are coming out [37:14] this year as the new Nvidia chips come [37:17] online. all the new data centers you [37:19] heard about um get built, you know, [37:23] especially some of the Elon Musk stuff [37:25] which is moving very quickly, but also [37:27] the investments from Google, Meta, [37:28] everyone like Anthropic, like we're [37:31] going to see some, if you thought last [37:33] year was exciting from AI point of view, [37:36] I think this will actually be the year [37:39] that is a little more jaw-dropping. [37:42] So, January 14th, mark my words there. [37:46] Um, [37:48] >> to touch on the the Claude code, um, [37:51] they they just released in the Claude [37:54] desktop app, uh, something called Claude [37:56] Co-work, which is Claude Code under the [37:59] hood. You you set it up, uh, you choose [38:01] a folder to run it in. Uh, and it runs [38:04] in exactly the same way as Claude code, [38:05] but it's a lot less um, a lot less [38:08] technical. you know, it's not it's not a [38:10] CLI based uh interface, which is um very [38:15] useful for, you know, non-codebased [38:18] work where Claude code seemingly excels, [38:22] which I I don't think was the [38:23] expectation when they released it. Um so [38:26] yeah, definitely worth checking out, but [38:27] it is on. [38:29] So [38:30] >> yeah, [38:30] >> this also, you know, back to the [38:32] brilliance of Ian's question is it's [38:33] almost like the hitchhiker's guide to [38:34] the galaxy thing. Like the answer when [38:37] you can have any answer like the what [38:39] you ask and what you build is really [38:40] important. [38:42] And so [38:44] um you know I would pick [38:49] uh I mean honestly I would pick what Woo [38:51] Commerce's roadmap is because that was [38:54] kind of the you know it's not that we [38:55] have unlimited developer resources but [38:57] we do have you know a pretty active [38:59] process of the hundreds of people who [39:01] work on Woo Commerce and the investments [39:03] uh that are happening into the [39:06] scalability [39:07] um you know the sort of idea of of the [39:10] the interface [39:11] being more radically accessible and kind [39:14] of unifying some of the things that are [39:16] right now like sort of some classical [39:18] WordPress interfaces but could be like [39:20] maybe like reduce people's clicks um [39:23] reduce kind of the friction they have [39:24] when they're running the store dayto-day [39:27] um you know the earlier you know there [39:29] was a mention of merchants like I say [39:31] very much the merchant experience is on [39:33] my minds and sort of like if you're [39:35] running a store every day what what do [39:37] you do 10 times or 100 times and how can [39:40] we make that like a little bit smoother, [39:42] you know, and again, every click you can [39:44] remove, every sort of like way you can [39:46] sand the edges of that experience um [39:48] multiplies, right? Because people are [39:50] doing it hundreds of times a day [39:51] themselves and of course millions of [39:53] times a day across the WooCommerce [39:55] WooCommerce system. Um checkouts already [39:58] getting a lot better, but of course [40:00] anything in the checkout is a multiplier [40:02] for the uh for our ecosystem. Um [40:07] it's already there. There's probably [40:09] some things in stripe link or shop [40:11] checkout that we don't match yet and um [40:15] for some stores or some geographies and [40:17] so that could be improved. Uh for main [40:20] ones like US stuff I think it's pretty [40:22] parody now in terms of conversions. Um [40:26] performance you can always be faster. [40:29] Always be faster. There's no one who [40:31] says I would love this website to load [40:32] slower. [40:36] >> Yeah. Well, that brings us quite nicely [40:38] to the next question, which is what are [40:41] the top milestones Woo Commerce will [40:43] deliver in 2026, which is from Robin. [40:46] >> James, I feel like we should point to a [40:48] Woo Commerce blog post or something [40:49] here. Like, is there like an official [40:50] resource? I don't I don't want to. Yeah, [40:53] I mean Bo actually published um I I [40:57] believe it was late last year and I'm [40:58] sure Brent in the the comments will be [41:00] able to drop a link in but his vision [41:03] for 2026 uh for for Woo Commerce which [41:07] is something that you know we're really [41:10] sticking to and I think one of the [41:14] so the quality is is high on the list um [41:18] performance is high on the list uh [41:20] builder experience is high on the list [41:23] as well as merchant experience which is [41:25] always high on the list. Uh and also I [41:27] think you know evolving with the AI um [41:31] ecosystem as as it moves and just [41:34] adapting to that integrating [41:37] uh things like the the Stripe uh Agentic [41:40] Commerce protocol and the the new Google [41:43] uh UCP [41:45] uh protocol uh that they announced and [41:48] just really working and refining those [41:51] experiences uh are always top of mind. [41:55] Uh hopefully Brent can drop in a link to [41:58] the relevant blog post from B. Um but [42:01] yeah that that's that should be [42:04] sufficient I would I would have thought. [42:07] >> Yeah you mentioned the builder [42:08] experience. We've got a live comment [42:10] from um Jerry who says is there any road [42:13] map for the block editor on the single [42:15] product? [42:18] there has been a lot of so I guess the [42:21] block there's two ways you could uh [42:23] understand this question one is kind of [42:27] using the the new interface uh what we [42:30] call data forms as as the the interface [42:33] for the the product editor which is one [42:36] one experience and that replaces the [42:38] whole uh experience of the product [42:39] editor uh and the other one is the the [42:43] block editor existing as a way to update [42:46] the product description [42:48] which the way I read that question is is [42:51] more in line with that. Um, [42:53] >> yeah, I think so. Like creating [42:55] multicolumn layouts with blocks and [42:57] things like that for the product page [42:59] instead of just the template based [43:01] layout we're used to. [43:03] >> Yeah. Yeah, and I would say there's no [43:05] official road map, but it's something [43:07] that for me is is high priority to to [43:10] dig into like I that experience of using [43:13] the editor to customize your product [43:14] pages um is just awesome. Like it's it's [43:19] much more flexible and and impressive [43:21] than you know a standard text editor. Um [43:25] Matt, I don't know if you had any [43:27] thoughts on that. [43:28] >> No, it sounds good. [43:31] I apologize. I I am not the like [43:35] biggest Woo Commerce expert in the [43:37] world, which is funny. I'm Thank you for [43:38] having me start your show. Um I think [43:42] about it a lot more from the uh [43:44] >> sort of like broader ecosystem and the [43:47] strategy and the like those are sorts of [43:49] things I can speak to probably a little [43:50] more or like the future of like [43:52] development and computing and those [43:54] sorts of things. But for a specific like [43:56] question like that, I think James is a [43:58] much better person to answer or B if he [44:00] was here. Yeah, agreed. There was quite [44:03] a lot of questions um that were really [44:05] specific that when we went through them, [44:07] we thought actually we've got James the [44:10] core product manager as a host. We don't [44:12] need where for for this interview we [44:15] wanted to go high level and talk about [44:16] the wider vision and the future bigger [44:19] picture stuff. So that's what we were [44:21] expecting [44:22] >> and sorry about that for the audience [44:24] but that you know there either James or [44:26] like other guests I think could do some [44:28] more of those like super deep dives. So, [44:30] think of this as just like the the [44:32] appetizer for do the woo. [44:34] >> Tune in episodes to go much much deeper. [44:39] >> Yeah, I think it's just uh you know, [44:41] really great to hear what what you [44:43] envision uh e-commerce or Woo Commerce [44:46] could be. Um so, I I think we've touched [44:49] on that quite a lot, which is [44:50] >> I did see a few questions come in about [44:52] UCP. So, um I'll speak to that. And [44:55] someone was like, why won't you part of [44:56] the announcement or whatever that is? [44:58] >> Um oh, there we go. [45:00] Yeah. Any update on UCP which just [45:03] Google recently launched. How will Woo [45:05] Commerce move forwards with this? [45:08] >> So I mean without speaking specifically [45:10] to UCP I will say that it is funny given [45:14] how much bigger and more money they have [45:16] that Shopify is is kind of scared of [45:17] WooCommerce. So often they will [45:20] negotiate to be sort of an exclusive day [45:24] of launch announcement. And if you [45:26] notice with like the Stripe stuff, I [45:28] mean, we were there on day one, but it [45:30] didn't get announced a few days later. [45:33] Um, or if they just negotiated to like [45:35] for us to find out about when everyone [45:36] else does, like, you know, it'll come [45:38] really quickly. So, um, don't worry [45:41] about that. It'll all be supported. Uh, [45:43] the second thing I'll say though is [45:44] that, um, and there was an article in [45:47] the information about this a few days [45:48] ago, is that these things are not being [45:51] used at all. [45:53] It's very telling that almost a year [45:55] after some of the stuff was first [45:56] announced, um there have been almost no [46:01] uh no one talking about how many [46:04] transactions have gone through this [46:08] and it was like a headline feature at [46:10] like the Stripe conference and the [46:11] Shopify thing and all this sort of [46:12] stuff. The CEOs are there and it's [46:14] moving the stock prices and like so it's [46:16] it's very interesting. This happens in [46:18] software kind of frequently is [46:19] occasionally there's something that [46:21] everyone's like oh that is the best idea [46:22] ever in the world and it gets a ton of [46:24] hype and a ton of everything and then [46:27] once it kind of lands in the world users [46:31] are like nope doesn't fit or there's [46:34] something there's something missing. [46:35] Now, I'm not saying that agenda commerce [46:38] 10 years from now won't be like a [46:39] double- digit percentage of commerce or [46:41] something like, you know, [46:43] we'll probably figure this out, but it [46:46] might also be, you know, the Google [46:48] Glass or one of these things that you [46:50] can put a bajillion dollars into and and [46:52] it seems like the coolest idea, but like [46:54] when it meets the reality of real world, [46:57] there's something about it that just [46:58] kind of like doesn't make it gel. [47:02] >> Yeah, I agree. There's some barriers [47:04] that are going to put people off. Um, [47:07] things like buying in AI. Well, how [47:10] about buying multiple things in order to [47:12] get free shipping. Just having one [47:13] product recommended isn't that relevant. [47:16] James and I discussed this in in the Q&A [47:18] at e-commerce day that um there's a few [47:21] things that need to really change about [47:23] the nature of people shopping before it [47:25] gets that widespread adoption. [47:28] And in the information article, I found [47:29] it very fascinating because with Woo, [47:31] you know, some of the stuff is a little [47:33] tricky to support and because we don't [47:35] host every Woo store in the world. So [47:37] providing like a universal catalog for [47:39] every Woo product in the world, it's [47:40] like kind of tricky. I mean, there's [47:42] ways to do it. Uh certainly if they sync [47:44] with jetpack or if we build some sort of [47:46] crawler or opt-in thing like we can [47:49] centralize some stuff but um it turns [47:52] out even Shopify who I would assume this [47:54] was much easier for has huge data issues [47:58] and it's because people run their stores [48:00] in different ways. They might say [48:02] something is in stock when it's really [48:03] not. Or there might be different [48:04] shipping variations. Or there might be, [48:06] you know, there's just different ways [48:08] that people show product variations when [48:11] they might not exist. You know, there's [48:12] all sorts of stuff out there that [48:13] apparently even for Shopify, which host [48:16] and has all the data. You know, it's all [48:17] on their servers. Um, sort of [48:20] normalizing it in a way that's [48:23] accessible to the users in a way that's [48:25] also useful and accurate and true. um [48:27] inside the chat interface has been a [48:30] bigger challenge than certainly I would [48:32] have imagined. So that's been something [48:33] surprising to me as well. Um the [48:36] information is like a paid site. Uh but [48:39] maybe someone can like actually someone [48:41] should I'm surprised a WordPress news [48:43] site hasn't covered this yet. So um [48:45] maybe request for a blog post for [48:48] someone to to summarize some of the [48:49] stuff from that information article. And [48:51] um yeah. [48:54] >> Yeah. Yeah, I think another another [48:56] point to consider is just how quickly [48:59] AI is evolving. Um to to kind of set a [49:03] standard protocol now is challenging but [49:07] you know a worthy uh exploration for [49:10] sure. Um but yeah, our teams are digging [49:12] into both uh ACP and UCP. Um and I'm [49:18] sure if you keep an eye on the developer [49:20] blog that we will have some information [49:22] about that very soon. If I had to make a [49:26] bet [49:28] um well I guess I will a prediction it's [49:32] uh the amount of commerce that will [49:34] happen from people just in a chat [49:37] interface [49:39] versus the amount of commerce that will [49:42] happen from AI agents driving browsers [49:47] and so using the normal website the [49:50] normal human interface but some of that [49:53] might be more like autofill might be [49:54] better with AI or finding the product or [49:56] navigating the site like those sorts of [49:58] things. Maybe even discovery of the [50:00] product might be driven by the AI. That [50:04] second part will be way way way bigger. [50:06] >> Yeah, [50:08] discovery is an interesting one because [50:10] that I always use AI now to recommend [50:14] products to me. Um, but it's still it's [50:18] still not great. So I use Claude most of [50:20] the time and it's still not great at [50:22] actually providing a link to the product [50:24] on any specific store. So it will say [50:26] like you know use you want this product [50:28] and it would just be the name of the [50:30] product and then I then have to go and [50:31] search for it. [50:33] >> I would say Anthropic is the worst at [50:34] that actually. Um Perplexing and Gemini [50:38] Google have gotten really really good at [50:40] linking the sites. Yeah, and I I think [50:43] we'll see that evolve over time, but [50:45] yeah, part of that experience is is like [50:48] reading the reviews yourself. Um, and [50:51] like Katie was saying, you know, [50:53] comparing free shipping costs and [50:55] getting discount codes and all that kind [50:56] of stuff. Um, so yeah, it's definitely a [51:00] challenge, but something I'm looking [51:01] forward to seeing what how that shapes [51:03] up this year. And I think it's going to [51:06] shape up pretty quickly at the rate [51:08] things are going. [51:10] Um, we have a question which I'm not [51:13] sure if you'll be able to answer. Uh, [51:16] from Tommy on X. He says, "Are there any [51:19] plans to bring back Woo Express? Uh, it [51:22] was an easy way to onboard less [51:23] technical clients that don't know what [51:25] hosting, etc. are, but still want the [51:28] flexibility of Woo and the scalability [51:30] of WordPress.com." [51:33] Oh, what I will say is that, you know, [51:36] just like every other WordPress host in [51:39] the world, um, on WordPress.com, we're [51:41] making a ton of investment into sort of [51:43] making things easier and that [51:45] onboarding. Um, one thing people don't [51:48] realize is now every paid plan on [51:51] WordPress.com supports full plugins and [51:53] themes. [51:55] So even the four buck a month one um you [51:58] get the full WordPress.com scalability [52:01] the platform of WP cloud um on every [52:04] single paid plan. So there's not the two [52:06] tiers of paid plans anymore. So which [52:08] kind of puts us in a similar category to [52:10] every other web host in the world right [52:12] you pay for it you get full WordPress. [52:14] Um now that capability and our you know [52:18] sort of the the very very deep technical [52:21] investments we've made that done to make [52:24] that scalable um performance secure [52:28] everything um like WordPress.com sites [52:31] basically never get hacked. You know you [52:33] don't have to worry about security in [52:35] the same way that you might on a host [52:37] that does not invest as much in the [52:38] security. um those sorts of things uh [52:44] are available and we're we're very much [52:46] thinking about tailored experiences by [52:49] the way not just for uh word woo [52:51] commerce but also other plugins so other [52:54] plugins um that all the other e-commerce [52:58] plugins in the WordPress community [52:59] anything on WordPress.com I want it to [53:01] be kind of oneclick easy and in fact [53:04] just you know how those blueprints for [53:06] for um uh playgrounds where you can kind [53:09] of like preconfigure something. Um, I [53:12] think we're going to start to see that [53:15] become more, [53:17] you know, common in like kind of [53:19] preconfiguring a hosting setup as well. [53:25] >> Yeah. So, you're kind of saying it's not [53:27] really needed because things have moved [53:28] on more generally with WordPress.com and [53:31] the different options and so on. [53:33] >> Well, and no, I think it's something [53:35] like it still might be needed. Um [53:38] >> I mean sorry express um whether that's [53:40] needed. [53:41] >> Oh yeah. Well so to get the scalability [53:43] and everything you don't need it [53:44] anymore. Um scalability security [53:46] upgrades everything. Uh the onboarding [53:49] experience I think can definitely still [53:51] be very much improved. So that's [53:53] something I still do think is needed. So [53:56] >> yeah, [53:58] >> and it was touched on in Porto, sorry. [54:01] Um, [54:03] >> the [54:04] having Woo Commerce installed in [54:06] WordPress is very much like you have a [54:08] plug-in installed. WordPress is the main [54:10] site and you have this kind of [54:12] e-commerce section. Uh, and I think what [54:15] something like Woo Express offered was a [54:18] flip of that where you've got this this [54:20] e-commerce admin experience versus a [54:23] WordPress with e-commerce. Um, so I do [54:26] feel like that side of things is needed [54:28] and I think uh that'll be interesting to [54:31] see. [54:31] >> And when you put it like that, I almost [54:33] feel like it should just be a setting in [54:34] the plug-in, right? [54:37] >> Yeah, that's been discussed. [54:39] >> Woo. Woo is a minor thing for some [54:41] things. some sites it's the whole thing [54:42] and in which case [54:44] >> I know there's it is tricky because a [54:47] lot of plugins fight for real estate in [54:49] the sort of navigation the sort of [54:52] standard Chrome of WordPress. Um, but I [54:55] think with user control again, you know, [54:58] it might be aggressive to do this by [55:00] default or something um, [55:01] >> yeah, [55:02] >> in the plugin, but like, you know, [55:04] having it be like so people know what [55:06] they're doing, they can switch it on and [55:07] off and like, you know, um, [55:09] >> for a plugin with the sort of surface [55:12] area of Woo. Um, you know, certainly [55:15] putting things at top level navigation, [55:17] I think, is okay. [55:18] >> You have a few things there. and two, [55:21] you can imagine something where it does [55:23] become a bit more primary. Now, that [55:26] said, I say like don't don't completely [55:27] hide the WordPress stuff. People still [55:30] are going to have pages and blogs and [55:32] everything like that. And it's nice to [55:33] have the dashboard where they see the [55:34] news and get involved with the community [55:36] and all that sort of stuff. Yeah. So, [55:40] >> cool. I think we're coming up on time. [55:41] So, how would you like to wrap it up? [55:44] >> Um, let's wrap it up with one more [55:46] question about the future. um which [55:49] feels like a good ending. So let's go to [55:54] um Robin's question which is long-term [55:57] what does Woo Commerce look like in [55:59] three plus years? [56:02] Oh. Um, [56:16] so things I'm certain of, [56:19] it'll be faster, [56:21] make a ton of investments in the [56:22] performance. Um, [56:28] updates will be seamless. [56:32] Uh, I deal with a lot of things in the [56:34] world. So, despite people's perceptions [56:37] of me, it actually takes a lot to get me [56:39] like truly riled up. But the one thing [56:41] that will do that without fail is when [56:43] an update breaks a site. To me, [56:46] >> that is the worst thing you could ever [56:49] do as software. It makes me furious. It [56:52] like is totally unacceptable and it [56:54] needs to happen zero times. And it's [56:57] possible. It's hard, but it's possible. [57:00] And um I think not just Woo, but every [57:04] WordPress plug-in developer has a [57:06] responsibility to really put in the work [57:09] to make updates as seamless as possible. [57:12] Otherwise, once you lose that trust in [57:13] updates, it's gone. So I'll say that [57:15] updates will be um frequent and see [57:21] um and the interface will be much much [57:24] more per uh much much more modern in the [57:27] sense that it'll feel a lot more like a [57:30] sort of modern app. Um and by the way [57:34] WordPress is going to evolve alongside [57:36] that. So we're doing some fun stuff um [57:39] to sort of spruce up the WordPress admin [57:41] a bit as well. And so we will both uh [57:45] benefit from that and I think build on [57:46] top of it as well. [57:51] >> Awesome. The uh the update point is is [57:54] very relevant. Um do you feel like [57:56] that's something that needs to happen at [57:59] the plug-in level or at the WordPressing [58:03] level as well? [58:06] >> H that's a good question. Um I think [58:09] there's work at every level sort of like [58:11] a defense and depth. This is the idea in [58:14] security like you don't just want one [58:15] layer of security, you want multiple [58:17] things because one of them's probably [58:19] going to fail inevitably. So then you [58:21] have all these other layers in place [58:23] that still make sure the bad thing [58:25] doesn't happen, the fatal thing doesn't [58:27] happen. Um, so [58:30] I do really appreciate at the hosting [58:32] level, you know, the investments people [58:35] make into auto roll backs or some even [58:38] do it like with visual testing on the [58:39] front end and stuff like that. And of [58:41] course, uh, providing an ability for [58:43] users to do that on demand is that sort [58:45] of undo button. Beautiful. That's very [58:48] important. um as a last resort. I think [58:51] the the other important thing and this [58:53] is also getting easier with AI is [58:55] testing and sort of like having a great [58:57] beta program getting things out there in [58:59] the world uh doing automated testing on [59:02] various you know to since you can get to [59:05] know I'm sure or feedback from your [59:06] users on what the most common things [59:08] they use Woo Commerce with or your [59:09] plug-in with is like how are you testing [59:11] that? If you're a developer are you [59:13] testing the beta versions of both [59:15] WordPress and Woo Commerce? So finding [59:17] any changes that might uh either you [59:20] need to update for or that maybe you [59:22] know the core platform needs to be [59:23] informed that they messed something up [59:25] because they missed some edge case or [59:26] some API you were using. So that uh it [59:29] is it it's going to take a village but [59:32] we've done it with WordPress um you know [59:35] now for you know knocking on wood but [59:38] but for many uh the uh we've had many [59:43] many many years of a a very um smooth [59:48] update process and you know for also [59:52] hundreds of millions or billions of [59:54] times now for plugins and themes as [59:55] well. Um but of course core has become I [59:59] think rightly so very trusted for [60:01] upgrades. So [60:05] >> yeah well thank you so much for coming [60:07] on and also thanks to everybody who [60:10] submitted questions. [60:12] >> I really appreciate it and congrats on [60:15] this new format, new show, everything. [60:17] Um I will definitely be a listener and [60:19] watcher and um can't wait to see what [60:22] you all do. [60:24] >> Amazing. Thank you. Uh next month we [60:26] have James Leage joining us. Uh we're [60:28] going to be talking about how uh well [60:31] the title is AI meets Woo and how AI is [60:34] already reshaping e-commerce. So pop [60:36] that in your calendar. It's on Tuesday [60:38] the 10th of February at a uh at the same [60:41] time. No, an hour early. [60:42] >> It's an hour before [60:43] >> ET and 5 p.m. C. And hopefully there [60:47] won't be any technical issues on that [60:49] one. [60:49] >> Yeah, we'll be experts by then. And [60:52] after that, James and I will be back [60:54] every month to discuss a different area [60:56] of Woo Commerce. So, please subscribe. [60:59] This is a new podcast. All our [61:01] accountants are new. So, even if you [61:03] subscribe to open channels, you also [61:04] need to subscribe to do the woo. So, [61:07] subscribe at dothewoo.com. [61:10] Um, and that's where you've got all the [61:12] links to the different places where you [61:14] can watch or listen. Thanks for [61:16] watching. Bye. [61:18] >> Thank you.  ## 📺 Video ![](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIo01LO3VpM) --- # 📝 Full Notes (Deep-Read Analysis) # 🏷️ Title: The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation with Matt Mullenweg ## 🧰 Action Inbox - [H1] Increase WooCommerce talks at WordCamps — submit e-commerce focused presentations #community - [H2] Explore Claude Code for development workflow — AI agent capabilities improving #ai - [H3] Focus on merchant daily experience optimization — reduce clicks and friction #ux ## 🧭 Table of Contents - [📝 Summary](#-summary) - [📖 Main Content](#-main-content) - [🗒️ Notes](#️-notes) - [📚 References](#-references) - [🗣️ Paraphrase](#️-paraphrase) - [📰 Newsletter](#-newsletter) - [✅ Action Items](#-action-items) - [🧪 Hypotheses](#-hypotheses) - [📊 Methodology](#-methodology) - [❓ Questions](#-questions) - [🔮 Future Research](#-future-research) - [💡 Implications](#-implications) - [🧠 Learning Styles Assessment](#-learning-styles-assessment) - [📊 Accessibility Assessment](#-accessibility-assessment) - [🌍 DEIB Assessment](#-deib-assessment) - [✅ Logical Validity](#-logical-validity) - [🛡️ DARVO Analysis](#-darvo-analysis) - [🎯 Conclusion](#-conclusion) ### 🔗 References - [WooCommerce.com](https://woocommerce.com) - [WordPress.com](https://wordpress.com) ## 📝 Summary - Matt Mullenweg discusses WooCommerce's future with hosts Katie Keith and James Kemp - Key themes: open source freedom vs. proprietary platforms, AI impact on commerce, community collaboration - WooCommerce serves 8% of all websites globally with $30+ billion GMV - Biggest threat is internal execution, not external competition - 2026 priorities include performance, accessibility, merchant experience, and AI integration ## 📖 Main Content Matt Mullenweg, CEO of Automattic, shares his vision for WooCommerce's future in this comprehensive discussion. The conversation covers competitive positioning against platforms like Shopify, the role of open source in providing merchant freedom, and how AI will reshape e-commerce development. Key insights include WooCommerce's massive scale (8% of global websites), the importance of community-driven innovation, and upcoming priorities around performance and user experience improvements. ## 🗒️ Notes #### ⏱️ [00:00](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=0) — [H1] Introduction and Matt's Role with WooCommerce - Key idea: Matt explains his involvement as CEO of Automattic and WooCommerce's place within the company - Evidence: "I work really closely with Bo Leens who leads he's the artistic director of the WooCommerce maison" #### ⏱️ [02:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=150) — [H2] WordPress as Operating System Analogy - Key idea: WooCommerce represents the "killer app" for WordPress, similar to Microsoft Office for Windows - Evidence: "I always have thought about WordPress as an operating system... we hadn't yet found the killer app on top of it" #### ⏱️ [05:45](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=345) — [H1] WooCommerce Acquisition Story (2015) - Key idea: Automattic acquired WooCommerce team of 43 people, only 3 developers, for community and UX strengths - Evidence: "automatic has like some of the best engineers in the world. So we can definitely fix all the engineering stuff" #### ⏱️ [08:20](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=500) — [H1] WooCommerce's Massive Scale - Key idea: WooCommerce now powers 8% of all websites globally - Evidence: "I think it's something like 8% of all websites in the world now run WooCommerce" #### ⏱️ [10:15](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=615) — [H2] Commerce Complexity Lessons - Key idea: E-commerce has multifactorial complexity especially internationally with payments, shipping, inventory - Evidence: "commerce has like a multiffactorial complexity especially as you go international" #### ⏱️ [12:40](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=760) — [H1] Biggest Existential Threat: Internal Execution - Key idea: Products at WooCommerce's scale aren't killed by competitors but by internal execution failures - Evidence: "with a product like at the scale of WooCommerce they're never actually killed by competitors" #### ⏱️ [15:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=930) — [H1] Open Source Freedom as Core Differentiator - Key idea: Primary competitive advantage is freedom - choosing software that increases rather than decreases autonomy - Evidence: "the first question you have to ask yourself when you're choosing anything is am I choosing software which increases my freedom or decreases my freedom" #### ⏱️ [18:45](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1125) — [H2] AI Impact on Feature Differentiation - Key idea: AI will make feature gaps less important, making platform and community choice more critical - Evidence: "I think feature differentiations are going to start to fade a little bit" #### ⏱️ [22:10](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1330) — [H2] Malleable vs Generated Software - Key idea: Future belongs to malleable software that can be customized rather than one-shot generated applications - Evidence: "where we'll see the plurality of usage and commerce and interaction is going to be with malleable software" #### ⏱️ [26:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1590) — [H1] Education as Key Opportunity - Key idea: Biggest opportunity is education through see-do-teach cycle, not competitor features - Evidence: "one of the biggest opportunities for WordPress and WooCommerce is education" #### ⏱️ [30:20](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=1820) — [H2] Ideal Customer Journey for $5M Retailer - Key idea: Mid-size retailers have choice between DIY with AI assistance or hiring developers/consultants - Evidence: "AI is raising people's ability to make it through these things" #### ⏱️ [35:15](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=2115) — [H2] Community Collaboration Examples - Key idea: Healthy collaboration shown through accessibility project with Equalized Digital and shipping fulfillment scoping - Evidence: "WooCommerce is now fully accessible, which is awesome on the front end" #### ⏱️ [40:30](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=2430) — [H1] WordCamp Coverage Gap - Key idea: Nearly 25% of WordPress sites use WooCommerce, so similar percentage of WordCamp sessions should cover commerce - Evidence: "maybe something like a quarter of sessions at WordCamp should be about WooCommerce" #### ⏱️ [45:20](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=2720) — [H1] Unlimited Developer Resources Priority - Key idea: Would focus on merchant daily experience optimization and reducing friction in store management - Evidence: "if you're running a store every day what what do you do 10 times or 100 times and how can we make that like a little bit smoother" #### ⏱️ [50:45](https://youtu.be/oIo01LO3VpM?t=3045) — [H2] Agentic Commerce Protocol Reality Check - Key idea: Despite hype, agentic commerce protocols see almost no real usage after a year of announcements - Evidence: "almost a year after some of the stuff was first announced, there have been almost no one talking about how many transactions have gone through this" ## 📚 References - [WooCommerce Official Site](https://woocommerce.com) - [Automattic](https://automattic.com) - [WordPress.com Hosting](https://wordpress.com) - [Claude Code AI Tool](https://claude.ai) ## 🗣️ Paraphrase - WooCommerce's primary strength lies in providing merchants with freedom and control over their e-commerce platform, unlike proprietary solutions that limit customization and autonomy - The biggest risk to WooCommerce isn't competition from platforms like Shopify, but internal execution challenges in delivering on community needs and roadmap promises - AI will democratize development capabilities, making the choice of platform and community more important than specific feature sets, as technical gaps become easier to fill ## 📰 Newsletter **WooCommerce's Open Source Advantage in the AI Era** Matt Mullenweg shared fascinating insights about WooCommerce's future, highlighting how open source freedom becomes even more valuable as AI democratizes development. With WooCommerce powering 8% of all websites globally, the platform's focus shifts from competing on features to empowering merchant autonomy and community innovation. Key takeaway: The real competitive advantage isn't having the most features, but providing the most freedom to customize, extend, and truly own your e-commerce platform. Resources: [WooCommerce](https://woocommerce.com), [WordPress.com](https://wordpress.com), [Developer Docs](https://developer.wordpress.org/) ## ✅ Action Items #### WordPress - Core: Increase WooCommerce integration and performance optimization - Community: Expand e-commerce track presence at flagship WordCamps - Training: Develop merchant-focused education programs and meetup content - Documentation: Create tailored onboarding paths for different merchant segments #### DevRel - Developer advocacy: Promote WooCommerce as platform for economic opportunity - Education: Create "see-do-teach" programs for e-commerce developers - Developer experience: Improve extensibility documentation and hook references - Community management: Foster collaboration between core team and extension developers #### Community - Maintainers: Support dedicated WooCommerce events and meetups - Contributors: Encourage e-commerce plugin developers to contribute upstream - Ecosystem: Facilitate knowledge sharing between commerce-focused developers ## 🧪 Hypotheses - AI will reduce feature differentiation between e-commerce platforms, making freedom and extensibility more important competitive factors - Malleable software architectures will outperform generated solutions for complex commerce requirements - Community-driven development will accelerate innovation faster than proprietary platform development - Education and developer experience improvements will drive platform adoption more than feature additions ### 📊 Methodology - Track adoption rates of new e-commerce platforms vs. established open source solutions - Measure developer productivity gains from AI assistance vs. platform extensibility - Survey merchant satisfaction correlation with platform customization capabilities ### ❓ Questions - How will agentic commerce protocols evolve beyond current limited adoption? - What merchant experience improvements would have highest ROI for the ecosystem? - How can WordCamps better balance general WordPress content with specialized tracks? ### 🔮 Future Research - AI agent integration with existing e-commerce workflows and interfaces - Open source community collaboration models for complex software platforms - Educational program effectiveness for technical skill development in commerce ### 💡 Implications - Practice: Developers should focus on platform expertise over feature-specific skills - Policy: Open source platforms may gain regulatory advantages around merchant data ownership - Education: Technical education programs need to balance DIY capability with expert consultation - Funding: Community-driven platforms require different investment models than proprietary solutions ### 🧠 Learning Styles Assessment Reading level estimate: Grade 12-14 (technical discussion with business context) #### 👀 Visual learners - Present: Platform comparison context, ecosystem scale visualization - Improve: Architecture diagrams, development workflow charts, market share visuals #### 🔊 Aural learners - Present: Podcast format with natural conversation flow - Improve: Audio summary of key strategic points, developer interview series #### 🗣️ Verbal learners - Present: Clear analogies (WordPress as OS, Office as killer app), defined terminology - Improve: Glossary of commerce-specific terms, platform comparison narratives #### 🧩 Kinesthetic learners - Present: References to hands-on development experience, practical examples - Improve: Step-by-step setup guides, interactive platform comparisons #### 🧠 Logical learners - Present: Clear strategic reasoning, data-driven insights (8% market share) - Improve: Decision frameworks for platform selection, ROI analysis templates #### 🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Social learners - Present: Community collaboration examples, WordCamp discussions - Improve: Discussion forums for strategic questions, peer mentoring programs #### 🧘‍♀️ Solitary learners - Present: Long-form strategic discussion format - Improve: Self-assessment tools for platform needs, independent learning paths #### 🌿 Naturalistic learners - Present: Ecosystem thinking, platform evolution patterns - Improve: Community health metrics, sustainable development practices ### 📊 Accessibility Assessment #### Screen reader semantics - Present: Clear speaker identification, structured conversation flow - Improve: Timestamped navigation, topic-based section headers #### Keyboard navigation - Present: Standard video player controls - Improve: Transcript navigation, searchable content sections #### Contrast and readability - Present: Clear visual presentation - Improve: High contrast transcript options, adjustable text sizing #### Text resizing and reflow - Present: Responsive video player - Improve: Scalable transcript interface, mobile-optimized viewing #### Media and captions - Present: Video discussion format - Improve: Full transcript with speaker attribution, searchable captions #### Forms and interactions - Present: Basic video interaction - Improve: Accessible comment submission, topic-based discussion threads ### 🌍 DEIB Assessment #### Cultural breadth - Present: Global commerce perspective, international complexity discussion - Improve: Multi-regional success stories, localization considerations #### Inclusive language - Present: Technical discussion accessible to business audiences - Improve: Plain language summaries, avoided insider terminology #### Neurodiversity support - Present: Long-form discussion format allows processing time - Improve: Structured topic sections, key point summaries #### Representation - Present: Business leadership and technical expertise perspectives - Improve: Diverse merchant success stories, varied use case examples #### Psychological safety - Present: Respectful discussion of competitive landscape - Improve: Community guidelines for strategic discussions ### ✅ Logical Validity #### Strong reasoning - Deductive strength: Open source principles lead to platform freedom (strong) - Inductive strength: Historical patterns predict AI impact on features (moderate) - Causal reasoning: Internal execution drives platform success more than competition (strong) - Analogical strength: WordPress/WooCommerce to Windows/Office comparison (moderate) #### Fallacies - Appeal to popularity: Using 8% market share as primary success metric - market share doesn't guarantee quality or future success - False dichotomy: Framing choice as purely "freedom vs. constraint" - many factors influence platform selection #### Tone of voice - Overall tone: Strategic and optimistic, balancing confidence with acknowledgment of challenges and competition ### 🛡️ DARVO Analysis - Deny: No defensive denials present - Attack: No attacks on competitors or critics - Reverse victim/offender: No victim/offender reversal - Emotional cues and rhetoric: Confident but collaborative tone, acknowledges competition strengths ## 🎯 Conclusion WooCommerce's future success depends more on execution and community collaboration than competitive feature battles. As AI democratizes development capabilities, the platform's open source foundation and extensible architecture become increasingly valuable differentiators. The focus should be on merchant experience optimization, developer education, and community-driven innovation rather than trying to match proprietary platforms feature-for-feature. ## 🧱 Refactor Appendix ### 📚 Literature Split Pad Purpose: Stage CEE units that become Literature notes. Split level: H3 ### [H1] Open source provides competitive advantage through freedom > [!quote] The Future of WooCommerce - A Conversation --- # 📄 Full Transcript *Auto-generated from YouTube captions · timestamps roughly every 30 seconds · [watch on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIo01LO3VpM)* **[00:00]** I'm Katie Keith, founder and CEO at Barn 2. >> And I'm James Kemp, core product manager at Woo Commerce. Uh, and as you can see, we we were going to do a fancy reveal, but Matt is in the room already. So, our special guest today is Matt Mulleng. Uh, and we're going to be talking to him about his vision for the future of Woo Commerce. >> Yeah. So, thank you, Matt, so much for coming on. I'm sure that everybody watching already knows who you are. So **[00:30]** could you introduce yourself in the context of your work with Woo Commerce? Because people know you're the CEO of the company that Woo Commerce is now part of, but they don't necessarily know the details of your involvement and the history of it. >> Sure. So um gosh, yes, as you said, I'm the CEO of Automatic and Woo Commerce is one of the products of Automatic. Uh so I work really closely with uh Bo Leens who leads uh he's the artistic director of the Woo Commerce maison. **[01:02]** We have some funny titles inside of automatic. Um the uh gosh how it started was um you know I always have thought about WordPress as an operating system and so uh I wanted to study like previously successful operating systems and so I read a lot of computer history books and of course study the history of Microsoft and I felt like WordPress was our Windows you know we had the platform but we hadn't yet found the killer app on top of it the thing that both you **[01:34]** there's a ton of demand for and also elevates the platform itself. So, um so that was Microsoft Office for Windows, right? Like when Office came along that sort of like blew up Windows and um as I so I just started like really digging into the you know tens of thousands of plugins and themes that were out there and looking for trends and seeing what people were using and like listening to the community at work camps and things like that. and commerce as a category started to stand out and within that category because there were a number of **[02:05]** commerce solutions. Woo Commerce um really started to be like something yeah I'd known about and automatic I had actually looked at before but started to take pretty seriously and um in I believe 2015 you know we we reached an agreement with the uh Woo founders to uh have them you know acquire them and have their team join. I think there were 43 people at the time. The team was only a few developers though. It was only like three developers. Um and uh honestly the some of the code **[02:39]** um wasn't as like performant or scalable or other things but I was like okay well automatic has like some of the best you know engineers in the world. So we can definitely fix all the engineering stuff. Woo has nailed like the community and the branding and the user experience and all this other stuff which is actually kind of harder. And so let's bring the best of what we've learned from building like WordPress, WordPress.com, everything we've done at Automatic and start to apply it, apply that playbook to Woo. And u that was 2015, so about a little over 10 years ago. And it's been an exciting ride. I **[03:11]** think you know we don't talk about the Woo stat as much, but I think it's something like 8% of all websites in the world now run Woo Commerce. >> Wow. >> Which is huge. Yeah. Uh yeah, I remember the the 10 year anniversary. Uh oh. Um, sorry. Yeah, I remember the 10 year anniversary. Uh, I guess it was last year now in 20125. Um, and a surprising number of the the people who came over with that acquisition was still uh, you know, thriving and working **[03:42]** on Woo Commerce and in other areas of automatic as well, which was nice to see. >> Yeah, the team hundreds of people now obviously and >> and the community has grown so so so much. It's been very very exciting to uh to be a part of and um also it was humbling um much in the same way I was humbled by Tumblr uh in woo I was like oh you know we've been doing this for a while how hard could commerce be but commerce has like a multiffactorial complexity **[04:14]** especially as you go international you know with payments and shipping and inventory and returns and like there's there's so much because it it really bridges for some stores, you know, the physical and the digital world. >> Yeah, for sure. And and there's so many different combinations of, you know, apps and plugins and things that people are using, different hosting software that that there's I couldn't imagine how many different variations of WooCommerce exist in the world. >> No two are alike. >> Exactly. Yeah. Um well, yeah, thanks to **[04:47]** everyone who has submitted questions beforehand uh on social media for for Matt. We're going to walk through a lot of them and and see what you know Matt's vision for the future of Woo Commerce is. Uh and also feel free to ask any additional questions as we're talking um that you would like us to put forward to Matt. >> Yeah. And before we get into the Q&A, um Do the Woo is essentially a new podcast. It's part of the Open Channels network **[05:18]** um which is now much wider than just Woo. So that's why we've relaunched Do the Woo as a dedicated Woo Commerce podcast within open channels. So that means it has all of its own channels like the YouTube and Apple and Spotify and all of that. So wherever you watch these things, please subscribe there um and wherever you're watching now as well. >> Yeah. Uh we received a ton of questions um which we're not going to be able to get to all of them today, but what we would like to do is uh put to Matt the **[05:51]** the most pressing uh questions that we felt, you know, his his vision and input would be great to hear. Uh and then Katy and I and potentially someone else from Woo Commerce will do a follow-up uh episode in a few weeks to try and answer the the remaining questions. >> Cool. >> Yeah. And we thought let's start with Woo Commerce's competitive advantage and the wider landscape that it sits in because a lot of people are talking about that and the big competitors that are in the e-commerce world both within **[06:22]** and outside of WordPress. Now, um after that we're going to talk about the user experience of Woo Commerce, the community, its features and priorities, and finally we're going to ask Matt about his long-term vision for it. So, we're going to try and slot the live questions into that structure. So, first of all, we've got a question from Robin Peterson from Food Plugins, which is, "What is Woo Commerce's biggest existential threat, internal or external, and what are you doing about it right now?" **[06:53]** >> H, this is a good question. Um so with a product like at the scale of Woo Commerce um they're never actually killed by competitors. So I would say the biggest threat is is internal that the that when products uh like that fail it's always because of uh execution. People think it's competitors but it's it's not. Um so I would say the biggest risk is um you know our ability to **[07:24]** execute against you know what we're hearing from the community and what we know that the software needs and the roadmap. Um now the competitive landscape is interesting. Uh certainly it's um you know with a company like Shopify and a product like Shopify um forces us to really like bring our best stuff because you know what Shopify is really good. [laughter] They're quite impressive and they're, you know, six, seven thousand people uh with a bajillion dollars. Um, now some people **[07:54]** might look at that and say, "Oh, wow. You know, Woo Commerce has no chance." But actually, this sort of David versus Goliath thing is exactly where WordPress was in like 2008, 2009. Um, you know, if if money was all you needed to create great software, right? Like we'd all be using Windows on our phone. But [laughter] you know it really like uh software built for love not just money and the community approach of something like uh Woo Commerce uh can be very very compelling. And then of course in 2026 **[08:26]** the first question you have to ask yourself when you're choosing anything is um am I choosing software which increases my freedom or decreases my freedom which is fun the question am I choosing open source or not. So um really before you look at any features or anything else um I think you need to choose like what how you'd like your freedom scale to balance and what direction you want to go there and open source that what differentiates Woo Commerce from you know others in the market other great e-commerce things out **[08:57]** there e-commerce features on Wix or Squarespace or Shopify or whatever there is it increases your freedom and especially in the age of AI Um, I think feature different differentiations are going to start to fade a little bit, right? So, Shopify has a feature that Woo Commerce doesn't have. Maybe before, you know, you'd have to wait for the Woo team to build it or someone to make a plugin or something like that. But now that obviously that cost is going down. **[09:28]** If you're pretty good with cloud code, you could probably whip something up yourself. And by the way, there's thousands of other developers out there using it. So, like I think we're going to start to see sort of the the feature differentiations between things start to fade a little bit. And so, really what you're choosing is a community, a platform, and like I said, that freedom stance. >> Awesome. Yeah, that's a that's a good answer. I think um the AI angle is is going to change a lot of things. Uh and **[10:00]** it's moving very quickly and I think those changes are just going to keep compiling over the the coming year. So, that'll be cool to see. Um, the next question we have is from Nick Mclarlin. Hopefully, I said his surname right. Uh, he says, "What are Woo Commerce's competitive advantages and how do they set Woo up for success in the next five years?" And I think this touches on what you were just saying about open source just then. So, I'm going to repeat it. Biggest **[10:31]** competitive advantage is freedom. If you care about freedom, if you want more liberty, autonomy, if you want sovereign software, um Woo is the best e-commerce platform in the world to provide that. And um the second I would say is Woo's open and uh infinitely extensible nature. So, we're in an interesting period right now where because you can kind of oneshot generate software, you get kind **[11:01]** of this um like it's incredible rush. Like if you've done this with AI and you tell it to make something or even like on TLE, you tell it to make like a a Doom block or something. You're like, "What just happened? I just created Doom from some words I typed in a box." Um and that is very very exciting. However, I think while there'll be like applications of that, um I do feel like where we'll see the plurality of usage and commerce and interaction is going to be uh with **[11:34]** malleable software. And I apologize, this isn't a term I came up with. I I saw some designers say it. I'm forgetting their name, but this idea like malleable versus generated software. So where you take something that is already there that's you know been built by humans and has the craft and security and you know all the things that come from the decades of investments the you know tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands maybe at this point of person hours have been built into the engineering the craft the **[12:04]** security and the platform of Woo and then you you create malleable software on top of that so you can customize it. This is of course what makes WordPress great and Woo Commerce as well is that with the you know hooks and filters and actions and everything you can you can modify pretty much everything for better and worse of course we know how this creates complexity and everything like that but ultimately I feel like that that freedom and that creativity which is enabled um just allows for faster **[12:35]** evolution you know if [snorts] you know for Shopify to get better Toby has to have a good idea. And I'm saying Toby as a standin for like everyone at Shopify, right? Like I can't ship a new feature to Shopify. [laughter] They have a platform as well, but it's like more limited, right? Um, now for Woo Commerce to get better now, I could be the biggest idiot in the world. In fact, I am. [laughter] So, the beauty is that like, you know, not just the Woo Commerce developers, but everyone in the community can make it better or just **[13:05]** make it better for them. This even be better for everyone. And that sort of personalization I think is um again the question was the advantages. So you know uh again there's reasons to own to rent an apartment versus own a house. Sometimes it's convenient and it's nice to use something kind of off the rack and if you fit into it but you know more power to you. Actually, one of my great blessings in life is I am very much um a men's medium. [laughter] **[13:38]** So, like I I can walk into a store and pick up a suit. I had to the other day um because I I was uh going to a funeral so I didn't have a black suit. So, was able to go in and get something off the rack and it it fit quite well. I have other friends who have different proportions. You know, if they don't get something tailored, it looks ridiculous on them. Um, so if you can get the off the rack, that's pretty cool. And if you're happy with that, great. So off therackck software can be fun, but at the moment that you need any personalization or you want it to be **[14:09]** more better fit to you and tailored, um, that's when I think open source really starts to shine and a platform like Woo Commerce um, gets there. Now, what do we need to get better at and maybe this is existential threat is education. You know, I think one of the biggest opportunities for WordPress annual commerce is education. And that's why I'm so excited about like the WordPress uh education credits program. You know, what we're I'm I'm calling 26 the year of the meetup. Actually, going to be doing a ton to enable meetups to make **[14:39]** meetups better, to get meetup organizers better uh you know, material and support and everything like that. And of course, media mediates ladder into work camps, which as we know are part of the magic of the whole WordPress community. Um, but really what that fundamentally is is like there's this I'm sorry this is a long answer but we're probably hitting a few other questions as well that I read. Um, when you think about it fundamentally spreads, it's usually like a see do **[15:11]** teach, right? That's kind of the three things that that are exciting. You see something that's exciting to you. it's a store or someone making something or someone doing something. You're like, "Oh, I could do that." This is how I got started blogging, right? There are all these blogs out there. I was like, "Oh, this is just a normal dude like me. Like, I could blog." I thought to have a website or to publish, you had to be like a journalist or like, you know, have certifications um or an editor. And it turns out, no, **[15:43]** I'm dating myself, but in like early 2000s, like this was an innovative idea that anyone could start a blog. And so, um, having people see what they can do with Woo Commerce is really, really important. That's why things like the showcase and demos are great. Um, then you do it yourself, right? That's the next level, which is very exciting. So, you kind of learn from that what you saw and you do it yourself. And then the final where you reach like ultimate status is when you teach someone else to do it, right? when you pass it on and when you think about it like WordPress **[16:13]** and Woo Commerce even hasn't grown because like our competitors we've spent billions of dollars on marketing you know it's grown because of that see do teach which is also kind of like word of mouth you know um I'm sure many people listening here can imagine what their introduction to WordPress or Woo Commerce was and it might have been you just came across the website and figured it all about yourself. But for a lot of people, you probably had a friend or **[16:44]** maybe an influencer online who said, "Hey, look at this. Check this out." And that was your entree into the community. >> Yeah. Well, you've talked about the open-source side of things. So, that leads us into a question that somebody else had, which is about the relationship uh between like Woo Commerce and people choosing other WordPress plugins that also are obviously open source. So, Rulo from Business Bloomer and Checkout um summit. I don't know why I've written e-commerce **[17:14]** there. Um says, "What can we learn from Shorecart, Fluent Cart, ED, and the other e-commerce plugins given, I suppose, that they equally have that freedom of open source?" >> Oh, well, the beauty of that is, you know, what we can learn is they can also exchange code. They can use Woo Commerce code and Woo Commerce could use their code. Um, so I think that, you know, being able to be inspired and share and, you know, between products is like part **[17:44]** of what accelerates the cycle of innovation. >> So if there's something specific, I don't don't have anything specific to say about any of those particular products except that I'm really glad they exist. >> Yeah, every uh every vote. [cough and clears throat] Um I wanted to touch on uh your point earlier about um just the extensibility of of Woo Commerce and you know that being one of the main reasons that people would want **[18:16]** to choose it um is the kind of flexibility and the freedom you have to not only build on top of it but contribute code to it. Um that's something that we're really focusing on uh at Woo Commerce is you know making this the the platform the the the underlying code of Woo Commerce to be very uh it should have all of the the base features that you you would expect and you know work in a consistent way that **[18:47]** you can extend on top of. So if someone chooses uh one person's uh you know bulk editor plugin, they could easily switch to another one and it would it would work in this in a similar way with the underlying um logic being the same. So that kind of ability to choose to pick and choose which uh extensions you use on top of Woo Commerce um is something that we want to make very reliable uh for for the people installing WordPress and and using WordPress and WooCommerce. **[19:18]** Um so yeah, I just wanted to touch on that. But moving on to user experience, we have a question here from Ian. Uh, and I know he he said online how to say his surname, and it's not how I how I would say it. I think >> it's Meisner, not Mizner. Meisner. >> Ian Mesner from Kestrel WP. Um, he has asked if a midsized retailer, say doing around $5 million a year, lands on WooCommerce.com, what is the ideal path for them to get started, and what are the biggest **[19:50]** obstacles? >> Ah, that's a good question. Um well I guess kind of the first fork in the road there would be you know do it myself versus do it for me. So um you know hopefully at woocommerce.com they they get excited about the possibilities of the platform and see examples of stores like them that are very successful or increase their business or increase their conversions by you know utilizing some **[20:20]** of the things on there. Um and uh you know so either they go the direction of like going to one of the partner web host which are not just automatic ones by the way we point to others and and get signed up with uh you know Woo Commerce configured and everything like that and they can start to go through the configuring Woo Commerce process. Um, you know, I'll be the first to admit that that's a a bit heavier than the WordPress process. And so, um, someone will have to have some motivation. Now, **[20:51]** I'll also say that AI is raising, uh, people's ability to make it through these things, right? Because they just put a a, you know, chat GBT window next to it and say, I'm stuck. What do I do? or gosh, even now we're having the browsers that have these AI agents built in which I talked about at um work campus US and state of the word and so like you can actually have the AI just kind of like watch it do stuff for you. You can say build me this and it'll start to like navigate Woo Commerce and do and do it and then you can see it do **[21:23]** it which is also kind of like again making that do-it-yourself path way more accessible. Um, so pre-I would have said probably 95% of the time they go to a a developer or consultants and you know we we link to some great things there. We have agency partners. as great platforms like Codable and of course the you know the big ones like Upwork and everything like it's you know one of the great things about the WordPress and WCommerce community is there's like so many people who are **[21:54]** fluent in it and so you can really find someone who's who's a great match for you whether that's in your language or in your country or whatever it is that's like important to you or they have a portfolio that matches what you want to build. Um you know there's there's a great kind of ecosystem that two-sided marketplace. Um so that would be one possible path. That percentage is probably um going to come down in terms of total numbers but I think the total demand for third party developers is going to go up **[22:25]** right. So maybe let's say I AI makes it so uh only you know let's just say half so half of people can do it themselves versus hiring a developer. So you think okay if there's if there were obviously a finite number of woo stores being created that would mean less work for third party developers but actually what's going to happen is there'll be more demand for stores being created in general and so you know there might be some dips and valleys in there but um ultimately like if I go out 10 years **[22:56]** there's going to be way more like woo jobs than there are today. Yeah, I totally agree that it's a big benefit of Woo, how many people are fluent in it. Um, for example, we use easy digital downloads on the barn 2 site and it can be very difficult when we need to find an expert um or hire somebody that's already experienced in that. With Woo, it's really, really easy. There are so many people that have all different skill levels, all different price ranges, so you can find **[23:26]** an expert that easily. Um, which brings us on to the community section where we have another question from Ian who asks, "What does healthy collaboration look like between the platform and the community?" >> Oh, um, I think it looks like what Woo has done for the past 10 years and before even the acquisition. You know, I I always say um I usually say this for WordPress, but I think it applies to Woo equally. Well, its success **[23:57]** has been predicated on how closely it um it has that collaboration with the community, what that looks like. And um gosh, there's so many examples of things like I talk about Wapu. I would have never approved Wapu and how amazing is like Wapu for the WordPress community like that that is something that like comes up from the community. Um, you know, the the cool thing about open source is that like, you know, community happens whether you want it to or not, [laughter] **[24:29]** right? people because people just publish plugins or fork the software whatever happen like so you kind of get um one thing I love about open source is that it kind of uh forces you if you're the the the steward of the software it keeps you honest you know because it's very natural market forces that um you know if unless you're like the most stubborn person in the world or blind you'll just like wake up one day and be like okay everyone's using this plugin we should just build it into whatever it is that that's happening or every time I go to work camp 10 people tell me So, **[25:00]** you know, those sorts of things. Um, so what that looks like in the future is, uh, you know, if I had to say something I'd like to see more of this year in terms of collaboration is I'd love to see more talks at work camps around Woo Commerce. Um, I'd love to see more either dedicated Woo Commerce meetups, which you know, Woo Commerce does have its own meetup.com thing. um or like topics like how do we you know teach more broader WordPress developers like how they can **[25:31]** learn Woo and how that actually probably increases their economic value in the marketplace, right? Um one nice thing about working in the e-commerce world, like we said there's a store that's making 5 million bucks a year. um they're making, let's say they're making 5 million bucks a year from their website, like they're going to want, you know, feel comfortable investing in that. So, if you think of what that threshold is versus like, you know, someone else building a website, a **[26:01]** coffee shop, you're building a website for their coffee shop, they're making most of the money from people coming through the door. The website's nice to have, but that, you know, of their revenue, how much will they spend? >> It's called half a percent, 1% on the website. or like an e-commerce store, both the revenue might be higher, but also like the percent they're willing to reinvest into their infrastructure and their website and development and customization and everything is um probably much higher hosting. You know, they they'll want to pay for more performant hosting and invest in those things. So, um uh you know, we track uh **[26:32]** 30 something billion of GMV happening through Woo Commerce and actual numbers higher than that because we don't we're not able to track everything. So when you imagine like the economic opportunity for doing things in the WordPress ecosystem, it's pretty huge. I would say bigger than WordPress actually. >> Yeah, for sure. I I think it touches on a point why um I've always said, you know, I I started as a a WooCommerce plug-in developer. Uh, and I chose that **[27:03]** route because the types of clients we were getting were the ones that had money to spend on this stuff because their store relied on uh, you know, transactions going through it. Um, and and that's how I kind of fell into the the e-commerce side of things. Uh, so it's definitely true that it's a it's a profitable area of WordPress and and of any like online business, I would say. Um I'll touch quickly on the the healthy collaboration as well because there's there's a couple of projects where we **[27:34]** have collaborate uh collaborated last year. Um one being the accessibility project that we had uh for Woo Commerce. We collaborated with Equalized Digital. Um, and that was just a case of, you know, uh, myself and Amber getting in touch and talking about what what that might look like and and that's, you know, came to fruition. Woo Commerce is now fully accessible, which is awesome on the front end. Um, another example is we **[28:04]** worked with Becca at Kestrel um, on scoping out what uh, shipping fulfillments might look like in Woo Commerce. And that is also a feature that uh Becca heavily helped to, you know, scope out what they've been hearing from customers and and clients uh around what people want. Uh and that work is now also in in WooCommerce Core uh behind a feature flag, but it's it's there to be used and tested. Um so I'd **[28:35]** love to see more stuff like that. Just more more collaboration of what people are seeing uh in the ecosystem. Um, and you know, just putting that out there to to someone like me or any other products person uh at Woo Commerce so we can talk about it. Uh, GitHub is a a great place to do that. Um, the next question you actually touched on already uh was from Rulo and he said, "Is there going to be any more uh WooCommer or is there going to be more WooCommerce coverage at flagship word camps?" Uh, it sounds like you **[29:06]** think there should be. >> Oh, should is is relative. So if people want it, they will be. [laughter] So I would say like, you know, be the change you want to see in the world. If you want more WooCommerce at work camps, um if you are listening to this podcast, you probably could be a speaker. So, you know, make the pitch and uh if you're, you know, helping to organize a word a word camp um you know, understand your audience obviously like look at who's coming and and I do think that with you know, almost a quarter of all WordPress **[29:37]** websites using Woo Commerce like you know maybe something like a quarter of sessions at work camp should be about Woo Commerce or commerce more broadly. Like you said there's other solutions as well. Um, I think that's great. As long as things are open source, they're welcome at word camps. >> Yeah. Well, that's what I would have thought. The last few flagship word camps that I've been to, I have submitted a talk about e-commerce or Woo Commerce. I've tried both. And a talk about myself, like my story, and my **[30:09]** story is always the one that's been accepted. Like, um, word come I think Asia last year, but there's been three or four. and nobody accepts my e-commerce talks, which I think are really interesting. So, I'm a bit concerned about why that is because all the data you said is totally correct about how many sites use Woo Commerce and e-commerce generally. That's where the money is. And yet, I am finding it really hard to spread the word about Woo Commerce and e-commerce at word camps. **[30:40]** And I don't know why that is. >> Well, Katie, your story is really good. So, [laughter] >> but everyone's heard it. I think e-commerce is more interesting these days. >> Okay. Well, [laughter] then don't submit it and just submit the e-commerce or submit it and then when do a little bait and switch when it's like my story actually turn it into a e-commerce talk. >> Yeah. But yeah, I agree that's definitely needed. Um, whoever does the talks, there should be much more representation at word camps. >> Well, and I'll keep that in mind. You **[31:11]** know, I the work camp I'm most active in choosing the content for is is work camp US. So, as that comes around and I look at things, I'll I'll I'll keep that in mind. >> Yeah. >> Awesome. >> So, the next group of questions are about the features and upcoming priorities of Woo Commerce. So, the first one there was from Ian again. Woo Commerce has intentionally serve merchants, product builders, and agencies. Are their goals and targets aligned to those segments and how are **[31:42]** they they prioritized? >> Merchants, product builders, and agencies um yes uh there are goals tied to each one of those. How are they prioritized? Um off the dome, not certain right now. Um James might be able to answer this better, but those are I would say some of the big personas that as we build things in Woo uh you try to well often sometimes when we build things it **[32:13]** addresses all of them but you know as we make it more usable or something like that like that benefits everyone but uh yeah there's definitely been some I would say some more specific outreach around like growing the agency program or other things like that. Um, I also saw a feedback that there's work camps might not want pitches for a specific product. I think I agree and I would say that once a product also becomes a platform itself like WordPress and if you go to the WordPress plugins directory, there's **[32:44]** hundreds or thousands of WooCommerce plugins, it's okay, you know, you know, once it becomes not just about itself but actually something that a lot of people can build on, that's uh, okay. >> Interesting. Yeah. Yeah, that's a fair point. You you don't want to promote a specific product, I guess, but um yeah, I mean, Woo Commerce is is huge at this point, so deserves to be talked about >> and people want solutions. So, >> yeah, exactly. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> I I've always found that on on Reddit actually, they they block a lot of uh **[33:16]** comments when you provide a solution to the question because it looks like promotion, but actually it solves the the issue that they were having. etc. [snorts] >> often a product does. Yeah. >> Yeah. >> So, we've got a couple of follow-up comments in of people watching live about the word count we discussion. So, let's do that before we move on to more presubmitted questions. >> So, um Dave has said suggested next flagship a separate room for e-commerce. **[33:46]** I would love to see that. That would make a lot of sense actually. >> That would be cool to see. >> Yeah. Uh, you know what? I'll tease something as well, which is um this could be an interesting year to have a dedicated woo event again. >> Yeah. Well, we got a couple of independent events popping up, which is interesting. So, we've just had well, it was kind of I think Word Camp affiliated e-commerce day for WordPress in Porto, which James and I uh both spoke at, and **[34:17]** then we've got Checkout Summit in Sicily in April. So, it's interesting to see that um community interest is growing in the e-commerce side of things and Checkout Summit is specifically Woo Commerce rather than e-commerce as well. Um so, I am liking that direction. >> There hasn't been a WooCom in the few years and I think this would be a cool year to see another one. >> Yeah. And we got a comment from Brent. >> Oh, this is what I addressed earlier. This is the one I was responding to. >> Oh, okay. If it's a platform and there's **[34:48]** like hundreds of plugins in the directory on top of it, I think that that sort of it's a spectrum, but that's where it makes it a little bit more okay, I would say, to talk about or a lot more okay to talk about a specific, you know, plugin or solution or things. >> Awesome. Was that all the the questions that you had, Katie? >> Yeah. >> Cool. Um, I think it's worth touching on the prioritization uh point because I I think I can speak to that a bit more. Um, one of the focuses this year will be **[35:23]** that every release should have something beneficial for each one of those target groups of people. um and and to more clearly, you know, uh put that out there in in in writing like this this feature or this uh enhancement is specifically targeted at this group of uh people or group of users. Um so I think we'll definitely see a lot more of that this year. Uh which which will be great to see. Um, we have a question from **[35:57]** Ian. >> Of course, >> our list of questions are all from Ian. Uh, if developer resources were not a constraint, what would you do? So, what would you uh what would unlock the biggest leap forward? Uh, so if you had unlimited developer resources, where would you put them? >> That is a really good question. And Ian, I'll say that it's very pressured with this idea of intelligence being on tap with AI agents. You know, we're seeing **[36:32]** if if you're listening to this and you haven't been clawed code pill yet, take some time. Nothing else from this podcast. Take some time, go through some tutorials, install claw code. By the way, it's not just for code. You can use it for other files on your computer. You can use it with your notes. You can use it with so much. Um, I saw some crazy stuff with it being hooked up to Playground and Beeper today. Like you can do some really, really neat things. Um, and that kind of is an un unlimited **[37:03]** developer resource in some ways that we haven't seen. And it is the 1.0 version and the capabilities that are coming out this year as the new Nvidia chips come online. all the new data centers you heard about um get built, you know, especially some of the Elon Musk stuff which is moving very quickly, but also the investments from Google, Meta, everyone like Anthropic, like we're going to see some, if you thought last **[37:33]** year was exciting from AI point of view, I think this will actually be the year that is a little more jaw-dropping. So, January 14th, mark my words there. [snorts] Um, >> to touch on the the Claude code, um, they they just released in the Claude desktop app, uh, something called Claude Co-work, which is Claude Code under the hood. You you set it up, uh, you choose a folder to run it in. Uh, and it runs **[38:04]** in exactly the same way as Claude code, but it's a lot less um, a lot less technical. you know, it's not it's not a CLI based uh interface, which is um very useful for, you know, non-codebased work where Claude code seemingly excels, which I I don't think was the expectation when they released it. Um so yeah, definitely worth checking out, but it is on. So >> yeah, >> this also, you know, back to the brilliance of Ian's question is it's almost like the hitchhiker's guide to **[38:34]** the galaxy thing. Like the answer when you can have any answer like the what you ask and what you build is really important. And so um you know I would pick uh I mean honestly I would pick what Woo Commerce's roadmap is because that was kind of the you know it's not that we have unlimited developer resources but we do have you know a pretty active process of the hundreds of people who work on Woo Commerce and the investments uh that are happening into the **[39:06]** scalability um you know the sort of idea of of the the interface being more radically accessible and kind of unifying some of the things that are right now like sort of some classical WordPress interfaces but could be like maybe like reduce people's clicks um reduce kind of the friction they have when they're running the store dayto-day um you know the earlier you know there was a mention of merchants like I say very much the merchant experience is on my minds and sort of like if you're running a store every day what what do **[39:37]** you do 10 times or 100 times and how can we make that like a little bit smoother, you know, and again, every click you can remove, every sort of like way you can sand the edges of that experience um multiplies, right? Because people are doing it hundreds of times a day themselves and of course millions of times a day across the WooCommerce WooCommerce system. Um checkouts already getting a lot better, but of course anything in the checkout is a multiplier for the uh for our ecosystem. Um **[40:07]** it's already there. There's probably some things in stripe link or shop checkout that we don't match yet and um for some stores or some geographies and so that could be improved. Uh for main ones like US stuff I think it's pretty parody now in terms of conversions. Um performance you can always be faster. Always be faster. There's no one who says I would love this website to load slower. >> Yeah. Well, that brings us quite nicely **[40:38]** to the next question, which is what are the top milestones Woo Commerce will deliver in 2026, which is from Robin. >> James, I feel like we should point to a Woo Commerce blog post or something here. Like, is there like an official resource? I don't I don't want to. Yeah, I mean Bo actually published um I I believe it was late last year and I'm sure Brent in the the comments will be able to drop a link in but his vision for 2026 uh for for Woo Commerce which is something that you know we're really **[41:10]** sticking to and I think one of the so the quality is is high on the list um performance is high on the list uh builder experience is high on the list as well as merchant experience which is always high on the list. Uh and also I think you know evolving with the AI um ecosystem as as it moves and just adapting to that integrating uh things like the the Stripe uh Agentic **[41:40]** Commerce protocol and the the new Google uh UCP uh protocol uh that they announced and just really working and refining those experiences uh are always top of mind. Uh hopefully Brent can drop in a link to the relevant blog post from B. Um but yeah that that's that should be sufficient I would I would have thought. >> Yeah you mentioned the builder experience. We've got a live comment from um Jerry who says is there any road **[42:13]** map for the block editor on the single product? there has been a lot of so I guess the block there's two ways you could uh understand this question one is kind of using the the new interface uh what we call data forms as as the the interface for the the product editor which is one one experience and that replaces the whole uh experience of the product editor uh and the other one is the the block editor existing as a way to update **[42:46]** the product description which the way I read that question is is more in line with that. Um, >> yeah, I think so. Like creating multicolumn layouts with blocks and things like that for the product page instead of just the template based layout we're used to. >> Yeah. Yeah, and I would say there's no official road map, but it's something that for me is is high priority to to dig into like I that experience of using the editor to customize your product pages um is just awesome. Like it's it's **[43:19]** much more flexible and and impressive than you know a standard text editor. Um Matt, I don't know if you had any thoughts on that. >> No, it sounds good. I apologize. I I am not the like biggest Woo Commerce expert in the world, which is funny. I'm Thank you for having me start your show. Um I think about it a lot more from the uh >> sort of like broader ecosystem and the strategy and the like those are sorts of things I can speak to probably a little **[43:50]** more or like the future of like development and computing and those sorts of things. But for a specific like question like that, I think James is a much better person to answer or B if he was here. Yeah, agreed. There was quite a lot of questions um that were really specific that when we went through them, we thought actually we've got James the core product manager as a host. We don't need where for for this interview we wanted to go high level and talk about the wider vision and the future bigger picture stuff. So that's what we were **[44:21]** expecting >> and sorry about that for the audience [laughter] but that you know there either James or like other guests I think could do some more of those like super deep dives. So, think of this as just like the the appetizer for do the woo. >> Tune in episodes to go much much deeper. [laughter] >> Yeah, I think it's just uh you know, really great to hear what what you envision uh e-commerce or Woo Commerce could be. Um so, I I think we've touched on that quite a lot, which is >> I did see a few questions come in about **[44:52]** UCP. So, um I'll speak to that. And someone was like, why won't you part of the announcement or whatever that is? >> Um oh, there we go. Yeah. Any update on UCP which just Google recently launched. How will Woo Commerce move forwards with this? >> So I mean without speaking specifically to UCP I will say that it is funny given how much bigger and more money they have that Shopify is is kind of scared of WooCommerce. So often [laughter] they will negotiate to be sort of an **[45:22]** exclusive day of launch announcement. And if you notice with like the Stripe stuff, I mean, we were there on day one, but it didn't get announced a few days later. Um, or if they just negotiated to like for us to find out about when everyone else does, like, you know, it'll come really quickly. So, um, don't worry about that. It'll all be supported. Uh, the second thing I'll say though is that, um, and there was an article in the information about this a few days ago, is that these things are not being used at all. [laughter] **[45:53]** It's very telling that almost a year after some of the stuff was first announced, um there have been almost no uh no one talking about how many transactions have gone through this and it was like a headline feature at like the Stripe conference and the Shopify thing and all this sort of stuff. The CEOs are there and it's moving the stock prices and like so it's it's very interesting. This happens in software kind of frequently is occasionally there's something that everyone's like oh that is the best idea ever in the world and it gets a ton of **[46:24]** hype and a ton of everything and then once it kind of lands in the world users are like nope doesn't fit or there's something there's something missing. Now, I'm not saying that agenda commerce 10 years from now won't be like a double- digit percentage of commerce or something like, you know, we'll probably figure this out, but it might also be, you know, the Google Glass or [laughter] one of these things that you can put a bajillion dollars into and and it seems like the coolest idea, but like when it meets the reality **[46:55]** of real world, there's something about it that just kind of like doesn't make it gel. >> Yeah, I agree. There's some barriers that are going to put people off. Um, things like buying in AI. Well, how about buying multiple things in order to get free shipping. Just having one product recommended isn't that relevant. James and I discussed this in in the Q&A at e-commerce day that um there's a few things that need to really change about the nature of people shopping before it gets that widespread adoption. **[47:28]** And in the information article, I found it very fascinating because with Woo, you know, some of the stuff is a little tricky to support and because we don't host every Woo store in the world. So providing like a universal catalog for every Woo product in the world, it's like kind of tricky. I mean, there's ways to do it. Uh certainly if they sync with jetpack or if we build some sort of crawler or opt-in thing like we can centralize some stuff but um it turns out even Shopify who I would assume this was much easier for has huge data issues **[47:58]** and it's because people run their stores in different ways. They might say something is in stock when it's really not. Or there might be different shipping variations. Or there might be, you know, there's just different ways that people show product variations when they might not exist. You know, there's all sorts of stuff out there that apparently even for Shopify, which host and has all the data. You know, it's all on their servers. Um, sort of normalizing it in a way that's accessible to the users in a way that's also useful and accurate and true. um inside the chat interface has been a **[48:30]** bigger challenge than certainly I would have imagined. So that's been something surprising to me as well. Um the information is like a paid site. Uh but maybe someone can like actually someone should I'm surprised a WordPress news site hasn't covered this yet. So um maybe request for a blog post for someone to to summarize some of the stuff from that information article. And um yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah, I think another another point to consider is just how quickly AI is evolving. Um to to kind of set a **[49:03]** standard protocol now is challenging but you know a worthy uh exploration for sure. Um but yeah, our teams are digging into both uh ACP and UCP. Um and I'm sure if you keep an eye on the developer blog that we will have some information about that very soon. If I had to make a bet um well I guess I will a prediction it's uh the amount of commerce that will **[49:34]** happen from people just in a chat interface versus the amount of commerce that will happen from AI agents driving browsers and so using the normal website the normal human interface but some of that might be more like autofill might be better with AI or finding the product or navigating the site like those sorts of things. Maybe even discovery of the product might be driven by the AI. That second part will be way way way bigger. **[50:06]** >> Yeah, discovery is an interesting one because that I always use AI now to recommend products to me. Um, but it's still it's still not great. So I use Claude most of the time and it's still not great at actually providing a link to the product on any specific store. So it will say like you know use you want this product and it would just be the name of the product and then I then have to go and search for it. >> I would say Anthropic is the worst at that actually. Um Perplexing and Gemini **[50:38]** Google have gotten really really good at linking the sites. Yeah, and I I think we'll see that evolve over time, but yeah, part of that experience is is like reading the reviews yourself. Um, and like Katie was saying, you know, comparing free shipping costs and getting discount codes and all that kind of stuff. Um, so yeah, it's definitely a challenge, but something I'm looking forward to seeing what how that shapes up this year. And I think it's going to shape up pretty quickly at the rate **[51:08]** things are going. Um, we have a question which I'm not sure if you'll be able to answer. Uh, from Tommy on X. He says, "Are there any plans to bring back Woo Express? Uh, it was an easy way to onboard less technical clients that don't know what hosting, etc. are, but still want the flexibility of Woo and the scalability of WordPress.com." Oh, what I will say is that, you know, just like every other WordPress host in **[51:39]** the world, um, on WordPress.com, we're making a ton of investment into sort of making things easier and that onboarding. Um, one thing people don't realize is now every paid plan on WordPress.com supports full plugins and themes. So even the four buck a month one um you get the full WordPress.com scalability the platform of WP cloud um on every single paid plan. So there's not the two tiers of paid plans anymore. So which kind of puts us in a similar category to **[52:10]** every other web host in the world right you pay for it you get full WordPress. Um now that capability and our you know sort of the the very very deep technical investments we've made that done to make that scalable um performance secure everything um like WordPress.com sites basically never get hacked. You know you don't have to worry about security in the same way that you might on a host that does not invest as much in the security. um those sorts of things uh **[52:44]** are available and we're we're very much thinking about tailored experiences by the way not just for uh word woo commerce but also other plugins so other plugins um that all the other e-commerce plugins in the WordPress community anything on WordPress.com I want it to be kind of oneclick easy and in fact just you know how those blueprints for for um uh playgrounds where you can kind of like preconfigure something. Um, I think we're going to start to see that **[53:15]** become more, you know, common in like kind of preconfiguring a hosting setup as well. >> Yeah. So, you're kind of saying it's not really needed because things have moved on more generally with WordPress.com and the different options and so [snorts] on. >> Well, and no, I think it's something like it still might be needed. Um >> I mean sorry express um whether that's needed. >> Oh yeah. Well so to get the scalability and everything you don't need it anymore. Um scalability security **[53:46]** upgrades everything. Uh the onboarding experience I think can definitely still be very much improved. So that's something I still do think is needed. So >> yeah, >> and it was touched on in Porto, sorry. Um, >> the having Woo Commerce installed in WordPress is very much like you have a plug-in installed. WordPress is the main site and you have this kind of e-commerce section. Uh, and I think what something like Woo Express offered was a **[54:18]** flip of that where you've got this this e-commerce admin experience versus a WordPress with e-commerce. Um, so I do feel like that side of things is needed and I think uh that'll be interesting to see. >> And when you put it like that, I almost feel like it should just be a setting in the plug-in, right? >> Yeah, that's been discussed. >> Woo. Woo is a minor thing for some things. some sites it's the whole thing and in which case >> I know there's it is tricky because a lot of plugins fight for real estate in **[54:49]** the sort of navigation the sort of standard Chrome of WordPress. Um, but I think with user control again, you know, it might be aggressive to do this by default or something um, >> yeah, >> in the plugin, but like, you know, having it be like so people know what they're doing, they can switch it on and off and like, you know, um, >> for a plugin with the sort of surface area of Woo. Um, you know, certainly putting things at top level navigation, I think, is okay. >> You have a few things there. and two, **[55:21]** you can imagine something where it does become a bit more primary. Now, that said, I say like don't don't completely hide the WordPress stuff. [laughter] People still are going to have pages and blogs and everything like that. And it's nice to have the dashboard where they see the news and get involved with the community and all that sort of stuff. Yeah. So, >> cool. I think we're coming up on time. So, how would you like to wrap it up? >> Um, let's wrap it up with one more question about the future. um which feels like a good ending. So let's go to **[55:54]** um Robin's question which is long-term what does Woo Commerce look like in three plus years? Oh. Um, so things I'm certain of, it'll be faster, make a ton of investments in the performance. Um, **[56:28]** updates will be seamless. Uh, I deal with a lot of things in the world. So, despite people's perceptions of me, it actually takes a lot to get me like truly riled up. But the one thing that will do that without fail is when an update breaks a site. To me, >> that is the worst thing you could ever do as software. It makes me furious. It like is totally unacceptable and it needs to happen zero times. And it's possible. It's hard, but it's possible. **[57:00]** And um I think not just Woo, but every WordPress plug-in developer [clears throat] has a responsibility to really put in the work to make updates as seamless as possible. Otherwise, once you lose that trust in updates, it's gone. So I'll say that updates will be um frequent and see um and the interface will be much much more per uh much much more modern in the sense that it'll feel a lot more like a **[57:30]** sort of modern app. Um and by the way WordPress is going to evolve alongside that. So we're doing some fun stuff um to sort of spruce up the WordPress admin a bit as well. And so we will both uh benefit from that and I think build on top of it as well. >> Awesome. The uh the update point is is very relevant. Um do you feel like that's something that needs to happen at the plug-in level or at the WordPressing **[58:03]** level as well? >> H that's a good question. Um I think there's work at every level sort of like a defense and depth. This is the idea in security like you don't just want one layer of security, you want multiple things because one of them's probably going to fail inevitably. So then you have all these other layers in place that still make sure the bad thing doesn't happen, the fatal thing doesn't happen. Um, so I do really appreciate at the hosting level, you know, the investments people **[58:35]** make into auto roll backs or some even do it like with visual testing on the front end and stuff like that. And of course, uh, providing an ability for users to do that on demand is that sort of undo button. Beautiful. That's very important. um as a last resort. I think the the other important thing and this is also getting easier with AI is testing and sort of like having a great beta program getting things out there in the world uh doing automated testing on various you know to since you can get to know I'm sure or feedback from your **[59:06]** users on what the most common things they use Woo Commerce with or your plug-in with is like how are you testing that? If you're a developer are you testing the beta versions of both WordPress and Woo Commerce? So finding any changes that might uh either you need to update for or that maybe you know the core platform needs to be informed that they messed something up because they missed some edge case or some API you were using. So that uh it is it it's going to take a village but we've done it with WordPress um you know now for you know knocking on wood but **[59:38]** but for many uh the uh we've had many many many years of a a very um smooth update process and you know for also hundreds of millions or billions of times now for plugins and themes as well. Um but of course core has become I think rightly so very trusted for upgrades. So >> yeah well thank you so much for coming on and also thanks to everybody who **[60:10]** submitted questions. >> I really appreciate it and congrats on this new format, new show, everything. Um I will definitely be a listener and watcher and um can't wait to see what you all do. >> Amazing. Thank you. Uh next month we have James Leage joining us. Uh we're going to be talking about how uh well the title is AI meets Woo and how AI is already reshaping e-commerce. So pop that in your calendar. It's on Tuesday the 10th of February at a uh at the same **[60:41]** time. No, an hour early. >> It's an hour before >> ET and 5 p.m. C. And hopefully there won't be any technical issues on that one. >> Yeah, we'll be experts by then. And after that, James and I will be back every month to discuss a different area of Woo Commerce. So, please subscribe. This is a new podcast. All our accountants are new. So, even if you subscribe to open channels, you also need to subscribe to do the woo. So, subscribe at dothewoo.com. Um, and that's where you've got all the **[61:12]** links to the different places where you can watch or listen. Thanks for watching. Bye. >> Thank you.