Matthew Widdop
Matty is a Junior SEO Executive at Intelligency, helping our clients to improve their digital performance. Matty is currently studying for his Level 3 Multi-Channel Marketer apprenticeship and has completed a Sport Journalism Degree at the University of Huddersfield.
Automattic CEO, Matt Mullenweg is intensifying his ongoing battle against managed hosting platform WP Engine, creating a tracking website that shows a list of all the domains that have left WP Engine since their initial fallout in September of this year.
WordPress vs WP Engine
The issues initially arose when Automaticc CEO, Matt Mullenweg, made disparaging claims about WP Engine, including that they should be paying WordPress ‘’a significant percentage of its revenue for a licence to the WordPress trademark’’ due to the use of WP in their name.
I previously wrote about the issue in September, when 159 employees left WordPress due to the ongoing turmoil. This did not manage to dissuade Matt Mullenweg however who has continued waging war against WP Engine.
WP Engine Tracker
The WPEngine tracker site gives users a list of all the domains that have left WP Engine, with the current figure standing at 26,050 as of 06/12/2024. The tracker also allows businesses to find new website hosts with current top destinations including Pressable, Bluehost and Digital Ocean.
WP Engine Response
WP Engines have responded by filing a lawsuit against Automaticc, the parent company of WordPress and mentioned the WP Engine tracker in their lawsuit stating the following
“Just last week, in an apparent effort to brag about how successful they have been in harming WPE, Defendants created a website—www.wordpressenginetracker.com—that “list[s] . . . every domain hosted by @wpengine, which you can see decline every day. 15,080 sites have left already since September 21st. September 21 was not selected randomly. It is the day after Defendants’ self-proclaimed nuclear war began – an admission that these customer losses were caused by Defendants’ wrongful actions. In this extraordinary attack on WPE and its customers, Defendants included on their disparaging website a downloadable file of ‘all [WPE] sites ready for a new home’—that is, WPE’s customer list, literally inviting others to target and poach WPE’s clients while Defendants’ attacks on WPE continued.”
The legal battle between the two companies is set to intensify in the near future as this conflict shows no signs of slowing down for the foreseeable future.
