BREAKING: WordPress Civil War Enters Year 3, Internet Still Somehow Finds Time to Argue About Pineapple Pizza
The WordPress vs. WP Engine saga has now entered what historians are calling “the longest custody battle over a content management system since two Joomla developers fought behind a Best Buy in 2011.”
What began as a trademark dispute has evolved into a full-blown digital Shakespearean tragedy, complete with legal filings, public statements, and thousands of commenters suddenly becoming constitutional scholars specializing in open-source licensing.
Matt Mullenweg, WordPress co-founder and CEO of Automattic, continues his campaign with the energy of a man who discovered someone borrowed his lawn mower in 2008 and has been preparing receipts ever since. Meanwhile, WP Engine stands accused of offenses that sound increasingly like medieval crimes: misusing marks, extracting value, and possibly failing to tithe properly to the Kingdom of Open Source.
The internet, naturally, has responded with its trademark nuance.
One side insists this is a noble defense of open-source principles and community stewardship. The other argues it resembles a homeowner burning down the garage to prove they still own the house. A third group just showed up to ask whether PHP is still a thing and if Gutenberg can stop moving buttons around.
Meanwhile, the average WordPress user—whose main concern remains “please God just let my plugins update without white-screening the site”—watches nervously from the sidelines clutching backup files and expired license keys.
Legal analysts predict the conflict could continue indefinitely, potentially outlasting several browser standards, three AI hype cycles, and at least four more redesigns of the WordPress admin menu.
At press time, commenters had reached consensus on only one thing:
“Whatever happens, somebody else is definitely the villain.”