WP Engine does about half a billion in revenue on top of WordPress and contribute back 40 hours a week, Automattic is a similar size and contributes back 3,915 hours a week. I wouldn't mind for WP Engine to go lose.
Some really articulate comments in the other thread:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41652760
>I have no horse in this race, but this blog post seems like the hot-blooded vitriolic ramblings of a crazy person that can’t mentally separate their commercial and open-source endeavours.
>If you post this kind of thing, it burns bridges that you can't mend later. How can the two organizations reconciliate after this?
Totally disagree.
WP engine has made their entire business off the backs of others, and passes off their own modified version of Wordpress as Wordpress.
If they don’t want to be seen as a parasite (or a cancer) they could contribute fairly to the development as others do.
If they want to use the mark, then all they need to do is use Wordpress as published.
What’s unreasonable about that?
Both are in the wrong. WP Engine are morally wrong not to pay back with developer time or money to enhance the Open Source project they are making money with. But Automattic's claim that "Managed WordPress" and in extension "WordPress Plugin" and "WordPress Agency" should be covered by their trademark is crazy.
The problem is that they call it "wordpress" but it is actually "fork of wordpress". It was already made clear that if they used an unmodified wordpress they could continue to use the mark. Thats literally what half the blog post said.
Wait till you hear about how Wordpress.com has modified wordpress and is selling it…
Yeah, i guess the trademark holder for wordpress should have a word with them too, right?