Join us for BigWP in NYC on April 11!

The next BigWP NYC meetup will be on Wednesday, April 11 at USA Today’s offices at 1633 Broadway (btwn 50th and 51st).

The BigWP meetup is a networking event open to developers, product managers, and editorial teams who run large, high-traffic WordPress sites. There will be 4-5 flash talks of 10 mins. each with 5 mins. each for questions, followed by happy hour nearby. If you’re interested in attending on April 11, please RSVP here — space is limited.

We’re still looking for a couple more flash talks so if you’re interested and haven’t already been in touch, please email me with an overview of the topic you’d like to talk about.

Big thanks to David Parsons and the rest of the team at USA Today for offering their new digs for this meetup!

Announcing the 2018 VIP Workshop

 

Save the date (and don’t forget to register)! We are excited to announce the next WordPress.com VIP Workshop is coming May 14-17, 2018.

As the leading provider of enterprise WordPress solutions, we’re proud to host the premier event focused on the needs of enterprise WordPress users. For the past couple of years, the Workshop has had two tracks, one focused on the interests of VIP product owners and the other on developers. In 2018 we’ll continue to follow that format and add additional refinements to make this year’s Workshop the best yet.

Register now

 

The VIP Workshop provides a unique opportunity to learn from the WordPress.com VIP team in person, as well as exchange ideas and experiences with other WordPress.com VIP clients and partners. The event’s format and setting offers lots of opportunities for both informal and structured knowledge sharing, including networking lunches and dinners, in-depth curricula and exercises, and focused, collaborative conversations.

A quick peek at the itinerary – details & agenda will be continually updated on the WordPress.com VIP Workshop site powered by WooCommerce.

• Monday, May 14th — Arrival Day. Check-in, special guest keynote and welcome dinner.
• Tuesday, May 15th — In depth business and engineering sessions.
• Wednesday, May 16th — In-depth product sessions and hands-on development workshops. We’ll wrap the day up with a best of WordPress.com VIP year in review!
• Thursday, May 17th — Departure Day.

Space is limited for this event, so register now and take advantage of early bird pricing! Early bird pricing is $3,500 per person until February 15. After which, the ticket price will be $4,000 per person.

Header image by CM Howard from the 2015 Automattic WordPress developer summit at the Carneros Inn in Napa, CA

VIP Workshop 2017 Update

We’re closing in on the final month before the Workshop so we wanted to give a short update and also remind you to register now if you haven’t as the registration deadline is April 5.

Register now

Like last year, we’ll be having sessions for both developers and product/business leads focussing on the latest challenges, solutions, and landscape of enterprise WordPress implementations. The full schedule is being finalized and we’ll have updates on speakers coming this week.

---

A part of the schedule we’re pleased to share is that Automattic’s own John Maeda will be kicking off the Workshop and getting us all set for a great week in Napa.

John recently joined Automattic as Global Head of Computational Design + Inclusion and previously served as Design Partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB), a world-leading venture capital firm. An internationally recognized speaker and author, his books include The Laws of Simplicity, Creative Code and Redesigning Leadership. He holds degrees in Electrical Engineering + Computer Science from MIT, an MBA from Arizona State U, and a PhD from University of Tsukuba in Japan.

Maeda was the recipient of the White House’s National Design Award, the Tribeca Film Festival’s Disruptive Innovation Award for STEM to STEAM, the Blouin Foundation’s Creative Leadership Award, the AIGA Medal, the Raymond Loewy Foundation Prize, the Mainichi Design Prize, the Tokyo Type Director’s Club Prize, and induction into the Art Director’s Club Hall of Fame.

Maeda serves on the Board of Directors for wireless hi-fi innovator Sonos and the global advertising firm Wieden+Kennedy. He is also a member of the Technical Advisory Board for Google’s Advanced Technology + Projects Group and the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on New Growth Models. Prior to his work in industry, Maeda was a tenured research professor at the MIT Media Laboratory and 16th President of the Rhode Island School of Design.

John can be found on Twitter discussing technology, business and design at @johnmaeda, one of TIME Magazine’s 140 Best Twitter Feeds.

 

Now Available: WordPress.com for Google Docs

Today the WordPress.com team released a new add-on that lets you write, edit, and collaborate in Google Docs, then save it as a draft post to any WordPress.com or Jetpack-connected WordPress site. For the many teams that rely on Google Docs in their workflow, this should save a few steps. See the announcement post on WordPress.com for more information, including instructions for getting the add-on for Google Docs.

Announcing the 2017 VIP Workshop

 

Save the date (and don’t forget to register)! We are excited to announce the next WordPress.com VIP Workshop is coming May 8-11, 2017.

As the leading provider of enterprise WordPress solutions, WordPress.com VIP provides the premier event focused on the needs of enterprise WordPress users. Last year we updated the Workshop to focus on both VIP product owners as well as developers and added a best of VIP showcase. We’re proud to continue with this format and continue to refine it to make this year’s Workshop the best yet.

Register now

 

The VIP Workshop provides a unique opportunity to learn from the WordPress.com VIP team in person, as well as exchange ideas and experiences with other WordPress.com VIP clients and partners through networking lunches and dinners, in-depth curriculum and exercises, and focused, collaborative conversations.

A quick peek at the itinerary – details & agenda will be continually updated on the new WordPress.com VIP Workshop site powered by WooCommerce.

• Monday, May 8th — Arrival Day. Check-in, special guest keynote and welcome dinner.
• Tuesday, May 9th — In depth business and engineering sessions.
• Wednesday, May 10th — In-depth product sessions and hands-on development workshops. We’ll wrap the day up with a best of WordPress.com VIP year in review!
• Thursday, May 11th — Departure Day.

Space is limited for this event, so register now and take advantage of early bird pricing! Early bird pricing is $3,500 per person until February 15. After which, the ticket price will be $4,000 per person.

Header image by CM Howard from the 2015 Automattic WordPress developer summit at the Carneros Inn in Napa, CA

Welcoming WebDAM to Our Technology Partner Program

We’d like to introduce our newest Technology Partner, WebDAM!

In a world where using multiple software applications just to complete one task is the status quo, WebDAM allows you to cut through the software clutter by managing assets in your DAM directly from WordPress. The new WebDAM Asset Chooser plugin for WordPress VIP streamlines processes so you can get things done faster.

With WebDAM’s Asset Chooser, you can browse, select and insert images from your WebDAM library without ever leaving WordPress. You now have one central location for storing and updating images. No more combing through individual posts. No new tabs. No more replicating assets in multiple libraries. Use the Asset Chooser to insert live links (meaning the asset is sourced directly from WebDAM) so that any updates you make in WebDAM are automatically reflected in WordPress.

To start using the WebDAM Asset Chooser, clients on our WordPress.com VIP platform can load the plugin via the Plugins UI in the Dashboard or in your theme’s functions.php with the following: wpcom_vip_load_plugin( 'webdam-asset-chooser’ ); Clients on our WordPress.com VIP Go platform can add the plugin from Github.

WebDAM, a Shutterstock company, is the leading cloud-based digital asset management platform. It connects the visual content that drives meaningful brand experiences at every consumer touchpoint. Over 500 of the world’s leading brands depend on WebDAM to advance the way marketing and creative teams manage and accelerate brand impact. To learn more or get started, contact WebDAM today.

Reddit Now Supports Embedding Posts

Beginning in January, WordPress.com added support for embedding Reddit comments via oembed so that you can easily embed them by pasting the link in the editor on a line by itself. Reddit has recently added support for embedding posts so you can now embed both posts and comments from Reddit in WordPress.com.

Previously, embedding Reddit posts required using protected embeds (the Add Embed button in the editor) which may have had issues with sizing the height of the embed on some responsive breakpoints. If you are having this problem, try using the oembed method noted above instead.

Onwards noble steed! from gifs

 

Welcoming Roost to Our Technology Partner Program

We’d like to introduce our newest Technology Partner, Roost!

Roost is the leading provider of web push notification solutions for publishers and online businesses. They give you the ability to intelligently reach your web traffic when it’s not online via their desktops & mobile devices.

The Roost plugin for WordPress gives customers access to a near native WordPress experience while leveraging key elements of Roost’s powerful APIs for customized notification triggering and audience segmentation.

Clients on our WordPress.com VIP platform can load the plugin via the Plugins UI in the Dashboard or in your theme’s functions.php with the following: wpcom_vip_load_plugin( 'roost’ ); Clients on our WordPress.com VIP Go platform can add the plugin from the WordPress.org plugins directory.

If you have any questions or would like to get connected to the team at Roost, please let us know, or email Dan Stever with Roost (dan@goroost.com).