Hi friends,
I hope you are all doing well!
This message is for clients who have WordPress websites hosted by Flywheel. For everyone else: Hello! Thank you for opening this! I hope you’re having a lovely start to your fall, and I hope I’ll be in your inbox soon with something of more interest to you.
For Flywheel-hosted clients, I send you all the same greetings, as well as some news. First: I give full kudos to my wonderful colleague Amy Wright who prompted me to reach out quickly instead of burying my head in a hole this Friday afternoon. I’m lucky to work with a content genius, and most of the following borrows Amy’s words.
A half step back: WordPress is a free, open-source content management system built and supported by a community of developers. WordPress powers over 40% of the web, and people who work with it love it because it is very flexible and allows integrations with other solutions that enhance its capabilities.
Flywheel is owned by WP Engine (WP Engine acquired it in 2019), and WP Engine recently became involved in a trademark dispute with Automattic (a significant contributor to WordPress), which resulted in WordPress blocking WP Engine from accessing resources. Before this incident, Flywheel was generally considered a respected member of the WordPress community. While Flywheel itself doesn’t seem to have had past conflicts with WordPress, it is now caught in the crossfire of the dispute between WP Engine and Automattic. (Just so you know, I’m not affiliated with Flywheel or in their referral program, I just think they’re great at what they do.)
What does this mean for you?
First, I want to reassure you that your website is currently stable. The only immediate impact is that you cannot easily install or upgrade plugins and themes. Updates are occasionally needed to keep your site secure and functioning correctly, and unfortunately, given the legal nature of the dispute, a quick resolution seems unlikely. If the situation persists, you can reach out to me and I will be able to make plugin and theme updates manually in the short term.
Should the situation continue, I will likely recommend moving your site to another hosting service. I’m exploring options and will let you know if this becomes necessary. As I’m sure you would expect, this would involve some collaboration with you and a charge for time spent, but I will look for hosting options that are as efficient as possible.
I sure appreciate your patience and trust as I navigate this situation (with Amy’s help).
Sending you my very best,
Sarah