[imiric]

Nice try, Matt.

In all seriousness, if this whole thing is about some false marketing claim from WPE, then call them out specifically on that in a tweet or something. Why does it deserve the "scorched earth nuclear approach", which equates to blackmailing them into giving you millions to prevent you from disparaging them in all media outlets? The claims Matt made go far beyond WPE not contributing to WP development as much as they say they do.

This corporate mudslinging paints WP.com in a much worse light than WPE. IANAL but I think there's a case here for a defamation lawsuit at the very least, if not for outright blackmailing.

[philosopher1234]

Publishing a blog on Wordpress.com is scorched earth nuclear and a tweet is fine? Why shouldn’t this get some actual publicity? What’s defamatory about it? Your response seems to be a better example of mudslinging than OP. At least OP pointed out some data to back their argument.

[imiric]

It wasn't just the blog post. Did you miss the keynote, numerous posts on Reddit and other outlets, as well as the threatening calls and text messages? I'm using his own definition of "scorched earth nuclear". This goes far beyond a single tweet.

> What's defamatory about it?

Oh, I don't know. Calling your competitors "cancer", their product a "cheap knock-off", and urging people to stop using them?

If my competitors are selling an inferior product, I would let that speak for itself, which should make my alternative shine in comparison. Going on a mudslinging crusade just reeks of desperation and immaturity, and the defamation and blackmailing could be illegal. If he really had a case against them, it would be resolved in court.

I'm not the target audience of either, but if I had to choose which one to use today, I would go with WP Engine based on this alone.