From June 13-15, 2024, WordPress enthusiasts from across the globe gathered in the charming city of Turin, Italy, to explore, collaborate and celebrate the world’s most popular web platform. The heart of the event was the dedicated team of 250 volunteers, led by WordCamp veterans Wendie Huis in ‘t Veld, Juan Hernando, and Takis Bouyouris, who tirelessly organized and produced the event, showcasing the true spirit of the WordPress community.
Seven “Team Servebolt” members attended WordCamp Europe, and it was a blast! Here’s a quick recap of the event’s highlights.
The Former Fiat Factory Building, Lingotto
WordCamp Europe 2024 was hosted in Turin at the historic Lingotto Fiere, once a bustling Fiat factory. This unique venue perfectly fit the event’s “automobile” theme, adding an extra layer of excitement and significance to the experience.
Of course, the Servebolt team did not miss the chance to taste the real Fiat experience ourselves.
The venue was quite large and did not feel overcrowded, although there were many, many people in attendance. It made for a great experience.
Contributor Day
Day 1 of WCEU 2024 kicked off with Contributor’s Day, a standout highlight of the event.
Contributor Day brought together 726 contributors working across 25 teams to support the WordPress project. Both developers and non-developers were enthusiastic as they collaborated to enhance various projects, including Accessibility, Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) and Sustainability.
Their accomplishments included translating 79,059 “strings” for the WordPress user interface across 29 languages, updating documentation for the forthcoming WordPress Core 6.6 release, onboarding new contributors for the support forums and testing teams, and identifying ways to improve plugin security.
Two Days of Engaging Sessions
Friday and Saturday included 60 presentations and workshops held across three tracks. Topics included WordPress development, accessibility, design, business, community, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity.
WordCamp Europe 2024 included a wider range of topics, such as more non-technical topics and hot topics like Google Search updates, alongside the traditional formats.
Joost de Valk and Juliette Reinders Folmer delivered the event’s opening keynote address on sustaining open source software projects. Their keynote covered funding open source, contributing beyond code, and convincing buyers in commercial enterprises that open source is a viable alternative to proprietary platforms.
The conference covered a wide array of topics and featured many engaging speakers, including a notable panel on AI in WordPress, highlighting its potential to revolutionize content creation and website management.
Networking, Networking, Networking
Networking was a key component of the event, with many opportunities to connect with other WordPress enthusiasts. Team Servebolt had fruitful conversations with current and future customers, fellow partners, and agencies. We met some industry leaders like Faizus Saleheen from authlab.io, Jakob Trost from greyd.io, and the NitroPack team, discussing innovations and potential future collaborations.
WordPress Summer Update
WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg provided a mid-year update on WordPress, addressing various topics such as the Gutenberg Phases, the WordPress Playground, and responding to a bug fix request, all of which have a significant impact on our community.
During his presentation, he highlighted the significant success of the contributor mentorship program, sharing inspiring stories of contributors who have made a difference. He also emphasized the impact of the WCEU Contributor Day, where community members came together to contribute to WordPress. He demonstrated Translate Live and shared an update on the Data Liberation initiative.
As you know, Servebolt is all about performance at all levels. Thus, it is no surprise that we were intrigued by one part of Matt’s presentation where he talked about a recent trend called “speed building challenges.” In these challenges, spectators watch WordPress experts build websites in real-time. This not only helps in improving development skills but also allows for exploring new ways to address potential performance issues before launching a new project.
Additionally, he discussed the latest developments on the WordPress Playground, emphasized performance improvements, and gave a thrilling sneak peek at upcoming features such as rollbacks for auto-updates and a zoomed-out view, which we’re all eagerly anticipating.
Viva Italia! The Passion of Italian Cinema
The after party, themed around “cinema,” paid tribute to Italy’s legendary film industry, which is celebrated for producing some of the most beloved films in history. It totally rocked!
It was a time for everyone to let loose and celebrate the successful event, with many attendees continuing their conversations late into the night.
Highlights and Takeaways
The event was a fantastic blend of knowledge-sharing, teambuilding, networking, and community spirit. Team Servebolt returned inspired and ready to implement new ideas and collaborations.
We’ve even already started improving our platform and products based on what we learned at the event!
Tired but nevertheless excited, we’re back with full power, ready for the big New Servebolt launch and several other ongoing projects.
Grazie, Turin! See you all in Basel, Switzerland.
