With WordPress being used by so many people (40+% of the web), I’m kept up at night sometimes thinking about all of the feedback that might be missing. When running the FSE Outreach Program in the early days of the Site Editor and block themes, it meant I spent a lot of time going to where people were and listening as much as I could in order to bring feedback back into the project at key points. I have a base routine for all of this now that includes joining as many Online Events as I can to hear from folks (amazing to be able to travel the world to hear feedback without leaving my apartment) and being in a lot of slack communities with key alert words to help me know when a topic comes up that I might be interested in.
Recently, I’ve been reading Extremely Online: The Untold Story of Fame, Influence, and Power on the Internet and it’s going through the early days of YouTube, including how much YouTube stars were dismissed and not seen as real creators. This includes a profound lack of support from YouTube itself with their partner program so much so that YouTubers began launching their own organizations to provide the support that was missing, turning into massive money making machines.
In reading about the recent past, I started thinking about the current WordPress ecosystem, especially as I dabble in YouTube videos mainly to share info with the real creators as part of a broader effort to provide accurate, compelling, and comprehensive information with folks in the Source of Truth docs for each release. In thinking about this more deeply, it made me wonder what would happen if there was a shared space for various WordPress YouTubers to provide feedback, talk about challenges, ask questions about some of the latest releases, etc. This could look like a lot of things from recorded hallway hangout style calls to an IRL meetup at an upcoming flagship event to a dedicated online event.
Either way, I’d love to ensure that for anyone who wants to share broadly with their audience about the latest in WordPress is able to do so with more ease and more accuracy. It pains me when I stumble upon a video with misinformation with thousands or hundreds of thousands of views. It also pains me when I stumble on a treasure trove of feedback in the comments of a YouTube video that touches on why something might be hard to use. How amazing would it be if creators felt even more comfortable sharing their insights back into the project? I love when I see a comment from an educator or influencer type about how much something is a pain point or requested.
In any case, what better way to reach YouTubers than a YouTube video?
Right now, I’m narrowing my focus to three main ideas:
- Providing Accurate and Relevant Information: I hope to help YouTubers by ensuring they have access to accurate and relevant information. I imagine the WordPress Media Corps could play a solid role here.
- Creating a Feedback Loop where creators can share their feedback from their audience back into the project.
- Sharing Tips and Tricks: Building a community where WordPress YouTubers can share tips, tricks, and best practices to support each other.
I don’t know what will come of this! I don’t know if a group like this already exists and I don’t have access to it. That’s part of why I’m writing this post. I do know I want to help and I want to help at scale. This just might be a way to do that.
Want to join the fun? Leave a comment and let’s see what we can do. Have a favorite WordPress YouTuber you think I should reach out to? Please share! For now, I’m reaching out to folks as I find them and will keep trying to stir up some momentum.
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