This was one of EmDash's first podcast interviews since launch. A few things that came up that I haven't seen addressed elsewhere:
- Kane confirmed Matthew Prince (Cloudflare CEO) directly asked "can we build the next WordPress?" — this was top-down, not a skunkworks project
- Their Q2 roadmap was literally a question mark. They didn't know if anyone would care. The community response changed that, and they're actively allocating resources
- Plugin sandboxing outside Cloudflare is being worked on by community contributors; Kane expects a Node implementation "next week"
- They want federated/distributed plugin marketplaces (looking at the FAIR proposal), not a centralized store
- Joost de Valk (Yoast creator) already has a merged PR improving SEO handling in core
- No marketplace monetization yet, but they explicitly want devs to build commercial businesses on it
First 37 minutes is the interview, rest is discussion of implications from a WordPress product perspective.
That's been the most common criticism, but it already doesn't require CF, and they're explicitly working on extending plugin sandboxing to work on other platforms. Plus, of course, GPL.
I don't see this as any more vendor-locking than a .com account. It's still early days, so can't really judge it as a finished product, but the opening shot across the bow is a big one.
NextJS doesn't require Vercel, but it certainly does not work as well without them. Are wordpress users going to migrate? Who are they targeting with this?
Top-down project directives are a signal the CEO is out of touch and becoming Elon-esc.
As a user, I want a container registry and managed kubernetes. These block my adoption of Cloudflare as a primary provider. This story around emdash tells me to stop considering CF effective immediately. I was already of this mind seeing how little they help developers on Discord and in their own forums.
Disclosure: I'm one of the hosts.
This was one of EmDash's first podcast interviews since launch. A few things that came up that I haven't seen addressed elsewhere:
- Kane confirmed Matthew Prince (Cloudflare CEO) directly asked "can we build the next WordPress?" — this was top-down, not a skunkworks project
- Their Q2 roadmap was literally a question mark. They didn't know if anyone would care. The community response changed that, and they're actively allocating resources
- Plugin sandboxing outside Cloudflare is being worked on by community contributors; Kane expects a Node implementation "next week"
- They want federated/distributed plugin marketplaces (looking at the FAIR proposal), not a centralized store
- Joost de Valk (Yoast creator) already has a merged PR improving SEO handling in core
- No marketplace monetization yet, but they explicitly want devs to build commercial businesses on it
First 37 minutes is the interview, rest is discussion of implications from a WordPress product perspective.
> this was top-down, not a skunkworks project
This is telling, though it already seems like it. It's just another vendor's lock-in.
That's been the most common criticism, but it already doesn't require CF, and they're explicitly working on extending plugin sandboxing to work on other platforms. Plus, of course, GPL.
I don't see this as any more vendor-locking than a .com account. It's still early days, so can't really judge it as a finished product, but the opening shot across the bow is a big one.
NextJS doesn't require Vercel, but it certainly does not work as well without them. Are wordpress users going to migrate? Who are they targeting with this?
Top-down project directives are a signal the CEO is out of touch and becoming Elon-esc.
As a user, I want a container registry and managed kubernetes. These block my adoption of Cloudflare as a primary provider. This story around emdash tells me to stop considering CF effective immediately. I was already of this mind seeing how little they help developers on Discord and in their own forums.
They're actively trying to avoid any kind of lock in, by the sounds of it. I'm still skeptical myself but it's at least a "wait and see"