Contrary to rumors Magento Open Source is indeed alive and here to stay for a long time to come. Willem Wigman talks about the two different support models of Magento Open Source and how this will benefit the community.
Long Term Support from Adobe will be called the Magento Open Source LTS version. This is a very common practice in Open Source software. The Short Term Support or STS version of Magento will be supported by the community. We also talk about the benefits of a cleaner more streamlined version of Magento Open Source LTS and how this will increase the ROI of merchants all over the world using any version of Magento.
What is the future of Adobe Commerce and Magento Open Source? Vinai Kopp and Brent talk about the recent Adobe Developers Live Commerce conference and discuss the keynote. We talk about Mage-OS and how the community has stepped up to help Magento Open Source move faster into the future. We debunk speculation in social media and talk about how long-term and short-term support will work around Magento. The excellent news: Magento Open Souce is alive and well and will be for a long time
TRANSCRIPT
Brent: Welcome to this episode. Thank you I have Vinai Kopp is here. I’m going to let you introduce yourself today. Vinai and I have known each other for quite a long time, but why don’t you go ahead and tell us what you do day to day and maybe one of your passions.
Vinai: Right on. Thanks for having me, I’m the technical director at Hyva themes. So I worked very closely with Willem and all of our customers about more specifically developing the developers to do the implementations and try to make their lives as easy and fun as possible. And one of my passions, oh boy. I guess sleeping.Dog working out doing the stuff with a dog is fun. man trailing and all kinds of just fun stuff. It’s great. Traveling with a family is lovely. I really enjoy writing code. That’s passion still is. Okay, good.
Brent: Yeah. I’ve had the opportunity to run with you and your dog and the mountains around Heidelberg, and it’s such a great experience.
Vinai: That was a very nice run
Brent: So today I think let’s talk a little bit about the Hyva of theme and I think more, more, let’s talk about. Some of the things that are happening with Magento open source and Mage-OS. I think that would be some really interesting topics that resonate. Let’s start with let’s start with Mage-OS and, talk a little about open source.
Brent: I know there was an Adobe developer live conference on Friday last Friday, and that would have been February 11th. What, was your takeaways from that?
Vinai: Yeah. Okay. For me, it was a very nice talk. I enjoyed it. Not just talks. I watched a couple of, and I didn’t watch everything. I just watched a couple of talks and presentations and this round table about Magento opensource and such.
Vinai: I liked it. The vibe within Adobe I’m enjoying is that it’s been a lot better than it used to be a couple of years ago, and they’re communicating a lot more which, helps me understand what’s happening. So that’s good. Even though you just asked me before we started recording, actually the keynote was a little misleading in part.
Vinai: A number of people reached out to me afterward and asked me about some of the statements that were made and at least from my understanding as part of the Magento open-source task force, where we talk extensively, not hours about these topics. Maybe the information given was a little incomplete, so I understand why people might’ve gotten the wrong impression there.
Vinai: One of the statements, for example, was that community open source handed over completely to the community. And that’s not true. What will happen at least according to the current plans as an expressed intent of Adobe is that Magento open-source as it is today will stay there as Magento open-source LTS.
Vinai: So long-term support, which has I have five years or whatever, support versions, very stable, absolute focus on security and stability because it’s the basis of their commercial offerings. And what they will be handing over to the community is a new distribution called STS Short Term Support. So this will not be officially supported on Adobe cloud.
Vinai: Probably it will be possible to install it and use. it Even though it just won’t be enough official distribution for, one. And that in fact will be owned by the community. It’s not quite clear who that will be. Will it be the Magento association or how that look like? But Adobe said they only will have a advisory role.
Vinai: No veto power or anything. So the community can in fact steer the way it should go, which is lovely. It’s pretty much exactly what we wanted to achieve with Mage-OS. And I’m very exciting. So I was very surprised when Adobe announced itself with a 180 turn. They’re so great. And a lot of things probably were being discussed internally before they announced this.
Vinai: So that’s one thing it’s not that open source is just handed over to the community and Adobe it’s okay, got rid of it. In fact, it’s going to be a whole new distribution. That’s in the hands of the community while the existing distributions will exist. And. Security features and new releases will flow back into STS and at the same time, any features that are developed and STS, and that are maybe then after a year or so are battle proven turn out to not cause big disruption and actually have tangible benefits for merchants.
Vinai: They can be cherry-picked back into LTS when there’s time for another release there. So there, these diversions are definitely not independent of each other, and there’s a vested interest on both sides to stay compatible to some degree I’d, even though I’m really looking forward to being able to innovate again, as part of the Magento Fork, and at least it’s hard not to speak about Magento STS.
Vinai: Because I’ve got pretty clear picture about Mage-OS, how that should be, you know what it’s for the value it will provide to merchants, to developers, to Adobe, to the ecosystem. It’s, maybe a bit premature. Trying to apply the same thoughts to the STS distribution, because that’s just not just Mage-OS. I’d But probably there’ll be some similarities.
Vinai: So I would be very excited to be able to help maybe steer some aspects of that into the direction that I personally find important, for example, make it more accessible for developers and the performance improvements, of course, et cetera. So many, things there to, do, to think about fun with. So that’s one part of it.
Vinai: The other part that you mentioned before we started recording again, was: Is Adobe going complete SaaS? Like Adobe Commerce going completely SaaS. I think what that was statement was intended to mean was that all new features that Adobe will be releasing for Adobe Commerce will be SaaS offerings, just like they have for the last couple of years.
Vinai: So everything around sensei. So Adobe analytics, product recommendation, search. I think those are the services they provide so far. They are SaaS offerings, but they only are usable with Adobe commerce because of the PHP stack, they built around it integrated into. Now in theory, they could be integrated into any commercial e-commerce offering, right?
Vinai: Not just Magento They’re SaaS offerings after all. But Adobe commerce will be built on the PHP stack. So it’s not like it’s completely SaaS now for the years to, for many years to come as the official statement. So nobody knows for how long pretty long as my expectation, right? It will speed pretty much what we’ve got right now.
Vinai: We have the stable PHP core and then SaaS offerings being built on top of this. And this is actually great because. Nobody likes breaking upgrades. It’s just doing work without getting any benefit out of it. So having a stable core is awesome for everybody developers have much more fun building new stuff, merchants don’t want to pay without getting something in return for development work and development hours.
Vinai: So this idea that we were proposing for Magento open source from the beginning for Mage-OS that is, and now also I think hopefully will be adopted for for the STS release, is that the same approach has followed. So any new features are developed as extensions, so to speak, right? It doesn’t have to be SaaS offerings, but they won’t be part of the core, so to speak.
Vinai: But that external extensions, which then can be added in, and the only difference is such a service or feature could be running inside of the same PHP process. So that would be the in-process customization. And as we develop as know and love. Or it could be a SaaS offering like Adobe offers it now, in case of Adobe, those could be customized through the thing called Adobe IO, formerly Firefly, et cetera, but there’s just for the SaaS offerings.
Vinai: So all the existing customizability of Magento still exists. And that’s great because we had the home module ecosystem and develop practice system around that. So maybe that clarifies things a bit.
Brent: I want to just break this down a little bit now. Cause we, when we went through a lot of things and I, did not have an opportunity to see the live broadcast.
Brent: But the The LTS and STS, I think obviously has confused a lot of people when, I read a few notes from, somebody that sent me here’s what’s happening, they said Magento’s going open source. Magento is going, SaaS was the first statement. And the Magento Association is going to take over the Magento open source.
Brent: These are some big statements. And I was like, wow where did this all come from? And I started doing some searching and I couldn’t find anything about it. So I think your clarification has made it much easier to understand. And then Willem did go through the LTS and STS with me.
Brent: And that also makes perfect sense. I do feel like maybe they did dump a whole lot in a keynote on the community. And I’m a little bit perturbed that it’s going to take three weeks for this recording to come back out. I feel like maybe there was some misinterpretations of this news and it hasn’t spread widely.
Brent: I just want to go back to open source and let’s talk directly about STS LTS. And so it’s clear right now, Magento is going to control the open source core of Magento. Adobe is going to control the open source core of Magento. It’s going to be called long LTS long-term support. And another entity at some point is going to get control over the fork, which is going to be this short-term support, which is going to be more of the innovative space that’s going to happen.
Brent: Would that be a good
Vinai: We’ll be able to adopt newer PHP versions much, much quicker. Include improvements that have a high priority for community better caching, better session handling. For Adobe, they didn’t have a high priority because of maybe focus on Adobe commerce, cloud or stability.
Vinai: There’s much more room to maneuver there for innovations.
Brent: Think some of the things you’ve talked about and one of the things they did they announce earlier was they’re going to decouple all the core features, all the third party modules like PayPal and Dotdigital.
Brent: All those are going to get removed from the core. And we’re going to end up with just Magento, which I think is a great idea in that part. Alright. Again, just to explain to the listeners LTS is going to be a a version of Magento that is a core version. That’s going to reside as an open source version for everybody to use.
Brent: It’s not going away. It is still going to be the core of Adobe Commerce. And Adobe commerce. Theoretically, what they’re saying is they’re not going to bundle a lot of new functions into the core of Magento, but rather depend on third parties and more likely from Adobe anyways, SaaS services to attach to it.
Brent: That a good, a easy way to say it. Okay. Absolutely. If we then talk just briefly about the SaaS, Because I heard a lot of people say Magento is going SaaS, right? I don’t know how that could have been misinterpreted. I guess I do know how it could have gotten misinterpreted.
Brent: It sounds like all the new features are going to be SaaS, but the core of Magento. As we know it, there’s no plans at the moment to make it go SaaS. And it would really have to be a brand new refactoring of Magento or Adobe commerce before it could possibly go completely SaaS
Vinai: so complete speculation here, but my guess is something like that will come at one point in time, maybe.
Vinai: But everybody within Adobe says many years to come, whatever that means, right until that we’ll be ready. So until then they will be reliant and dependent on the PHP version for many years to come. And also even after this new product finally has been realized this complete SaaS commerce offering. They have a lot of existing customers on Magento, as we currently know it and they will still need to be supported.
Vinai: So that will take another how it is, software never dies and we have still have Magento one and what’s called oh, it’s commerce hanging around. It’s still we’ll still have Magento two sides on PHP in 10 years. Officially supported by Adobe,
Brent: yeah. And I think the, realization to have this SaaS offering, it will be something that competes in the enterprise space when it’s ready.
Brent: And I’m guessing five years from now, it’ll be ready. Ideally it would be cool if they had three versions, they had a SaaS, they had a on-prem and they had an open source. With the open source, always underlying core that’s pushing forward. All the core features that are made Magento. And there’s no reason why a SaaS version couldn’t be PHP.
Brent: I think Akeneo has a SaaS version. That’s PHP Shopware has a SaaS version that’s PHP. Let’s, not speculate too much, but I think just to help people understand what was put out there on Friday The peripherals of Magento as we see them, or as Adobe commerce, sorry.
Brent: As we see them are going to be SaaS. And I guess the good news for that is that anybody has open source would now have options to bring in some of the enterprise SaaS features that Adobe commerce is offering
Vinai: theoretically will be decides to offer them to. Open source merchants running on source, sure.
Vinai: So there’s no technical reason not to only business reasons. Hey, we want to have it exclusive for commerce, which I don’t know, but they’re all, always other offerings too. Companies like Nasto offering product recommendations and other search streetwise, et cetera. So there are many options, competitors, so to speak of the Adobe offerings, which are of course, open to any open source merchant too.
Brent: And I think all of these, a lot of these extension companies Shipper HQ is a great example of who decided that they were going to go SaaS early on. They’ve had big success in doing that. And I don’t think because some of that the processing is done outside of Magento doesn’t necessarily mean
Brent: that it’s going to stop you from making some customizations that you want around that. If we think about how Magento works, there is an extension that usually talks to a SaaS provider.. And then the SaaS provider does its work and it comes back right. At a minimum, you can just connect with restful or you have some basic connections where it would do everything, but generally we’d have some extension.
Brent: You would install that extension would do the communications. If there’s any rules that we want to build, we could build into that extension. That’s outside of the SaaS. And I guess we would call that microservices, right? If we’re truly SaaS, you’d have to have all these different microservices that are residing outside and you’d have to manage all those things.
Vinai: I don’t know how micro to these servicesare, but services. And that’s exactly how the Adobe SaaS offerings integrate into Magento commerce to exactly. Just like you said. So no
Brent: difference. Yeah. And I think too I guess there are going to be Adobe extensions that you would install.
Brent: And I’m thinking specifically of the new Adobe payments, which is an extension you install, but the bulk of the work is done outside of Adobe commerce. And it is open to, it is open to open source clients. Interesting that a lot of the extension updates, because they said the extension is partially written in react.
Brent: The extension updates can be pushed to the extension from Adobe.
Vinai: Yeah. Then it has to be hosted somewhere like the JavaScript code needs to be pulled in from some server environment controlled by. Adobe in that case. So they just update the file server, which then gets loaded into the browser.
Vinai: That’s the only way to do that because they are unable to update the code running on a server, unless of course they own the server tooling with a cloud. So that would be another story. But Yeah, it’s everybody’s has the same tools at their disposal as a technological tool. It doesn’t matter whether it’s Adobe, whether it’s a third party SaaS provider, whether it’s an in-house team, Adobe obviously has a bit of.
Vinai: Power in terms of manpower, they can put behind some, things and unify a lot of offering. And there certainly is a benefit in that, but they still have to build stuff with the same technology everybody else see what’s
Brent: so I think some of the things I’m hearing is that you’re, excited or let’s call it bullish about this LTS/STS Model.
Brent: And it’s going to be a good path forward for the years to come, at least in the short-term at least five years in the long-term 10 years, right?
Vinai: Yeah, I am. Your guess about the timeframes as good as mine. That said I, my idea is probably something similar yet. I think probably not too far off, but again I, have no idea.
Vinai: I don’t know no additional information now because Adobe had big collaborations. They’ve got legal. They’ve got a ton of teams, a lot of different departments that have to be involved, product ownership, marketing, API’s, strategy, leadership, whatever that means. So, many people, so many aspects it’ll take some time.
Vinai: It won’t be here tomorrow. I have no clue how long it’ll take. It does seem like Adobe is interested in making that happen as quick as possible, as quickly as possible. So I can have no. Impression of anybody’s stalling, this and this is I’m talking here. Being part of this Magento open-source task force, right?
Vinai: So we meet every two weeks and get to talk with other members of the community who are interested in the future of open source and also five or six people from Adobe were there all the time. So we talk about different aspects of this and try to find the best path forward. And that’s what this is. So it’ll take some time.
Vinai: And in the meanwhile, we, from the Magento opensource community Alliance, we’ll continue to build out the Mage-OS distributions and everything that we’re doing there, I believe will seed and directly into the STS version. Because we’re learning. Building this and all that knowledge will serve being able to have a community run Magento version, even with the guidance from Adobe, it doesn’t hurt learning.
Vinai: Things are never going to so we are not dependent on Adobe. And that’s the one thing I keep, repeating. And it’s one of my main motivations there. I think it’s pretty important to be independent, to be able to make our own decisions without having to wait for others. And so far everything that.
Vinai: Has greatly just only good things have come from it. Look at what we’re getting. We’re getting STS version. We have a lot more communication with Adobe. The whole vibe is shifting around Magento. We have a lot more clarity about where Magento’s headed, et cetera. So I believe if we could continue to do this.
Vinai: Good things will come.
Brent: All yeah. So I want to shift gears. Let’s I want to close out this Mage-OS thing. If you’re a listener and and you’re not technical, don’t worry Magento’s around.
Brent: I, want to just dive when it just one small technical talk, but really quick.
Brent: So I did see, I think he’s a Magento master and I should know his name, but he talked about integrating the UCT, the upgrade compatibility tool into the build of. Of every build of Magento. I think that’s exciting and I think more people should use this upgrade compatibility tool as well as just the multi, the testing framework.
Brent: I can’t express more that developers need to be using some of the tools that are out there. Have you used the upgrade compared to the UCT tool at
Vinai: all? Not an anger. I’ve just used it on. It’s a code base that I work on, but because I’m working with that product company, Hyva, it’s not like we have our own sites.
Vinai: Like I’m not a merchant in effect. I work for merchants, so it’s slightly different, but yeah, it’s good. This upgrade compatibility tool is helpful. I wouldn’t consider it a goal to be a hundred percent green because that severely limits what can be done, but it’s super useful. And that it shows where to pay extra attention during upgrades.
Vinai: Chances are depending on how the code is written, it will still work. But it’s, it just gives a indicational where, and get them started.
Brent: Good. All right, so let’s move on to the Magento association. So the you’re part of the open source task force, right? Is that what it’s called now? The open source task force.
Brent: I’m on the membership committee. So I can share my news from our meeting yesterday. And you can share your news how’s that you share your news first. What’s the news on the open source taskforce
Vinai: then use all the open source taskforce is that we’re trying to. Figure out how to make this STS version happen as good as possible.
Vinai: First Adobe has to figure some stuff out internally, but once it’s ripened a little bit we want everybody on this task force, once a joint efforts, they’re realizing that in fact, a lot of the work will be up to the community. And with as all things open source, the people who show up and do the work, they’re the one who counts.
Vinai: So it doesn’t matter about how’s things. How groups of people as are, should look, it’s just whoever’s there and does it. Yeah, I hope many more people will turn up, but the same with this open source task group at the beginning, we’re a lot more people. After sometimes some people just stopped going.
Vinai: Maybe they thought nothing would come out of it or don’t have time or last happened. I realize now we live in a world where things do happen that make Magento seem less important. So I understand, but we need the people who are willing to show up and do the work, and we want to encourage people to join.
Vinai: So that’s what we talked
Brent: about. One thing I’ve seen from this task force is the lack of representation from people outside Europe.
Vinai: Wait, so you’re talking about Mage-OS I think those are the task force is the committee of the Magento association. Yeah. Yes. So a Mage-OS. Yes, it absolutely you’re right.
Vinai: The U S was underrepresented and many other parts of the world. Okay. And the reason for that and you, guessed correctly. You’ve talked about that before. It’s just, we want it to move fast and moving faster, easier with a smaller group. Yeah. Now we’re at a point see we have, we almost have a release ready, and once that’s ready, we will open up the group and we’ll open up the GitHub repository and invite people to.
Vinai: It’s super important, what people have to participate, but then we have something, we’re not just people talking about stuff and we’ve got something. Yeah that’s super exciting and I’m looking forward to many people joining like us and other people, other parks, we need that.
Brent: Just to clarify and I started to add some confusion. Magento open-source taskforce is five people from Adobe and five community members that are working on how are they going to make this all work? The open source version, and what’s going to happen. The Mage-OS, the Mosca is a group of people that are actually working on making it work.
Brent: Is that a good way to describe it?
Vinai: Yeah. Started earlier. Thus whole STS version only happened because. Oh, what the open letter that this community lines, European centric group published and yeah, so that’s how it started, but it’s not going to stay that way. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It’s confusing from the outside.
Vinai: I wouldn’t have a clue. What’s going on a Magento association. We have. We have Magento open source. Now we have Magento opens on LTS and STS, and then we have major multiple distributions and we have too much who can understand all that stuff. But I did it the company in real time. Yeah. So hopefully everything will just merge together over time.
Brent: Yeah. All right. So from the membership side, then the Magento association is going to have a paid model. And at first, what you’ll get from paying is you’ll have the right to vote for the board and the board voting is out now. I think it’s starting. And I think I think that there has been quite a shift in the community and, people are looking for new board members.
Brent: I think they’re looking for March 1st to start, it’s going to be on Patrion that they’re looking to to March 1st to start the member drive to get people to join the Magento association. And it’ll be I won’t say I won’t have any, I won’t say any prices yet because nothing has been confirmed, but th there should be some affordability in there as well.
Brent: It’ll be very similar to what Drupal’s doing. And the pricing will be the pricing to join will be lower than what Drupal has. And the first benefit is that you’ll be able to vote for the board of the board for Magento association. That’s my big thing. Yeah, I, yeah. And I think one of the things is that people have, complained from that the Adobe side it’s not been transparent and communicative and they had Magento association side has been slow in communicating.
Brent: So I think what we’re seeing is each of these committees is happening and I’m taking some responsibility on telling the world what’s happening in our current. I, wrote a blog post about our meeting in January. That should be out pretty soon. Now I’m going to write a media blog post about our meeting for February.
Brent: And honestly, to just the time to get that blog, post approved is quite quite a long stretch. It’s not like you just record it and get it live right away. There’s a lot of, there’s a lot of red tape and I’m learning that. Part of it is that the community has to be okay with some of this red tape.
Brent: And I think what you’ve said earlier about Mosca and how you wanted to make it happen faster, I think that’s a great decision to make that work, because if you do open it up to the whole community, now you have multiple, people who want to do different things and you, you can never get anything.
Vinai: Do you remember last September and meet Magento, Poland. The discussions that were happening there, the board paid membership and everything. So it was cool to see this come to fruition. Very nice. Also back then Matias from Typo3, he said, okay, if you start to open things up, what will happen is a lot of people will attend the first two meetings now be
Vinai: back to
Vinai: fraction and those are the important ones.
Vinai: So don’t spend too much time making everything too transparent and easy. Because too much effort there isn’t worth it. And back then, I it would be nice if we just had hundreds of people working overtime, getting everything done, we just yeah, I think that’s just not how it’s going to work.
Vinai: He has a lot of experience in that
Brent: areas. Yeah, I know I saw some of those. I saw some of his tweets or I think that there were tweets or LinkedIn, but I think there are tweets anyways. I just want to reassure people from the Magento association side and by the way, go to Magento association.org forward slash join and join today.
Brent: That things are happening there. Things are happening on the open source tasks. We’ll have some great news on the events committee. Things are happening on the events side. There’s going to be more meat Magento’s coming. There’s things happening from the membership side.
Brent: And I’m just going to continue to push that Magento association has a place on their website to tell us what each of these committees is doing. I do feel like it’s not like we’re working towards transparency, but it would be great to ha to even publish the meeting notes. As a transcript.
Brent: I don’t know why not right? This isn’t, there’s nothing happening in these meetings. That can’t be, we don’t sign an NDA and we don’t say, no, you can’t say this to anybody. So why can’t we talk at least talk about it. I think if we don’t do that, then we also end up with speculation. Like we did from last Friday’s conference where the keynote is saying Magento is going SaaS.
Brent: And everybody starts getting confused.
Vinai: Yeah. Would it be helpful to know. To be able to refer back to, okay. What’s actually going on if needed. Probably most people won’t watch that because we all busy and. No more meetings oh yes. I want to watch more
Brent: meetings. Yeah. I think he just said from a news standpoint, even from a transcript standpoint, if you Google, like I like right after I saw those notes, I’m like, I started Googling Magento, going open source and Adobe commerce open-source and Magento Adobe commerce, all SaaS and nothing’s out there.
Brent: There’s nothing, there’s no news about it. So then I’m like maybe there’s a misinterpretation of what the person said. Yeah. All right. We are going to have to do a second episode because we’re running out of time for your Hyva talk, but I think let’s, briefly dive into Hyva and I think that we should do a second episode specifically on the reason why people should, we should implore people to have faster websites.
Brent: I think that should be the topic. If you happen to be on Magento, Hyva is a great option. And we’ve just launched our first client on the Hyva theme it’s taken us a while, a live one. So we’re excited about it. And we’re seeing great things. And every, meeting I’m in this, shouldn’t be a Hyva commercial, but it’s going to be every meeting I’m in.
Brent: I pitch Hyva and say that there’s no better way to improve their ROI on a website than to increase the site. Speed. So tell us, maybe give us some updates. We have five, 10 minutes. Now give us some updates on Hyva and tell us what’s happening.
Vinai: So much it’s happening, all the things, all the good stuff’s happening in particular things that I’ve been working on a lot.
Vinai: Extension compatibility. We now have a number of extension vendors. Join Hyva. We are committed to supporting all their extensions, making them compatible. So they work out of the box on Hyva installs. We have some early adopters like red chants and Tuma with great extensions. So they all have their extension are compatible.
Vinai: And now we can seeing more larger major extension vendors join like mate, we just renounced a tech partnership with Magewerks and WebKuul coming. They have a lot of compatible extensions. So that’s great seeing that these extension vendors see the benefit in making the extension compatible.
Vinai: So we have more than a hundred compatible extensions. Some are listed in the Hyva compatibility tracker. Some are compatible out of the box, so no need to install additional extensions just provided by the vendor directly. And that’s been great. So I’ve been recording videos on how to make this compatibility model.
Vinai: I’ve been writing a lot of documentations. We’ve made the documentations public, which has been requested a lot, so people can inform themselves before actually starting out purchasing a license. So that’s done now at docs hyva.io, and that’s. What I’m trying to do, basically making the life of extension developers more pleasant and making life easier for merchants because all the extensions they want to work with, they just work.
Vinai: So that’s good. A lot of extension vendors have been following. Lead off Magento, creating better extensions in a way that they weren’t built for Luma. So building a ton of small JavaScript files, and that’s exactly the opposite of what we work, how we work in Hyva. But there’s a reason for right there.
Vinai: Any Google page metric, just. It just doesn’t pay having, this required JS based front end. So having small inland JavaScript is great. People love it. Customers love it. It’s super fast. Yeah, we have to adjust the way we ride these modules. And that’s what I try to add in. Developers.
Brent: That’s great.
Brent: Yeah. So I I’ve been again I’ve been pitching the fact that Hyva was going to improve your web vital scores. It would be great. And I’ll give you some idea that I had, it would be great. If on the Hyva site on your hyva.io site, you have some kind of. Check right.
Brent: With a with the theoretical. If you switched your theme, what your score could be. So like you punch in your URL. It does a quick calculation, which it’s an open, it’s an open API for the vitals. All you do is show that performance score. Like for example, I just did a test on on, yesterday on a client and it came back as a 17 on their performance score.
Brent: And I have a script on my computer that I run. So I just put in lighthouse URL, boom. It gives me a little report and I can share it right with the client. It would be cool to say, and that you would say here’s your score? 17. Theoretically, if you, it you’d know that it’s going to improve it just by removing all that JavaScript.
Brent: It’ll improve it by 50 or 70%, whatever it is. So it’d go to 65 or something and knowing that they still have still a lot more work to do, but you can give them some scores. I, can equate this to there’s some marathons that you can do that are downhill marathons, and they always say, if your marathon was a four hour marathon at Chicago, if you do this marathon, you’re going to do a 3:30.
Brent: Okay. You, can extrapolate the idea of performance gains from a benchmark that you would get in general. And of course you would say, this is not really going to happen. This is all theoretical, but you will see an improvement and improvement could be as much as this.
Brent: Absolutely. Yeah, it’d be a good selling tool.
Vinai: On average, if we take the customers where we have numbers, who went from Luma to Hyva, the medium amount they improved by is X. Then we could apply that there, maybe something like that. We, could, it would be tricky if people then would try to. Take that as a a promise, it didn’t work.
Vinai: You still are using this super expensive chat, live chat or whatever that ruins all the page metrics, no matter what page you set up with an excuse. It depends as always, but yeah, I like the idea of being able. Just immediately present some kind of
Brent: assaults there. Yeah. And then I think some, big some benchmarks some, key benchmarks and, having some success stories on, your site, you already have some success stories, but actually rolling them out with big, huge numbers and graphics.
Brent: Like some marketing directors like to see and CEOs like. They like to see a 56% improvement in load time or 120% improvement in a thousand percent. You know what I mean? Like those are the things that people like to see. I didn’t want to make this a marketing session, but
Vinai: thanks for this free consultation, I’m working on a new site and we were just missing a bit of the content.
Vinai: It looks great. I can’t wait till it’s finally live. So there’ll be more stuff. It’s coming. It’s almost there. I really would like to have somebody on board who focusing focuses on producing that kind of content it’s would be really helpful. Yeah. You got a job
Brent: good. So let’s, close out today.
Brent: I think that that there is some effort to get more content from Mage-OS. I think we had a meeting earlier and getting the community to be involved in helping to develop some of that content. So why don’t you just talk briefly about what you’re working on? Sure
Vinai: the background is Adobe removed the domain, Magento.com and redirect all traffic to their Adobe commerce, adobe.com landing page.
Vinai: And I was pretty disappointed about, and I think that’s a super bad idea. It’s bad for everybody who built their business around Magento and gender opensource named Magento. And it’s. Harsh. I dunno, it’s not good. So I think the decision was made, and that was also confirmed from speaking to people inside of Adobe, that people who don’t understand and to not have the full picture.
Vinai: And that just happens with a large company like Adobe. So hopefully, maybe something will change. I have no idea, but fact is at the moment, if somebody wants to get formed about Magento open source, If they don’t know that already, what do they do? There’s no magento.com. They just go to a page on Adobe side, selling them to Adobe commerce, which is it’s just explaining how that’s built on top of Open-Source.
Vinai: Is beyond what most people want to know. So we need something there because it’s possible to create wildly successful websites on Magento. Open-source so many people are making doing great. And that’s why we decided are the Mage-OS group to put up content around Magento, open source. Targeted at merchants former.
Vinai: So they’re able to inform themselves so description what it is comparisons to Adobe commerce, for example case studies maybe insights into a specific features that are offered here. I don’t know, for example, page builder because that’s it’s feature that got rolled over from commerce to open.
Vinai: So things like that, that interest merchants who might consider it. So that should come out as fast as possible. And hopefully somebody else like the Magento association or Adobe will also do something, but experience has shown they move slower. So trying to get something done. And as soon as something else is there.
Vinai: The, if that’s better. I think everybody would be happy to contribute the content there too. So it’s just important to get the content out there because so many people’s livelihood is built around Magento and not Adobe
Brent: commerce. Yeah, I agree. So I just closing out today a couple of key points and I just want to key in, on Magento open source.
Brent: And I think that we have to continually talk to the leadership at Adobe and let them know how important those customers are and what a great funnel they. To getting to Adobe commerce. So everybody on Magento opensource is a great candidate for Adobe commerce, in opensource isn’t necessarily right for Adobe commerce.
Brent: Because it there’s certain things. Clients don’t need. But everybody could be right for Adobe or for Magento open source. And if leadership understands the more they invest in the open source side of it, the more potential clients they have that will move to Adobe commerce, the right type of clients Adobe wants.
Brent: And I know. That Adobe wants people that fit into their suite, right? They want people that would maybe get AEM that would get Adobe target to get Adobe analytics. They’d like to have people that fit into that Adobe, experience suite, which includes Adobe commerce. This is a great vehicle for Adobe to get clients upstream into where they would like to see them.
Brent: And I also would agree that decoupling some of these things that were. Some of the third party modules that were product core, we’ll make upgrades easier and make the experience that some Magento open-source users have had where upgrades have been a little bit more difficult and, they’re costly, right?
Brent: So slimming down the core and making it really, great and making the core. Easily upgradable is going to help the open source users to to have a larger ROI on their investment. Yeah, the key here though, is we just need to keep pounding in that Adobe can’t forget open source and it’s not a competition to Adobe commerce.
Brent: The way Adobe commerce is positioning themselves are for big business. There’s no, absolutely no focus on medium and small business. So why don’t they continue to focus on it by letting them use open source?
Brent: There’s some great folks inside of Adobe. Eric Erway, Nicole Khan Nelson Mineola.
Brent: Come on Chris, John Pasha talk HockeyApp I think it is not quite sure how to pronounce their names. Apologies, but they are great. They’re really working hard on increasing awareness and aside of adult. And we can see that it’s happening through the relaunch that we’re seeing now. So they’re also on the source task force.
Brent: So it’s not just us having to talk to it over leadership. We have to do that. You need to do that, but there also are good fonts inside of Adobe.
Brent: Yeah. Good. Vinai. We’re going to have to schedule another. Just performance interview and talk specifically about how you make your website faster and that will of course lead into
Brent: But thank you for today. It’s been a very enjoyable conversation. I’m going to get the transcript out on this one right away, so people can read it as well. And and let’s do another one where you can let’s do it. We should do an episode when we’re all ready to, display how easy it is to install Mage-OS I think that’s a fantastic idea.
Brent: Yeah.
Vinai: Yeah, let’s do that
Brent: one again. Alright. Thanks so
Vinai: much. Okay. Thank you to Brent. Yeah, take care. Thanks for having me. Bye bye.
We speak with long-time Magento Community member Aron Stanić from Inchoo. We discuss all the changes in the community over the years as well as the state of Magento and its brand. We finish off with a discussion on the importance of expectations in the client/agency relationship.
Transcript:
All right. Welcome to this episode today. I have Aron Stanić. Aron is a long time a Magento community member. I think at least 25 years. You’ve been in the Magento community. Aron why don’t you go ahead, do an introduction. Tell us what you do on a day to day on your day-to-day life and then maybe one of your past.
Thanks, Brian, it’s great to be here. As you mentioned, my name is Aron Stanić. Currently Exploring what the future calls I was for 12 years employeed Inchoo Croatian based e-commerce agency in true ease, their famous word of famous company in the Magento world, at least.
And so I’ve spent my, my, the most of my 12 years there as one of the co-owners as well. I was mostly working around sales, marketing activities. And I worked a lot with merchants right. Directly with merchants. So one of my passions is you put it so other than e-commerce and you ex in particularly around e-commerce, one of my passions is running.
I can say him. As much of a passion as it is for you, because I cannot pull off those mileage is I think similar, especially in those temperatures that you do your rounds. But that has been a passion for my wife and myself. We started running actually in 2019 little did we know that habit will actually get us through COVID and pandemic with some degree of sanity.
Wow. Okay. That’s great. Yeah. And I think you’ve been to the big damn run I’m sure I’ve seen pictures of you at the big dam run. So was it the 2019 was your first big dam run or it must be since you started running in 2019. Yeah. Okay. I did run hearing nurse even before that. I used to play basketball actually back in high school and Rhodes college.
Big run was the one and only for me in front of the 19th. Yeah, it was the first time I was running in the desert and it felt great. It was a great drapes thing. But even before that, I used to have these 5k or three K runs that were in that. Organized that’s various other Magento meetings, right?
So we organized the developers paradise back in 2016 in Croatia. And then we organized to meet Magento’s in Azek, in our hometown hearing in Croatia. So each of those events also had its own small major on as a part of the agenda. Great. Yeah. So let’s talk today about Magento and the Magento association and where the community’s going.
What you’ve been involved in the association, or have you been involved at some level and what are you, what is your thought on what’s happening at that? Yeah. So I haven’t been formally involved with Magento association as such. I was involved in meat, Magento association, like back in the days, because we were organizing these events and we were constantly not just organizing, attending a lot of these events and we were also parts of some task forces back into the, but now since maybe since plenty, again, like 19.
Around the time. And before Adobe took over completely now, Magento association had its, I don’t think he ever had exact clarity right on, on what it should be after he took over from each Magento association because it was a very turbulent time and it still is around the ecosystem and especially in the community.
And now with the latest The fork side right there that you’ve heard with the Moscow, with the open source community Alliance being opened up. I think that this is very interesting times. I’ve noticed that with the initial Moscow initiative it opened up. And Magento association in a way to organize the task force that we live in big numbers is also then involved in but from the latest things with hero with, I believe on three there, I don’t think he’s that thrilled with how some of the conversations went around the whole magenta and keeping the brand or north keeping the brand within the Adobe ecosystem.
So we’ll see, I’m actually very curious and anxious to see what. Comes back with max, because I was just checking before the call there hasn’t been the official communication from the magenta open source community Alliance, since I believe in the vendor. Because then they were involved with Magento association as the members of task force that was supposed to.
Come up with a way of how to keep Magento community or Magento open source now, still alive, right? In one way or another. I for one would be very disappointed if it, if Adobe just simply don’t give up on on Magento community rights. And I can completely, I can totally relate to a lot of people, especially the contributors through the Magento open source who would feel in a way be betrayed.
Maybe it’s a harsh word, but they have to understand that point because when you’re contributing through an open source initiative, obviously there’s a notion then. Okay. If you’re contributing, if you’re putting your time and effort and it’s free, right. And you know that it’s free Should you expect anything in return?
And I think that anyone who was actually contributing did expect initially anything in return, but with the open source contributions, it’s inherent that there is not necessarily a quid pro quo, but th the sharing you’re sharing, not because he wants something. And not because you expect something back, but it’s understood that by this sharing, it will be better for everyone around you.
You know what I was thinking about it. But when you, obviously, you also have a you’re also our father and father of two kids. One is 10, one is seven. And for them the first things that we are learning, we are teaching them how to. We’re not talking to them about individual ownership and private property and its we’re teaching them.
Really good to hold on to something for the toy or to food or anything that you should share with someone else, not just because then they will share with you, but because it’s, these are the things to do. And I believe that open source is a great way of organizing efforts of individuals and agencies alike to, to add value to any ecosystem.
And over here we have. 12 13, 15 years, whatnot of people really heavily contributing. And now for it all to not necessarily fall apart, but for them to feel like it has not, again, been for nothing. Obviously a lot of people have made a very decent living and have brought their careers on a different path because of magenta and because of what Magento open-source was and still is.
But it’s he has got some other over a bit. They it leaves an author faced in your mouth. And the I’m very curious to see where this is going. I’m actually I can’t say that I’m ha I’m having a preference. Obviously it would be great if Adobe showed That there they understand the value and the strength of Magento can source and to not treat simply disregarded, but even if it happens now, if it’s business as such then I would.
Welcome an initiative that comes up with a fork because in the open-source world of e-commerce softwares, I don’t think that there’s anything still there that can meet that can match Magento’s community and Magento’s feature set. So there are contenders, definitely shopper is one of them, and there has been silliness and others, but no one has.
Really beer. Yes. And it would be a huge waste to just ditch it altogether. Yeah. It’s not only just the feature set. It’s also the ability to add all of your own features without having to have some external service as your feature. In a SAS platform, you’re going to have some external service that connects via APIs.
And the ability to do that inside of Magento is another uniqueness that it has. I have a theory on why Adobe does it, why it seems like Adobe is squashing, the Magento name, or doesn’t seem to care about open source. If you think about all the people now that have, that are making these decisions, nobody at Adobe that’s making these decisions is left from Magento.
All the senior management is Adobe, senior management and their goal is to create a suite around all the different Adobe enterprise products. And have a complete experience for the user. All their products are enterprise products. So it makes sense that Adobe commerce is a part of that suite. And why would they pay attention to anything that doesn’t, that isn’t part of it.
So if their goal is to get clients that can work in this. In this enterprise suite of products, so experience manager and target and all the other products that make up the Adobe. Their priority and their goals are not anything around, Hey, let’s get people onto a free version of it.
I think that experienced manager is a patchy sling. There’s a free version out there to use. There’s no talk about that. And there’s no community around that and I’m sure that actually there’s probably a small community around it, but there’s nothing that. Resembles, what is the Magento community, which incorporates hundreds of thousands of people.
So I think the mistake that Adobe is making is that they are forgetting where the software came from. And they’re forgetting about the path that smaller and medium-sized businesses will take to get to the point in which they now. And they now will be, could be part of that Adobe suite that would incorporate experience manager and all the other parts of that puzzle that Adobe would like to assemble, to make a complete experience solution for users.
I agree. I agree with that. Definitely been another thing is you mentioned that small and medium businesses might that the open source might be. Path words, they send the price level, but then, and I’m not sure that would necessarily be the case, at least for the majority of small and medium sized businesses that were usually that were original using magenta one to begin with even Magento.
When there were still no thoughts of squashing open or anything while he was still alive and kicking Magento two was still maybe a third too complex and overly robust. That’s pretty much made for the needs of those really small and medium sized businesses. And they make up the vast majority of implementations of Magento globally even now For them, even if Magento stays as such as Magento opensource or some within some other name complexity.
Losing its complexity is not yet getting it. The lecture of, in the field that Magento one used to have towards the, in the eyes of those small businesses, because they want something that’s fairly quickly set up that they can start selling tomorrow. And even in the pandemic during the pandemic, right there was when the lockdowns.
I remembered that the BigCommerce had a huge in the UK big commerce had a huge marketing efforts saying you’ll get the line with us in 24 hours. I think you could not do that essentially with my gender, even with some other open source platforms you could, if you had a really good theme and they had all the time in the world just for you, but SaaS platforms suffer a service platform such as Shopify and BigCommerce.
Took advantage of this type of, not just the pandemic, but also of where Magento 2 went and with all the issues that Magento 2 had in the previous versions and a lot of those small and medium size businesses rolled over. And you can see if you’re looking at BuiltWith or some other platforms, you can see where businesses who used to be on Magento, are now.
I know where did they go? So unless they stayed in that open source, and in that case, they might be still in Magento 2 even still on Magento 1, or maybe have considered Shopware or WooCommerce. If they are really simple businesses, then you have the other ones, the other huge batch that have actually moved away to towards the SaaS Platforms.
Yeah, and I think you’re exactly right. The messaging from Shopify for the longest time has been, their platform is easy and Magento is super complicated. I know that Derek Harlick and myself way back in to. 15 or 2016 did a presentation on getting Magento up and running in 90 minutes and selling something to the audience right there.
And it can be done, but you’re exactly right. The complexities that are there and the way that the admin is presented gives you everything you need and more. And sometimes just on a SaaS platform, there’s guard rails around it. You can only do so much. You can’t do everything you can do in Magento.
And if you were to say, or even hide some of those things, maybe Magento would be more popular. I know that we had, for a long time, we had the client of universal music and they the problem was that they’re the people that were deciding what they would like in their store knew they could do anything they want.
And when you can do anything you want, and then you run up to the saying, okay, you can do anything you want, but you have to also spend that much time and money to get anything you want. So with a SaaS base, you suddenly say you can get almost anything you want. Here’s what you can have choose from this.
And that. A lot of times it helps people to determine what they need. On the other hand, they promise you other things. So maybe you are limited in terms of the feature set and features and the innovations that you may have, but they promise you your time and they promise you the stability of the platform and they tell you it’s for your own.
And I can see that, but for example, I think there’s something also here involved.. If you take a look you’re graphically, right? Where SaaS has higher market share.. That’s US. That’s Canada. That’s Australia. That those are your, let’s say single markets countries, primarily while in Europe, where there are a lot of different small countries.
But if you disregard Germany and UK and all of this huge ones, then if you’re a business you’re usually operating regionally, not just now. And you have to take care of various facts you have to take care of multi languages. Multicurrency is, are local regulations. And this is where actually open source gives you the ability and the flexibility that you need even out of the box, Magento supports multilanguage multicurrency.
So in your. And if you think of that then, and connect it with who is leading the now Magento open-source community Alliance. If you take a look at the people, they’re mostly 90% European. Right there, not that many Americans actually, who are involved in that because again, they have either lean towards the view, Adobe commerce and the professional enterprise level side, or they’re in the SaaS business because SaaS makes sense, makes much more sense.
Then it’s much easier to adopt. In a single market, such as you know US. So in that sense, I believe that open source can meet the needs of European businesses still with much on a much higher level than. SaaS can, obviously you can, even the Shopify BigCommerce, you can add plugins that allow you to have, or go with Shopify plus then it opens up and you have the ability of multilanguage multicurrency and all of these things. But in its nature open source is much more flexible and it can respond to. Ever-changing regulations, of the European union in a much better way than then it is the case with SaaS it’s easier at the end of the day it’s much easier.
And it, a lot of Surveys have shown that in one or different researchers that, that ease of doing business in US as compared to you is much higher. So there, there are very little regulations, very little friction. You have an idea or a product you want to start selling online. Do it over here, you have to jump through several hoops and especially then you have to fire an accountant who can explain to you a lot of the details and intricacies about how much can you sell to a specific country and how much then you can you have the tax when you reach a certain threshold and these Northern states can not be done probably as easily as they can with opensource.
I just want to back up to some what you said about Mosca and and there’s two points like the con the most people they decided they’re going to do this fork. And then I do want to talk about the speed of change and the amount of people in those decision-making processes and how long it takes.
So I do disagree a little bit about the fact that the most was, I feel like the most good decision was made in a bubble in Europe. And I wasn’t exactly consulted or I wasn’t on the, I wasn’t in the inner circle in that I didn’t know what was happening until after it happened. And I also realized that there wasn’t an effort to bring it to a broader community because they would like to make this quick, they would like to make this a little bit quicker than if you have more people there’s going to be more disagreements.
So I don’t disagree that the most initiative is. Is I think it’s a good thing. I think it’s a good thing to keep things rolling. I don’t a hundred percent agree with the fork. However, I do feel like if Adobe’s not going to listen, if Adobe is going to sit, continue to sit on the bench and not recognize that there’s a strong community, that the fork is a great option.
But I do feel like because Willem and the team there recognize that if they don’t do something. And if they try to incorporate too many people that’s speed in which it takes to get agreement on what they would like to do is going to, it’s going to stall and you’re never going to agree on anything, you’re going to be stagnated. So I going back to that, I do want to talk about, I know that Karen Baker has continually talked about the fact that we need to be an inclusive community and she has a lot of very strong opinions. There are also going to be very strong opinions in the opposite.
And that then turns into stagnation. So how do we make, how do we keep this moving forward without this just being a European centric organization? What’s wrong with it being centered in Europe and just getting a. I do agree with that. We, the notion that the speed is here also very important.
I had a feeling that Adobe is letting the time clock play off, just letting it play out, then we’ll see what happens if it comes to that then we might need three act or not. And I think that you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned that some of those decisions and everything.
From the fact that there are no more regional Magento people left at Magento. So starting with Roy and Yoav and moving towards through generations and generations of these people. Yeah. You are completely correct. So then you have a feeling that The care for this product and for the community is in the hands of the community itself.
You don’t have strong organization or old, either sheep. That’s that has been throughout these years, running this product. And that’s definitely a challenge, but if you don’t know who is exactly calling the shots and how are these people decided, or who decides that they’re calling the shots.
Then you may get into a point where there’s just too much noise and too many distractions for them to be able to create anything. So inevitably in the way I see it, there’s going to be, have to be if the fork is. Really going forward, there’s going to have to be some type of an entity behind it. Leading it, calling the shots and it’s not getting, you can’t have 100% democracy and these things because we didn’t have it. Even when it was still open source within Adobe, within Magento, you still had contributions and pull requests and everything. And someone had to prioritize.
Yeah, I think what we’re thinking. Yeah. People were thinking the Magento association was going to take over the charge or a. The care for the product, for the open source product. But that was not even the initial idea. I don’t think that was why Magento association at the beginning started.
It was organized through to, again, they grow from Meet Magento association, but to be more a facilitator of networking and then knowledge exchange and those kinds of things. So we are not. Somewhere on defense or in the, in between. And whether someone will step up and say, okay, we’re doing it this way.
I know if they get their livid and then we’ll take it or we’ll give it, if not, I think if this gets dragged on for too long, then the other thing that, that, that works for him. Yeah. And take it or leave it as a good way to put it and sometimes take it or leave it as decided on 51%. So there’s going to be a, there’s going to be a very small minority that doesn’t agree with what you’re doing, but again, these decisions have to be made.
And I guess the only way to do it is just to wait in the court of public opinion in terms of how the Magento community is viewing it. I do want to circle back again to the European centric because the reality is the reality is that, that there’s a lot of people in America that.
That don’t have any stake in this. They don’t really care. I can probably count on my two hands, the amount of people in the U S maybe it’s more than that, but the people that are that have some, still have some passion about it the passion for Magento is definitely still rooted in Europe.
The bulk work of Magento is being done in India. Let’s face it There’s a ton of people. There’s tens of thousands of Magento developers in India, but they don’t they’re, their voices is heard in a different way. If anything, maybe there has to be a strong voice coming out of south Asia as well to help push this.
But I think from a commercial standpoint and we always have to go back to Adobe, has a commercial vision for their product and. This open source product fit into their commercial vision. If it doesn’t, we have to help them understand how it can if it and if they’re not going to listen then the fork is an inevitable, but I will say that as soon as that letter came out, I think the next.
Adobe had a post that said, no we’re committed to this product and here’s why, blah, blah, blah. Now the ironic part of that is that, that I can’t remember the person’s name at the moment. But he’s gone. He’s not part of the, he’s not even part of this effort anymore. So again, there’s been turnover and there’s new people that have no vision or they have no history of what Magento has been.
And so they, they have no idea why this should be at all important. And yeah, one more point about the board that the other part of a Magento association is a lot of the people that were involved in that these first two years of. Board level membership are gone. I think Ben marks was on the original board as an adviser.
He’s gone. Guido was on the board and I believe he’s gone as well now. So some of those people that have a strong opinion about where it should go are gone. Yeah. You are completely right there. So what’s the funny thing is that you mentioned India as one of the very important, the areas or regions where a lot of bulk of Magental work and implementations, and even globally is being done, not just in, but from and I noticed on the Magento association page that the next event.
The only one in between a little, two or three events that are left in the Meet Magento ecosystem is the one in India. It should be true to happen in early February. And then it’s followed up by, by Mexico land and I’m not sure what it’s called. We have a Baltics events scheduled for me, so we’ll see what happens there.
There, there’s still some of those efforts and organizations being, you did mention a really good point. About us agencies, not really getting, not necessarily invested, but involved in all these areas, they don’t see their own benefit. So you with what gentle and. A handful of other agency that I’ve known from these 12 years like Shiro and Creatuity who are based in the US are still there.
But a lot of others were either acquired maybe by some other agents, but Accentures and whatnot, by those larger agencies, or they have also switched right towards other solutions. So yeah that that’s why you see that European centerism and around around so interesting times definatly they have had some, we’ll be we’ll see where this all goes..
Yeah, I think gone are the days of the single Magento agency who only does Magento. Unless you are a a Viamo of the world that has that clout and enough business to sustain that at that high level, it is difficult to operate in there. Just, I think one last point on this, on the American side as these agencies solidify and get bigger..
The management also has a commercial vision of the product and the people who remembered what Magento was and where it came from are also gone. And so from a leadership standpoint, that agencies. If those agencies have no have no recollection of why should happen and their team, isn’t part of that community.
Then there’s also going to be a disparity in how that agency reacts to events. And. Things like that. And I think we’ve seen it. Mainly at the sponsorship level it’s been difficult to organize events in the U S there are assuming it’s a hundred percent going to be a developer event, which it traditionally has been, but like Mage Titans was a good example of how it worked well in Europe, but did not work well in the U S.
Yeah, I know. Yeah, because it was always, let’s put it this way, business oriented rather than community oriented. So one thing that I saw with Adobe’s acquisition, obviously Adobe’s and other companies similar to Adobe, they’re acquiring a lot of different businesses and it’s usual, it’s normal for them to then absorb that product that they have acquired or an agency or.
Within their own system renamed it, rebranded, whatever. I think that Magento is maybe the first one that, that, where Adobe in their own acquisitions felt the pushback, such a pushback from the community. And when you’re talking about in the scale and the real business numbers, five client numbers, This is small.
This is a small piece of apply, but it creates much greater noise. Then it’s probably the worst thing in their mind. I get just think of that someone at the top level saying, okay, what are these guys even talking about? What kind of community open source?
What are we talking about? It’s like, how can we get. Yeah. And why should we care about us as a brand? So I think that the ensemble handle some of these conversations that are also taking place. Yeah. I’m just writing that down. You said, how should we get rid of. And unfortunately it’s partially true.
They would like it to all go away and their vision of where it should be, I think. Okay. So let’s, we’ll, let’s just close out this topic on the Magento stuff, but I think that if we’ve identified the main problem with the Magento association, Adobe has been communication and Mosca really highlighted the fact that, Hey, if we make a lot of noise and somebody’s going to answer, so Magento association has answered and Adobe has answered. But I think the vision of where Adobe would like to see. The magenta opensource is so muddled that if they were to just come out with a clear statement that would be such a a boost for the community. And honestly it wouldn’t hurt their enterprise side of things.
There’s no downside to committing to something on the open source, even saying even having a public or having some public statements about open source. And saying how important it is to the community. There’s absolutely no. Cause they could change their mind in a year and again, we would be back in the same spot and they would, there would be nothing lost to them because the reality too, is that the enterprise level clients out there who aren’t using community, they don’t care about community either or right.
It’s it’s developers and at the merchants who are using it and have. Who believe in it that those are the ones that really have something in it. Yeah. He needs. And those third party providers, service providers who lean on to merchants wherever they are. And if they see that there are hundreds of thousands of businesses on a particular platform, that they will create an integration for that particular platform.
We’re talking about the ERPs or search engines or. Yeah. You mentioned it wouldn’t hurt, but I think that anything that they would come now from Adobe without it feeling. That, that it’s really honest and that they’re substantial. Let’s just follow the process, but that there’s real substance behind me with just know backfire.
So from my point, you mentioned that the vision is muddled. I haven’t seen that there’s any vision at all. To be very frank,, I assume that the vision exists for them for the open source. And it’s very difficult for someone probably to just come out and say that. Yeah, I think the same thing from the Magento association, I think what we’ve seen is a announcement in, in, around Magento Connect, which I think happened in September, October.
And and they said that that there’s a commit there. There’s going to be things happening from their side. And that there’s a podcast coming out. That’s gonna help support the Magento community. Actually, they didn’t say what the podcast is a commercial podcast and it’s just advertising Magento as a platform.
And I don’t know if you’ve listened to it my, my complaint and I’m on the membership community. For the Magento association. Our goal on the membership community is to grow membership, right? And I would think the best thing to do in a podcast is to make a short commercial for the Magento association to join.
And right now it’s completely free. So here’s my commercial right now is go to Magento association.org forward slash join and join it’s free. And eventually it’s going to be, there’s going to be a paid membership, but right now it’s free. And there’ll probably be some incentives if you’re already a member.
That you’ll be a founding member. Blah-blah-blah so that’s my little, that’s my little pitch on why you should join the I think that there, there is a lack of cohesive vision from the Magento association. There is a vision, but I don’t think. It’s communicated. That’s my thought on that.
Yeah. It’s all comes down to communication and it’s probably something that we’ll talk about in the next part of the conversation as well. How important communication you think. Not just between the members of the ecosystem, but in between the relationships between the agencies and merchants.
So yeah, definitely. We know the task force that was established right around the gentle can source. I think that the community likes some, again, some clarity and communication on where the task force is, what they’re talking about. The only thing I believe that we heard that. Those couple of speeds from Wheeler a week ago or something like that.
So yeah, that never seemed. Yeah. So let’s move to agency discussions and communications. A great is a great thing to talk about. What’s your approach from the agency side to make sure your clients are. You know what we did throughout these years, we’ll be okay. We created, we made a lot of mistakes.
We did some good things as well, but th the one thing that I. Strike it as the most important thing in any agency, client relationship any business relationship whatsoever is actually managing expectations now, because if a client comes, if a merchant comes to an agency or looks for an agency, they have.
Be very clear first and foremost in front of themselves, what did these, did they expect from an agency? Do they expect them to be a partner through partner and then they will rely on their advice and then maybe hire them, not just for the technical and for the development part, but also for some of the e-commerce marketing activities or are they just looking for someone to.
The solution. And that’s one of the most important things to have as, as initial conversations. Then you, as an agency could also decide whether you want to establish this kind of relationship. If there’s someone who’s just looking for you to create the technically sound solution, then they will then take over and manage and run them their own.
Okay. Perfectly fine. If we can meet halfway, if the expectations are. Ben’s a great place to start. On the other hand, if you, as an agency are looking for partners or for merchants who we can partner with, who you can grow with and help them grow, then you probably would not be that willing to take such clients.
We, you see early on. They don’t see you again as equals or someone who can contribute to the growth, the bottom line, but just expect you to deliver the code that is floats. So those are the initial conversations. So what are the expectations? What do you expect from this relationship? And then. Even beyond that, obviously you have to talk about the budget expectations and the overall total cost of ownership and within the e-commerce and within, especially with the open source, there’s a lot of education that has to happen from both ends.
You have to understand the client’s business, but you have to also. The client or the merchant understand options and weighing these options. And then teach them that it’s not a good idea to, to. To overall to over the blow the the installation with 1500 extensions, hoping that because each of them is doing their own part, everything will magically happen.
We’re not in the microservices yet. So if you know that there’s, there has been a lot of a ton of conversations around these kinds of things because they’re that. It’s it comes down to communication. Sometimes someone from the Magento side has communicated that it’s open source, it’s free.
Then you have thousands of extensions on the marketplace that you can simply plug and play. And help your business, help your installation be more complex. And then you have to manage again, the expectations not tell them that it was completely wrong, but explain why it’s not exactly like that.
And then when you were in that position and did, this is what has happened to me a lot of times, a lot of the times is when you are, have a good understanding of the product, which you should have, if you’re talking to a potential customer or the potential line, You are not avoiding some of the difficult conversations.
Sometimes you are even opening them. If you know that they are crucial to managing expectations properly. And then that puts you in a, why was he positioned? Because someone else is just pitching the solution, right? Someone else is just pitching the product, just the bank. Again, it depends who you have on the other side, if you have personal on the other side, who recognizes that and for understands, and who’s not looking for yes.
People on the other hand, on the other side of the table, then you opened up the doors to do some proper relationships down the road. But for me over the years speeds being a hassle sometimes managing no. Let’s say, and I’m not not saying anything against Magento, but understanding why their marketing and where they buy their sales theme does not know the product really well.
It’s because the knowledge of the product and potential issues and the downsides and the comparisons between others will inevitably Put them in the in the worst position it will not help themselves. If you’re talking primarily about benefits and what the product gives you, and then hand it off to an agency who needs to implement everything that you have promised, and that it’s easier.
The hard work comes down, comes back to you. So the experiences have been you have to prepare, you’re very open, very honest, because at the end of the day, if you over. Someone will end up hurting it will be either your product your project development team, or are you going to approach your manager for them will be in a pickle or inevitably there is going to be issues on the client side as well, because the new solution that you put out will not be what they thought it would be or where they, what they hoped it would be.
This is where I doing open source in general has to have these conversations with SaaS platforms. Let’s say that the conversations are faster. It’s you have that? It works in that way. Can I tweak it? No. K right then. Yeah, I can. So that means I have to adopt my business model to the platform. Thank you.
They’re leaving again. It’s faster. It’s clear. We don’t know source. You can do everything, but that doesn’t mean you should, right? Because he then jeopardizes the stability of the system. It jeopardizes the business. Model as a whole, if you start doing all too many customization, so managing these kinds of expectations has been in my book crucial for establishing good, solid, honest long-term clients relationships.
I gave a talk at Magento, imagine 2015, and the title of my talk was what to expect when you’re not expecting. And it was the, you hit on many of the same topics. So education uncom uncomfortable conversations has been one of the main parts of my talks at these events. My original talk was in meat, Magento or Magento live journal.
And my, my thought was I want to educate merchants on what to expect from an agency and how to maybe navigate some of those communication points. And the funny part about that was all the people that raised their hands were developers. You have developers, agencies and murders.
And the ones that are struggling the most are the developers who are on their own, who don’t, who, oh, maybe you’re not, they’re not communication savvy. And I think the makeup of a developer, isn’t exactly how well they communicate with people. Their makeup, a really good developer is a good developer because.
They’re engrossed in their technology. They’re not necessarily engrossed in how well they communicate with the client. So I think you’ve hit them all exactly right on the point. I think that the best thing Adobe could do is have an engineer on a call with a client to help the client understand what they can and can’t do.
But the thing is that happens, especially on magenta. The client will find out they can do it and then they’ll find out that’s going to be 500 hours and they’re like no, it shouldn’t be that much. I want to do it in 200 hours. And then there’s somebody at the agency, a sales person, normally, who would.
Yeah, we’ll figure it out. Let’s get this signed and that’s starting from the sales cycle and you hit it on the head as well from the how Magento used to sell a Magento enterprise for the salespeople start that. And it ends up having to be cleaned up by the project management team.
Yeah. And there’s even that’s, all of these things are coming from us being immersed in Magento as a product for these 10 or 12 years. So you cannot even blame. Some of these people who are actually, they’re also doing their own job, because a lot of those people, especially in the sales and marketing.
Thought or in a different way, or haven’t been directed, is there a job description and then understand completely from that standpoint, that we touched on previous from the business standpoint, it’s about the numbers, right? It’s about the new logos. How did they put it right then your sales, and then someone else has to clean up the mess. And then when you have invested several thousand hours, maybe in. That it’s not that easy to take on that Suncoast motion, and forget about it. Let’s move away and start something in you. Then you’re stuck and. Again, from the magentas standpoint, from the open source perspective of e-commerce softwares, there’s nothing yet there that’s matching Magento.
So anyone who has a fairly complex website especially if they want to create a lot of these things, even if they’re on, even with the notion that they’re on e-commerce or sorry, on open source, they sometimes feel stuck. I you because they might want to move away from agenda, but they understand that it’s very difficult to them.
Replicate that. Yeah. And sometimes impossible. Yeah. So I just we only have five minutes left, so let’s we have to close out. Unfortunately we have to close out this conversation just to recap what you said earlier the expectations of the client should be should be, you should learn those that the agency needs to learn the expectations of the client at the start of the project.
I’m an advocate of bringing the sales person in, because oftentimes to this, the client will say I was promised this and what the client hears sometimes is different than what the sales person says. That’s all just meeting expectations and then education, I think is what you said next. So listening to the client, helping them understand the way things are going to go.
And then also helping them to understand. So the client has to do some education and we have to do some education as an agency. And then I think that just to key in on that, what you said about having those difficult conversations and making sure you talk about that. As soon as you can, because the longer you wait, the longer there is for that time to pass.
And the client say you should’ve told me this a month ago. We could have dealt with it. Then none of the waiting around is going to help anybody. Is it did I summarize what you said earlier? Pretty well. Perfectly. All right. So Aron, what is, so you just briefly, what what is your future look like?
What are you planning on? I got, as I mentioned, I’m on my way out I’ve been having some conversations over these past several weeks with again, with some of the members of the community I’m taking some time off even though with restrictions now in Croatia, both colleagues, some online classes with the kids.
It’s not a sabbatical, it’s not really a relaxing time. But still it gives me some times to Re-evaluate what I have done over these 12 years see some of the things that I love doing see some of the things that I might not want to do again. And then I know the easiest way for me east of stay around e-commerce ecosystem, because I know like that in terms of weather, whether it’s going to be.
Similarly agency experience or something completely different fairly open to new experiences in that regard. Great. And as I close out I was give everybody an opportunity to do a shameless plug to promote anything you’d like, what would you like to promote today? Okay. I haven’t actually through things.
For one 12 years is 12 years. Hey, so each crew.net, I N C H O o.net for anyone who is looking for a solid or grave Magento. That’s you don’t have to look elsewhere. They’re still a great team who can handle any kind of Magento project. Other than that I’m based in Croatia, leading creation.
So great shot, especially is no fraud, especially in the U S for Fritzy and for the nice beaches. But one thing that, that has really been a good thing or. Past year or so throughout the pandemic is that the Croatia has opened up for these are the non digital nomads, right? So you have you, right?
So that’s the freedom of movements or anyone can work, travel anywhere, bar the COVID restrictions. Other than that Gratiot has starting in 2021 and starting to get digital nomads. It’s a perfect for any Nani resident, primarily for us people to stay, to live in Croatia for up to 12. No, no questions asked.
So it’s a permit for a long-term state. And this is being done. And this is being taken advantage of by a lot of us actually residents who are traveling, who have found, and it’s fairly affordable to live in Croatia. And there are a lot of different homes who are offering that type of long-term state options.
So if. In Kingsville for remote work and you’re looking for a country where you can actually live on a in a much more affordable way with your celery and learning from the states, from anywhere else in the world, and still have a great view. They take a, I dunno, take a swim in March if you want to.
So there they’re really great options for Nani residents or anyone who’s listening. You should visit DNA Croatia dot. So DNA, crayfish.com. That’s these are the no men’s association of, for creation over there. You can learn a lot about what it takes to travel, to come live in Croatia and work for your current employer or for yourself, if you are a freelancer.
So this is a great place to be. And if you do decide to come no, feel free to give me a call. Maybe we can meet for a coffee or. All right. That’s fantastic. And we cannot swim here in our lakes and March. In fact, yesterday I was out around the lakes and there was a whole group of people doing kite surfing which was really cool.
And it’s not surfing as you would think. It’s on a big frozen lake and they’re going across this lake probably 60 miles an hour with there’s both a wind surfing on the ice and there’s kite surfing. For if there’s no snow, if it’s just straight up ice, you can go more than 160 kilometers an hour on the ice.
It’s crazy fast and no more than a hundred miles an hour. Anyway, You don’t care if it’s fluid or solid, you just pull up. Yeah. Right now it’s all solid. It’s going to be solid until March our lake. We can run, we can walk on our lakes from December, until March anyways. Not a plug for Minnesota. If you like that winter outdoor lifestyle, that is a great place to be.
So anyways, Aron, I really appreciate you being here. It sounds like we’ll have to do a co we should do a follow up conversation with the, with your next chapter in life. And we can continue to talk about how we can improve Magento association and the communications around it so much for being here.
Store owners want to get from out of their e-commerce business. Real conversations happen when building a customer-centric culture is a prime focus. Whether you are a merchant or warehouse distributor, or a manufacturer looking for digital commerce. You should look at your tech partner, either agency or the solution integrator, and make sure they understand the business aspects and the workflow of your industry.
Vatsal Shah offers transformation and growth to organizations and individuals by creating an inner drive. He helps them elevate their brand image, increase revenue and profitability. He founded Pragmatic Consultancy in 2008 to unlock their potential. As a business coach, he championed transformations of 69 IT, Digital Agencies, E-Commerce, and Retail organizations, trained more than 12K people and 184 CEOs. His clients spread across India, China, UK, Africa, Ireland, and the USA
Vatsal and I also discuss Vatsal’s involvement in Meet Magento Events
Transcript:
All right. Welcome to this episode. Today I have Vatsal Shaw. He is a coach, a CEO coach. E-commerce evangelists speaker. I’ve seen him speak in person. He’s a pragmatic at pragmatic consultancy. Sorry. Let’s all. Please introduce yourself. Do it much better than I just did. And maybe tell us one of your passions in life.
Yep. Thank you for having me here at the same time. Yeah. So in a nutshell, if I tell about myself, what I do is I help it companies, digital marketing companies and agencies grow from small to big, say from few million dollars to multi-million dollars or multinational companies. What I work closely with them in terms of strategy, planning, execution, creating organization structures, they’re liberal politicians pricing and.
And as a result, a lot of adult Shopify, big commerce agencies have grown. I also work with various mobile and app development companies available in development companies. So almost all types of ID, sector companies. And I’m fully focused on that. And my passion is when people grow and then they touch more lives and all prosperity at that time, I feel good.
So I’m a teacher at heart and businessmen as. I have a weird combination about education. I studied it masters, then marketing majors, then psychology and communication. So I try to keep on accumulating new knowledge and keep on sharing on different platforms. And yeah, my mission is wherever I am, I should be able to transform lives, whether it is individuals or.
And my individual passion and singing and drawing, bending, and singing as well. So are you going to sing a song for us today? No, because I may be singing in Hindi, but you’re a leg Indian language. Your target audience may not understand that. So we’ll do a follow-up episode with you singing. Oh, we’ll do the intro.
I will sing a song for you and meet with India, because then the audience is. Alright. Perfect. So today I’d like to split up the topics between the store owner and maybe the agency and see maybe there’s I know there’s different perspectives from both all was there’s different perspective there, the third perspective from the developer as well, but maybe you could go into what customer.
The store owners want to get from out of their e-commerce business. Yeah. So it has been my favorite topics since long. We have been reading on internet or maybe listening the dogs from specimens. And I started with the purpose. We might have read a book called Scott McCain, which is what customer really want.
And then a lot of popular conversation happens where customer centric culture is a prime focus. So what I always look at is when any e-commerce. Oh, no. Or you can say merchant or warehouse, distributor, or a manufacturer looking for digital commerce. The space, what they look at is their tech partner, either agency or the essay they understand the business aspects and the workflow of that industry.
They bring subject matter expertise on the table. They help them digitize their workflow instead of. Fixing them around a platform or a tool or technology, which is preferred by them. It is an interesting no six, seven points. I can recall from the court Mac in that customers are looking for a compelling experience and where the it companies or agencies.
Giving the customer service or development service or e-commerce maintenance service. And so on customer look at personalization and personal focus that how I can help their business, how can increase their revenue. How can I increase their order ROS and so on. But most of the agencies focus on tech part, or they are focusing on digital part or UX part all together.
Is there a very rare combination. Most of the essays don’t focus end-to-end servicing of the customers customers want reciprocal loyalty means they want me as a solution architect or business practitioner to suggest what not to do. Instead, I have seen a business analyst or e-commerce solution specialist keep on prospecting.
What next can be sold to the customer. And a customer wants differentiation. If. Same Gordon’s book purple cow. What they want is there as to what has to be remarkable or different. If you look at all different chains of retail store on store, we’ll have component. Similar, but the orchestration of the retail sales is different.
And the same thing happens when you talk about digital commerce. So I understand that functionalities can be same platform can be the same, but the way it has been delivered has to be different. Whereas I have seen that agencies are busy making excellent at their packages and selling the same thing again and again.
So these are some of the gaps which I keep one finding in the market and I’ve seen the biggest. Exactly do opposite side. And then the Grove as billion dollar company and the rest skip one, struggling and finding new customers, licensed valley, switching the platforms and so on. And and as a result, Merchants struggle in finding the right partner.
So it is not the problem in Asia. It is a problem. I have found everyday because I talked to agency partners in us, UK Australia, Singapore, and India. So I have seen this trouble going on everywhere. And I would say merchants are right now pretty savvy, but still they get confused.
What is right for them. Yeah I I agree with that. So what do you think agencies could do to interpret what the client wants? In my previous stock which I recently delivered at magenta association connect we recently delivered that Magento association connect actual problem statement.
Somebody is trying to solve. And then based on that research is done, right things. So it’s interesting thing I used to teach when there was a curriculum going on in India that help us start digital commerce. And I was affected in there. So I used to teach to the merchants and the business owners as well considered that you are going to the new city.
And if you don’t have enough money on you’re trying on, so you won’t buy a house or an apartment, what you will do as you go on. So that can be Shopify. If you grew up at big and if you are established, then you want a bigger system because you have bigger house like bigger family and you want to scale it bigger.
So then you can look at hosted SAS cloud platform, or you can switch to window. And if further you grow, then you can have only general solution, which is enterprise grid, which can be Adobe commerce or any other no. Solutions, which we see in the Gardner store. So with the need of the client size and scale, if it’s just them, things, it works in a different fashion and it will reduce the cost of ownership. What I’m seeing is merchants struggling in their profit and margin for each thing. And that’s where the number of site opens you find equal ratio. Number of sites gets school. Yeah, I think that’s been an ongoing thing for a long time.
Is the is the sites that go back and forth between either agencies or platforms that’s happened quite a bit. So in the beginning you mentioned some breakdowns that agencies should pay attention about. Maybe we could go over those again. You mentioned UX UI, what are some of those high level things?
If we were to take buckets, the merchant or the agency is offering and they are, and I think the other thing you said is they don’t offer. They don’t often offer all of the different things. They’re just offering one small segment of those broader orphaning offerings. What what are the things that that you mentioned earlier?
Okay. Interestingly, most of the agencies, they do requirement gathering. Then they do solution specification, but they don’t do like the product development companies do. So when you look at the product development companies or digital product development companies, what they run is a design sprint, or discovery sprint.
They go on MVP model. I have not seen e-commerce stores getting developed in. It just design, like you tell us what you want. We will package it, deliver. And then at the end we will support. I believe that business evolved over a period of time. What worked in 2018 may not work in 2020 and will not work in 22.
So it can be in a weaving model. Then we can keep on increasing the scope. Digital commerce where the technology and marketing can work. And then I’m doing Moscow analysis is very interesting stuff. And when I deal with merchants, I knew that mustache would have, could have, and won’t have eaters and I would rather recommend them what not to do then.
So yeah, it is not pro business when it talk about closing the deal. But what I have found is by doing this, I end up winning more. Sure. Yeah. So where then the agency comes in, if the client is asking for something that isn’t measurable or is measurable. So what I mean by that is a lot I think what you’ve said earlier was agencies will just do exactly what the client said.
And then they don’t often go back and measure the success of whatever they’ve been they’ve delivered. Maybe you could talk about some things that would be measurable that an AI would help an agent. Sure. In previous question also, I missed telling it so one is consolidation part second, I’ve seen that agency don’t focus on marketing automation, and it goes in the way of the customer.
So recently I have seen that some of the agency have picked up a conversation where they say client, that we work on value pricing or the amount of orders. Or the increase of the revenue have we will have a share out of it. It is called performance marketing. So that is lighting. New thing. Agencies should look at UI.
UX is already people have been doing, but I would say interaction design can be the next thing where they can look at ideal customer profile, which is ICP of merchants clients. And then based on that, they can create custom customer flows and personalization. These are the costly things. So all merchants can not afford.
I understand that, but the people were in terms of the enterprise who can go for it, they should look at it. And it didn’t say you should start looking at it for similar concept, but it does smaller scale. They can give to all the plans. Yeah. Yeah. And I think you would agree that a agency should offer it and let the client say no, rather than never say anything about.
Certainly. Yes. So w when you offer something, at least you are leaving a customer empower and they have rights to choose. So when customer feel empowered they love it. And instead of dictating, this is not right, this is possible. This is not possible. If we give choices to the customer where you made a differentiation between types of agencies.
So maybe you could explain or tell us the difference between an e-commerce agency and an it company. I think a lot of times those two things get blurred. Yeah. I have seen this overlapping conversations out there. I have seen the. Agencies have different type burners. Their primary focuses on UX design and they outsource the development.
Second IRC in a digital marketing and branding agency, but they have small development arm and then outsource development. Third is tech focused company, which is working on as a platform essay or implementation partner. And they don’t have to do marketing house. So this all three of them claim themselves.
And it was just very confusing to the market. And there are pure-play ID players in this. Menu also, you will find e-commerce development is one of the option. So I can see this four distinct types and then all claim that they can build an e-commerce store. So what they mean, maybe The right components.
They may degrade the jacket and put it live. But th that is where not the business begins. It is, I would say 20% of the nearest 80 is missing. Which is around the business and the workflows and marketing and so on. It’s a different way of looking at it. I have seen ID companies, how they build up in a different way.
What they look at is we will make one thing and sell multiple things. So there is a product approach. There are agencies which work like a B2C B2B approach. What I mean by that is there so end clients or they sell dedicated resources. And I think companies are more focused on selling resources, staff, augmentation, teams, selling, they are offering manpower to the other it companies, agencies, or to the end customers.
And so that is one of the VR selling. Services and gaining money, which is most commonly found in it. Companies or product development companies, unlike agencies. And then what agencies look at is how we can create a masterpiece, how we can win a project or a brand or a kitchen where we do value pricing.
And we may do less number of projects, but we will have be more. So these are the two different tracks that I’ve seen. People get confused between to try and both the things together and switching between two and so on. So don’t you think though, that in that to be in it, to be an e-commerce agency, you have to be an it company and not necessarily I asked an e-commerce or digital commerce agency.
Not an ID company, but they know how to do orchestration of all these components available. They do have programmers and developers, but Derek, their center is not technology or product. Their center is commerce. So now you look at the big four consulting firms. They do amazingly big implementations, but their core focus is commerce or retail tech, or digital transformation of retail chains, not a particular platform or technology.
They use technology to deliver. Oh, that would be the with, okay. So are you making the differentiating around platform rather than technology or rather than the skill set of the particular developer? Because it sounds like an e-commerce agency. If they’re only on Adobe commerce then they’re focusing on that and they can’t offer something.
I’m not saying they can not offer something else. I, you can see that most of the Adobe partners have started offering multiple platforms now, except couple of still they’re still low Adobe only, but rest of the people that have. No suggesting different platforms. What I’m seeing is their core concentration, even while department gathering and suggesting to the customer is revolving around the product platform or the technology.
It’s not that our own commerce. When you put commerce into the center where you start reading. What is the customer’s product? What is their differentiation? How we can create a story around pans products, and then you start building no canvasing their customer’s journey, and then fit commerce technology in that.
So it can be then in store catalog can be variable. It gets, so it brings the only channel solution. So what. So it’s what is the first priority technology first or commerce first? Yeah. Okay. I get it. So I think that a lot of the, a lot of the agencies that have been Magento only are focusing on making sure the client fits into Magento.
And what you’re saying is figure out what the customer needs first and then find the best solution for them. Okay. And then wherever the right components are fitting. Components and technology in the clients need. So it can be Magento. It can shop if it can be front end with Hiva or it can be used to a friend or it can be anything else.
It backend can be anything. It can be, anything can be anything. So it’s not necessarily that it only one product can be fitted. Yeah. You can have one product as a base and then you can revolve components around it, but the focus should be commerce, not the product we are. Got it. Oh as we move through this, then how can agencies become more agile when they’re making these decisions for on the behalf of clients?
Oh, it is a interesting phase. We are passing through. Now since last couple of years, we can see that there are different layers of solutions on the label. So the VA said different platforms available that our platform, which is economical, that our platform, which is for the mid range.
And there are platforms, which is expensive. Now, when you. I consider that if I’m an agency owner, what I have to do is I have to be agile in strategic decision making to sustain and grow. What I need to look at is my imbalance, what analysis I’m supposed to do. But at the same time, nowadays is a question on installed capacity.
So we build a one listing, can Google G nine metrics. It says capacity building of the company. Now all the agencies are supposed to be. Check a skill they have, they’re supposed to build new capacities. Earlier they were doing one of the tech work. Now they’re talking about composable commerce.
They need to learn or unlearn rather different ways of doing and calling and practicing e-commerce development. People who are front end developers, maybe. Be in need or maybe a different kind of rented would be in a need. So a lot of new things are coming up. So if I will be an agency on I would have forecast there’s interns on 1819, that what would be the next instead of being like, I would have been a late adopter of different front end platform.
Maybe she’ll get in Contentful, goes to a friend, a lot of many other things. And then we’ll look at how different vacuums forms can help me deliver what client. Second. What I have seen is agencies who have been settled records all or two and a half decades old, 15 decade, Allie, 1.5, which has been a seasoned player who have been gold platinum partners, adapting new change and embracing Jane needs.
Lot of evaluation with them, which leads a redesign of the process, recharging in no motivating people inside to learn new things and learn what they’re already good at or the best. And reshape the organizing structure. Earlier you had only one type of people. Now you have multiple type of people, a leader who used to be a king, maybe now he’s one of the manager.
So a lot of structure restructure happens. And then so this leads to a jail management. And if you go to any businesses, They teach different ways of managing business, but they I would say new terminology should be taught nowadays. It’s just got a general management because businesses are specifically it businesses becoming now a giant, it started project management.
Now it is business management. It also getting a day because everything new coming in new conversations are, I know their social commerce is going to play a big role because three platforms will be more now different ways of payment methods are. A lot of things have changed. So I would say the people who used to be great may not be a fit into the market sooner.
It would be survival of the test. I would say that, yeah. That’s a really good way to put it this, since things are moving, they’re moving exponentially quicker. It seems like you have to be agile when you, when it comes to your management process, just like you have to be agile when it comes to your delivery process of your technology.
You mentioned a composable commerce. I know that composable commerce and content and commerce are a big thing right now. Maybe you could explain what your thought is around composable commerce and how it fits into today’s. I think you are the better person than me do. Explain where this composable of commerce here with masters.
And I claim to remaster in commerce space, but I would say composable gives a lot of freedom of expression to the developer, or maybe an agency also to the customer where I have Liberty to choose what all I want and I can. No set up things together, which works in the favor of my business.
So earlier I would say it was made to order. Now it is assembled to order. So if I say in a simpler word, what is composable? Commerce is assembled to order depending on the client need, we assemble right components and deliver to this plant. And it, it breaks the boundary of one particular platform’s dominance.
It becomes open to everyone. We shared the pie and the pie is bigger than this word, compostable commerce is heading towards. And how do you feel content in commerce fits in with that? Last year in the UK happened to talk about content driven commerce. I always believe that we don’t buy products.
There was a popular tweet because of my session with Guidewire. I said that people don’t buy a product, people buy stories. So you don’t buy apple phone or for 100 back, you buy a story which is around math. Similarly, you don’t buy anything like the, I think you are using. Right now.
Yeah. Yeah. So you’re it because somebody might have you on a great story about it, and then you happen to buy that. So people don’t buy products, people buy stories around it. Look at the community into inclusive Magento community. It is a spirit and the story which holds us together. So it’s always that it’s, they want a product.
And then when you talk about expiration of. Nowadays generation Zed is coming in. The next set of buyers are doing this enzyme. They are patient, they are digital, they’re tech savvy. They read about brands and then the juice products, which connects to their values, which is a girlfriend which builds loyalty and trust.
There are some of the key points we can find in McKinsey article, how their behavior prints, and then looking at that continuum and commerce will be the key. When you talk about DTC brands that are more towards advanced story and content, their philosophy, why they read it and so on. So it is going to be a interesting part.
I know that you mentioned earlier around growing your e-commerce business, what do you think it takes to sustain and continually grow an agency in this e-commerce world? Recently. Oh CNS not only e-commerce development, but marketing of store using marketing technologies arrow, maybe automation.
And then there can be a huge gap when. Need of skilled manpower of which we need as a merchant automat, no manufacturer to run my e-commerce store. If agencies start focusing on giving that service, which is called e-commerce process, outsourcing EPO which is called manage e-commerce stores.
So some of the people I have seen some companies have started this. Since one and a half year are doing there, get catching wildfire. What it does is this allow merchants or manufacture to focus on the core business and rest of the grunt work, which they need to manage the store also done by the agency.
Maybe a subcontracted partner agencies have, but that can be new addition to grow it and see business second, I would say no, client is small, maybe a new birding literacy brands can be a unicorn and coming two, three years. So it is a scale look at how they can start small and then grow along with the.
And working on performance marketing alone or the client or e-commerce tool can be an amazing thing. And the way I recommended we should look at Jeannine metrics, which is called installed capacity. So what kind of team competition? I have skilled metrics I have inside the company, how to keep on checking and updating it to stay into the market.
Yeah, I think you you mentioned something interesting there about about no client is too small and oftentimes you do get a big client that has a small idea that wants to grow it. So that’s a great way to look at it. Hey they, this is a really big client, but they want to do something that’s as a test.
And there’s all kinds of tools out there too, to test their ideas. And you as an agency or as an agency has to be willing to take up that test and move forward with that with that client. And it could be a small client and the agency believes is them or could be a big client that has a small idea that the agency believes in.
I think both are very valid. You mentioned Meet Magento a few times and I’d like to go into Meet Magento’s now. You attended all the Meet Magento India. I had been doing most Saul. Yeah, I turned it all and I have taken a role play in four, not one, not in one because I worked my top was not selected by you.
I would say that this kidding, but yeah, in the in the first episode of Magento, I here I was. Then in the third one, I was a anchor and speaker and hopefully contributing this year as well. And then not only in making much of the India, I have been contributing to split, went into Singapore, Indonesia, UK, wherever I get an opportunity.
Recently I contributed to Magento association connect. Yeah, I know Magento community because I started my gender with Magento when the first meter release was there. I still didn’t call it Dave and I was, I used to do a job and my CEO gave me a big printout of what into architecture and then the data structure and.
What the hell how this can be possible. I’m talking to them eight, nine. And since then I have been, then I left my ID job. And then at that time I used to be e-commerce product manager. And then later on, I started my consulting career and help a lot of e-commerce agency grown using Magento. So the idea has been fantastic journey.
And personally, I love orange. And now I’m forced to love many more colors, like green, blue, and so on. So let’s just say, we’ve been talking a lot about agencies as an agency. Why would an agency want to attend any Meet Magento? Yeah. There are a lot of things. One. People don’t generally spend time on reading or entrepreneurs are busy managing things, which is coming up in their daily routine.
So consider that if I want to have a quick review of what’s new into the mix. Good a bit Magento, you will find world’s finest speakers talking about the new trends. What is coming next? And then know you can quickly learn and whatever you feel interesting. You can go back and explore. Second you meet like-minded people.
And have a drink with them. Third it’s fun to be with the community. It’s a different you have talk to like-minded people. You talk about your case studies and you learn from each other’s experience and exposure. That’s the reason you should read and go into Meet Magentos. Personally, I have been to imagine as well, four times.
So it’s altogether different vibes when you meet in person nowadays it’s drier because. We are on zoom and then delivering session on hoopin. But yeah, but all who below, but when it goes back normal, I think it’s. Interesting conversation happens when we meet. Yeah. And I think some of those conversations happen in person and different conversations happen in person.
And you feel more enabled or more empowered, I think on both sides to have more conversations and things come up that wouldn’t normally come up. It would never come up if you didn’t attend. And I think it’s harder on zoom too, to have those open conversations. What about why would a developer Juan and with tandem Meet Magento event?
Okay. So I would say they have numbers. Life is pretty boring sorry, developers. I love you, but yeah, that’s how it is. You love computer and poor more than the people around many may not agree to it, but yeah, I have seen that you’re focused on. What is to be delivered as a tech park. So if you want to revive your human feeling go and meet your friends at windows.
And then actually in the way you’ve learned from each other, feel jealous that somebody knows more than me. And then you go back and put up more hustle and learn what it does also have certification coupons going on. So you’ll go and attempt your exam. They get a day off, maybe paid from your boss and then go and attend video.
I’ve seen that developers can learn a lot of things. They’re focused towards that, but there, they can also attend business tracks, or you can say margin tracks to see how commerce at the play. I always seen that funny part, that developers and then the lead in tech technical. I don’t know why that I’m not interested in business tracks.
Actually what they are making is actually empowering the business. So they should look at that also as a perspective consider that if they want to become a freelancer agency owner, they should attend business track to understand how this business. Yeah. I you bring up a great point about developers on how the developers should have a bigger, a broader view of the solution that they’re doing when they’re doing their coding.
A lot of developers fall into that trap of, Hey, I’ve been given this task, I’m going to do this task without asking any questions, attending those business tracks, lets you have a chance to learn the bigger picture of what you’re trying to accomplish. I want to key on one point you said, why would a boss let their employee attend?
And so my question is why should a boss give their employee time to attend a Meet Magento event? If I would be a boss, I would let my all employees go and sponsor tickets and then I will see them go and see the world, how it goes. Why? Because when they go there, they see the tracks, they look at different parts of where people coming from.
Different part of world, some from America, some from Germany, Europe, maybe Singapore, Austria. In the place where you are, and then they learn how to, how they communicate, how they behave body language, they learn soft skills. They also explore presentation skills. I will not, some of the team members, I would push them to talk as well.
I would push my developers to deliver a talk as well. There is a different exposure to develop a person’s personality. And then yeah. It is always good that there is a trend as well, that other, we know many business agency owners come there for shopping, you know what I’m talking about so that they take away into those developers that is part of life and part of business.
But at the same time if I’m having a great culture, if I’m paying well, I should not worry about my developers going here and there. But then I would put them as a brand ambassadors as a. And from what my brand have a snowball effect, bring many more people like you into our company and let’s throw together that can also be a talk I can deliver as a boss too much.
Yeah. I think you brought up a great point about that, that it is a two way street that your people are out there to recruit other people. And it is a, it is an open forum and giving them the opportunity to learn more about what’s out there in real life and talking to other other people in their same industry.
You learn a lot from that. And I know in the past I’ve learned a lot just from attending, talking to other agency owners you learn their experiences. Certainly there’s going to be some filtering around that, but you do learn about how they’re experiencing their customers now. And we did, we earlier, we talked about how maybe clients jump between platforms.
Clients definitely jumped between agencies. As you start to be great, big talk to bigger agencies, you’ll learn this big clients been with this agency and this agency, and they they seem to change their mind every two years or every year sometimes. I wanna, I want to key on one more point that you made too about about speaking at events like this and how these smaller events and actually Meet Magento is not a small event.
It’s been quite large. But it’s not as it’s not as, I don’t know how to come. It wouldn’t be compared to say Adobe summit there. There’s not the same budget. Let’s just say that the why would, what is the PR what would, let me try to phrase this question correctly? Why would a person want to speak at an event like that?
Okay. So it’s an interesting question. Many people ask me you are not going there to sell your service or promote your CEO coaching course. You are not an agency. You are not a developer. You are not part of Magento. You’re not running a Magento farm, or you are not running WordPress from why you keep on talking there.
So I say there are a lot of tech, people are there and a lot of agency owners have. If I have some idea and if I can get a platform to share, it’s amazing to get. And then I would say a lot of. URI or I would say followers, or you can say fans, I have earned in my life of who appreciate what I talk is thanks to Meet Magento.
A lot of people in those, I have spoken even in word games and also in university forums, but meet Melinda has given me helped me a lot of respect in the country where I’m living. And it has actually made me a better personally. And that’s the reason I should go and talk there. It actually, when I’m supposed to prepare for a talk, I’m supposed to do background work, study research.
It also helped me improve my intellect as well. So it’s amazing to. Yeah. Yeah. So I would just key in on to couple of those points, that number one, it gives you an opportunity to learn how it is in front of other people. And it helps you to collect your thoughts and put them into a format that helps you to communicate to others.
And you will get direct feedback from others and how your presentation went good or bad. I know that we’ve been talking about giving some coaching. If there’s younger people that would like to present we could help them give them some coaching on how and I’m sure that you would also be good at giving some coaching to younger people or maybe people that are not so experienced in public speaking.
I would also say that since this is virtual, it is a lot easier to do a presentation to people because you don’t, maybe you don’t see them out there in person. And there’s not that extra pressure. There’s some pressure still, but you don’t see them there in person. So there’s a lot of opportunities and I think the biggest one is just that.
In preparing you end up learning so much about what you’re presenting that in that presentation all that time, it takes to put it together. You end up learning 10 times more than you could possibly have known before you started that presentation. I would add one point there considered that what all knowledge I hear.
If I can summarize that knowledge in 20 minutes. Think about how well I will be making my pitches to the customer. So it helps me create framework that how I can compress my conversations still, it can be crisp and effective, so it helps in business development as well. So where’s the train. All right. I promise I have one last question about meat Magento.
Why would the merchant want to attend a Meet Magento? Oh, it’s interesting. At one particular place, merchant can see what all kinds of technology he or she needs is available. All the boots are there at the same time. He or she can validate different vendors standing there. Third, they can validate whether that vendor is good or bad, because you will always find people who can give feedback about them for they can learn new things fifth, they can also meet a product company, employees, like they meet one another.
You will always find people from Adobe. You’ll always find people from.digital. So we’re actually a platform or a product. So you can go and talk. You can get. It started on the live meeting. People were from payment gateway or processor like PayPal. People is always there. So you’ll find there’s a merchant.
I can find quick solutions so I can have quite answers to my questions, which I have been thinking in my office. I can just go for a few hours and get those answers. All right. So you brought up one more question. I apologize for not, I’m going to have another question. One. The last question about me, Magento prompts.
Why would one of these eight, what would one of these tech companies sponsor? I Meet Magento event. So there are multiple reasons. One, you get promoted locally, so you be attractive to the new employees. That is one of the biggest advantage tech or is get when they promoted me Magento.
Second, if the merchant’s footfalls are there, you catch that merchant as well, and a third, any type of brand promotion happening, you should have an opportunity to do it. Why? Because unless you are visible on earth, how people will notice you and how you get Get more leads or the mileage. So I would say attending events and sponsoring events is one of the channels of generating leads or getting visibility.
So people should spend money there. Yeah. Excellent. All right, so let’s just switch to the Magento association for a little bit, as we close things out. That’s not, yeah, we won’t get into anything contentious, but I know that. Suddenly because of because of some people they’ve made some noise in our community and it started with the hoof a theme, and now it’s culminated in this may major open source community Alliance that has put some of us would look at it.
Some people would look at it as some division and others would look at it as it’s coming together. So I feel as though that it’s helped us to come together better because really this open letter that. Has prompted Adobe to wake up the Magento association to wake up and suddenly we’re all talking. What is your view on that?
So when people are sleeping here to make noise, to wake them up, there’s the first answer sake. Sorry. You can say that openly, but yeah, that’s there. And second, I am also part of modern day association committee ISO a committee called diversity and. And you might have a red a blog coming out from from the chosen ones who is going to take a head Magento open source.
So DNI committee actually played a good role in choosing who can be the next stars betters. I would say it was intended, it was spending, but this noise helped them do it faster. So sometimes I believe people perform better and faster in pressure and that actually have happened and I go the same then does help us merge together instead of splitting into two.
So I think now it can be a better roadmap we can see, and I hopefully See that open source survive grew and try because a, I would say whatever market share Magento has, the majority of it is open source. The Adobe commerce. So if it thinks then there will be a vacuum in the middle layer of open source e-commerce systems.
Yeah. And I think all these things are coming together now to show the importance of where the community fits in. And Adobe’s also acknowledging that the open source product has a great hold on. What the commercial product does and that they can’t simply ignore it and continue on with plans without talking to anybody.
I wouldn’t say Adobe cannot do it. The reason is open source clients. Are there potential prospects to convert into the pain? Licensed claims anybody who’s on opensource would likely to if they grow likely to buy at a promise. Actually for them, it was a lead generation platform. Instead of putting it on back burner, they should look at how they can tell.
Yeah, no, I agree that this has been the, this has been the question since 2010, since the enterprise platform came out, is how do you, is it a competitor or is it a lead generation or a One league below, like in, in cricket you have a premier league, right? You have a a great big league and then you have the leagues that are at, and everybody promotes the top.
So clients, the clients should, their aspiration of a client should be driving to the top and having this premier platform that you’re going to be on a Gobi needs to look at that open source as the, as. Driving place that helps people to move to the top. And I think in the past there’s been hundreds of thousands of users on the open source platform and they need to make sure that they’re.
Attending to those users because of bad experience and open source, and essentially means that they’re not going to go to that commerce platform because why would they even had a good experience. So from the Magento association point of view, then w I think there’s only 2000 members and I think there’s a hundreds and hundreds of thousands of developers that are in the Magento community.
How can we get more people to join Magento associates? They have created a committee which is commit a community building, or you can say it, it adds more registration to the Muslim association, but I believe that it’s not marketed, but if it is communicated it will work. Just for example, if you go on LinkedIn and you search Magento.
And you just select Southeast Asia countries like India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Singapore. LinkedIn search ends at 50 to get results. And then it’s dot.dot. You will find more than 50 to give people if you just stand that those many. Now you think about all different continents, Africa, USA.
Russia, Australia, New Zealand and so on. So this can be, this has to be, I would say 20 X or 30 X community and registered on Magento association platforms. I think it. It needs marketing. It needs a declared hash. And then we’ll look here looking at people registering here. And I think it’s not promoted by.
Yeah. And I am on the I am on the membership committee. We don’t have any control over marketing. I think it has been suggested a few times that we do marketing as well. But what I believe is when solutions are not working, then the fork works, so sometimes you need to make new. No.
Then it starts working ultimately the benefit of Melinda community association unless you get more membership, how we can monetize or how we can grow big or how we can pass on more benefits. So it’s needed it as it has to be marketed, but then you always find great influencers in particular country.
They are not even leveraging those influencers to gain more membership. Yeah. And I think one thing that I just thought of that it seems like a no brainer is when we do a Meet Magento event, we should ask if those people would also like to join the Magento association, there has to be some way of opting people into the Magento association.
If they sign up for Meet Magento event, I think those two pieces are disconnected at the time. Yep. So if those data was pulled into the Magento association membership, it will create a magic. So I would say by default opt-in can be a choice that if you registered to Meet Magento, you are attempting for free the part of Magento’s position as well.
Excellent. We’ve solved everything. Thank you so much. We have used up our time and I, we had talked about going for 30 minutes and we’re coming up to an hour. So I think I I think we have to we have to wrap things up now, but I appreciate your time. I know that earlier I asked you if you could give me a shameless plug, so why don’t you go ahead and give me a shameless plug about anything.
Perfect. Lots of Shaw. The CEO is this right. CEO of pragmatic consultant. So when they get all right, yo coach. Perfect. Okay. It was great speaking to you today. I appreciate your time. A lot of first time we dogged in this land. The log of first time we talked about this lent the log of first time we talked, taught this length, the law of first time we talked with this lent.
This week we interview Tomas Gerulaitis who signed the original letter for the Mage Open Source Alliance.
Brent and Tomas talk MOSCA
Transcript
Welcome to this special Mosca episode of talk commerce today have Tomas Gerulaitis. Thomas, why don’t you introduce yourself? Tell us what you do. And maybe one of your passions in life. I’m Thomas Gerulaitis. I’m the Magento practice lead at a little company called space 48. I’ve been working with Magento.
Close to 10 years now. And I guess so passion. So that’s a difficult question. Other than, clean code, which I am partial to I guess motorcycles, And are you in the UK? Are you living in the UK or are you yeah, Europe? Yes, I’m in the UK.
I’m in Bath, a little town called Bo. Great. I’ve been to bath I or Boff as you say it. Yeah, it’s a beautiful city. I didn’t, I took a shower while I was there, but I think that’s okay. I’ve been there a couple of times, but anyways so great to have you today. This is going to be a. A little bonus segment on, how the Magento community alliances or the major open source community Alliance is coming together and how it’s sparking some fire in our community.
I, particularly reached out to you because you are one of the signers of the original letter. So I wanted to talk about that. Maybe dive into some of the deeper issues. And I know that the big issue that people are talking about is forking let’s fork it or not. But I think the, what the underlying thing is, just some transparency from Adobe on how that should work.
So maybe getting your feedback and opinion on that would be good. Yeah. Yeah, of course. the name is still in progress. Yeah. We’ve debated it entirely. I don’t know if it’s if I’m divulging too much, but we’ve debated it internally for quite a while and especially using Magento in the Dame.
But yeah we’ll, make sure to, come up with something as catchy, as Moscow, as soon as we can. And do you feel as though right now is a good time to do a fork? Or do you think this letter is meant to light some fire or, wake up some people at at Adobe? I think it’s a bit of both certainly bringing the issue to light and be bringing an issue to the forefront of the community.
That was one of the goals. But also I think like action needs to happen. And as soon as it happens that the sooner it happens the better. And, whether it’s creating a fork right now, which we’re in the process of or. Like studying some other action or for example, the Magento association taskforce that was started up or the sign up.
So have been started up a couple of weeks ago. I think we need to do something immediately to reassure the merchants in the space that magenta isn’t going away. Because I think, especially after the Adobe summit earlier in the year, we’ve heard some talks that we heard some, big plans that Adobe has for Adobe comments that got a lot of people worried.
A lot of people from the developers seen people who’ve been working at magenta for, 10 or more years. But merchants as well. We’ve seen a number of people moving away from. From the community and, from the platform partly because of the uncertain future, of Magento, not necessarily Adobe commerce specifically because that’s becoming a separate product and it’s quite clear that’s happening, but Magento as well.
And that’s the main reason why this came around and it’s preparing for the future, making sure that. That the clients that we’re supporting right now and the potential clients in the future, they’re still around. Yeah. And I think we’re talking about three players right now. The first would be Mosca or major open source community Alliance.
The second would be the Magento association and then the third would be Adobe. Right now, Adobe holds the control and I would agree that they have done a very poor job of communicating to the open-source community. And they haven’t really looked at the fact that the majority of the installs of Magento two are on open source.
I think they’re only looking towards, or looking at Adobe commerce, the. The outward things that they say are that that the magenta open-source is, not going to change. Nothing is changing in it. There, there should be more assurance or reassurance that the open-source Magento will stay around.
And and that the open source is still going to be the underpinning of the main commerce platform. Yeah. Yeah. I agree with that. I think it’s in a way it’s easy to say that they’re committed to open source, but we know that like Adobe is a business and their revenues and coming from supporting Magento open source, it’s coming from Adobe commerce.
I think that’s why it would be good to see some actions. He said something backing those words. But hopefully, that’s to come. Yeah. I think this is our second time around that we have seen a purchaser not, understand. I’m just going to use the word, not understand because I don’t feel as they understand where like this th this huge base is a great, place to get new users on.
Onto the commerce platform. And I feel as though that they’re alienating the open source platform in, favor of a very, small install base on the paid version and that if they would take a more open stance that they would open up the amount of users they could potentially have on their paid version.
Yes. Yeah. So this field like put, been around. So for people who’ve been in the community for a while, we’ve had these discussions in the past. It’s not the first time that this has happened. Yeah, I know that Tom Roberts jaw and I were privy enough or we’re lucky enough to be in the original E-bay re insurgents or re-invigoration of the community in 20, I think it was 2015 or 2014 where they took us all out to drive race cars that in Las Vegas.
So I’m hoping that my podcasts don’t preclude me from. I’m hoping they don’t preclude me from the next race car driving event in Las Vegas. But I do feel as though that we shouldn’t wait two or three years for that to happen this time either at the last time it happened it took us quite a long time to wake up and figure out that this, our open source community is, quite important in what we’re trying to do here.
So the Magento Association is another part of the puzzle. What is your view on how they’re helping or hurting or just, what is your view on the association right now? Yeah. We’ve that they, the letter that came out to the wider Magento community, that wasn’t our first communication.
We spoke to the Magento association first cause from the discussions with, the initial people in the group in the airlines that talks about it very much about treating this as a proper open source. Association opensource kind of project. It, then I brought typo three as a very good example of open the project that’s working really well. And it’s evolving the platform and is useful for everyone involved. But in discussing that we’ve realized that this is what the magenta association was supposed to do. For Magento it was a project to support the open-source development, to empower developers, to contribute to the community, and to evolve the platform.
But I feel like personally, I’ve it wasn’t announced. And then I’ve not heard a lot about it since. And that’s one of the problems that we’ve identified and, why. We’ve been so open so, vocal and so quick to, start these discussions is because we feel like we need to act now. Something has to happen and it’s just been slow.
So far. Yeah, I think that there has been quite a vacancy. I’ll use the word vacancy and communications from the Magento association. I know that they’ve continually said some of the problems are around the logo and using the name, but I don’t think that is a reason why we shouldn’t at least have communication.
I think you’ve, hit you’ve. You’ve said it that if they were, to just communicate what they are doing and even better communicating what they can’t be doing or aren’t doing or We, don’t have to get the details. I think people just want to know what’s happening. And the, I think the major open-source Alliance community Alliance initiative is, the response to that.
And the fact that, Hey, we’re not going to wait lot around forever. It’s been, it really has been two years. Exactly. And, I think there, the intent could be here behind this Alliance. Isn’t to be hostile to. Like shame anyone it’s we’re very passionate about Magento. We want to see the platform continue and succeed.
And we’re just trying to find the best way of doing that. And yeah we’re still in talks with the magenta association. I know a number of the original members have signed up to be part of the open-source task force. And we’re still communicating with Magento association and with Adobe.
We’re trying to find the best way to proceed with this. Yeah. I feel as though the association is, tiptoeing around things and they’re worried that they’re going to upset somebody and. I, this is something that has to, happen and, is I think it’s long overdue. I applaud you in that.
I think just one thing that ghetto had mentioned to me ghetto Jensen had mentioned to me is why did I sign it when I’m not a big proponent of forking, but I am a proponent of putting pressure on those who need to do something. And I think the ultimate, if it’s going to be forked or not forked, whether that’s in the letter or not.
Okay, let me just back up. I believe if nothing ever, if nothing happens, it’s going to have to get for it. I, do believe that’s going to live on just like Magento one continues to live on. Even though we get threats that our, sorry, our stores will get shut down because we’re not PC, whatever the reason.
But it continues to live on and and, works. This pressure that’s being put on is important. And the reason I signed the letter is because I believe that we need to make this change now. And without this community vocalization, it was, it would never happen. We would, I think that Adobe would continue its path of doing what it wanted to do.
And Magento association would continue to sit on the sidelines and not doing anything. This is something that had to happen. And I agree, I think yes, there’s a lot of controversy around the fork in particular, but I think the it’s, the tools that we have right now. It’s, all the control that we have right now is because Magento is open source and is licensed for open source.
All we can do right now, if nothing changes we’ll fork it well maintain it. We’ll keep it going on. But that isn’t saying that we’re taking Magento as it is right now and starting a new project. That’s completely different. It’s going to compete in a diverse, that’s not the plan. The plan is just to keep it going.
And that’s the way that we, can right now. So when, you so one last thing on this topic And we’re, going to try to make the short today is just the amount of inclusion. I think that some of us didn’t know about the letter and I think some of us in the Western hemisphere or the U S or even India, weren’t quite aware of what was happening.
And I think that there has been a lot of criticism about making sure that it is an inclusive community and not an exclusive community. And on the same side, I understand that we all have to make decisions and those decisions will go faster when the fear there’s fewer people involved. From the major open source community Alliance.
[00:14:46] How do you see more people becoming involved and then having a voice in that? So that’s, one of the big questions that we’re trying to work out with. There’s a way to allow more people to contribute while still keeping the pace of things that we’re doing. Because I fully agree with that.
Having a consensus from a large group is, great, but it makes things slow. So, far it’s been a small group of people trying to do. The issue to the front of the community to, get something started, but we’re working right now on, on getting people, accessing them, getting people involved in those discussions and whatever happens in the future.
It’s all like we’re trying to be as open and as public as we can. And do you see then future workflows would be a fork and then. Fixes happening on the fork. And then those fixes getting rolled back into the main Adobe commerce version or the, other fork of magenta open source. I think it gets very complicated, especially one of the biggest complaints from developers is they put in a, they put in a pull request on an issue happening inside of Adobe or inside of Magento and it never gets answered.
And then it gets auto closed. So I think that’s where kind of awkwardness as a means as well. It’s and I think partly it’s because currently there’s, not a lot of there’s not a lot of benefit in investing your time and maintaining magenta, open source and people who do that.
A lot of them, they’re not being paid to do that. A passion project, a side project for them. And I think that’s where kind of a defined open source program would, help actually make making sure that the people available whose job is to go through these full requests and, answer questions and make sure that the product is moving along.
Yeah. What are the ideas behind the folk? And I’m not saying that it’s going to be easy. I think that’s one of the personally to what are the sort of criticisms that I’ve seen that I, didn’t particularly appreciate is everyone saying, oh, 14 is hard. Therefore this is going to fail. W we’re not saying that it’s going to be easy.
We’re not saying that we’re just going to create a new repository with the Magento COVID as this right now. And everything’s going to be sunshine and rainbows and it’s, it is going to be a lot of effort. But I think we’ve got people who are very passionate about this and who are very invested in this to, to put that effort in and get, it over the line.
Good. All right. So last question, before we close out, who would you like to hear from at Adobe in order to see things moving, not solve things, but what sort of messaging would you like to see from Adobe and who is it that you would like to hear from, at Adobe? I think passionately.
I don’t know if I can identify a specific person that messaging needs to come from, but I think I would like to see the Magento association get more control over Magento. I would like to see them become in a sense owners of the Magento open source. Because again, one of the one of the.
Restrictions and roadblocks that we’ve seen so far, it always comes down to the intellectual property, the name, the license and that in my view, that should all be a solved problem. We’ve got Magento association, they’re already an approved organization by Adobe. I would like to see them get a lot more control over Magento so that the community.
Can continue investing into the platform without the fear of it going away in a week, a month, a year, however long it takes. And what about Magento community engineering? Do you think that they’ve just been sidelined and we don’t hear from them anymore? I must admit I’ve not been an active part of the Magento community engineering for a while.
Yes. It’s whether it’s by, nature of the platform being targeted more towards bigger clients, bigger big industries. Or if it’s just the interest is waiting because of the slow response. I think, yeah, the community engineering has been a, not really a player in the space. Like, you said, there’s currently three big players and community engineering is one.
Yeah. Realistically community engineering should be driving that close rate on PRS and at least reviewing them and getting back to people. And I’ve heard from multiple people that one of the issues around the open source is that, or is that the PRS aren’t getting closed? And it just correct me if I’m wrong.
You don’t, if there’s a bug in the source code of Magento, it doesn’t really matter if it’s open source or, if it’s Adobe commerce, the core code. It’s the same right now. There’s no fork between open source and Adobe commerce. It’s the same code. So I don’t understand why they would treat the open source any differently.
But anyways, that’s that’s just another issue and another, topic at hand for the future. Thomas I, thank you today. If there was a small little tidbit, you could help merchants feel good about staying on Magento two. What would that be? I think all you need to look at is the passion we’ve had in the last couple of weeks in response to the letter.
Whether it’s people supporting it or people. Criticizing it or and, providing feedback. I think you can see how invested people are in Magento and platforms like this. Don’t disappear. Look at magenta one it’s still around. But gender is not going away anytime. Yeah that’s, great advice.
And and, well said words for anybody out there that is still, or that night it’s still on magenta. Two waiting to go to Magento three. No, that was a joke. Good. One last little thing I always do on, the podcast as they give you a chance to do a shameless plug about anything you’d anything you’d like to plug today.
I’m not sure if I have anything. I’m pretending. Yeah, I usually prep people, but anything it doesn’t have to be business. It could be personal charity. I guess charity I’m supporting mind charity in the UK. It’s supporting people with mental illnesses, mental problems. So please do any.
Excellent. Thank you very much. Thomas it was, it’s been great having you today. I know it was short notice and I appreciate you putting some words out there to help us understand the quick nature of what’s happening in our Magento community today. So thank you very much.
This week we interview Jakub Winkler (No relation to the Fonz) of Q-Solutions Studio. He has some very strong opinions on the MOSCA letter and why this has happened now.
We discuss the Magento Community and the impact that the Magento Open Source Community Alliance will have on it.
This episode was hosted by Kalen Jordan. The interview happened on the behest of Kalen to talk more about the Mage Open Source Community Alliance and the recent letter published.
The “Cone of Silence”
Transcript
00:02:36,173 –> 00:02:39,533 kalen: See here’s the great thing about the car in the garage. is that?
59 00:02:40,733 –> 00:02:46,573 kalen: Um, you get what I got Wifi. I got great Wi fi. So that’s not an issue. I’ve got good
60 00:02:46,733 –> 00:02:49,293 kalen: connectivity. Great sound proroofing
61 00:02:49,773 –> 00:02:51,533 kalen: right, because when you have kids,
63 00:02:52,653 –> 00:02:53,693 kalen: that’s the key. It’s
64 00:02:53,340 –> 00:02:54,340 65 00:02:53,853 –> 00:02:59,293 kalen: all about soundproofing, so cars are probably, Uh. Your car is your probably single
66 00:02:59,533 –> 00:03:04,333 kalen: most sound proooofd object that you own, believe it or not, So
67 00:03:05,120 –> 00:03:06,240 brent_peterson: except for the Um. The
68 00:03:05,993 –> 00:03:06,993 69 00:03:06,400 –> 00:03:09,760 brent_peterson: Cone of silence from the original gets smart, and now you’re going to have
70 00:03:09,760 –> 00:03:11,680 brent_peterson: to google that because it’s quite hilarious.
71 00:03:12,500 –> 00:03:13,500 brent_peterson: Look up. the
72 00:03:13,033 –> 00:03:14,033 73 00:03:13,360 –> 00:03:16,800 brent_peterson: Cone of silence in the original gets smart from the nineteen sixties.
74 00:03:16,813 –> 00:03:21,133 kalen: You’re going to have an entire to do list of things to Google by the time you’re
75 00:03:21,293 –> 00:03:23,213 kalen: done with this podcast, Which is
77 00:03:24,973 –> 00:03:26,413 kalen: it? Just as it should be
78 00:03:25,200 –> 00:03:29,520 brent_peterson: Um, for so for soundproofing, I’m building a little home studio in my
79 00:03:29,600 –> 00:03:31,120 brent_peterson: basement, Um, not like
80 00:03:30,673 –> 00:03:31,673 81 00:03:31,440 –> 00:03:36,320 brent_peterson: t. â–j gamble. I’m not going to gamble hundreds of thousands of dollars on my
83 00:03:37,553 –> 00:03:38,553 kalen: First of all, No,
84 00:03:39,060 –> 00:03:40,060 brent_peterson: no, nobody.
85 00:03:39,133 –> 00:03:42,893 kalen: nobody does anything quite like T. â–j gamble, so that
86 00:03:41,120 –> 00:03:43,760 brent_peterson: Yeah, nobody can compete against that. I’m going to
87 00:03:43,473 –> 00:03:44,473 88 00:03:43,920 –> 00:03:48,480 brent_peterson: spend two percent of my budget. Uh, like that. as compared to his hundred
89 00:03:48,720 –> 00:03:54,560 brent_peterson: percent, he’s going to be the United States military infrastructure, and I’m
90 00:03:54,540 –> 00:03:55,540 brent_peterson: going to be like
91 00:03:56,140 –> 00:03:57,140 92 00:03:57,820 –> 00:03:58,820 brent_peterson: Um for
93 00:03:58,273 –> 00:03:59,273 94 00:03:58,740 –> 00:03:59,740 brent_peterson: for budgeting towards
95 00:04:00,880 –> 00:04:04,720 brent_peterson: my my studio. But this morning I was recording and I got everything all set
96 00:04:04,880 –> 00:04:06,480 brent_peterson: up very nicely, made the
97 00:04:06,273 –> 00:04:07,273 98 00:04:06,480 –> 00:04:10,240 brent_peterson: mistake of leaving the door upstairs open and we have a new Jack
99 00:04:09,873 –> 00:04:10,873 100 00:04:10,400 –> 00:04:12,960 brent_peterson: Russell. so the next thing I know is Susan’s
101 00:04:13,033 –> 00:04:14,033 kalen: That’ll do it.
102 00:04:13,120 –> 00:04:17,120 brent_peterson: running down the stairs. Turns the corner and all I hear is No,
103 00:04:18,480 –> 00:04:22,880 brent_peterson: And the this little puppies’s found the basement. and and we have carpeting
104 00:04:23,040 –> 00:04:26,400 brent_peterson: and has discovered that. Hey, this carpet is just like grass.
105 00:04:27,680 –> 00:04:28,800 brent_peterson: So if you listen
106 00:04:28,833 –> 00:04:29,833 kalen: just like grass.
107 00:04:29,120 –> 00:04:34,560 brent_peterson: to my, if you listen to my podcast today with Ysa Ritzma, there will be a
108 00:04:34,720 –> 00:04:37,680 brent_peterson: person yelling in the background that only comes in
109 00:04:37,313 –> 00:04:38,313 110 00:04:37,840 –> 00:04:42,480 brent_peterson: for a second, and I will give a Starbucks gift card if you can pick out that
111 00:04:42,720 –> 00:04:44,160 brent_peterson: exact time five dollar
113 00:04:44,320 –> 00:04:47,920 brent_peterson: Gar, Starbucks gift card If you could pick out the. If you give me the time
114 00:04:48,060 –> 00:04:49,060 brent_peterson: signature on that
115 00:04:50,513 –> 00:04:51,513 kalen: very cool.
116 00:04:51,500 –> 00:04:52,500 brent_peterson: Yeah, big spender.
117 00:04:51,613 –> 00:04:57,453 kalen: Well, if the link is up, if the link is up, I will. I literally will stop our podcast
118 00:04:57,613 –> 00:05:00,253 kalen: right now and just go find that. because
119 00:04:59,040 –> 00:05:03,360 brent_peterson: Hey, th. I. I. I recorded that early this morning and I published it
120 00:05:03,100 –> 00:05:04,100 121 00:05:03,453 –> 00:05:07,773 kalen: Okay and it’s up. Okay be cause. I, I mean, honestly, I’d rather just get the gift
122 00:05:08,093 –> 00:05:09,533 kalen: certificate. I mean, you know,
123 00:05:09,140 –> 00:05:10,140 124 00:05:09,693 –> 00:05:13,533 kalen: as much as I enjoy chatting, I I could really use.
125 00:05:11,760 –> 00:05:13,760 brent_peterson: for for you, I would send it anyways,
126 00:05:14,973 –> 00:05:21,293 kalen: Okay. Well, I, I, I’m in. I’m go to hold you to that. Uh, cause I, you know, I really
127 00:05:21,533 –> 00:05:26,493 kalen: need the Co. These are tough times and I could use a gift card right about now for
128 00:05:25,520 –> 00:05:29,840 brent_peterson: as you sit in your Um, modelles Tesle models that you probably
129 00:05:26,353 –> 00:05:27,353 kalen: some coffee.
130 00:05:29,553 –> 00:05:30,553 131 00:05:30,240 –> 00:05:33,680 brent_peterson: got hand delivered from from Yn musk.
132 00:05:34,573 –> 00:05:36,973 kalen: well, we. You know, we do hang out from time to time.
133 00:05:36,740 –> 00:05:37,740 134 00:05:38,333 –> 00:05:42,813 kalen: He’s a good guy. Are you pro Elon Mosqu or anti Yon mosque? This is my new. Okay.
135 00:05:40,880 –> 00:05:44,720 brent_peterson: I’m pro. Do you not read? You know, do you not look at your social media
136 00:05:44,733 –> 00:05:49,373 kalen: I read. No, I. no, I read. I read. I mean, I. I read a lot of stuff. Um,
137 00:05:44,960 –> 00:05:46,960 brent_peterson: when you? okay, Yeah,
138 00:05:50,653 –> 00:05:53,613 kalen: I read the New York Times Covered to cover every morning.
152 00:06:21,540 –> 00:06:22,540 153 00:06:22,573 –> 00:06:28,573 kalen: Uh, So what? what? Uh? What did you talk to Yssie about today? Man, y, I saw his post
154 00:06:29,053 –> 00:06:31,613 kalen: on the open source situation. I,
155 00:06:33,213 –> 00:06:36,653 kalen: I, um. I agreed with a lot of it. I was happy that he said a lot of stuff he said.
156 00:06:37,300 –> 00:06:38,300 157 00:06:37,933 –> 00:06:39,453 kalen: But what did you guys rant about?
158 00:06:38,080 –> 00:06:43,840 brent_peterson: so I think W. we. We tried to dig into what is the issue here? Um, and it’s
159 00:06:44,000 –> 00:06:47,920 brent_peterson: really not. It’s not about forking or not forking right, and I didn’t make
160 00:06:48,000 –> 00:06:52,320 brent_peterson: the joke about Uh, my my neighbor, as I was growing up. Uh, I grew up in
161 00:06:52,400 –> 00:06:57,520 brent_peterson: Golden valley, Minnesota, and my neighbor had a uh, at a had like a thirty
162 00:06:57,760 –> 00:07:03,120 brent_peterson: two Cadillac, this giant car, and he got personalized license plates on the
163 00:07:03,200 –> 00:07:05,040 brent_peterson: car that said four â–q two.
164 00:07:05,953 –> 00:07:06,953 165 00:07:06,800 –> 00:07:13,200 brent_peterson: Um, and I’m sure it had nothing to do with Uh, forking a Github repository
166 00:07:13,360 –> 00:07:16,240 brent_peterson: or any sort of repository. Uh, because it was like
167 00:07:16,073 –> 00:07:17,073 kalen: You never know.
168 00:07:16,400 –> 00:07:18,960 brent_peterson: this is a. This is in the late seventies, anyways,
169 00:07:19,373 –> 00:07:25,213 kalen: I mean, maybe William is seventy four years old and he just is, is aged very well,
170 00:07:23,920 –> 00:07:29,440 brent_peterson: y. He, he carries it very well anyway, so I don’t think that this is a. The.
171 00:07:29,600 –> 00:07:34,000 brent_peterson: The issue here is not about forking or not forking. The issue is about
172 00:07:34,320 –> 00:07:36,880 brent_peterson: transparency and communication from Adobe.
173 00:07:38,033 –> 00:07:39,033 174 00:07:38,560 –> 00:07:44,320 brent_peterson: And the second issue then is about the Magento Association and how much can
175 00:07:44,260 –> 00:07:45,260 brent_peterson: they share?
176 00:07:46,320 –> 00:07:50,160 brent_peterson: How much control do they have? And what do people think they can do
177 00:07:50,753 –> 00:07:51,753 178 00:07:52,973 –> 00:07:57,453 kalen: Yeah, I think it’s all. Yeah, there is kind of. It’s all kind of bundled together and
179 00:07:57,533 –> 00:08:03,213 kalen: it’ weird. I feel like even talking right. You’re in a doobe partner, right, I
180 00:08:03,373 –> 00:08:07,773 kalen: assume, unless you’ve gotten pulled from the partner program for making tons of
181 00:08:07,853 –> 00:08:11,133 kalen: horrible dad jokes, which I assume could happen at any point.
198 00:08:54,960 –> 00:08:58,720 brent_peterson: Yeah. but what is the issue here? I think the issue is pretty clear that and
199 00:08:58,800 –> 00:08:59,840 brent_peterson: they stated it right.
200 00:09:01,440 –> 00:09:08,160 brent_peterson: They, this so again. This makes for a lot of unknown variables. There is no
201 00:09:08,320 –> 00:09:11,360 brent_peterson: public road map from a gentle open source and this has
202 00:09:11,153 –> 00:09:12,153 203 00:09:11,600 –> 00:09:12,640 brent_peterson: left a lot of the community
204 00:09:13,760 –> 00:09:18,320 brent_peterson: who believe in the monolith who believe in the model is a valid approach to
205 00:09:18,400 –> 00:09:21,840 brent_peterson: many cases feeling uneasy about the future in Ma Geno,
206 00:09:22,433 –> 00:09:23,433 207 00:09:23,420 –> 00:09:24,420 brent_peterson: So I think
208 00:09:24,033 –> 00:09:25,033 209 00:09:25,040 –> 00:09:28,880 brent_peterson: it, and I don’t think it’s about forking or not forking. It’s not really
210 00:09:29,200 –> 00:09:35,520 brent_peterson: about about monolith or splitting up into micro services. It really is about
211 00:09:36,240 –> 00:09:40,480 brent_peterson: helping people understand where the open sources where the open source of
212 00:09:40,420 –> 00:09:41,420 brent_peterson: magenta is going.
213 00:09:42,733 –> 00:09:47,053 kalen: right, right and a, and I just feel like, Um,
214 00:09:49,533 –> 00:09:54,013 kalen: you know I, you know I’m I’m a little bit further from the details these days. As far
215 00:09:54,173 –> 00:09:59,853 kalen: as what exactly they’re introducing with the micros, and how that’s differing from
216 00:10:00,093 –> 00:10:05,293 kalen: the the traditional kind of moth. I bundle together lots of different things under
217 00:10:05,533 –> 00:10:11,373 kalen: this category of like community unrest, like the the, The people that have been
218 00:10:11,693 –> 00:10:16,733 kalen: complaining about con, contributing the people that have posted an issue to Gith hub
219 00:10:16,973 –> 00:10:22,333 kalen: and they get no response And then ninety days later the issue gets auto closed,
220 00:10:22,653 –> 00:10:27,293 kalen: right, Or you know, Uh, Jacob Winkler has posted a lot about stuff he’s contributed
221 00:10:27,453 –> 00:10:31,453 kalen: and it just gets. it. just sits there. I talked to Damie and Retzinger about that
222 00:10:31,533 –> 00:10:37,773 kalen: yesterday, Lukash, uh, uh. What’s his face? that? Um, uh, he’s going to get mad of me
223 00:10:37,853 –> 00:10:43,053 kalen: for that that had similar issues. It’s just like there’s all this stuff where there’s
224 00:10:43,133 –> 00:10:47,053 kalen: all this energy of the com. Like when I said something to me, said like there’s this
225 00:10:47,133 –> 00:10:52,573 kalen: energy and if it’s not sort of harnessed it gets frustrated And that’s what I see
226 00:10:52,813 –> 00:10:56,733 kalen: from. Like The Twenty thousand foot view is like there’s people waiting around on P.
227 00:10:56,893 –> 00:11:02,893 kalen: Rs. there’s people waiting around for architectural direction. There’s just all this
228 00:11:03,133 –> 00:11:08,733 kalen: and it’s just like Hey, let’s start a dialogue with a dooby. What does that even mean
229 00:11:09,133 –> 00:11:14,413 kalen: start a dialogue like I want. like I want to see people just do stuff you know, Like
230 00:11:14,893 –> 00:11:19,293 kalen: William came out with Hooa, and everybody loves it. He reinvented the front end.
231 00:11:19,853 –> 00:11:25,053 kalen: Everybody loves it right. it’s it’s he’s doing stuff. He’s actually making stuff
232 00:11:25,293 –> 00:11:30,253 kalen: happen independently. I feel like that’s kind of the spir. I’m on a rant here. I’m on
233 00:11:30,333 –> 00:11:31,773 kalen: a full on rent. Um,
234 00:11:32,813 –> 00:11:37,293 kalen: anyways, I feel like that’s kind of the spirit of Magento is that we just go out and
235 00:11:37,373 –> 00:11:42,093 kalen: we do stuff, whether that’s in the form of a a module that we create and contribute
236 00:11:42,333 –> 00:11:48,573 kalen: or whatever. we just do stuff. And we don’t sit around waiting for approval from
237 00:11:48,733 –> 00:11:54,093 kalen: anybody, and I feel like we’ve just been sitting around waiting for approvals. You
238 00:11:54,173 –> 00:11:58,653 kalen: know now, I, that’s just my. I could be completely wrong about that ’cause I’m not
239 00:11:58,813 –> 00:12:01,213 kalen: very on the ground connected all this stuff
240 00:12:02,720 –> 00:12:06,640 brent_peterson: Yeah, I think they’re I. you’re. You’re very correct in saying that people
241 00:12:06,880 –> 00:12:08,560 brent_peterson: are sitting around waiting for
242 00:12:09,600 –> 00:12:13,200 brent_peterson: fixes to get put in and I think that uh
243 00:12:14,320 –> 00:12:19,680 brent_peterson: that Adobe has definitely missed the boat in terms of making sure that from
244 00:12:19,760 –> 00:12:23,680 brent_peterson: the community side they’re keeping up with what’s happening on those on
245 00:12:23,760 –> 00:12:26,480 brent_peterson: those poll requests and and those fixes, because they are
247 00:12:26,640 –> 00:12:32,240 brent_peterson: missing out on a huge amount of potential bugs that are in the code already
248 00:12:32,480 –> 00:12:34,240 brent_peterson: and that are getting fixed And it’s a.
249 00:12:34,033 –> 00:12:35,033 250 00:12:34,480 –> 00:12:38,240 brent_peterson: It’s a Mi. You know thousands of coders that are out there helping that. Um.
251 00:12:38,033 –> 00:12:39,033 252 00:12:39,440 –> 00:12:42,960 brent_peterson: So that’s one issue. The other issue that you brought up is what is the road
253 00:12:43,120 –> 00:12:47,200 brent_peterson: map of Magento? Um. I think there’s sort of a road map for the commerce
254 00:12:47,360 –> 00:12:51,200 brent_peterson: version of it, but it’s not. It hasn’t been published since Say twenty
255 00:12:51,520 –> 00:12:56,240 brent_peterson: nineteen, Uh, Since the last time we had a live conference. Um, I don’t know
256 00:12:56,400 –> 00:13:00,640 brent_peterson: if they’ve actually put out at any like Meet Me Genento, India, or any like
257 00:13:00,640 –> 00:13:04,720 brent_peterson: this. Meet me Gentle Poland, Did anybody from a doobe show up for the
258 00:13:04,720 –> 00:13:07,360 brent_peterson: virtual part of it? I haven’t seen the whole conference yet,
259 00:13:08,260 –> 00:13:09,260 brent_peterson: but did
260 00:13:08,653 –> 00:13:12,893 kalen: yeah, I know, I just I just know they said that they had a travel restriction so as
261 00:13:12,973 –> 00:13:16,333 kalen: far as actually going, nobody actually went there in person.
262 00:13:17,040 –> 00:13:21,680 brent_peterson: yeah. So, um, you know that’s that be? I think, just helping us to
263 00:13:21,700 –> 00:13:22,700 264 00:13:23,440 –> 00:13:28,240 brent_peterson: where we’re going the last time I saw Anton Cririll, before he left Magento.
265 00:13:28,880 –> 00:13:35,280 brent_peterson: he gave a speech at Meet Magento Germany about Magenta moving to isolated
266 00:13:35,220 –> 00:13:36,220 267 00:13:36,593 –> 00:13:37,593 268 00:13:37,360 –> 00:13:41,840 brent_peterson: And I’m okay with that. And the reason is is you can still put those
269 00:13:42,000 –> 00:13:47,760 brent_peterson: isolated services together as a monoliphs, and and deploy it now. Yes and I
270 00:13:48,000 –> 00:13:52,800 brent_peterson: had the conversation this morning about. Does that mean? Uh, you’re going to
271 00:13:52,880 –> 00:13:57,040 brent_peterson: have to use something like G, P, r, S, or some. He. He had a technical term
272 00:13:57,200 –> 00:14:01,120 brent_peterson: that have already forgotten. Um. they’re They’re like a graphq, â–, type of
273 00:14:01,200 –> 00:14:05,120 brent_peterson: interface that’s internal that binds those services together And is that
274 00:14:05,360 –> 00:14:08,560 brent_peterson: going to be slower than not binding them together? I don’t know who. I don’t
275 00:14:08,720 –> 00:14:13,600 brent_peterson: care. because if it isn’t that, doobe’s probably going to fix it. So is it
277 00:14:13,553 –> 00:14:14,553 278 00:14:14,000 –> 00:14:17,840 brent_peterson: monolither really an issue or not? I don’t know. I think what the issue is
279 00:14:18,160 –> 00:14:23,920 brent_peterson: is like what they’ve done with Uh, with search. they’ve deprecated uh, a Mi
280 00:14:24,160 –> 00:14:29,360 brent_peterson: sequel search in favor of elastic search. without giving the option of
281 00:14:29,520 –> 00:14:33,680 brent_peterson: having just a regular. Uh, my sequel search, and
282 00:14:33,313 –> 00:14:34,313 283 00:14:33,920 –> 00:14:37,360 brent_peterson: jeeze, I know that everybody loves my sequel search. They love the fact
284 00:14:37,073 –> 00:14:38,073 285 00:14:37,520 –> 00:14:41,120 brent_peterson: that as you search for anything, you bring everything up on the database.
286 00:14:41,393 –> 00:14:42,393 287 00:14:42,580 –> 00:14:43,580 brent_peterson: What could be better
288 00:14:42,993 –> 00:14:43,993 289 00:14:43,680 –> 00:14:47,040 brent_peterson: than if you had a thousand things? And no matter what you search for, you
290 00:14:47,200 –> 00:14:49,840 brent_peterson: always get a thousand results. See, I’m
291 00:14:49,553 –> 00:14:50,553 292 00:14:50,000 –> 00:14:52,000 brent_peterson: being sarcastic. Now you’re not even laughing,
293 00:14:52,573 –> 00:14:56,013 kalen: I. I didn’t even catch that because all I was thinking about was going into my next
294 00:14:55,833 –> 00:14:56,833 295 00:14:57,840 –> 00:15:02,160 brent_peterson: So what you’re saying is what I hear you saying. Now is you’re not actually
296 00:15:02,400 –> 00:15:03,760 brent_peterson: listening to me? You’re
297 00:15:03,773 –> 00:15:05,213 kalen: I. I let me,
298 00:15:03,920 –> 00:15:05,920 brent_peterson: just thinking about what you’re going to say next.
299 00:15:06,653 –> 00:15:10,733 kalen: you know I did make that mistake, but let me take a step back. Let me take a step
300 00:15:10,893 –> 00:15:16,733 kalen: back. And what you said was there is a thousand things in the database and every se
301 00:15:16,973 –> 00:15:20,973 kalen: â–query returns you without. So you’re saying My sequel is horrendous for research. Is
302 00:15:20,953 –> 00:15:21,953 kalen: what you trying to say?
303 00:15:21,360 –> 00:15:25,360 brent_peterson: It sucks. but at least it works at the some degree, and it gives somebody
304 00:15:25,600 –> 00:15:28,320 brent_peterson: that basic option if they want to. You know that the issue
345 00:18:09,053 –> 00:18:13,293 kalen: proof will be in the pudding. That’s another thing. the I said on the on the panel
346 00:18:13,693 –> 00:18:16,413 kalen: which I really enjoyed. It was very, very interesting.
347 00:18:18,673 –> 00:18:19,673 348 00:18:19,200 –> 00:18:23,200 brent_peterson: No, I think that, Uh that. I mean, I think that William Willm has started
349 00:18:23,440 –> 00:18:27,520 brent_peterson: something that that has been that has been lacking in our community. Um, if
350 00:18:27,680 –> 00:18:32,400 brent_peterson: we look back at what happened when Ebay bought Magento, it took about three
351 00:18:32,420 –> 00:18:33,420 brent_peterson: years for
352 00:18:34,320 –> 00:18:40,880 brent_peterson: for them to realize that there is a strong underpinning of public sentiment
353 00:18:41,713 –> 00:18:42,713 354 00:18:42,560 –> 00:18:48,240 brent_peterson: that that evolved around Magento and Um. There was a number of people that
355 00:18:48,400 –> 00:18:53,360 brent_peterson: got invited to the imagined conference, and uh, Um and Um, you know they.
356 00:18:53,520 –> 00:18:57,920 brent_peterson: re. They sort of reinvigorated the community and then I think the next year
357 00:18:58,080 –> 00:19:00,320 brent_peterson: they sold they sold it. Um,
359 00:19:03,200 –> 00:19:06,800 brent_peterson: when uh? you know, I think when Uh, Marco of Veltic took over, then there
360 00:19:06,880 –> 00:19:11,440 brent_peterson: was this recom commitment to the Mu to the community. I’m interested in
361 00:19:11,600 –> 00:19:17,600 brent_peterson: learning Uh, from people that that were involved in say, uh, a M, a patache
362 00:19:17,760 –> 00:19:21,840 brent_peterson: sling or one of the other open source platforms that they have. Uh, what
363 00:19:22,080 –> 00:19:24,800 brent_peterson: what that community looks like? And I know it’s a different
364 00:19:24,433 –> 00:19:25,433 365 00:19:24,960 –> 00:19:30,000 brent_peterson: type of community. I think a M’s on Java. Um, and it’s a little bit more
366 00:19:30,080 –> 00:19:31,200 brent_peterson: mature maybe than
367 00:19:30,833 –> 00:19:31,833 368 00:19:31,360 –> 00:19:35,280 brent_peterson: Magento, But it’d be interesting to see what what’s happened to those people
369 00:19:36,080 –> 00:19:39,360 brent_peterson: and do. does. Uh. does a doobe still listen to them?
370 00:19:40,973 –> 00:19:46,573 kalen: Yeah, that’s a good question. I think I want to say, Cordova, or Phone Gap, or one of
371 00:19:46,653 –> 00:19:51,533 kalen: those was also one of the bigger open source projects that had been acquired, and I
372 00:19:51,613 –> 00:19:56,733 kalen: was always curious about the same thing. You know how, how how have things gone with
373 00:19:56,813 –> 00:19:59,293 kalen: some of these other open source communities?
374 00:19:59,873 –> 00:20:00,873 375 00:20:01,613 –> 00:20:06,973 kalen: but I don’t know. I think. probably the fact that we don’t already know like they’re
376 00:20:07,133 –> 00:20:11,293 kalen: not there. There isn’t like a druple community out there. There isn’t a typo three
377 00:20:11,153 –> 00:20:12,153 378 00:20:11,920 –> 00:20:13,280 brent_peterson: Well, there is a Dple community.
379 00:20:12,173 –> 00:20:16,493 kalen: out there. There’s a no. no, No, No, but I’m saying Under Adobe
380 00:20:16,720 –> 00:20:18,080 brent_peterson: Oh, right. okay, got it.
381 00:20:16,973 –> 00:20:22,733 kalen: Like there there, you know there isn’t there. Aren’t one of these kind of bigger open
382 00:20:23,053 –> 00:20:25,293 kalen: source communities that you think of immediately,
383 00:20:26,733 –> 00:20:31,213 kalen: So yes, I mean, I, I don’t really know. And then, of course you know more and more
384 00:20:31,373 –> 00:20:35,933 kalen: people are leaving every day, right like Matt. A C was there for a while and he was
385 00:20:36,093 –> 00:20:44,493 kalen: rara open source. Then he was gone and bed bargs, of course is, uh, is uh now at uh,
386 00:20:45,693 –> 00:20:47,453 kalen: not sp, uh, shopware, right,
387 00:20:47,620 –> 00:20:48,620 brent_peterson: not at Spriker.
388 00:20:48,573 –> 00:20:54,333 kalen: um, I was going to say spriker, um, um, uh, Geto moved to Spriker, right,
389 00:20:54,260 –> 00:20:55,260 390 00:20:54,833 –> 00:20:55,833 391 00:20:56,573 –> 00:21:02,653 kalen: So you know, um, Yeah, there’s just this like, Uh, You know a lot of people like
392 00:21:02,973 –> 00:21:09,453 kalen: Anton’s at Word Press at W, P engine, right, Pyoter is at. Is it Uh, w P,
393 00:21:09,600 –> 00:21:11,440 brent_peterson: I thought he’ at Big commerce. Yeah,
394 00:21:09,693 –> 00:21:13,213 kalen: engine, big Haer, for Yeah, first it was W P, and then big
395 00:21:13,140 –> 00:21:14,140 396 00:21:13,293 –> 00:21:14,413 kalen: commerce. Right, So it’s like
397 00:21:15,180 –> 00:21:16,180 brent_peterson: Yeah, I think
399 00:21:16,000 –> 00:21:19,120 brent_peterson: that you know, and when they get so large that those people are going to
400 00:21:19,120 –> 00:21:24,400 brent_peterson: come and go, And that’s just that’s the reality of what it is. And uh, you
401 00:21:24,480 –> 00:21:29,520 brent_peterson: know. The. The. I think the the key point there is that the community can’t
402 00:21:29,760 –> 00:21:36,560 brent_peterson: be made up of any one person or group of people at Adobe Slash Magento, And
403 00:21:36,720 –> 00:21:40,960 brent_peterson: the community never was made up of core people at Magento. The community
404 00:21:40,753 –> 00:21:41,753 405 00:21:41,360 –> 00:21:43,680 brent_peterson: was made up of our community, and if you
406 00:21:43,233 –> 00:21:44,233 407 00:21:43,760 –> 00:21:48,880 brent_peterson: look all the way back to that first imagin conference, Um, it was. you know,
408 00:21:48,960 –> 00:21:51,920 brent_peterson: a whole bunch of people from all over the world that made up that community,
409 00:21:52,593 –> 00:21:53,593 410 00:21:53,680 –> 00:21:56,080 brent_peterson: Germans and French people, and a few Americans.
411 00:21:56,673 –> 00:21:57,673 412 00:21:57,280 –> 00:22:02,400 brent_peterson: Um. That kind of that that start started there. or at least we the some of
413 00:22:02,480 –> 00:22:07,200 brent_peterson: the core people in that community, then, Um. and that that’s just continue
414 00:22:07,680 –> 00:22:09,840 brent_peterson: to change and and grow and
415 00:22:11,040 –> 00:22:12,800 brent_peterson: ebb and flow. Um, and
416 00:22:12,433 –> 00:22:13,433 417 00:22:12,960 –> 00:22:16,560 brent_peterson: people come and go and and join and leave and are interested and not
418 00:22:16,460 –> 00:22:17,460 419 00:22:18,160 –> 00:22:22,320 brent_peterson: But I think that’s that’s the key part of it and that’s where I think that’s
420 00:22:22,400 –> 00:22:29,600 brent_peterson: where Willm and Vn and and the team at Um at Whofa have have tapped into.
421 00:22:30,720 –> 00:22:33,840 brent_peterson: and now this open letter now has spurred something
422 00:22:34,880 –> 00:22:40,000 brent_peterson: that is, is causing people to at least raise their eyebrows. Wake up, you
425 00:22:41,520 –> 00:22:43,920 brent_peterson: and and take some notice. and something iss happening.
426 00:22:45,613 –> 00:22:50,173 kalen: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I’m even feeling re energized, you know, and and I, you know,
427 00:22:50,493 –> 00:22:54,653 kalen: I’ve got other stuff I’m starting to focus on. I always feel guilty that I, I don’t
428 00:22:55,293 –> 00:23:01,453 kalen: do. you know, Uh, do more for the association and different things like that. And um,
429 00:23:02,253 –> 00:23:07,213 kalen: you know I, I, I’ve drift. My interests have drifted, you know, as like a lot of
430 00:23:07,293 –> 00:23:13,693 kalen: people do. Um, but yeah, this whole thing has kind of got me all excited and
431 00:23:13,853 –> 00:23:15,053 kalen: bothered, you know,
432 00:23:16,093 –> 00:23:21,453 kalen: and got me you know, thinking about things and kind of thinking back to like. What is
433 00:23:21,613 –> 00:23:27,213 kalen: that original Magento community spirit that’s somehow being expressed? Um. here,
434 00:23:28,333 –> 00:23:30,813 kalen: Um, you know, a little bit of a rebellious
435 00:23:32,253 –> 00:23:36,493 kalen: spirit. It, or at least it kind of an independent. You know, there’s a real
436 00:23:36,573 –> 00:23:40,493 kalen: independent streak in the Magento community you know, and I think.
437 00:23:39,680 –> 00:23:44,400 brent_peterson: Yeah, and I think, Uh, you know Yov and and and Roy and Bob were all
438 00:23:45,520 –> 00:23:50,000 brent_peterson: very independent minded people who promoted that culture in our community.
439 00:23:50,380 –> 00:23:51,380 brent_peterson: And really
440 00:23:51,033 –> 00:23:52,033 441 00:23:51,680 –> 00:23:56,240 brent_peterson: the the key was that they promoted innovation that happened in it. And I
442 00:23:56,320 –> 00:24:00,400 brent_peterson: think the one thing that we are, we are sorely missing in Gentle
443 00:24:00,640 –> 00:24:06,000 brent_peterson: specifically is that drive from leadership and else, just say, leadership is
444 00:24:06,000 –> 00:24:10,080 brent_peterson: at the Adobe level here that drive to innovate and have the community
445 00:24:10,560 –> 00:24:14,880 brent_peterson: innovate, and the frustrations that you mentioned earlier around, maybe and
447 00:24:17,300 –> 00:24:18,300 448 00:24:19,040 –> 00:24:24,880 brent_peterson: If you can’t get a poll request done and looked at for a error, how what is
449 00:24:24,960 –> 00:24:28,720 brent_peterson: your chances of getting a poll request for something that is contributing
450 00:24:28,960 –> 00:24:33,200 brent_peterson: that is actually innovative to Magento rather than just fixing something?
452 00:24:36,173 –> 00:24:40,333 kalen: Yeah, totally. And and I don’t know, I don’t know what the realities are on the
453 00:24:40,333 –> 00:24:44,493 kalen: ground. I’m sure that they’ve got a a tough work load Is probably hard to manage all
454 00:24:44,653 –> 00:24:49,053 kalen: these issues and things that are coming in. There’s probably a lot of noise coming
455 00:24:48,753 –> 00:24:49,753 456 00:24:50,653 –> 00:24:56,893 kalen: so it’s probably a hard tricky thing to solve. But I don’t know. I just feel like if
457 00:24:57,053 –> 00:25:03,213 kalen: the community sort of just did their own fork, I kind of just feel like it would. It
458 00:25:03,293 –> 00:25:07,773 kalen: would just I want to believe that it would work better. And and maybe that’s naive?
459 00:25:08,013 –> 00:25:13,053 kalen: you know, maybe at this scale that’s completely naive. I don’t know. but I, I’m like,
460 00:25:13,773 –> 00:25:18,973 kalen: let’s do it. Let’s you know, let’s let’s see what this thing would be. You know.
461 00:25:20,000 –> 00:25:24,880 brent_peterson: Yeah, I’m not. I’m not uh. convinced on forking yet, Um. I, um. I, I would
462 00:25:25,120 –> 00:25:29,040 brent_peterson: like to have. I would like to have Adobe energized a little bit more
463 00:25:29,280 –> 00:25:35,440 brent_peterson: internally to kind of see some value in what the community can do, Um, and I
464 00:25:35,520 –> 00:25:38,320 brent_peterson: know that there’s an answer for whatever is out there,
465 00:25:39,360 –> 00:25:43,440 brent_peterson: Um to fix. And I think you know the reality too. Is that? what? what? I
466 00:25:43,520 –> 00:25:48,720 brent_peterson: don’t remember? What year they started publishing Um. G, the code on Github.
467 00:25:49,600 –> 00:25:53,840 brent_peterson: It wasn’t that long ago that we couldn’t even contribute to bug fixes. That
468 00:25:53,920 –> 00:25:56,160 brent_peterson: you had to email somebody and email your patch.
469 00:25:55,753 –> 00:25:56,753 470 00:25:56,400 –> 00:25:57,840 brent_peterson: and hopefully it got looked at.
471 00:25:58,353 –> 00:25:59,353 472 00:25:58,880 –> 00:26:03,440 brent_peterson: You know that that we where it’s been it’s It’s relatively new that we could
473 00:26:03,600 –> 00:26:09,360 brent_peterson: actually co. We could, we could do a Poquest and we could uh offer that as a
474 00:26:09,020 –> 00:26:10,020 475 00:26:10,713 –> 00:26:11,713 476 00:26:11,520 –> 00:26:15,840 brent_peterson: I think that they just need to make pay some attention to it, and you know
477 00:26:16,160 –> 00:26:19,840 brent_peterson: just really what it comes back down to, though is just communication and
478 00:26:20,000 –> 00:26:23,120 brent_peterson: transparency. If they were to come out and say hey, we don’t have enough
479 00:26:23,280 –> 00:26:26,400 brent_peterson: people to do this. We don’t have enough people to actually look at all these
480 00:26:26,560 –> 00:26:27,680 brent_peterson: bugs that you’re putting in.
481 00:26:28,573 –> 00:26:33,933 kalen: right, right. like people have asked. like, okay, Wh, What exactly these associations
482 00:26:34,093 –> 00:26:38,973 kalen: roll with open source? Is the association doing events only? are they going to be
483 00:26:39,293 –> 00:26:43,853 kalen: somehow, you know, in charge of open source. And then, like I think, it was said in
484 00:26:43,933 –> 00:26:48,253 kalen: the panel yesterday that like a dialogue was started with a doobe on the topic,
485 00:26:48,653 –> 00:26:52,973 kalen: right, What exactly does that mean that a dialogue was started like you’re saying
486 00:26:53,213 –> 00:26:58,973 kalen: Transparency. like. Okay, Who’s the person that is in charge of this when? like?
487 00:26:59,453 –> 00:27:05,213 kalen: like? When was the issue raised? How much time has passed? When when are we going to
488 00:27:05,293 –> 00:27:09,933 kalen: get an answer? You know, so I guess you’re I think you’re right From that perspective
489 00:27:10,093 –> 00:27:16,333 kalen: Is Is is like. If we could get transparency, Um, that would, that would be great and
490 00:27:16,413 –> 00:27:21,773 kalen: I don’t. I don’t think anybody there is like a bad guy like. I just think I don’t
491 00:27:21,853 –> 00:27:25,613 kalen: know. They probably have their own internal meetings and internal policies and
492 00:27:25,773 –> 00:27:31,133 kalen: they’re just doing their job. You know, But something is amiss
493 00:27:32,973 –> 00:27:40,333 kalen: so as something’s not aligned, so like, how can we? I don’t know how. I don’t know.
507 00:28:22,880 –> 00:28:26,400 brent_peterson: that that’s just not going to happen. So you know, I don’t know if that’s
508 00:28:26,560 –> 00:28:30,320 brent_peterson: goingnna get any better, and I don’t know why it would be any better in the
509 00:28:30,400 –> 00:28:34,000 brent_peterson: in A. in this Mag, major open source community alliance.
510 00:28:35,040 –> 00:28:39,200 brent_peterson: They were able to make that letter happen quickly because they only involved
511 00:28:39,360 –> 00:28:43,760 brent_peterson: the people that were there right. So, if we were to say and I, you know,
512 00:28:43,840 –> 00:28:46,880 brent_peterson: like I didn’t know. Apparently that letter was floating around for a week.
513 00:28:48,080 –> 00:28:54,000 brent_peterson: Um, so it was it was seen by a few people, which I can understand. But if
514 00:28:54,160 –> 00:28:58,080 brent_peterson: you were now to say okay, I want to have everybody see it. Okay. Well now
515 00:28:58,240 –> 00:28:59,840 brent_peterson: everybody’s going to have a different opinion,
516 00:29:00,193 –> 00:29:01,193 517 00:29:00,880 –> 00:29:05,440 brent_peterson: And and uh, suddenly you get mired down in in, Um,
518 00:29:06,480 –> 00:29:10,000 brent_peterson: in a whole bunch of you know what, not so good
519 00:29:09,533 –> 00:29:10,813 kalen: a whole bunch of moarchy.
520 00:29:11,120 –> 00:29:13,920 brent_peterson: molchy. That’s a great word. Thank you for that, Um,
521 00:29:15,440 –> 00:29:20,640 brent_peterson: and that moarchy. Then just keeps us, keeps our feet stuck and we can’t move
522 00:29:20,880 –> 00:29:24,160 brent_peterson: because we’re waiting to get out of this moarchy, where
523 00:29:24,113 –> 00:29:25,113 kalen: Yeah, yeah, I mean
524 00:29:24,480 –> 00:29:28,000 brent_peterson: if if you’ more, if you’re smaller and more agile, you can make those
525 00:29:28,240 –> 00:29:30,880 brent_peterson: decisions quickly and go forward. It’s kinda like
526 00:29:30,633 –> 00:29:31,633 527 00:29:31,360 –> 00:29:36,160 brent_peterson: it’s kinda like you know as a leader you need to make those decision. You
528 00:29:36,240 –> 00:29:40,400 brent_peterson: have to do it sometimes unilaterally, Uh, because you need to make ‘
529 00:29:40,220 –> 00:29:41,220 530 00:29:42,000 –> 00:29:47,040 brent_peterson: and as you know as somebody that is an entrepreneur, then that is part of
531 00:29:47,200 –> 00:29:50,320 brent_peterson: the culture. But if you’re looking at something where it’s a bigger
532 00:29:50,560 –> 00:29:54,720 brent_peterson: organization like Adobe or like Smith Buckland, and you have to follow a
533 00:29:54,800 –> 00:29:59,600 brent_peterson: whole set of rules, and uh, you have to go through every single step and
534 00:29:59,680 –> 00:30:01,920 brent_peterson: whoop, and there is no room
535 00:30:03,200 –> 00:30:05,520 brent_peterson: for for pushing the envelope, Because
536 00:30:06,340 –> 00:30:07,340 537 00:30:06,433 –> 00:30:07,433 538 00:30:07,040 –> 00:30:10,320 brent_peterson: will we do? Well, I guess you know what we really need here is Elon Musk,
539 00:30:12,173 –> 00:30:13,773 kalen: that’s what it comes back to.
540 00:30:12,960 –> 00:30:16,160 brent_peterson: He would say he would save Ma Gentta, open source.
541 00:30:16,973 –> 00:30:25,293 kalen: I mean, I think Willm is the Elon musk. You know, Um, which um, you know. I think you
542 00:30:25,193 –> 00:30:26,193 kalen: know that you need
543 00:30:27,133 –> 00:30:31,453 kalen: Um. I, I’m a big believer in what individuals can do right like you, you do through
544 00:30:31,613 –> 00:30:37,133 kalen: out the analogy of of Um, socialism, or kind of collectivism, which is kind of
545 00:30:37,373 –> 00:30:39,053 kalen: contrasted against kind of
546 00:30:40,093 –> 00:30:44,333 kalen: individual. What? what an individual or a small group of individuals can do right? I
547 00:30:44,413 –> 00:30:49,133 kalen: mean, I think of Laravelle, started by Taus, one guy, Taylor Otwell, you know, And
548 00:30:49,053 –> 00:30:55,053 kalen: and it’s it’s this huge ecosystem that’s grown, but he’s continued as the kind of B D
549 00:30:55,133 –> 00:31:00,893 kalen: F. â–l, You know the sort of benev benevolent dictator for life. And and it’s it’s
551 00:31:05,293 –> 00:31:07,373 kalen: whereas Magento is kind of Um,
552 00:31:08,413 –> 00:31:10,253 kalen: stagnated in in some ways,
553 00:31:11,693 –> 00:31:16,653 kalen: and anyway, I, you know, I just think that and I and I know he probably hates it
554 00:31:16,733 –> 00:31:22,093 kalen: every time I. I sort of make a big deal out of him individually. Um, because he’s
555 00:31:22,253 –> 00:31:27,293 kalen: trying to build a uh team and kind of, I think catalyze kind of a broader movement
556 00:31:27,613 –> 00:31:29,453 kalen: you know, but um,
557 00:31:30,493 –> 00:31:35,293 kalen: yeah, man, I mean, you know I, I think one person can can build something you know.
558 00:31:35,533 –> 00:31:39,773 kalen: Incredible. It’s like it’s like the mythical Man month. you know, I’m sure Doobe’s
559 00:31:39,853 –> 00:31:45,373 kalen: throwing tons of resources at various things. I’m sure if you looked at their burn
560 00:31:45,613 –> 00:31:51,293 kalen: charts and their budgets, they would be significant. But that doesn’t always mean
561 00:31:51,533 –> 00:31:56,813 kalen: that you know things are getting done And and I know that people on the association
562 00:31:56,973 –> 00:32:03,133 kalen: have put in a ton of effort a ton of time, a ton of blood tears. I just you know,
563 00:32:03,533 –> 00:32:09,053 kalen: that doesn’t always guarantee like results right. Sometimes one person or a small
564 00:32:09,293 –> 00:32:15,773 kalen: group of people can get stuff done super fast, right on on a on a shoes string
565 00:32:15,673 –> 00:32:16,673 566 00:32:18,733 –> 00:32:23,613 kalen: whereas the bigger incumbent right can spend a lot of money. Really a lot of time and
567 00:32:23,853 –> 00:32:26,733 kalen: not really go as fast. You
568 00:32:27,680 –> 00:32:30,720 brent_peterson: Yeah, no, I think you, you hit it there and there’ two sides of that whole
569 00:32:30,960 –> 00:32:36,160 brent_peterson: thing about about collective collectivism. There is a broad community that
570 00:32:36,320 –> 00:32:41,920 brent_peterson: can support a A. a. a, Um, a dream of somebody. and that that broad
571 00:32:42,160 –> 00:32:46,160 brent_peterson: community it kind come together in the terms of Magento and fix a whole
572 00:32:46,240 –> 00:32:51,360 brent_peterson: bunch of bugs. Right, uh, but if that, but what that broad community can’t
573 00:32:51,520 –> 00:32:52,800 brent_peterson: do as a community
574 00:32:53,700 –> 00:32:54,700 575 00:32:55,360 –> 00:33:00,560 brent_peterson: C is is always agree on what is the next best thing that we. What is the
576 00:33:00,640 –> 00:33:06,400 brent_peterson: next big thing that we should do for our community to move us forward. Um,
577 00:33:06,640 –> 00:33:09,040 brent_peterson: because you are always going to have somebody that is more
578 00:33:10,400 –> 00:33:14,400 brent_peterson: all, used a word conservative and liberal. Uh, not in the political sense,
579 00:33:14,640 –> 00:33:17,520 brent_peterson: but just if you think about it, the people would like. Some people in our
580 00:33:17,600 –> 00:33:20,560 brent_peterson: community would like it to stay the way it has been, and some people would
581 00:33:20,720 –> 00:33:23,680 brent_peterson: like to grow into new things. And there’s new people coming to the community
582 00:33:24,080 –> 00:33:27,680 brent_peterson: that know. Don’t care about what happened in Magenta One. they, they’re
583 00:33:27,760 –> 00:33:30,560 brent_peterson: they’re in. They’re involved in a genento, too. Uh,
585 00:33:30,720 –> 00:33:34,080 brent_peterson: and they would like to see that. So there’s all kinds of opposing views that
586 00:33:34,160 –> 00:33:38,880 brent_peterson: are happening. So the two sides are are the broad community, Help support it
587 00:33:39,200 –> 00:33:44,080 brent_peterson: and maintain it, and and make sure that we’re we’re growing. In a flat
588 00:33:44,400 –> 00:33:47,520 brent_peterson: sense. You know we’re growing. but it’s it’s really just maintaining
589 00:33:47,760 –> 00:33:51,840 brent_peterson: something. Then there’s the little people that are poking things at it that
590 00:33:51,920 –> 00:33:54,720 brent_peterson: are lighting fighters here and there, like the Hofa theme,
591 00:33:55,153 –> 00:33:56,153 592 00:33:55,680 –> 00:33:59,600 brent_peterson: And those people are the ones that are sticking out that are making things
610 00:34:57,200 –> 00:35:00,720 brent_peterson: Maybe there’s some people that want that and I, you know, I think that the
611 00:35:00,880 –> 00:35:03,680 brent_peterson: idea that that between p w a and hufah,
612 00:35:04,720 –> 00:35:11,120 brent_peterson: uh, a bolted on theme versus a a p w A’s theme. Um, you know that’s just the
613 00:35:11,200 –> 00:35:13,200 brent_peterson: beginning of making it more complicated
614 00:35:14,240 –> 00:35:20,160 brent_peterson: and does, does it? Um. Does it make it so much more complicated that people
615 00:35:20,180 –> 00:35:21,180 brent_peterson: aren’t going to use it?
616 00:35:22,973 –> 00:35:25,613 kalen: Yeah, I mean, that’s kind of the million dollar question like
617 00:35:27,773 –> 00:35:32,253 kalen: I don’t know, you know, I mean I. I. I did some stuff with like Laraville, which uh
618 00:35:32,413 –> 00:35:37,133 kalen: bundles all sorts of uh, modern jaasript stuff that I wasn’t familiar with Web,
619 00:35:38,413 –> 00:35:43,133 kalen: all sorts of stuff that I just was not at all familiar with and it mostly just worked
620 00:35:43,533 –> 00:35:47,373 kalen: right out of the box because they had it configured and packaged in a way that it was
621 00:35:47,453 –> 00:35:53,933 kalen: easy to get up and running and kind of on boarded me into this tool set. And um, my
622 00:35:54,093 –> 00:35:58,573 kalen: sense is that it’s sort of the exact opposite case with a lot of Theo stuff where
623 00:35:58,733 –> 00:36:02,973 kalen: it’s you. Things just take a long time to get to get going,
624 00:36:04,093 –> 00:36:08,253 kalen: and the complexity is slowing every you know everybody down.
625 00:36:09,233 –> 00:36:10,233 626 00:36:11,293 –> 00:36:14,413 kalen: I. I. I don’t know. I mean you, you would know better than I would you know what the
627 00:36:14,493 –> 00:36:19,853 kalen: pros and cons are to the isolated services. Um it it. It just seems like there’s this
628 00:36:20,013 –> 00:36:25,693 kalen: contingent that is saying. Let’s keep it simple. Um, Which makes sense to me. keep it
629 00:36:25,773 –> 00:36:30,973 kalen: simple. Stupid, Um, and I, I don’t know. It seems like the Enterprise Commerce
630 00:36:31,133 –> 00:36:34,093 kalen: edition. Whatever the heck is being called These days. They still call it Enterprise.
631 00:36:34,813 –> 00:36:37,853 kalen: Um, Is kind of Adobe Commerce.
632 00:36:38,893 –> 00:36:43,293 kalen: Enterprise Edition Is is. Can it be like a different thing? It just feels like it’s
633 00:36:43,373 –> 00:36:45,853 kalen: going to be an entirely different thing from
634 00:36:46,433 –> 00:36:47,433 635 00:36:48,013 –> 00:36:53,133 kalen: Magento is Now. I mean, why not just have it become an entirely different thing
636 00:36:53,293 –> 00:36:58,013 kalen: written in Jaa Micro serviceerists. I, I mean, I’m hearing that it’s going to be
637 00:36:58,093 –> 00:37:01,053 kalen: getting rewritten a Java or something like that. I don’t know where I heard that
638 00:37:01,133 –> 00:37:02,333 kalen: from, but um,
639 00:37:02,400 –> 00:37:04,240 brent_peterson: Well, you’re in Austin. So you should know?
640 00:37:04,893 –> 00:37:08,093 kalen: I should know these things. you know, I hear things I hear a little.
641 00:37:07,440 –> 00:37:10,480 brent_peterson: what Do you? You should be hanging out at the coffee shops? Although a Doobe
642 00:37:10,800 –> 00:37:14,080 brent_peterson: employees hang out and you should be overly overhearing their conversations.
643 00:37:14,813 –> 00:37:18,013 kalen: Well, maybe that’s what I do. Maybe that’s where this is coming from.
655 00:38:05,120 –> 00:38:08,320 brent_peterson: That’s all. I mean that what youve just said would solve everybody’s
656 00:38:08,400 –> 00:38:11,840 brent_peterson: problem, because if they did that, then sure be that people would fork it,
657 00:38:12,000 –> 00:38:17,040 brent_peterson: and we’d be off to the races with to open Source and the Ma,
658 00:38:18,080 –> 00:38:21,280 brent_peterson: or a Doobe commerce. then would its own little beast
659 00:38:22,320 –> 00:38:25,520 brent_peterson: that would live on on on through the Adobe world.
660 00:38:26,033 –> 00:38:27,033 661 00:38:26,960 –> 00:38:31,520 brent_peterson: I don’t know if Adobe would want to do that because I think they’ also left.
662 00:38:32,400 –> 00:38:37,040 brent_peterson: Uh, you know a patchy sling there, which is the undering experience manager
663 00:38:36,900 –> 00:38:37,900 664 00:38:37,393 –> 00:38:38,393 665 00:38:39,853 –> 00:38:44,573 kalen: you know I. I. I actually had a conversation with Dame and Retsgrey yesterday. Um, I
666 00:38:44,573 –> 00:38:50,013 kalen: don’t know if you know him, but he’s a. He’s a. He’s a cool guy and uh, he, um, it’s
667 00:38:50,093 –> 00:38:55,213 kalen: not live yet, but um, he was saying something really interesting, which is that a uh.
668 00:38:55,293 –> 00:39:01,133 kalen: Magento is kind of like open source, but not exactly in the sense that a lot of these
669 00:39:01,293 –> 00:39:04,973 kalen: architectural decisions right, like I heard from. I think one or two different
670 00:39:05,213 –> 00:39:09,373 kalen: people. The thing about Java. Okay, not going to say who, Because again, that’s kind
671 00:39:09,453 –> 00:39:13,693 kalen: of the nature of this beast is that it’s like you know a guy and you have a
672 00:39:13,773 –> 00:39:17,773 kalen: conversation with some person. But it’s off the record because they’re not supposed
673 00:39:17,853 –> 00:39:23,293 kalen: to be what right. And this is sort of exactly how open source is not supposed to
674 00:39:23,373 –> 00:39:27,773 kalen: work. Everything should be discussed out in the open. It should all be discussed on
675 00:39:27,853 –> 00:39:32,573 kalen: Github. Whoever was talking about rewriting it in Java, if in K. If they were in
676 00:39:32,733 –> 00:39:38,333 kalen: fact, that should just be discussed openly right look, but there’s all these backroom
677 00:39:38,653 –> 00:39:43,693 kalen: conversations right. there’s the partner ecosystem. There’s always these backroom
678 00:39:43,933 –> 00:39:48,493 kalen: conversations and part of that is, Uh, you know, there’s a closer relationship
679 00:39:48,813 –> 00:39:52,333 kalen: between partners and that’s that can be a good thing. That can be a feature, not a
680 00:39:52,413 –> 00:39:57,373 kalen: bug. but it’s it’s also just kind of. you know. it’s kind of wacky. The whole thing.
681 00:39:57,953 –> 00:39:58,953 682 00:39:59,700 –> 00:40:00,700 683 00:40:00,353 –> 00:40:01,353 kalen: you know, it’s kind of
684 00:40:00,400 –> 00:40:02,640 brent_peterson: that’s back to somebody’s got to make a decision.
685 00:40:03,713 –> 00:40:04,713 686 00:40:04,720 –> 00:40:08,880 brent_peterson: At some point, the decisions the the moving forward decisions have to be
687 00:40:08,960 –> 00:40:13,840 brent_peterson: made, and they shouldn’t involve every single person in the whole world. You
688 00:40:13,380 –> 00:40:14,380 689 00:40:14,173 –> 00:40:15,373 kalen: Well, okay, I mean
690 00:40:14,400 –> 00:40:17,120 brent_peterson: there, there’s going to have to be a group of leaders that that do that, and
691 00:40:17,200 –> 00:40:20,320 brent_peterson: they’re going to have to make that decision and then live with the live with
692 00:40:20,100 –> 00:40:21,100 brent_peterson: that decision.
693 00:40:23,193 –> 00:40:24,193 kalen: you could be R. I
694 00:40:24,253 –> 00:40:28,333 kalen: mean, yeah, I mean, you know that’s where leadership is. That’s where leadership is
695 00:40:24,320 –> 00:40:25,520 brent_peterson: That’s what leadership is.
696 00:40:28,493 –> 00:40:32,973 kalen: and in business, that’s that’s how sort of business works. Um, you know, you’ve been
697 00:40:33,053 –> 00:40:36,893 kalen: a business owner for many years and you’ve had to make those types of decisions and
718 00:41:27,373 –> 00:41:31,693 kalen: Oh, there’s no nucleus or there’s no center of gravity right,
719 00:41:30,880 –> 00:41:34,720 brent_peterson: Right, he had that big speech and Karen Baker did the same thing about how
720 00:41:34,880 –> 00:41:37,920 brent_peterson: our community’s falling apart And uh, you know, I
721 00:41:37,553 –> 00:41:38,553 722 00:41:38,000 –> 00:41:42,080 brent_peterson: think those are the times where Um where maybe it is splintering and and
723 00:41:42,240 –> 00:41:47,200 brent_peterson: having those people stand up and talk about it brings us together again.
724 00:41:49,100 –> 00:41:50,100 brent_peterson: So but is it
725 00:41:49,713 –> 00:41:50,713 726 00:41:50,160 –> 00:41:53,520 brent_peterson: splintering is? Yes, of course, it’s always splintering. People are going
727 00:41:53,680 –> 00:41:55,680 brent_peterson: off in their own directions and so
741 00:42:33,760 –> 00:42:38,080 brent_peterson: everybody’. not going to have the exact same opinion about everything. So
742 00:42:37,713 –> 00:42:38,713 743 00:42:38,240 –> 00:42:40,320 brent_peterson: what does splintering the mean?
744 00:42:43,053 –> 00:42:44,333 kalen: Yeah, I think
745 00:42:45,773 –> 00:42:49,933 kalen: I go back to Larriville, because I’m Ca. I, That’s the other the closest analogue I
746 00:42:50,013 –> 00:42:56,173 kalen: have. You’ve got one leader, Taylor Otwell, who is incredible. He, every year he
747 00:42:56,333 –> 00:43:02,733 kalen: reads the entire code base line by line. That’s how committed this dut is. Everybody
748 00:43:03,213 –> 00:43:07,133 kalen: respects them as the like. A Lot of open source projects need to have a leader, right
749 00:43:07,293 –> 00:43:13,533 kalen: a B d f, â–l and Um. Lius Torvalts. Right. You think of these people and
750 00:43:14,893 –> 00:43:19,693 kalen: Um, or or companies need a founder. You know, you know you have a founder that’s led
751 00:43:19,853 –> 00:43:27,373 kalen: the company from day one and I, I feel like that is is kind of an important thing. We
752 00:43:27,453 –> 00:43:32,173 kalen: don’t have that right now. Um, although I think maybe that’s Willm, That’s my
753 00:43:32,253 –> 00:43:34,653 kalen: campaign, William for B. D f. â–l, but
754 00:43:37,313 –> 00:43:38,313 kalen: I don’t know. I mean
755 00:43:39,293 –> 00:43:44,253 kalen: yeah, I mean yes, Th. this would. This could splinter things. I guess
756 00:43:45,693 –> 00:43:47,693 kalen: um, I, I think organically.
757 00:43:48,813 –> 00:43:54,573 kalen: if if it was successful, it would start to pick up steam. And then maybe people that
758 00:43:54,733 –> 00:43:59,133 kalen: were not as interested in it would start to find a use case for it right.
759 00:44:01,133 –> 00:44:06,093 kalen: I mean, what about commerce and open source? Is that a splintering? is that A? Is
760 00:44:06,173 –> 00:44:07,533 kalen: that a splintering of the community?
761 00:44:08,653 –> 00:44:09,773 kalen: You know. I mean you. re.
762 00:44:09,600 –> 00:44:12,640 brent_peterson: I mean a commerce and open source is just a name. and that’s been around
763 00:44:12,500 –> 00:44:13,500 764 00:44:15,280 –> 00:44:16,880 brent_peterson: Enterprise came out in twenty ten
765 00:44:17,633 –> 00:44:18,633 766 00:44:18,560 –> 00:44:24,080 brent_peterson: and know the reality is thato has to make money so they have to pay. They
767 00:44:24,140 –> 00:44:25,140 brent_peterson: have to pay the bills,
768 00:44:25,933 –> 00:44:29,053 kalen: Yeah, money is good. Money’s money is important.
769 00:44:31,073 –> 00:44:32,073 770 00:44:32,513 –> 00:44:33,513 771 00:44:34,173 –> 00:44:39,133 kalen: I guess I. I think the point you raise is is interesting to me. Is like everybody’s
772 00:44:39,293 –> 00:44:41,693 kalen: always saying that everything is splintering the the community
773 00:44:43,053 –> 00:44:48,333 kalen: and the argument the association is making is listen, guys. We have been working for
774 00:44:48,413 –> 00:44:53,293 kalen: three years now to create this association to put some structure in place to foster
775 00:44:53,533 –> 00:44:59,213 kalen: dialogues and you guys are trying to blow it all up and you guys are saying Oh, we’re
776 00:44:59,293 –> 00:45:04,413 kalen: just going to do our own thing, And they’re saying we want you to work with us right
777 00:45:04,733 –> 00:45:10,013 kalen: as the association to communicate these things in a in a clear way to Adobe.
778 00:45:11,453 –> 00:45:18,173 kalen: And and I feel, and like I get that. But the same time it’s like
779 00:45:19,293 –> 00:45:22,013 kalen: there’s so much pent up frustration
780 00:45:23,453 –> 00:45:27,613 kalen: and ankt in the community And it’s just like
781 00:45:28,973 –> 00:45:35,133 kalen: it’s sort of spontaneously combusting. I feel like. In some ways you know
782 00:45:34,720 –> 00:45:35,840 brent_peterson: But doesn’t it feel like
783 00:45:36,940 –> 00:45:37,940 brent_peterson: that’s what happening
784 00:45:38,960 –> 00:45:40,160 brent_peterson: every time this happens.
785 00:45:42,173 –> 00:45:44,333 kalen: what do you mean? What do you
786 00:45:43,280 –> 00:45:46,880 brent_peterson: I mean it feels like the things are falling apart when this
787 00:45:46,513 –> 00:45:47,513 788 00:45:46,740 –> 00:45:47,740 789 00:45:48,400 –> 00:45:52,080 brent_peterson: When it felt like when Um Ebay bought Mago,
790 00:45:53,760 –> 00:45:59,760 brent_peterson: they had that â–x Commerce conference and then the next year it wasn’t I to a
791 00:45:59,840 –> 00:46:04,800 brent_peterson: man conference. It was just imagine. like Magento came out of it completely
792 00:46:05,180 –> 00:46:06,180 brent_peterson: right. Like
799 00:46:22,720 –> 00:46:28,000 brent_peterson: like it was getting sucked into some beheemth like Ebay, and and we’re never
800 00:46:27,940 –> 00:46:28,940 brent_peterson: going to get it back.
801 00:46:30,413 –> 00:46:36,973 kalen: I think that the corporate overlords, they keep trying to sort of absorb Mago. and
802 00:46:37,053 –> 00:46:39,613 kalen: then it just doesn’t just can’t happen.
803 00:46:41,133 –> 00:46:47,133 kalen: Like, like I said man, the community is rebellious. We’d like to do our own thing. We
804 00:46:47,213 –> 00:46:54,013 kalen: have our own hive mind. You know we’re going to keep fighting. You know, we’re go to
805 00:46:54,173 –> 00:46:58,333 kalen: keep. We’re going to keep forking. You know, it’s going to keep aing
806 00:46:59,120 –> 00:47:01,040 brent_peterson: Yep, uh, you know. think about um.
807 00:47:02,160 –> 00:47:06,240 brent_peterson: think about you. Think about these business leaders that are making these
808 00:47:06,480 –> 00:47:11,600 brent_peterson: decisions that don’t give uh, rats. Whatever about Magento. They bought
809 00:47:11,760 –> 00:47:14,960 brent_peterson: Magento in in the sense that they needed, and they wanted a commerce
810 00:47:15,200 –> 00:47:20,000 brent_peterson: platform to to go into the Um, broader Uh portfolio for a doobe,
811 00:47:20,433 –> 00:47:21,433 812 00:47:20,960 –> 00:47:24,640 brent_peterson: Uh, and what? they could have chose some other platform. That’s a Sass
813 00:47:24,800 –> 00:47:28,000 brent_peterson: platform. They could have chose something like Big commerce or whatever is
814 00:47:28,160 –> 00:47:33,680 brent_peterson: out there. They chose a Ma genento and it’s a Ph P platform. I don’t. I’m
815 00:47:33,840 –> 00:47:38,400 brent_peterson: just, I’m just putting out my guesses here. I’m guessing they didn’t think
816 00:47:38,640 –> 00:47:42,800 brent_peterson: about. Hey, this is Ph P. and none of the other products on a doob or Ph. H.
817 00:47:42,500 –> 00:47:43,500 818 00:47:44,080 –> 00:47:47,520 brent_peterson: Right they? they didn’t think of any that. I’m sure they looked at a bunch
819 00:47:47,460 –> 00:47:48,460 brent_peterson: of factors
820 00:47:48,673 –> 00:47:49,673 821 00:47:49,120 –> 00:47:53,840 brent_peterson: that made it F. from a business standpoint Make made it make sense.
822 00:47:55,840 –> 00:47:59,360 brent_peterson: And then the next thing after that you have a whole bunch of managers that
823 00:47:59,440 –> 00:48:01,360 brent_peterson: make decision. Ions that again,
824 00:48:02,480 –> 00:48:05,840 brent_peterson: don’t necessarily a line with where Magento was.
825 00:48:07,200 –> 00:48:10,400 brent_peterson: They just are looking at where they would like it to be,
826 00:48:11,520 –> 00:48:17,200 brent_peterson: not necessarily thinking about how it got there and how it’s going to get
827 00:48:17,440 –> 00:48:22,240 brent_peterson: maintained. in terms of hey, you know we have three hundred thousand people
828 00:48:22,400 –> 00:48:27,600 brent_peterson: that care about it. Um, are we going to upset them if we start doing this or
829 00:48:27,680 –> 00:48:30,800 brent_peterson: are we going? Are they going to feel shut out when we stop talking
830 00:48:30,740 –> 00:48:31,740 831 00:48:32,433 –> 00:48:33,433 832 00:48:34,273 –> 00:48:35,273 833 00:48:34,500 –> 00:48:35,500 834 00:48:34,893 –> 00:48:37,053 kalen: do you mean when we stoped talking altogether,
835 00:48:37,440 –> 00:48:41,360 brent_peterson: well, you know, if if we look at this as being a communications problem and
836 00:48:41,440 –> 00:48:44,640 brent_peterson: the communication is just there, not telling us what’s going to be happening
837 00:48:44,800 –> 00:48:49,840 brent_peterson: in the future with Magento, they are there really in. in a sense, not really
838 00:48:49,820 –> 00:48:50,820 brent_peterson: telling us
839 00:48:51,680 –> 00:48:56,400 brent_peterson: where they where where it’s going right. We don’t know necessarily where
842 00:48:57,940 –> 00:48:58,940 843 00:49:00,320 –> 00:49:04,960 brent_peterson: and that is, uh, a concern that the community has, because they would like
844 00:49:05,200 –> 00:49:07,440 brent_peterson: people would like to know where it’s going,
845 00:49:07,953 –> 00:49:08,953 846 00:49:08,480 –> 00:49:13,520 brent_peterson: and even more than I, I think few people want to be included in that they
847 00:49:13,600 –> 00:49:16,400 brent_peterson: want to feel that. if it’s a community you want to feel like you’re included
848 00:49:16,220 –> 00:49:17,220 brent_peterson: in the community
849 00:49:18,560 –> 00:49:22,640 brent_peterson: And if you don’t know what’s happening and the decisions are being made and
860 00:49:44,880 –> 00:49:46,480 brent_peterson: next episode on shopware.
861 00:49:47,233 –> 00:49:48,233 862 00:49:48,813 –> 00:49:52,973 kalen: I don’t know the first thing about shopper, other than I think it’s the next Magento,
950 00:53:33,120 –> 00:53:37,360 brent_peterson: um, I heard that Laravell was named after a guy named Larry Vll.
951 00:53:39,380 –> 00:53:40,380 brent_peterson: Did you hear that
952 00:53:43,533 –> 00:53:45,293 kalen: I, I did not.
953 00:53:46,240 –> 00:53:48,720 brent_peterson: Uh v e I, â–l,
954 00:53:50,300 –> 00:53:51,300 brent_peterson: and Um,
955 00:53:52,160 –> 00:53:56,800 brent_peterson: if it would, it would have been Larry Vile, like Vale, Colorado, otherwise,
956 00:53:56,500 –> 00:53:57,500 957 00:53:56,673 –> 00:53:57,673 958 00:53:57,120 –> 00:53:59,200 brent_peterson: now it’s Larry Vlle, and they just shortened it.
959 00:54:01,120 –> 00:54:02,480 brent_peterson: Did you hear that same rumor
960 00:54:04,080 –> 00:54:06,560 brent_peterson: like his neighbor’s name was Larry Vlle.
961 00:54:08,413 –> 00:54:10,653 kalen: please tell serious. Are you serious?
962 00:54:11,060 –> 00:54:12,060 963 00:54:14,013 –> 00:54:19,853 kalen: How did you get me? I was like the very last minute I was like, Oh my God, he’s
964 00:54:19,633 –> 00:54:20,633 965 00:54:20,960 –> 00:54:23,920 brent_peterson: Yeah, we made through this whole episode without any jokes.
971 00:54:31,453 –> 00:54:34,013 kalen: dad joker on the planet.
972 00:54:34,500 –> 00:54:35,500 brent_peterson: I’ve been told that,
973 00:54:37,293 –> 00:54:40,973 kalen: Just when I think I have you figured out, you throw me for a loop. you know,
974 00:54:40,820 –> 00:54:41,820 975 00:54:42,640 –> 00:54:47,280 brent_peterson: uh, speaking of, Uh, of well, so coup a couple of things as we close out.
976 00:54:47,600 –> 00:54:52,960 brent_peterson: Um, If if Willilm is our eelon musk, it is going to be infinitely less
977 00:54:53,200 –> 00:54:58,960 brent_peterson: expensive for him to shoot the Hofa theme into space than it was for Elo to
978 00:54:59,040 –> 00:55:01,440 brent_peterson: shoot his first tessin to space, right,
1006 00:56:05,693 –> 00:56:07,773 kalen: Oh God, thank you. Did you
1007 00:56:07,420 –> 00:56:08,420 1008 00:56:07,853 –> 00:56:09,613 kalen: do that as you come up with that one yourself.
1009 00:56:09,760 –> 00:56:12,640 brent_peterson: I don’t come up with any of my jokes myself. No,
1010 00:56:11,213 –> 00:56:14,973 kalen: You don’t come up with any of them, but you deliver them like an absolute champion.
1011 00:56:15,280 –> 00:56:18,400 brent_peterson: yeah, that’s the only that I don’t even know if that’s my talent.
1012 00:56:18,913 –> 00:56:19,913 1013 00:56:19,460 –> 00:56:20,460 brent_peterson: I don’t think it is.
1014 00:56:20,653 –> 00:56:23,053 kalen: I, no, I wouldn’t â–quit your day job.
1015 00:56:22,160 –> 00:56:26,880 brent_peterson: I do come up with spontaneous jokes. Uh, and I do have to explain them. I
1016 00:56:26,960 –> 00:56:28,160 brent_peterson: think that’s the best part of it,
1017 00:56:30,893 –> 00:56:33,453 kalen: It is the best part, ladies and ja.
1018 00:56:32,240 –> 00:56:34,560 brent_peterson: my, my best joke, my best joke.
1019 00:56:34,113 –> 00:56:35,113 1020 00:56:34,800 –> 00:56:37,440 brent_peterson: When I’m running, I know we’re over now, but uh, I
1021 00:56:37,453 –> 00:56:39,053 kalen: no, no, no, we have all the time in the world
1022 00:56:37,520 –> 00:56:42,960 brent_peterson: do. I do my long runs. Um, and oftenims we outut with, I’m with the new Sam
1023 00:56:43,120 –> 00:56:45,920 brent_peterson: Muth, a new group of people and we’re doing twenty miles or something like
1024 00:56:45,540 –> 00:56:46,540 1025 00:56:46,193 –> 00:56:47,193 1026 00:56:47,520 –> 00:56:54,880 brent_peterson: I wait until Mile eighteen and I, My advice is always running is always
1027 00:56:55,600 –> 00:56:59,440 brent_peterson: running. Is is is, uh, ninety percent mental
1028 00:57:00,033 –> 00:57:01,033 1029 00:57:00,480 –> 00:57:05,120 brent_peterson: and the last fifteen percent is in your head, and I leave it at that and we
1030 00:57:05,280 –> 00:57:07,360 brent_peterson: just keep going. And then if they’re
1031 00:57:07,273 –> 00:57:08,273 kalen: I love it
1032 00:57:07,440 –> 00:57:12,480 brent_peterson: paying attention at all what I say, they will question my math, but a lot of
1033 00:57:07,440 –> 00:57:12,480 brent_peterson: paying attention at all what I say, they will question my math, but a lot of
1034 00:57:12,560 –> 00:57:15,520 brent_peterson: times they’re not, They’re not at the point where they could think straight,
1035 00:57:12,560 –> 00:57:15,520 brent_peterson: times they’re not, They’re not at the point where they could think straight,
1036 00:57:15,380 –> 00:57:16,380 1037 00:57:15,380 –> 00:57:16,380 1038 00:57:15,693 –> 00:57:17,933 kalen: they don’t. They don’t catch it, kind of like I didn’t
1039 00:57:17,580 –> 00:57:18,580 1040 00:57:18,093 –> 00:57:21,773 kalen: catch your my sequel joke. They just kind of go like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
1044 00:57:23,860 –> 00:57:24,860 1045 00:57:25,053 –> 00:57:29,453 kalen: I love it. I love it, ladies and gentlemen, Brant Peterson, All done here, were
1046 00:57:29,613 –> 00:57:30,973 kalen: wrapping it up over and out.
Today I have Jisse Reitsma from Yireo. Jisse and I have an open conversation around Mage Open Source Community Alliance and some reactions to the letter. We talk about the reaction from the Magento Association and talk a little about what could make it better. If you are interested in talking about this subject, please reach out to brent@brentwpeterson
The discussion on this week’s podcast focuses on the current issues developers are facing with Adobe and Magento. Two main issues discussed were the transparency of Adobe and the monolith and modularity dichotomy.
The Mage Open Source Community Alliance (MOSCA) open letter to the community sought to show that developers care about the Adobe products and believe that the open-source code that drives their products is neglected. Developers are accustomed to accessing a roadmap of the software shared with the broader community, which shows transparency, and some don’t believe that they are receiving that transparency with Magento.
It is believed that open source development lies in the hands of developers, and instead of just talking about the changes that they want to see, they can make it happen. That is one point that the open letter drove home. However, at this point, the change seems to be happening without actually any organization.
An important question in all this discussion is if there is indeed a split, who would own the trademark? Who is going to be the owner of the source codes? Who will be responsible for fixing the bugs as they arise?
If Adobe is not becoming more transparent in their decision-making, if there’s not a roadmap being published upon opensource, assuming that there is one, then actually the community will not see which way the whole Magento opensource thing is growing. Then, in the end, that’s going to mean that many people are just so unsure about a fundamental something that they’re either going to leave or create a fork or are going to stick with even Magento one. And that’s the direction we don’t want to go to. Something needs to change.
While some developers believe there is no need for a monolith, others believe it is functional. The proposed decomposition of the monolith by Magento does not leave developers with a choice. It is suggested that developers be given an option to decide whether or not they want to go the route of the monolith or modularity. It boils down to deprecating or not deprecating.
There are a lot of Magento merchants that use the software, and a lot of those merchants feel uneasy about where their version of Magento is going. A question that they have is if Magento gets more complicated, does that mean that it would get more expensive for them to run their store?
Some proposed solutions to having Adobe communicate and be more transparent with the community are having a monthly bulletin, utilizing social media, and employing a social media and marketing committee to keep the community informed. This way, developers could openly share their ideas and grow on them like trading at a bazaar. What is currently happening is that the discussion is taking place in a cathedral manner. There’s a lot of conversing and what comes out is a filtered down smooth message that doesn’t have teeth and is unopinionated. The beauty is that the community is in charge of the innovation, and the Magento association should bring it out.
What it comes down to is just more communication and transparency from Adobe would solve these problems.
The letter is creating quite the buzz in the community and already has more than 1300 signatures (As of Sept 17th). We talk about where Magento Open Source is headed and what this means, especially to merchants.
We go into OneStepCheckout and some real numbers that help merchants decrease cart abandonment. (If you don’t measure you don’t know) We also talk about the reason why One Step Checkout has adopted Shopware as its 2nd platform.
Show notes:
Hyva + OneStepCheckout live store: haardenexpert.nl
This week we interview Anna Völkl. Anna is the lead Magento developer and release manager at Economics the leading Magento agency in Austria. We dive into a great discussion about Magento security and tools merchants should use to help secure their Magento store. We talk about a day in the life of a Magento developer and Anna shares some of her passion around the Red Cross. We discuss the Magento community and the re-opening of Magento events someday. We all miss them!
