5 speakers, 1 organizer, and a Platinum Sponsorship: 10up loves WordCamp Boston

Jake Goldman on October 24, 2013

WordCamp Boston has a special place in team 10up’s heart, going all the way back to Boston’s first camp, which I helped organize in 2010, before there was a 10up. In 2011, not 6 months after founding 10up, we reached into our pocket to offer a Silver sponsorship, and I spoke about WordPress as a CMS. In 2012, we again extended a Silver sponsorship; I debuted a talk on Enterprise, and was joined by fellow 10up speakers Jess Jurick and Luke Gedeon (who runs the neighboring Providence WordCamp). Today, two 10uppers live in the Boston metro area: Senior Engineer Dave Ross, and Engineer Kelly Dwan, who also organizes the monthly meet up and helped organize this weekend’s event. Three of our senior staff – Jess Jurick, John Jacoby, and I – all lived within ~100 miles of Boston at some point since 10up’s inception.

So it goes without saying that, above and beyond Kelly’s co-organizing, we were going to make a meaningful contribution to WordCamp Boston 2013. With more resources in hand, we’ve provided a top-tier, Platinum Sponsorship; we’re sponsoring Saturday’s lunch! You’ll find 7 of us at the conference, 5 of us speaking:

I’m giving away 10up developer interview strategies and questions.
Our Director of Engineering and lead bbPress developer, John Jacoby, will be giving away some bbPress secrets.
Senior Engineer Eric Mann, hot on the heels of his talk at jQuery Conference in Russia, is teaching PHP Unit Testing, a skill set crucial to the future of WordPress.
Are you afraid of the command line? Senior Engineer John Bloch, just coming off the TechCrunch.com relaunch last week, will teach you to fear the command line no more.
Finally, Engineer Kelly Dwan will co-lead a Friday workshop focused on theme and plug-in UX.

You’ll find more 10uppers roaming the halls and manning the 10up table (did someone say free swag?): local Senior Engineer Dave Ross and prolific core contributor (find her face on your credits screen) Helen Hou-Sandi.

Check out my guest blog post on the WordCamp Boston website for more reminiscing about 10up and Boston connections, like our work for Boston Magazine. If you’ll be in town, find a 10upper, visit our table, be sure to see our talks, and enjoy lunch – it’s on us!

10up at WordCamp San Francisco 2013

Jake Goldman on July 23, 2013

WordCamp San Francisco was the first ever WordCamp, organized by WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg back in 2006. It has since grown into one of the largest WordCamps in the United States, and is considered WordPress’s canonical annual community event. I’m excited to reveal that we’ll have eight 10uppers in attendance, four of whom will be presenting.

One of our newest employees, Grant Landram, will be attending WordCamp San Francisco for the first time. Grant is excited to experience the WordCamp that started this international phenomena and meet WordCampers from around the world. As a WordCamp organizer in Seattle, he’s eager to learn from the organizing team and bring that knowledge back home. Grant’s presentation explores collaboration with non-technical stakeholders, and offers an anecdotal overview of the pitfalls technical personnel may encounter when working with non-technical stakeholders. He’ll cover techniques for identifying and understanding a stakeholders’ true knowledge, and actions that help non-technical participants follow technical conversations. Grant is also volunteering at the Happiness Bar on Friday, so stop by to chat with him if you’re going!

Eric Mann will also be attending WordCamp San Francisco for the first time, and is eager to connect with online collaborators he’s engaged on Twitter and IRC. Eric will be giving a short talk on Saturday morning, highlighting ways developers can automate their coding process using Grunt. Like his presentation in Seattle earlier this year, this version will focus on the goals of automation and practical tools, along with a live demo. At 10up, we’ve built two fantastic tools that leverage Grunt for WordPress development: a template that builds the foundation for a new plugin and one that builds the foundation for a new theme. Eric also built out a template that builds a new theme based on Automattic’s _s (Underscores) starter theme. Attendees will walk out with access to plenty of tools to kick-start, simplify, and improve their development processes.

Jake Goldman on June 7, 2013

This coming Tuesday, June 11, at 10 AM I will be on Sacramento’s 105.5 FM Money 2.0 with Andrew Rogerson. I’m excited to talk about 10up, our distributed business model, and the future of web development. I’ve had the pleasure of speaking with Andrew a few times; he’s an experienced, savvy business thinker who always challenges me to rethink the business of marketing and building websites. I’m eager to tell 10up’s story to a different kind of audience, and to engage with Andrew.

To listen to the show, you can tune into Money 105.5 FM on the radio or online with TuneIn or on iHeartRadio.

Publishing Workflows for WordPress & CMS Expo 2013

Jake Goldman on May 21, 2013 • 3 Comments

Last week, I had the opportunity to participate in CMS Expo 2013, where I presented Publishing Workflows for WordPress. The final talk is broken down into three major sections: (1) a review of inherent WordPress workflow, including some improvements coming with 3.6, (2) a look at plug-ins that enrich its native workflow, from full featured editorial plug-ins like Edit Flow, to narrow, helpful tools like Ice Visual Revisions, and (3) inspiring case studies that illustrate just how far WordPress workflow and curation can be extended in the hands of a strong engineering and user experience team.

I’ve published the slides to YouTube, since a large portion of the presentation includes screen recordings, demoing some built in features, plug-ins, and showcases. I want to thank the awesome, engaged audience, which ranged from fellow WordPress professionals to novices who have never even opened the software.

Talking WordPress at CMS Expo this week

Jake Goldman on May 12, 2013

This coming week I’ll be participating in and speaking at the annual CMS Expo in Chicago. CMS Expo educates and informs business leaders, content marketers, website implementors, and other professionals looking for an in-depth review of the latest web-based publishing solutions. With three full days of content and more than 50 speakers, CMS Expo covers a cross-section of popular content management systems, including Drupal, Joomla, MODx, and of our favorite, WordPress. I’ll be one of four speakers offering insight and content focused on WordPress.

Assuming planes run on time, I’ll be there on Monday evening for the Welcome Kickoff Meetup at the Orrington Conference Center, where I’ll look forward to joining lead WordPress developer Andrew Nacin’s WordPress breakout meetup.

The conference fully kicks off on Tuesday, May 14, where I’ll be presenting Publishing Workflows for WordPress at 4:30 pm CST. On the heels of a session reviewing WordPress’s CMS chops, I’ll dive into scenarios where light weight, out-of-the-box WordPress just doesn’t cut it. Here’s my session description:

10up Sponsors HigherEdWeb New England

Jake Goldman on February 13, 2013

I’m proud to announce that 10up will be a 2013 Bronze Sponsor of The HighEdWeb New England conference. We’ll be sponsoring the post-conference reception, which will take place on March 18 at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Massachusetts.

Conferences like HigherEdWeb New England inspire schools to implement smarter, more engaging websites that better tout the outstanding education New England schools deliver, attract superior applicants in the age of social media and smartphones, and increase administrative efficiency. The values of openness, community, and meritocracy espoused by open source projects like WordPress are shared by higher education and shared by 10up. As a graduate of a New England university, the University of Rhode Island, I’m especially proud that our team is supporting a conference that shares our values and pushes large institutions like universities to embrace the benefits of changing technology.

You can catch Jess, our Director of Web Strategy, and Craig, a Senior Web Strategist, at the conference. Craig in particular is no stranger to higher ed websites, having led projects for the University of Vermont and The New England Culinary Institute.

Celebrate 10up’s Birthday – Three WordPress Events

Jake Goldman on February 6, 2013

10up birthday map

On Monday, February 18, 10up will turn 2 years old (more on that in a future post). On Tuesday, February 19, a handful of team 10up employees will celebrate across the country by doing what we’ve done all along – playing an active role in the WordPress community at three different meet ups on the 19th (plus a belated fourth event on the 26th)!

Jake Goldman on February 4, 2013 • 1 Comment

Be sure to check out my interview with WPDaily.co and Helen’s recent interview on Code Poet. We also noticed WordPress.com VIP plugging our ongoing contributions to WordPress 3.6, and we’re flattered by WPMayor listing us on their Best WordPress Agencies round up. And if you’re in the mood for a fun watch, Taylor guest co-hosts an episode of the WPWatercoolor he “inspired”!

John Bloch joins 10up

Jake Goldman on January 28, 2013

Hi! If you don’t know me from a WordCamp, the WordPress DC meetup, or the broader WordPress community, my name is John and I love LAMP. Building websites started as a hobby for me, but it didn’t take long for me to realize that this was my professional calling. I’ve always been fascinated by the process of architecting software; watching something I’ve helped craft come to life from mere concept still fills me with wonder.

I started working with WordPress in 2008 and it quickly became my platform of choice for building websites. After publishing plugins and engaging the WordPress community, both online and at the local DC meetup, I quickly became hooked. I started attending more WordCamps, and even had the privilege of speaking at a few. From multilingual sites to multisite networks, from store locators to TinyMCE extensions to combat shortcode madness, the applications and sites I’ve built upon WordPress testify to its flexibility and power.

Come Work With Us: WordPress developer with a front-end focus

Jake Goldman on January 16, 2013

At 10up, we say we’re always hiring, and it’s true. We’re always looking for WordPress engineers and web strategists, but right now we’ve especially got our eyes on hiring another WordPress developer with a focus on the front-end. We offer a competitive full-time salary and benefits. If you’re interested, send a resumé and code samples (like a WordPress theme) to [email protected].

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