WP Engine wins preliminary injunction in WordPress legal battle

A judge has issued an injunction ordering WordPress co-founder Matt Mullenweg and his company Automattic to restore access to the WP Engine web hosting service, according to legal documents seen by The Verge. Automattic must also restore WP Engine's control of its popular ACF (Advanced Custom Fields) plugin. It also removes a checkbox implemented by Automattic that made people say they had no relationship with WP Engine. 

The ruling follows a major dispute between WP Engine and Automattic and its CEO Matt Mullenweg, a co-founder of WordPress. Last September, Mullenweg accused WP Engine of misusing the WordPress trademark and said it "never once" donated to the open-source arm of the foundation. The WordPress foundation then banned WP Engine from accessing resources like plug-ins and themes, breaking many of WP Engine's over 200,000 websites. It also took control of the company's ACF plugin, forking and renaming it to Secure Custom Fields. 

WP Engine then sued Automattic and Mullenweg, accusing them of extortion and abuse of power. The company said that Automattic demanded eight percent of its gross revenues (or donated employee time) in exchange for restoring its access. Mullenweg admitted that "a good chunk of my Automattic colleagues disagreed with my actions," and said that 159 employees resigned and took him up on a buyout offer of at least $30,000.

Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin said that WP Engine's claims that Automattic's actions harmed its business had merit. Without the injunction, WP Engine will suffer "irreparable harm" because it has "suffered loss of existing and potential customers," adding that those customers and the larger WordPress community also sustained harm. 

In a post on X, WP Engine said it's "grateful that the court has granted our motion for a preliminary junction that restores access to and functionality of wordpressdotorg for WP Engine, its customers and its users." Automattic, meanwhile, said that it planned to file counterclaims "shortly" and "looks forward to prevailing in trial." It should be noted that while providing temporary relief to WP Engine, the injunction is certainly not the end of the legal actions. 

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