#WPLDN - January 2026: Open Source Sustainability & Digital Freedom
Details
Join us for another evening at #WPLDN, where we're diving into the heart of what makes WordPress possible and exploring how organisations protect access to information when it matters most.
This month features a fascinating combination: understanding how hosting companies invest back into the open-source ecosystem, and a rare, unrecorded session on keeping websites accessible under challenging circumstances. Two talks that remind us why community and resilience sit at the core of everything we do.
📅 Date: January 29, 2026
⏰ Time: 6:00 PM – 8:30 PM ⬅ EARLIER TIME
🎟️ Cost: Free (Registration Required)
Session 1: Beyond hosting: How Kinsta invests in WordPress and Open Source
🤝 Speaker: Marcel Bootsman (Kinsta)
The success of WordPress and countless other technologies hinges entirely on the dedicated, often unpaid, work of open-source contributors. But how can companies that rely on this ecosystem ensure its long-term health and sustainability?
Marcel will take us beyond hosting to explore the mission and impact of the Kinsta Community Sponsorship Program. This initiative actively sponsors contributors across various facets of WordPress (Core, documentation, accessibility, polyglots) and other critical open-source projects.
If you've ever wondered how commercial success and open-source citizenship can work hand in hand, this session is for you.
About Marcel: Marcel is the Partnerships & Community Manager EMEA at Kinsta. He has been active in the WordPress community since 2010 and ran his own WordPress agency until 2020. A dedicated community contributor, Marcel is (or has been) a WordCamp organiser, forum moderator, and translation editor. When he's not looking at a screen, he enjoys walking, working out in the gym, riding a bike, and playing tennis.
Session 2: Keeping sites up when stuff goes down
🤝 Speaker: Austin Meakin (Amnesty International)
What happens when governments or other actors try to take websites offline? Austin works at Amnesty International on the Humanity Open Source WordPress theme and a number of websites running on it. In this session, he'll explore online censorship and surveillance, and what's being done to keep sites accessible when things get complicated.
⚠️ Please note: This session will not be recorded or streamed due to the sensitive nature of the content. If this topic interests you, make sure you're there in person!
Schedule:
🔹 6:00 PM – Doors Open & Networking
🔹 6:30 PM – Welcome & Session 1: Marcel Bootsman
🔹 7:30 PM – Short Break & Networking
🔹 7:45 PM – Session 2: Austin Meakin
🔹 8:30 PM – Social & Wrap-Up
📢 RSVP Now!
Don't miss this chance to learn how the WordPress ecosystem sustains itself and discover the vital work being done to protect digital freedom. Secure your free spot today and join us for talks, networking, free pizza, and post-event socials at a local bar. We'll see you there!
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Venue Information
The Bridge is a charity supporting women to make positive choices and encouraging improvements to fitness, health, and wellbeing. The venue features a plant-based café (supplied by Girls Who Grind Coffee) and is just a 5-minute walk from London Bridge Station.
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Massive thanks to our sponsors who make these free events possible:
DreamHost, PodcasterPlus, Mollie, hosting.com, 20i, and Kinsta
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If you're interested in being a featured speaker at an upcoming event, we'd love to hear from you at https://wpldn.uk/speak.
🎥 - Media Release Terms
By attending, you understand and accept that portions of the event may have audio/photo/video-recorded and/or live-streamed and may be used by the organisers. You agree that the organisers have the right and permission to use and publish such media for any purpose in any format, including online and offline, now and ever after, without further compensation, permission, or notification. You understand that all official recordings from the event are the exclusive property of the organisers, available under the Creative Commons AttributionShareAlike license for general use, and you do not ask for nor expect compensation or notification of the use of official recordings or photographs in which you appear or speak. Please inform an organisational team member at the event's start if you do not wish to appear in photos or videos.
