Hugh Lashbrooke 11:33 pm on August 17, 2021

Proposal: Brand guidelines for Learn WordPress content

Shortly after Learn WordPress launched in late 2020, the decision was made to remove any content that mentioned any brand other than WordPress itself until guidelines could be established to indicate what kinds of brands could be mentioned, and how they can be presented. This was an understandable, and intentionally temporary, move to ensure that the platform remained balanced and unbiased towards any particular product or company.

As Learn WordPress is growing, this is a good time to revisit that decision and work on some guidelines that will help the team make wise decisions about brands being included in training content.

Goals

The purpose of creating brand guidelines here is threefold:

Learn WordPress needs to be home to high-quality learning materials that serve the needs of all WordPress users – from beginners to power users – without being home to commercial interests.
While the platform is not responsible for the success or failure of any particular business providing services to the WordPress community, it would be great if it could create a fertile environment for pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party/theme developers, hosting providers and others to actualize their own goals and make a living while contributing to the community.
Guidelines need to consider the WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ teams and volunteers involved. These contributors who make sure that everything runs smoothly deserve impactful tasks and appropriate credit.

Proposal

Keeping the above mentioned goals in mind, here is a proposal for guidelines that can be implemented to remain in line with similar guidelines on other contributor teams. See the ‘References’ section below for more from other teams.

Brands can be included in Learn WordPress content if:

They are relevant to the piece of content in question.
They respect the WordPress trademark and don’t misuse it in any way.
They embrace the WordPress licence. Meaning that any WordPress derivatives (plugins, themes, or distributions) they distribute must be licenced under the General Public Licence (GPLGPL GPL is an acronym for GNU Public License. It is the standard license WordPress uses for Open Source licensing https://wordpress.org/about/license/. The GPL is a ‘copyleft’ license https://www.gnu.org/licenses/copyleft.en.html. This means that derivative work can only be distributed under the same license terms. This is in distinction to permissive free software licenses, of which the BSD license and the MIT License are widely used examples.).

Additionally, plugins and themes can only be included if there is a version of their product that is hosted in the WordPress.org Plugin/Theme Directory – this will not only ensure compliance with the licence and trademark guidelines, but it will ensure that any plugins/themes mentioned in the content will be freely and readily available for learners directly in their WordPress dashboard.

When brands are mentioned in training content:

At least 2-3 options of different brands that provide a similar product/service must be mentioned wherever possible and reasonable to do so. This is in order to keep the content aligned with the purpose of helping people learn how to use WordPress, rather than how to use a particular plugin/theme/service.
For practical reasons, in some cases it may be appropriate to have a workshop that is focused on a single plugin. In those instances, the content must be clear about the purpose (“How to use Plugin X”) and can only cover plugins/themes that are hosted in the WordPress.org Plugin/Theme Directory – no upsells or highlighting premium features available elsewhere should be included.
A disclaimer must be added to the content (or possibly in the global site footer) that any brand/product/service mentioned is considered a suggestion and not an endorsement.
Content must be reviewed and updated if there are any previously mentioned brands that no longer adhere to the trademark/licence requirements above (for example, if they change their licencing or use of the WordPress trademark). A feature for tracking this can be a part of the proposed audit tool.

Regarding the promotion of your own company/brand:

Company/brand logos should not appear in videos as far as possible – visuals must aim to be product-neutral and unbranded.
You may not highlight your business or otherwise advertise your own products/services as part of any content on Learn WordPress – this includes individuals who create training content professionally. All videos are accompanied by bios of all speakers, so credit will always be given appropriately to the individuals creating the content.
The only time where you may highlight your own product when producing content for Learn WordPress is if it is relevant and contextual. For example, if someone who works for Easy Digital Downloads is creating content about using eCommerce in WordPress, then including Easy Digital Downloads as an option alongside other eCommerce plugins would be reasonable so long as it is done according to the guidelines above.

Feedback

Your thoughts on this proposal along the following lines would be greatly appreciated:

Do you think the proposed guidelines are a reasonable way to meet the goals outlined above while remaining in keeping with similar guidelines elsewhere in the community?
Is there anything you would add/change/remove from the guidelines proposed?

Please provide feedback in the comments section. This proposal will be finalised on Thursday, 26 August and will then be implemented for all content hosted on Learn WordPress now and in the future.

References

In order to help establish the above proposal, the following similar guidelines from other contributor teams were examined.

From the WordPress.tv Submission Guidelines:

WordPress TV is a moderated community and the videos we publish are for the benefit of all users of WordPress. As such, our content is meant to be a reflection of the values of the WordPress project; therefore, videos published to WordPress.tv must:
– respect the WordPress trademark,
– embrace the WordPress license,
– only promote WordPress-derivative works (themes, plugins, and other distros) that are suitable for promotion at wordpress.org,
– and be free of spam, incitement to violence, and discrimination of any kind.

From the guidelines for speakers at WordCamps:

WordCamps are official events. Most attendees see you, a bonafide WordCampWordCamp WordCamps are casual, locally-organized conferences covering everything related to WordPress. They're one of the places where the WordPress community comes together to teach one another what they’ve learned throughout the year and share the joy. Learn more. speaker, as someone who represents WordPress. In your presentation, you’ll want to make sure you only recommend WordPress products or companies that honor the WordPress trademark and embrace the WordPress license.

From the Support Forum Guidelines:

For support of commercial themes or plugins, go to the official support channel.

In order to be good stewards of the WordPress community, and encourage innovation and progress, we feel it’s important to direct people to those official locations. Doing this will provide the developer with the income they need to make WordPress awesome.
…
Ultimately, the vendors are responsible for supporting their commercial product.

Thanks to the following people for their input on this proposal: @courane01, @nao, @angelasjin, @harishanker & @dansoschin .

Chris Badgett 1:13 am on August 18, 2021

Solid brand guidelines in my view.

Only mentioning brands that can be immediately actioned by learners via access from the repo makes sense.

Also requiring mention of “At least 2-3 options of different brands that provide a similar product/service must be mentioned wherever possible and reasonable to do so…” removes exclusive promotional tendency to more of a categoryCategory The 'category' taxonomy lets you group posts / content together that share a common bond. Categories are pre-defined and broad ranging. of brand focus.

Also from general “guest posting policies” from the blog world, It’s helpful to give creators more freedom to link out via their byline / about the author section. This gives creators a safe place to mention their business, website, socials, etc. and reduces their desire to feel like they have to squeeze brand mentions in the content to get some benefit from their contribution. It sets up a healthy win / win.
- Hugh Lashbrooke 2:22 am on August 18, 2021
  
  Thanks @chrisbadgett!
  
  You’ve got it right with the reasoning and motivation here – I’m glad that came across correctly in the proposal and that you see this as setting up a healthy win / win scenario.
- Alex Standiford 1:02 pm on August 18, 2021
  
  Also from general “guest posting policies” from the blog world, It’s helpful to give creators more freedom to link out via their byline / about the author section. This gives creators a safe place to mention their business, website, socials, etc. and reduces their desire to feel like they have to squeeze brand mentions in the content to get some benefit from their contribution. It sets up a healthy win / win.
  
  I think this is critical, especially for people who are not making resources on Learn for their own products. I make courses on my own website, and based on the (reasonable) limitations on brand mentions and promotion, I would have no way to mention this otherwise. If my bio allows me to link back, I would get the SEO benefits on my own brand, and also some measure-able traffic through Learn, and also be able to show that I have content that can’t be placed on learn without being overt.
  
  I think this sets a nice, clear boundary.
  - Hugh Lashbrooke 4:09 am on August 20, 2021
    
    Agreed. The bios on Learn WordPress are taken from the individual’s WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ profile, so each person has full control over what they include in it and can update it at any point. I’m inclined to say we should also pull the job title and company name from the profile as well to display that on Learn.
Matt Cromwell 11:28 am on August 18, 2021

This is a great start in a good direction. I’ll provide feedback based on your requests:

1. Do you think the proposed guidelines are a reasonable way to meet the goals outlined above while remaining in keeping with similar guidelines elsewhere in the community?

There’s three general categories of guidelines that you provided:
A. Brands can be included in Learn WordPress content if:
B. When brands are mentioned in training content:
C. Regarding the promotion of your own company/brand:

Essentially, if your brand is included, it will be because there is a pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party/theme on .org that abides by .org guidelines. And if you submit a webinar or article for Learn, then there are specific guidelines to follow.

This is perfectly reasonable and well-thought through.

2. Is there anything you would add/change/remove from the guidelines proposed?

The one minor tweak I’d suggest is in “C”, specifically:

Company/brand logos should not appear in videos as far as possible – visuals must aim to be product-neutral and unbranded.

As written, this is a little in conflict with the possibility of “How to use Plugin X”. Generally, with WP TV videos, the guideline (as I’ve understood it) is that the logo shouldn’t be omni-present, like not as a footer throughout the site. It’s difficult to do a “How to Use Plugin X” if you can never show the logo of Plugin X.

So I think a more appropriate update to that one guideline would be

Company/brand logos should not appear as a watermark or footer throughout the video. In as far as the plugin/theme avatarAvatar An avatar is an image or illustration that specifically refers to a character that represents an online user. It’s usually a square box that appears next to the user’s name., logo, or brand is mentioned or shown, it should only be in the context of its placement on the WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ Directory, or as shown within the configuration or use of the plugin/theme itself.
- Hugh Lashbrooke 7:32 pm on August 18, 2021
  
  Thanks @webdevmattcrom – especially thanks for highlighting that inconsistency! That’s the one part of this proposal that I wasn’t sure about, so I’m glad you picked up on it and have offered a solution. I like what you’ve suggested and the wording is solid, so I’ll work on incorporating that into the proposal before moving forward.
Pooja Derashri 11:48 am on August 18, 2021

Thank you, team! It is a time-awaited guideline for brands. 🙂
Only include plugins and themes that are on the WordPress repository is a good point as most solutions are available there.
Sometimes while working on the lesson plan I thought, It could be beneficial to mention some relevant products/services. And now we can mention some must-go products(plugins/themes) that would be an awesome thing affixed. 👍
- Courtney Engle Robertson 12:42 pm on August 18, 2021
  
  I think if we dig into things like Google Analytics at just a very high-level overview, keeping things that are free to join matters as well.
  - Hugh Lashbrooke 4:10 am on August 20, 2021
    
    Agreed! Ideally, people would be able to come away from any Learn content and immediately put things into practice, and free tools really help to make that possible.
Alex Standiford 12:52 pm on August 18, 2021

This is good. The message aligns well with other places in WordPress, and creates the same relationship between WordPress and businesses that is available anywhere else in WordPress. I think maintaining that relationship, and setting the same boundaries here makes sense.
- Hugh Lashbrooke 9:17 pm on August 22, 2021
  
  Thanks Alex – I’m glad you’re on board with the proposal!
Taco Verdonschot 7:22 pm on August 18, 2021

Does a pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party author get a say?

A few examples.
Let’s say I decide to create a course on how to use WooCommerce. Obviously, I’m not on the team but ‘just a user of the product’. This means that my lesson/course may be unintentionally incorrect or incomplete. Does the WooCommerce team then have anything to say about the lesson/course I want to publish on Learn?

Let’s say my course on WooCommerce was brilliant, but now they’ve pushed an update that renders parts of my course incorrect. Can the WooCommerce team now request my course to be removed?
- Hugh Lashbrooke 7:37 pm on August 18, 2021
  
  All good questions @tacoverdo!
  
  I think in this case, your question isn’t directly about the brand usage guidelines so it won’t be fully answered in this proposal and would be better served as part of broader guidelines relating to how content is vetted/approved.
  
  That being said, my instinct (and this is my personal thoughts on it without having yet discussed this with anyone else on the Training team) would be to say that anyone submitting a workshop about how to use a pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party of which they are “just a user” would be to contact the plugin author directly and get their input on the content before going live with anything.
  
  That is a separate discussion to have, but definitely one that needs to take place soon. We’ll work on a similar proposal to this one that has to do with the process for vetting/approving content and take it from there.
  - Taco Verdonschot 7:41 pm on August 18, 2021
    
    I don’t think it’s a separate discussion. We’re talking about the guidelines for using brand names. I think having written permission to publish from the brand should be included in the guidelines, at least for the ‘how to use pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party X’ types of content.
    
    Obviously, if I’d just give a list of brands to point out there are several options to do eCommerce with WordPress, that’s much less of an issue.
    - Hugh Lashbrooke 7:43 pm on August 18, 2021
      
      I think having written permission to publish from the brand should be included in the guidelines, at least for the ‘how to use pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party X’ types of content.
      
      That seems like a reasonable requirement to me – either you would come with that written permission when you submit your workshop, or part of the vetting process would be to obtain that. I like it!
      - Hauwa Abashiya 3:00 pm on August 24, 2021
        
        Sounds good. One question that comes to mind is how would we know who is authorised to provide permission and how do we maintain that?
        
        Hugh Lashbrooke 9:18 am on August 26, 2021
        
        That’s a good question! Since we’re making sure we only deal with plugins/themes in the directory, we could reach out to them through there at the very least. Either way, we will need to put some work into tracking down the right people when we need it. Generally speaking I don’t forsee an issue with the process going well.
Gary Kovar 2:52 pm on August 20, 2021

One of the areas that is of interest to me is tooling (specifically as used in videos). Generally, I use TablePlus, which appears to be a proprietary license. For the purpose of Learn would I instead use phpMyAdmin (GPLGPL GPL is an acronym for GNU Public License. It is the standard license WordPress uses for Open Source licensing https://wordpress.org/about/license/. The GPL is a ‘copyleft’ license https://www.gnu.org/licenses/copyleft.en.html. This means that derivative work can only be distributed under the same license terms. This is in distinction to permissive free software licenses, of which the BSD license and the MIT License are widely used examples.) for potential videos? Or is it sufficient to note that while I’m using TablePlus there are GPL options like phpMyAdmin available?

Another area that could be a bit ambiguous is build tooling and dependency management. With the blockBlock Block is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. builder we have node and npm dependencies. In this situation it is clear we wouldn’t mention yarn because there is a WP standard dependency management tool.
On the php side we generally do not have build tooling dependencies. However, a working knowledge of composer can be extremely helpful in some situations. There aren’t really alternatives to composer. Clearly composer is not a requirement for creating themes/plugins in WordPress.

I realize I am not proposing anything helpful hear. Rather, I want to be sure we don’t paint too restrictive of a rule set to limit the value of Learn for more advanced topics.
- Hugh Lashbrooke 8:51 pm on August 20, 2021
  
  Thanks for asking this – it helps to clarify one big point about the licencing guidelines in the proposal. As with the licence guidelines for WordCamps speakers, the GPLGPL GPL is an acronym for GNU Public License. It is the standard license WordPress uses for Open Source licensing https://wordpress.org/about/license/. The GPL is a ‘copyleft’ license https://www.gnu.org/licenses/copyleft.en.html. This means that derivative work can only be distributed under the same license terms. This is in distinction to permissive free software licenses, of which the BSD license and the MIT License are widely used examples. requirement only applies to WordPress derivatives (plugins, themes, forks or distributions), so any other tool doesn’t have to be licenced under the GPL or even be open-source.
  
  That being said, preference should be given to free and open-source tools so that learners can start using them right away without having to worry about purchasing new software or subscriptions. That isn’t always possible of course, so for some tools using a proprietary, or even premium, option would be OK assuming no suitable open-source alternative exists.
- Courtney Engle Robertson 1:35 pm on August 21, 2021
  
  When we do refer to open-source tools, even programming languages, it would be good form to also link to ways to get involved with those projects.
  
  Example: when introducing PHPPHP PHP (recursive acronym for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor) is a widely-used open source general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for web development and can be embedded into HTML. http://php.net/manual/en/intro-whatis.php. language or testing new versions of PHP with WP, refer to https://www.php.net/get-involved. Similarly, https://github.com/composer/composer/blob/master/.github/CONTRIBUTING.md when introducing Composer.
  - Hugh Lashbrooke 9:15 pm on August 22, 2021
    
    Agreed – linking to other OS projects would be beneficial all round.
- Courtney Engle Robertson 10:01 am on August 24, 2021
  
  Ah, Gary got me thinking as well about code libraries like using SelectWoo. https://github.com/woocommerce/selectWoo.
  
  This isn’t a pluginPlugin A plugin is a piece of software containing a group of functions that can be added to a WordPress website. They can extend functionality or add new features to your WordPress websites. WordPress plugins are written in the PHP programming language and integrate seamlessly with WordPress. These can be free in the WordPress.org Plugin Directory https://wordpress.org/plugins/ or can be cost-based plugin from a third-party/theme, but I do know some very active plugins using this.
  
  While the original proposal was for plugins/themes, I think so much of what was brought forward is good to include.
Adam W. Warner 9:18 pm on August 23, 2021

Just jumping in to give a +1 for this discussion and very pleased to hear that Brands and brand guidelines are being implemented.

As with other brands contributing in general and officially with the Five for the Future initiative, having the opportunity to showcase the individuals contributing and where they currently work, helps us to incentivize our contributions internally in an even more tangible way.

Agreed. The bios on Learn WordPress are taken from the individual’s WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ profile, so each person has full control over what they include in it and can update it at any point. I’m inclined to say we should also pull the job title and company name from the profile as well to display that on Learn.

I’m also a +1 for this. ^^^
- Hugh Lashbrooke 10:52 pm on August 23, 2021
  
  Thanks for your input Adam! I like the idea of having companies included in bios so much that I’ve logged it on GitHubGitHub GitHub is a website that offers online implementation of git repositories that can easily be shared, copied and modified by other developers. Public repositories are free to host, private repositories require a paid subscription. GitHub introduced the concept of the ‘pull request’ where code changes done in branches by contributors can be reviewed and discussed before being merged be the repository owner. https://github.com/: https://github.com/WordPress/learn/issues/232
Hauwa Abashiya 3:05 pm on August 24, 2021

I am really excited about this and I think the proposal is reasonable. I think someone else mentioned it, allow links to any open-source resources or tools.
Hugh Lashbrooke 10:57 pm on August 26, 2021

A big thank you to everyone who got involved in this discussion and provided input on this proposal. I have finalised and published these guidelines in the Learn WordPress handbook: https://learn.wordpress.org/handbook/brand-usage-guidelines/

As with anything we do, these can always be iterated upon in the future, so if it becomes clear that updates are necessary then those can be discussed and implemented at the time.

Welcome

Meetings (Calendar)

Proposal: Brand guidelines for Learn WordPress content

Goals

Proposal

Feedback

References

Welcome

Meetings (Calendar)

Goals

Proposal

Feedback

References

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