Essays

  • History and Future of Kids Heroes in WordPress

    Kids events are not a new thing in the WordCamp and WordPress event space, however, the number of these events happening around the world are on the rise. Kids events focus on teaching children how to become content creators, creative thinkers, and even business owners. Numerous repeat attendees have morphed their personal blogs into businesses…

  • I Am Cookie Dough

    I was always told I had to go to college. I was “gifted” so learning came easy and I enjoyed it.  From ages 6 to 18, I went to competitive accelerated schools designed to churn out college students. It was a narrow path I’d been set on, without encouragement to explore beyond. Majoring in theater…

  • How The WordPress Community Helped Me Face My Fears And Do It Anyway

    Your comfort zone is a muscle. If you don’t stretch it, it will shrink. It still feels unreal. Two days ago, I was standing on a stage, sharing my expertise. And not just any stage. One of the stages of WordCamp Europe 2019 in Berlin. A conference with over 3200 registrants, over 2700 attendees. A…

  • My “Hero’s Journey” Through the Dark Underworld of WordPress Hosting

    The following is an expanded and updated version of my presentation at WordCamp Salt Lake City 2017. My girls love Moana. Especially when it first came to video and they could watch it every day… or two or three times a day if mom wasn’t feeling good or catching up on sleep from being up…

  • Ugyen’s Roadmap to WordPress Contributions

    འབྲི་རྩོམ་འདི་རྫོང་ཁ་ན་ལུ་ཡ་ཡོདཔ་ཨིན། Ugyen Dorji is from Bhutan, the landlocked country situated between two giant neighbors, India to the south and China to the north. Ugyen works for ServMask Inc and is responsible for the robust Quality Assurance process for All-in-One WP Migration plugin. He believes in the Buddhist teaching that “the most valuable service is one…

  • I Found My People

    When I was a kid not a single girl said “I want to be a web designer when I grow up”. Mostly because there was no world wide web. There weren’t video games either, until I was in junior high school and Pong came out. Back when I was a kid, girls mostly thought about…