Matt Mullenweg tells Automattic staff in Slack he’s back in control after CEO ouster

Early Friday morning, Mullenweg shared the following new message on Automattic’s Slack:

“(Don’t call it a comeback…) Howdy everybody! Happy to announce the board is back in agreement, and I’m in control of Automattic. A lot happened in the past 48 hours that we need to sort out, and I hope much of it was a misunderstanding, because I have huge respect and regard for those involved.”

He also posted a link to the YouTube video for LL Cool J’s “Mama Said Knock You Out.”

As of yet, no one at Automattic has heard a confirmation from the board. Mark Davies’ Slack account was also deactivated, sources said.

However, TechCrunch heard yesterday that Mullenweg had removed all Slack admins from the Automattic Slack and made an odd post about being a “pirate” in which he cursed. (Mullenweg famously does not curse). Given this situation, it’s hard to know if he’s now trolling or if legitimate changes have been made.

After his surprise removal as CEO this week, Mullenweg’s public and private social media posts suggested he wasn’t done fighting the decision. On Reddit, he told those speculating what this meant for the open source community that they didn’t know what they were talking about after initially replying, “Hey y’all. I’m here, just fine,” to a Reddit post linking to the 404 Media article that first broke the news.

On X, Mullenweg also posted that “Things are different than they appear,” and said he was in need of sysadmins and security researchers to help him move some of his stuff hosted at Automattic elsewhere, even though he supported Davies as CEO.

In both places, he suggested that Silver Lake, the PE firm that’s the majority owner of the hosting company WP Engine, which is currently embroiled in a lawsuit with Mullenweg and Automattic, was involved in this plan to “destroy” his life.

On Friday morning, Mullenweg posted on X, “Boards are never boring,” followed by a laughing/crying emoji.

Matt Mullenweg tells Automattic staff in