Sessions

Presented by Chris Van Patten in Talks (45 min).

Gutenberg will usher in an era of unprecedented customisation for non-technical users and editorial teams. It’s incredibly exciting… and simultaneously terrifying. In this talk, you’ll learn strategies you can employ—code snippets, training tips, and UX improvements—that you can use to ensure users have all the customisability they need, without the risks and downsides.

Presented by Barb Palser in Talks (45 min).

Imagine an open web as fast, performant and engaging as walled garden platforms and native apps. Think about the value of delivering an instant, smooth experience to your loyal users – and to new users discovering your content on the web for the first time. The path to that vision involves both technology and organizational commitment.

The first part of this talk will make the case for prioritizing web performance, covering key consumer, platform and monetization trends favoring fast websites – as well as tools, data and use cases to help publishers correlate speed to topline audience and business goals.

Then, we’ll talk about strategies to improve speed and performance, including the current state of the open-source AMP format in WordPress, progressive web features and the latest in performance measurement and tooling. You’ll leave this session with strategies for gaining internal buy-in, implementation approaches to consider and tools to measure impact.

Presented by Vadim Supitskiy.

How Forbes solved the challenge of supporting AMP and canonical mobile templates.

Presented by Sina Bahram, Pattie Reaves in Workshops (90 min).

There you are, sitting with an open code editor, ready to bake new features into your WordPress theme, but something’s stopping you: You’re not sure what accessibility features you need to worry about as you whip up your markup.

Sina Bahram, president of Prime Access Consulting, and Pattie Reaves, senior user experience developer at Alley Interactive, will walk through common patterns in WordPress sites for publishers — navigation, archives, and posts — and give you clear, easy-to-reproduce recipes for accessible sites that you can take back to your own local development “kitchen.”

Although you will get the best results by integrating accessibility into the development process when “baking” from scratch, it’s never too late to spice up your site’s accessibility. We’ll also discuss automated tools for identifying potential accessibility problems, and common solutions to technical and editorial accessibility issues. Finally, we’ll talk about the future of WordPress and how to be smart about upgrading to Gutenberg to maintain accessibility.

Presented by Jodie Riccelli, Shayda Torabi in Talks (45 min).

We all know how beneficial the open web is and how the byproducts of that are the many benefits of building your website on WordPress. You own your content. You have endless plugins to extend your site. Plus, it’s adopted by 30.7% of the web!

However, we spend so much time talking about what your site should look like, and not a lot about how it will function for your team of editors, writers, and producers.

Efficiency is something we all strive for, and thankfully, we’ve learned a thing or two about that from our experiences of building websites for media clients and publishers of all shapes and sizes. And we’ve learned, that as a publisher, you want to enable your writers and editors to work as efficiently as possible.

If you are lost in a sea of endless tools organizing your editorial content while trying to adhere to your editorial workflow, then this talk is for you. Learn how to use WordPress to consolidate your workflow into one efficient, organized space.

Presented by David Parsons, Tyson Bird in Talks (45 min).

How to Maintain a WordPress Site with 50m+ Monthly Uniques

During this talk, David Parsons will go over how the USA Today Sports team uses WordPress.com VIP to help scale their sites. In addition, he will go over what best practices the team uses when building things that are not necessarily on WordPress as well. This includes 3rd party API’s etc.

Infinite stories. 550+ websites. One template to help them all.

In a company of several hundred newspapers with staff sizes 1-100+, GateHouse Media needed a way for newsrooms to take control of publishing special projects. The innovation team created a WordPress template that pulls analytics and advertising information for any site and uses Page Builder widgets to make digital design easy for even the smallest newsrooms. Tyson Bird will show you what was included — and what wasn’t — and how GateHouse papers have been doing journalism with impact using WordPress.

Presented by Jim Birch in Talks (45 min).

You know how your content looks on your own website, on desktops, laptops and phones, but how does it look when it leaves your site? Using open source protocols like Schema.org, Open Graph, and W3C specified meta data to markup your structured data, you can help boost your content’s chances of outperforming its competition.

This session will present a whirlwind, two fisted, no holds barred, data filled session that has almost too much information about implementing Schema.org schemas for structured data and current best practice meta tags in WordPress using plugins, themes, and widgets.

Attendees will come away from the session knowing how to implement and test Schema.org schemas, and current meta tag best practices in WordPress to gain search features in Google and enhance the look of your content on social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest.

Presented by Caroline Porter, Sherry Skalko, Harry Backlund, Sarah Schmalbach in Talks (45 min).

Industry developments have highlighted the need for media organizations to reexamine traditional distribution models and cultivate genuine relationships with their audiences. But where do you start? What do those relationships look like? And are they scaleable and sustainable?

This experienced group of journalists share their experiments with audience engagement, from internal adoption and design, to implementing learnings and generating revenue. You’ll learn from the successes (and failures) of others and how to run a successful experiment in your own newsroom.

Moderated by Sherry Skalko (Executive Director, Injustice Watch), the panelists include Caroline Porter (Consultant, Shorenstein Center on Media), Harry Backlund (Co-Founder, City Bureau), and Sarah Schmalbach (Entrepreneur in Residence, Lenfest Institute).

Presented by Mike Selander, Libby Barker in Talks (45 min).

Use of a decoupled CMS is an exciting new approach that many organizations are exploring as a way to remain nimble in rapidly evolving industries. A decoupled approach allows teams to maintain the familiar and robust WordPress admin interface while simultaneously embracing design-forward front end experiences that are engaging, aesthetic and highly flexible. With the recent incorporation of the WordPress REST API into core, these possibilities are now a reality. But how, exactly, can this be achieved on an enterprise scale?

In late 2016, Human Made partnered with TechCrunch to realize these possibilities. The goal itself was ostensibly simple: create a fully decoupled WordPress admin that engaged a React front end to create an app-like experience. Nevertheless, the technical challenges presented as part of this goal were not insignificant, including API challenges, caching, theming in PHP & React, and more. This session will focus on the decision-making and logistical considerations our team took to meet the challenge of creating a holistic WordPress/React product. Presented by both the Project Manager and development team involved, the purpose of this session will be to provide insight and tangible action items for other teams hoping to achieve similar goals.

Presented by Eric Ulken in Talks (45 min).

“You’ve read your last free article. Subscribe now.”

With the decline of digital display advertising and the rising importance of consumer revenue to publishers, the dreaded paywall message is an increasingly common sight for users, as ever more publishers join the bandwagon and begin tightening their meters.

But what happens when everybody has a paywall? What are the implications for the open web, and for democracy? And how might the WordPress community help content creators get paid without needing to wall off their stuff from the world?

Presented by Paul Schreiber in Workshops (90 min).

Presented by Ernie Hsiung in Workshops (90 min).

Communicating across stakeholder groups is hard but it doesn’t have to be. Join Ernie Hsiung, CTO at WhereBy.Us, for discussion about how tech and editorial teams can work together, what challenges they might run into, and when silos might be most appropriate. We’ll start the workshop learning about lessons learned at WhereBy, and then flip the session on its head by taking the conversation into small groups.

Presented by John Eckman in Talks (45 min), Workshops (90 min).

“Taking Back The Open Web” is a bold theme, but every word in that sentence requires some significant unpacking if we’re to agree on a path forward. From whom is the open web being taken back? Who took it from us in the first place? What do we mean by open, and do we really mean “web” here?

Dries’s version of the open web (to which the CFP linked) is a vaguely defined point in the recent past where “the web felt like a free space that belong to everyone.” Anil Dash’s version, which he calls “The Web We Lost” posits a time when the web was about “letting lots of people build innovative new opportunities for themselves” which has been replaced by a system which “continues to make a small number of wealthy people even more wealthy” via “narrow-minded, web-hostile products.” The call for papers for this conference, with a focus on publishers, points to “stress” caused by “proprietary formats which enforce limits and restraints.” There’s even an Open Web Foundation (founded in 2004) dedicated to “open, non-proprietary specifications for web technologies,” to which primary subscribers are Facebook, Google, and Microsoft.

Is the conflict between the open web and the (presumably) closed web which opposes it, really about formats? Is it about access and distribution? Is it about a small number of powerful corporate overlords versus inspired, creative small business entrepreneurs?

In this talk I’ll lay out a couple of different ways of thinking about the “open web” we’re after, what each of those visions postulates as the problem, and what solutions emerge from that set of problems. I’ll conclude with some of my own take on how WordPress as itself an “imagined community” (cf. Benedict Anderson’s 1983 book) can and should contribute to shaping the future of the web. (Hint: It’s about democratizing publishing through open source AND community).

Presented by Austin Smith in Talks (45 min), Workshops (90 min).

A path is opening for innovation in local news to gain reader support while breaking free of ad revenue and platform intermediaries. My research project at the Lenfest Institute explores the history of publishers monetizing attention, the conflict between advertising and reader support, and the challenge to integrate legacy products and digital products. In my report, I propose a broad solution that takes news organizations down this path. In short, publishers need to deploy technologies that allow them to know their audiences better, design user experiences that clearly convey value to their readers, and develop economies of scale that reduce costs without cutting journalism.

This talk will cover material in my report from the perspective of WordPress and the open web, both of which are core to my thinking.

Presented by Keanan Koppenhaver in Talks (45 min).

The WP REST API is baked into WordPress, runs on a standardized protocol, and allows your site to have even greater reach through integrations and syndication. Unlike AMP, FBIA or other proprietary formats for delivering content, the REST protocol is not locked down to one platform. The REST API allows you to support a wide variety of clients from mobile apps to voice interfaces to desktop apps to solutions that haven’t even been imagined yet.

In this talk, we’ll explore:
– How the WP REST API can enable web to print workflows through InDesign,
– Making your content more accessible through Google Home and Alexa
– Even distribute your content to services your readers have built to consume content on their own terms.

Come explore how the REST API can truly be the foundation of a more open web.

Presented by Boone Gorges, Jake Goldman, Russell Heimlich, Mike Auteri in Talks (45 min), Workshops (90 min).

Is WordPress a Product or a Community?

WordPress fans often cite “the community” as one of WordPress’s main selling points. Makers get excited by the prospect of participating in the development, design, and support of the WordPress software product (zomg 30% of the web). Yet the prospect of participation doesn’t hold the same charm for organizational decisionmakers who are choosing which software products to build their business on. How can we argue for WordPress as a business solution when an honest look at history shows that community-driven projects don’t necessarily, or even usually, result in superior products? How can we conceive of WordPress so that we’re realistic about the shortcomings of the community development process, without selling short WordPress’s strengths as a product?

Making Images Smarter

Handling media at scale is a challenge. A seemingly small design tweak could result in days and days of recrunching media. There is also the performance implications out of respect for our audience. This talk will cover how we made our dumb static assets smarter with dynamic capabilities that gives us more creative freedom while also making our sites more performant for our visitors. We’re also open sourcing our work so any publisher can eliminate the need to recrunch media.

The Easy (and Sane) Way to Create Responsive HTML Emails

Creating HTML Emails (especially ones that are responsive) is awful work. The markup involved brings back nightmares from creating websites in Geocities back in 1996 (at least for me). In this session, I will introduce you to Foundation for Emails 2: a framework that allows you to quickly, easily, and sanely build responsive HTML emails that are easy to edit, update, and maintain. I will show you how to get started using npm to create your project, and the simple markup and grid system that automagically makes your email layouts wonderfully responsive. Also, you can use Sass (how cool is that?!).

At PMC we built our updated WWD.com Digital Daily email publication with Foundation for Emails 2. I will show some of the approaches I used leveraging Foundation for Emails partials to keep me from repeating code. I’ll also show how I organized this project to allow for other publications (and brands in our company) to expand what I started and use elements that have already been built.

Solving Content Reuse and Syndication

These days, most publishers have more than one website under their umbrella. That can take many forms: several newspapers or magazines under one owner; an old print-centric brand married to a digital-first property; a network of affiliate TV or radio stations; a set of sites targeting niches; or a massive publishing operation with several sites glued together (e.g. news, editorial, blogs, and sports running on sandboxed site).

And yet, when it comes to sharing news and other content across those properties, WordPress, like most Content Management Systems, doesn’t do much to address that problem out of the box.

Having solved variations of this same problem over and over again for clients that include a radio network with 60+ stations, one of largest Bay Area unicorns with a huge collection of geographically targeted blogs (among others), and a massively popular network of 5 enthusiast geek blogs, 10up finally put together its lessons learned and created Distributor.

Distributor is a free WordPress plugin that makes it easy to syndicate and reuse content across multiple websites — whether in a single multisite or across the web using the REST API.

There’s something for every publisher in this talk: UX design / problem solving, REST API use case, content strategy, SEO best practice (for content reuse), tools for managing websites, and even developer tips.

Presented in Unconference (30 min).

Gutenberg Therapy Session (how to make sure everything is ok)

Presented in Unconference (30 min).

Direct Revenue Discussion – paywalls, subscribe/unsubscribe process

Presented in Unconference (30 min).

The Future of WordCamp for Publishers – greatest needs/opportunities to help publishers

Presented by Ryan Kienstra, Leo Postovoit in Workshops (90 min).

How do you offer a rich, performant experience without rewriting your codebase? Getting content to your users quickly requires developer trickery, calling for solutions to load render-blocking assets, redraw content, and adapt to poor network conditions, which are often difficult to build and maintain. The AMP project and AMP for WordPress plugin were introduced as free open source technologies to load pages up to 85% faster, bringing higher levels of engagement, better delivery of ads and faster page loads. We’re excited to show you how AMP can be integrated into your publishing site and why you should use these tools in your publishing workflow.

In this presentation for publishing teams, we’ll introduce the recently expanded AMP toolset available to all WordPress authors and administrators to implement AMP, with support of nearly every WordPress feature including Gutenberg, widgets, and embeds. For site admins, we built a compatibility tool to surface and group errors on your site. For developers, we’ll also talk strategies to render AMP pages, and how to use AMP markup in your WordPress site. With AMP, we’ll show you how you can bring speed and features to your users and ultimately a more successful web presence for publishers.

Presented by Kay Lima, Vadim Supitskiy, Sally Lehrman, Susan Price, Jeannette Washington in Talks (45 min), Workshops (90 min).

#CodeDys

One size doesn’t fit all. This hands-on discussion will address accessibility for individuals who exhibit dyslexia and other language based disorders. The surface will be scratched in distinguishing the varying features of dyslexia by providing a virtual experience. Further, learn how you can be empowered to create hacks that meet you wherever you are.

Trust Project: News with Integrity

We all think we can tell the difference between opinion, advertising and accurate news. But how do we really know? Newsroom participants in the Trust Project, a consortium of top news companies led by Sally Lehrman, are implementing transparency standards that help the public easily assess the quality and credibility of news. Learn a bit more about the project and how to qualify for participation, including implementing the standards on your site.

Connecting Through Voice

This talk looks at new ways to connect with a global audience while offering people with disabilities better access to your website’s content. See how Amazon’s (AWS) Translate and Polly are being used with WordPress to increase engagement and accessibility.

How Forbes Combined AMP and Mobile Templates

This presentation will describe how the team at Forbes solved the challenge of supporting AMP and Canonical mobile templates.

Presented by Nick Johnson in Talks (45 min).

A Paywall is the publisher’s lemonade stand. If the product is good people will pay for it. If not they will stop coming back. There is some confusion about what the Open Web means when it comes to paywalls, and there are those who throw the paywall under the bus and say all content should be free. Readers are fed up with poor quality journalism, confused by fake news, and are looking for sources they can trust. Providing well-researched content with value costs something. Paywalls give publishers the tools they need to focus on journalism and content, rather than being distracted by indirect methods of keeping the lights on, such as advertising, affiliate marketing or appealing for voluntary donations. Publishers shouldn’t be afraid to charge a dime for their all-natural, freshly squeezed, 100% lemonade. We can drink to that. -Key Takeaways- It’s about trust and quality, and people are willing to pay for that. * Paywalls and paid content strategies are not the enemy to the open web * Paid content as the primary revenue source drives better quality and potentially less bias * People are paying for trusted news sources in the wake of fake news * Why gimmicks aren’t worth the time, most of the time -Talk Outline- Juxtapose paid content to advertising using analogies. Journalism, well researched reporting and fact finding, is a service that should not be thrown into an enemy camp against the open web. It should be embraced and supported. Quality is something people pay for, something people need. Too much advertising hinders the experience. Paywalls don’t have to be completely closed down. Publicly important information can be free. Social media, a necessary tool, but a dangerous source for empirical information. The problems of fake news. Publishers will try a lot of acrobatics to get people to subscribe. Free pizza or zoo passes with an annual subscription. These things can be nice, but most of the time they are or difficult than they are worth. Focus on the content and lower the barrier of entry, everything else is a distraction.

Presented by Brian Boyer in Talks (45 min).

We used to be normal. Pageviews = ad impressions = $$$. Now we’re supported by our members, and that changes everything. Sure, views matter, but conversions matter way more. User experience must reinforce your business model, and we’ve done a ton of work — backend and frontend — to optimize our sites for membership. In this talk, we’ll discuss not just what we did, but why we did it.

Presented by Joshua Wold in Workshops (90 min).

It doesn’t matter who you are, give sketching a try.

I’ve used quick sketches to bridge the communication gap between what our clients what to create, and what our developers can build.

If you spend 10 minutes on a sketch to describe how an interface will work, you can then share it with your team and validate whether everyone is on the right page. Even if you’re wrong you’ve got a starting point.

In this workshop we’ll walk through previous development problems that I’ve used sketching on, including publishing workflow examples, and then work on live examples together.

You can sketch. This isn’t art, it’s not graphic design or illustration; it’s quick and messy sketches.

If you come away inspired to try out sketching on just one project, then this whole workshop will have been a success. If you can draw a squiggly line, an arrow, and a circle, then you will fit right in.