WordCamp Canada 2024: WordPress is for Everyone

As I stepped into the Infinity Convention Centre in Ottawa for the inaugural WordCamp Canada, I couldn’t help but feel a mix of excitement and nervousness. 

This was my first WordCamp, both as an attendee and a presenter, and I was eager to connect with fellow WordPress enthusiasts and learn from their experiences. Little did I know that the next three days would be a transformative experience.

The event, which took place from July 11 to 13, drew together WordPress professionals and users from across Canada and around the world. As I looked over the schedule, I noticed a significant number of presentations focused on WordPress’ impact on diverse communities, barriers that still exist to access in those communities, and the importance of inclusivity and cultural considerations in WordPress development and usage.

WordPress for all

Keynote speaker Meggan Van Harten reinforced that theme with her presentation, Accessibility in Action: Indigenous Communities, discussing how Indigenous accessibility diverges from general compliance principles and the importance of engaging with Indigenous perspectives to foster inclusive solutions.

Aida Correa-Jackson’s session, Pivot: Making Room at the Table: Empowering Marginalized Communities Using WordPress, explored the transformative potential of WordPress and immersive technologies in empowering marginalized individuals and communities. 

Other sessions on this theme included Growing in Accessibility by Karim Jetha and Sara Ferguson, which covered web accessibility, and the panel discussion on Empowering Indigenous Communities with WordPress, featuring panelists Stacy L. Carlson, Prakash Koirala, Battouly Cisse, Raquel Manriquez, and Nicolette Gomez. Michelle Frechette’s Underrepresented in Tech: the Journey to Amplify Others discussed the creation of a database to amplify underrepresented voices in the WordPress space.

Additionally, Lucas Rodriguez presented WordPress: Empowering the Underserved in Rural Ontario, sharing his experiences using WordPress to help small towns in rural Ontario. The panel discussion on Impact on Underrepresented Communities featured panelists Kiera Howe, Nyasha Green, Michelle Frechette, and Shanta Nathwani. 

Amber Hinds’ session, How to Ensure Your Website Complies with Canadian Accessibility Laws, provided an overview of accessibility laws across Canada, and how to make sure your WordPress sites are accessible to as many people as possible. Finally, Lois Chan-Pedley’s Breaking Language Barriers with Multilingual Sites discussed the process of creating multilingual sites using WordPress plugins.

Technical sessions and business perspectives 

WordCamp Canada had no shortage of business and technical sessions, covering a wide range of topics. Nick Diego’s session, Your WordPress, Your Way: Curating the Editor Experience, focused on customizing WordPress’s editor and site editor to create a more controlled and user-friendly block editing experience. Aurooba Ahmed’s session, Working across timezones as a productive developer, shared tips and tricks for working remotely and collaborating across multiple time zones.

Other sessions included Taming the Whirlwind – Growing Your Business While You’re Busy by Nathan Ingram, which addressed the challenges of finding time to grow a business while managing client work. 

Corinne Boudreau’s session, How to Make Meaningful Privacy Policies for Your Client’s Websites, emphasized the importance of transparent privacy policies for building trust with users. Marc Benzakein’s session, The Problem(s) with WordPress (not a rant session), explored the challenges facing WordPress and sought solutions through collective critiques and suggestions.

Additionally, there were sessions on creating custom blocks with `create-block`, harmonizing creativity and code in design systems, building accessible eLearning experiences, and mitigating security threats to WordPress sites. 

Other topics included leveraging ChatGPT for business insights, mastering web performance, and creating effective About Pages. The sessions aimed to provide practical advice and actionable strategies for developers, designers, and business owners in the WordPress community.

Wrapping up

As I presented my own session, An Editor’s Eye on Code Reviews, or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Curly Brackets, I was struck by the sense of camaraderie that permeated the event. 

Even between direct competitors, there was a palpable sense that we’re all one big WordPress family. We may not always agree on everything, but we all want to see WordPress continue to succeed, grow, and expand. 

In general, we want to see more people from underserved and underrepresented communities succeed with WordPress—because we need everyone’s talents, skills, and perspectives to help make WordPress the best it can be. 

Throughout the three-day event, it was made clear that we all have something we can contribute to help move the WordPress project forward. We’re strong individually, but together we can help fulfill the promise of open source: that WordPress is for everyone. 

As I left the Infinity Convention Centre on the final day, I felt a great sense of belonging and a renewed sense of purpose. WordCamp Canada was more than just an event–it was a reminder that we’re all in this together and that together, we can achieve great things.