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Mullenweg’s “full nuclear” message

by CranDiscuss

According to court documents publicly refiled September 30, Matt Mullenweg was talking about going “full nuclear with WPE,” with “partnerships/merger/M&A as an exit,” before the WordPress feud went public.

The August 15, 2024 Slack message was put to Mullenweg during his deposition. He said he didn’t recall it but could see it in the document; he wanted more context before explaining “full nuclear.”

Another refiled exhibit opens a window onto WordPress.org’s “Mission Control” dashboard. Automattic CTO Barry Abrahamson testified that it graphed active installations of rival WP Engine’s ACF Pro plugin “that WordPress.org knows about.” The data came through WordPress.org’s API; he said it was anonymized and aggregated before storage.

Matt Mullenweg (deposition testimony), U.S. District Court, Northern District of California / CourtListener
ECF 418-1: Mullenweg deposition excerpts, refiled September 30, 2026
Barry Abrahamson (deposition testimony), U.S. District Court, Northern District of California / CourtListener
ECF 419: Abrahamson deposition excerpts, refiled September 30, 2026
Filed underAutomatticMatt MullenwegWP Engine
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Internal memos · Lawsuits

Court revives antitrust claims against Automattic, citing internal ‘carrot and stick’ message

by BernsteinDiscuss
Satirical portrait of Matt Mullenweg against an orange brush blot.

“If they don’t take the carrot we’ll give them the stick.”

That’s internal correspondence quoted by WP Engine and reproduced in a September 24 court order reviving its antitrust claims against Automattic and Matt Mullenweg.

The carrot was a trademark license: WP Engine could pay Automattic a percentage of its revenue. The stick? Well, as we saw, Mullenweg: blasted WP Engine at WordCamp US, blocked its access to WordPress.org, and added a login checkbox requiring users to declare they weren’t affiliated with WP Engine. In WP Engine’s account, that’s what refusing the carrot got you.

WP Engine alleges at least 11 competitors were targeted for multimillion-dollar deals. The order recounts an alleged “Restriction of choice plan”—a remarkably candid name for something happening around open-source software.

Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín found the allegations sufficient to let four antitrust claims proceed. The WordPress.org checkbox requiring users to deny any affiliation with WP Engine also supports a plausible illegal-tying claim: access conditioned on not dealing with a competitor.

These remain allegations, not a liability finding. In the order, Automattic also won dismissal of WP Engine’s computer-fraud-law extortion claim without leave to amend.

Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California
WP Engine v. Automattic: Order re Motions to Dismiss — September 24, 2026
Filed underAraceli Martínez-OlguínAutomatticMatt MullenwegWordpressWP Engine
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Lawsuits · Management

RCI’s leadership lap dance: CEO and CFO step off the main stage with a three day goodbye

by LewDiscuss

RCI Hospitality Holdings, the publicly traded strip club empire and owner of Rick’s Cabaret and Bombshells has announced the abrupt departure of CEO Eric Langan and CFO Bradley Chhay.

Recently, the company and several executives, including Langan and Chhay, were indicted by New York state over an alleged long running tax and bribery scheme. NY claims that the company bribed a state official with “Dance Dollars,” to lower its tax burden. RCI and the executives deny the allegations, but the  stock has been on a slide all year, shedding 58% of its value.

The timing of the resignations is really odd.

In a normal corporate transition, you’d expect something like:

  • “Effective immediately” (emergency mode), or

  • “Effective at year-end” (pretend this is totally planned and strategic).

Instead, we got an announcement two days before Thanksgiving to take effect the day after. A November 25th announcement, which goes into effect on November 28th.

The C-suite equivalent of “I’m breaking up with you… on Monday. I still need a ride to the airport.”

In those three days, the company nominally gets to say it still has “continuity” while everyone prints new org charts. Starting November 28:

  • Travis Reese (current executive vice president) becomes Interim President and CEO

  • Albert Molina (current director of financial reporting) becomes Interim CFO

At the same time, Langan and Chhay do not actually leave the building. They stick around as advisors and keep their compensation structures.

Officially this is a “leadership transition” and the board is bravely “positioning the company for the future.” In reality, it looks like the board wanted to show regulators and investors that it did something about the indicted executives without losing the two people who know every lease, liquor license, side deal, and debt covenants by heart.

Filed underBradley ChhayEric LanganRCI HospitalityRick's
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Boardroom intrigue · Internal memos

Former Campbells Soup employee releases wild tape of company vice president

by LewDiscuss

A former employee is suing Campbell’s (of soup) for wrongful termination after he was allegedly fired for reporting his boss’s wild rant in which he says the company makes “bioengineered meat for poor people.” The fired employee has released audio of Campbell’s Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer Martin Bally making the statements as well as calling the company’s Indian employees idiots who “couldn’t think for their fucking selves.”

We’re trying to get ahold of the full audio, which reportedly goes on for over an hour (!). In the meantime, here is the story by a local Detroit station:


(Archive)

Case information: 25-018465-CD (Garza v. Campbell Soup Company)

Filed underCampbell's
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