5 Ways to Contribute to WordPress (If You're Not a Developer)

Editor's Notes

• #2: Good afternoon everyone. Thanks so much for taking the time to attend this session and learn more about how to contribute to WordPress!
• #3: WP Evangelist means that I attend WordCamps and other events and listen to the community. At FooPlugins, we make plugins. Rather, my business partners make plugins and I make sure people know about them. I’m not a developer which you’ll see evidence of in a few minutes. 5 for the future Bonus Slide: Contribute to Yourself Breaks, health, #wpmom Call outs for community advocates: Rich Robinkoff Adam Silver
• #4: WP 1.5 and highlight the number of downloads as compared to the latest version. Talk about status of themes and plugins at that point.
• #5: This is a video of me when I quit smoking. I won’t play it for you, but if you look hard enough, you can find it and see I went through a few stages of nicotine withdrawal;)
• #6: After discovering WordPress and building a few sites of my own, I decided to try and build a theme. I was active in the now mostly defunct Yahoo Videoblogging group and many of us there were using WordPress. Themes were mostly standard blog layout then, content on the left, sidebar on the right. The group was discussing the need for themes that catered to video display and layout so I took a stab at it. I tried to find an image of this theme, but couldn’t and that’s probably for the best:)
• #7: These plugins worked fine for my own needs, but when I put them on the plugin repository I soon learned just how bad my coding skills were.
• #8: After some time I realized that designing and code development were not my strong suit. Although I knew what looked good, and I understood the ”overview” of how themes and plugins were built, I went through a period of feeling like I didn’t belong.
• #9: Had I lost my artistic skills I was “known for” when I was a kid? Had all the early years of encouragement and support from my parents all been one big lie?
• #10: If you’re not familiar with Tom McFarlin, I highly recommend reading his blog. Although I had been describing myself as a “WordPress Website Architect, Teacher, and Consultant” for several years, it wasn’t until I read Tom’s post about what the term “developer” actually meant as opposed to an “advanced user”. He coined the term “Implementor” and I connected with that.
• #11: Through this journey, I had been blogging about what I was learning and started to build a readership and have people actually respond by leaving comments on my site. It was then that I realized I did have a way to give back to the WordPress project without the need to be a talented developer or designer. Rather than just asking questions on the .org forums, I started answering them and found my strong suit was helping others learn WordPress and find solutions by utilizing plugins and other tactics like short code snippets. I then started to get more involved by reporting bugs and offering my opinions on enhancements to the software. I eventually faced my fear of public speaking at a WordCamp in 2011 and I’ve been a WordCamp addict ever since.
• #12: If it weren’t for Matt Mullenweg and Mike Little, there would be no WordPress. If it weren’t for the thousands of people contributing, there would be no WordPress. If you weren’t attending this WordCamp (and this session), the future of WordPress would not be as solid as I believe it is and will continue to be. So, all of this is well and good, but am I just talking about Altruism? The selfless concern for others? In a perfect world, yes. But let’s be honest, we are Human and we have a natural tendency to do things that benefit us directly. The survival instinct. The good news, no, the GREAT news is that by contributing to the project, helping others while still helping yourself are not mutually exclusive. You can do both!
• #13: Learn from other users, developers, and designers Become more valuable to your employer Become more proficient in your own business My “hobby” with WordPress brought me brought me from customer service phone support to the IT dept. of an Amazon owned audio publisher. It also helped that the IT lead shared a cubicle wall with me and I ”evangelized” the capabilities of WordPress over and over. In retrospect, he probably gave me a chance mostly to shut me up 
• #14: Open new doors for yourself Create more opportunities One thing leads to another From the first time I installed WordPress, to the many sites I’ve started and ended…I’ve learned something that pushed me forward to the next site. The next “big idea”, all powered with WordPress. A multi-author site for writing the dreams you’ve had, an eCommerce pet supply store, and social community for people who wear prosthetic body parts. (can you guess my prosthetic?) Every one of those experiments moved me one step forward, and by documenting those, and writing about what I was learning in WP made me easy to find online. And the people who found me, often needed some kind of help and were willing to pay me to do the WordPress work for them.
• #15: No matter how you contribute to WordPress, just the fact that you’re paying attention helps.
• #16: Because you and I have such easy access to the internet, laptops and smartphones, it’s sometimes hard to keep in mind that there are millions of people across the world that have never even been online at all. WordPress (and open source software) are tools that are helping to bring people together. Regardless of their age, race, creed, color, sex, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, marital status, or socioeconomic status. Together we CAN change the world for the better.
• #18: Congratulations! You’re already contributing! The single act of being here today at WordCamp does make a difference. Because WordPress powers 26% percent of all websites on the internet, and millions of people around the globe utilize the software each day, you’ll find a diverse mix of cultures, skills and personalities coming together in various ways. If you haven’t participated in any of the WordPress communities online or in person, it’s the easiest way to start connecting with others who share your passion.
• #20: Answering questions on the official WordPress.org support forums is not only a great way to give back and get involved in the community, but also the best way to help other users learn all that can be done with WordPress. Not only can you share what you know, but because the support forums contain millions of existing threads, it’s also a great place to learn yourself.
• #22: Are you skilled at the written word? Do you find you have a knack for breaking apart technical processes into easy-to-understand steps? If so, consider contributing to WordPress documentation. WordPress is always growing and changing, and areas of the WordPress.org site like the Codex, handbooks, inline documentation and even areas like developer.wordpress.org are in constant need of the written word.
• #24: WordPress is used all over the world and because of this, there is an ongoing need for Polyglots (a person who knows and is able to use several languages) to assist in translating WordPress to other languages. By helping to translate WordPress, you’ll be helping to democratize publishing by providing anyone in the world the ability to communicate their message to millions.
• #26: You probably know that there are tens of thousands of free themes and plugins available, all hosted on WordPress.org. Did you know that every single one of these themes and plugins gets reviewed by volunteers before being made available for download? Even though you may not consider yourself a hardcore theme or plugin developer, you can still get involved in reviewing the usage and functionality of themes and plugins to help ensure that end users have access to useful tools for their WordPress-powered websites and blogs.
• #28: There are many other ways to contribute to the WordPress project, but the five listed above have proven to be the easiest route for non-developers (like me). You can find other ways to contribute to the WordPress project here. Participation by users in the open source software world is what has made WordPress the chosen platform of millions of people worldwide. If you’ve been utilizing WordPress for your own website or blog, or even running your own web development business, please consider giving back to the project that has given so much to so many.