WordPress initiates new AI team to accelerate innovation

WordPress has founded a new AI team focused on accelerating and coordinating AI projects across the WordPress ecosystem.

According to WordPress, artificial intelligence (AI) is already transforming the way people create and manage content online.

“As this technology evolves, it’s essential that WordPress remains at the forefront, ensuring innovation happens in the open, guided by community values, and built to core standards,” the website builder states in a blog post.

To make this happen, WordPress has established a new team of professionals focusing solely on AI development. This AI team will coordinate several teams, such as the Core, Design, and Accessibility teams, to explore AI-powered features and integrate shared standards.

In addition, the AI team will publish and maintain a public roadmap of AI initiatives and canonical plugins.

The AI team consists of four members who will bring “deep experience in open-source, performance, and product development”, as well as a strong commitment to building AI features for the WordPress ecosystem.

The team members are James LePage (Automattic), Felix Arntz (Google), Pascal Birchler (Google), and Jeff Paul (10up).

To get things started, James and Felix will initially serve as the official team representatives supporting team organization, communication, and coordination with other WordPress teams.

“This is an exciting and important step in WordPress’s evolution. I look forward to seeing what we’ll create together and in the open,” says Mary Hubbard, Executive Director at Automattic, the company that owns WordPress.

Last month, WordPress announced an AI website builder to make building a WordPress website even easier.

“Rather than piecing everything together yourself, like picking a theme, adjusting colors, adding text, and finding images, the builder streamlines the process for you,” the company said at the time.

The only downside is that the new AI website builder only works for new websites, meaning you can’t make any adjustments to existing websites with AI.