Naming
Notice that the original project name is ClassicPress
, not just Classic
. This makes some difference to me. From that point of view, it’s not quite right to restrict “ClassicSomething” names.
Yes, such a name can be associated with CP, but I don’t think we can forbid this. CP pretends to be an ecosystem. And it’s a widespread naming practice for satellite projects to mention a recognizable part of a brand to conquer the target audience. E.g. Windows / WinRar, Instagram / InstaTools and so on. WordPress / ClassicPress
The word “Classic” is not our property, isn’t it? If someone would develop a plugin “ClassicMusic” it may be confusing, yes, but it’s ok. Some people think that FaceApp is a Facebook-driven project, but Facebook is not responsible for that mess.
Plugin status
In general, my vision is very close to @james thoughts. (I just write posts much slowlier )
Really think that we shouldn’t throw any projects out of the infrastructure (Slack, Forums, Github etc) at least at this stage. CP community is rather small now. It needs as much consolidation as possible to increase its summary value, weight and influence. This is very important for the “external” point of view. Each project which focuses on ClassicPress and positions it as the primary development platform is quite valuable. It can bring here additional attention, contributors, partners, users, clients. More activity, more buzz — better chances for promotion and integration with other projects (hosters, providers, agencies, studios etc) for all of us.
To my mind, we now have 3 “levels” of projects within this ecosystem.
- ClassicPress itself (and potentially core plugins).
- Community-driven projects (which are inspired by ClassicPress and give it a high priority).
- 3d-party projects (which are build foremost for WordPress, but add CP support, too).
So, technically I agree with @anon71687268 that number 2 is not a part of number 1. But considering all the things above I think we should treat those 2-level projects very carefully and even encourage (foster? stimulate? – not sure about wording) them. Slack channels, Forum threads — fine!
However this doesn’t mean that such projects should have any direct competitive advantages towards 3d-party plugins (in ranking etc). This only means that we should stimulate communication and sharing the experience between ClassicPress contributors, the community and other enthusiasts. BTW this also helps everybody to stay in touch and avoid WP-alike scenario (Core team vs Community vs Plugin devs).
For example, I haven’t contribute to ClassicCommerce yet (and I’m not sure that I’ll have time for that), but I follow this channel in Slack, see familiar people there, find tons of useful notes about Github (thanks @james once again) and stay in course. Even drop my 0.02 cents if needed. But if this project moves to another platform, I’ll unlikely follow it.
We are not so big to search for separation. 20-30 active contributors for all projects, probably? Let’s think about it when we reach the line of 200-300