Inspired by the very inspiring Ana Rodrigues, I wanted to start blogging more. That was reinforced by a stray comment in a Security and AI panel.
But before we go much further, Hi! I’m Tim Nash. You might know me as a security consultant who specialises in WordPress, you might have seen one of my talks, or perhaps heard me on WPBuilds.
Today marks the end of what’s been a busy week. Three events attended, one talk delivered. It was awesome. Informative. Enjoyable. Exhausting.
Yet a month ago I wasn’t planning any of this. Earlier in the year, Maciek Palmowski encouraged me to submit a talk to WordCamp Gdynia in Poland.
I typed out the word “sorry…” ready to decline. It felt too far away, I wasn’t in the right headspace, life was complicated, and my health wasn’t great. But I stopped myself, Googled flights to Gdynia from Leeds/Bradford Airport, and discovered it was actually cheaper and quicker than getting to London.
So I picked a talk that had been rejected before one I’d wanted to deliver for years and submitted it. They said yes. Ok, I’m going to Poland! The plan was simple: fly out Thursday, stay a couple of days, see the sights, fly home.
Then along came LoopConf.
I REALLY wanted to go. To see friends, to watch some of them on stage. But it felt impossible. Life was messy, health was meh. Then Brian Richards, one of the loveliest humans alive, reached out and encouraged me.
Cue the moment of: “Fuck it! Let’s do this.”
So the schedule became: travel to London Wednesday, watch Tammie Lister speak at WPLDN, go to LoopConf, hop on a plane to Poland, give a talk, head home.
Tammie’s talk was particularly thought-provoking. Very rarely do I wake up in the night with thoughts spinning from a talk, and even less often from someone else’s. We’re in a transitional moment with “AI.” For now it’s in a box, but it won’t stay there.
LoopConf itself was brilliant. Not just the chance to see people I’ve missed and meet new ones, but the talks. Ryan from Human Made spoke about FAIR Package Manager reaching 1.0, an entire ecosystem, not just distributed package management. Ross gave a superb “25 Things Over 25 Years,” complete with interactive notes and slides that had half the room taking screenshots. Rashmi’s session on AI and security was packed with fascinating use cases, things that were pipe dreams are now possible. And Ana’s talk on the indie hacker movement had the most direct impact on me. It nudged me from “I should document this trip” to actually doing it. Ana, if you’re reading this, you rock (which means I published it, so well done me).
Of course, the best bit of any event is the people. Meeting, reconnecting, hanging out. It was a joy to just attend.
At one point someone asked why I was going to Poland. I joked: “Well, I wasn’t invited to speak at LoopConf.” They took it seriously. It was soul-destroying.
I love WordPress events. I love supporting them. I’ve been an organiser, speaker, volunteer, sponsor, sometimes all at once. Being “just an attendee” is a treat. Hearing Rashmi’s talk at LoopConf felt like having a security session written for me. Which made WordCamp Gdynia a little later even more of a treat.
I want more of that. More deep dives into security. People don’t need to hear me constantly, its lovely to be invited to events. I enjoy speaking, I want to speak but NEVER at the expense of others.
Step one was surviving Luton Airport.
That meant a 4:30am start, train over, through security… only to discover a two-hour delay. Luckily my talk was on Saturday. Poor Robert Windisch, who was running a Friday workshop, made it to the venue with 20 minutes to spare.
My first impressions of Gdynia were wonderful. Lovely place, welcoming people. I met old friends and new ones. Tried the before-party, but tiredness won.
The talks the next day were excellent. Rashmi returned, this time with Maciek, for a session on AI patching and Vulnerability Disclosure Programmes that set the tone for a security-heavy morning. My own talk on gaining confidence in automatic updates was well received and was followed perfectly by Robert from MelaPress on user management. Between us we covered updates and users two of the biggest security issues in WordPress. It was his first talk and you wouldn’t have known.
Photo by Remkus de Vries via Twitter
Simon closes out my highlights of talks at Gdynia with a session on EU CRA legislation. My last blog post was on its UK “cousin”, so it was fascinating to see how he distilled such complex legislation into clear, actionable points. As fun as a talk on legislation can be, it was brilliant.
There were so many great talks on though in both English and Polish, the next day looked great as well such a shame to miss.
I also joined a panel on AI and security with Simon, Rashmi, and Stanislav. Credit to Simon for keeping the discussion engaging. It was a genuinely great conversation and really didn’t feel forced. All the talks, including the panel, will be on WordPress.tv soon.
And now here I am at the airport. Tired. Heading home. Day two of WordCamp continues without me, but for me there’s a bed calling.
Looking back across all 3 events, a few patterns kept surfacing.
AI is here to stay.
Community matters, and events are widening their scope, reaching beyond WordPress into the wider open-source world.
And perhaps most importantly, friends and connections are vital. In a time when social media is mostly bots and noise, the human side matters more than ever.
ALL CONFERENCES should have proper coffee! It was such a treat at WordCamp Gdnyia to have nice coffee.
So what do I take away from it all?
I want to go to more events.
I need to get back to blogging, even if this site is a mess.
I miss social media, but unlike blogging, I can’t see a way back that wouldn’t impact my mental health.
And apparently flights to and from Poland are always delayed my flight home is currently showing as late too.
Update: I made it home and even got some light reading done!