Once they started contributing to WordPress, our featured contributors found they just couldn’t stop being involved. They were so inspired by the experience that they wanted to build their local communities too.
Join the fun of contributing
For Patricia Brun Torre, contributor day experiences were the catalyst to join the organising teams of WordCamps in her home country.
Contributor days are especially designed to onboard new contributors.
@PatriciaBT70 (Switzerland)
Her first contributor event experience was at WordCamp Europe in Leiden in 2013.
“I was amazed by the team there. I was also totally inspired by Bram Duvigneau (@bramduvigneau), who led the Accessibility Team. Bram is blind, and showed us how his screen reader tool acts when a webpage is not well built for accessibility. He inspired many people to aim at a better online accessibility.”
She added:
“There is a misconception that we must be experts to contribute, that’s wrong. Contributor days are especially designed to onboard new contributors. I first contributed lightly as a polyglot, but then became more passionate through contributing as a WordPress event organiser (local Meetups and WordCamps co-organiser in Switzerland). I very much enjoy talking about this at contributor events at our local WordCamps to inspire others to do the same.”
One of Patricia’s favourite memories is from WordCamp Lausanne 2018’s Contributor Day, where she and Carole Olinger (@CaroleOlinger) explained to students what is it to be a WordPress event organiser.
She is a regular volunteer at WordCamp Europe and this year will be cheering online from her home in Switzerland.
“At WordCamp Europe 2019 in Berlin, I was busy at the registration desk, but I left for a moment in order to breathe in the great atmosphere of more than 500 people in the same place giving so much to WordPress, and somehow writing history! I love contributor days.”
So many things you can help with
Speaking at a WordCamp opened Marco Andrei Kichalowsky’s imagination to the possibilities for contributing to the global project.
He had been working with WordPress since 2004. When he came back to his home town in Porto Alegre, Rio Grande do Sul, after five years of living abroad in São Paulo, the platform became his main work. His journey began in 2015 when he participated as a speaker at WordCamp Porto Alegre.
“When I arrived at the event, seeing all the work that needed to be done, I became a volunteer to help the organisation. And I have not stopped since this day.”
Seeing all the work that needed to be done, I became a volunteer to help.
@marcoandrei (Brazil)
He added:
“I joined the Porto Alegre WordPress Meetups organisation team. I started to collaborate with WordPress development, translating themes and plugins to Brazilian-Portuguese. In 2017, I was coordinator of WordPress Porto Alegre. Nowadays, I am part of the WordPress Polyglots team, continue to help to organise Meetups in Porto Alegre and am a speaker at open source events.”
Contributing is for all skills
Taking part in a contributor event is not just for those who have worked on WordPress.org for years, but could be the first step to learning much more about the platform and discovering others locally who use it too.
Ana Cirujano’s first experience of contributing and the wider WordPress community was at WordCamp Madrid 2017. She said:
“I remember that on the previous day and inbetween talks, speakers encouraged us to go to the Contributor Day. I thought that a ‘contributor’ was someone who had been working with WordPress.org for a long time and who must be a developer. I am a designer and I thought I could not contribute anything.”
But out of curiosity, she went to the Contributor Day. The Polyglots Team was led by Fernando Tellado, who explained how the translation team worked. Within a few minutes, Ana found that she could translate her first strings.
I’ve been to more than 20 Contributor Days… When you start contributing, you don’t want to stop.
@acirujano (Spain)
She said:
“It was very exciting for me. The fact that the phrases I had translated from English to Spanish were going to be shown in thousands of WordPress websites around the world was a fascinating idea. I will always thank Fernando for that learning. If your mother tongue is not English, I think Polyglots is a good team to start.”
Since that day, Ana has been to more than 20 Contributors Day in Spain, UK and Europe, on Themes and WordPress.tv teams, and led the Design team more than 10 times. She has also been a speaker at WordCamps, a WordCamp organiser and a Meetup organiser. She contributed from her home to Plugin development and the Core teams too.
Ana said:
“When you start contributing, you don’t want to stop!”
How could you contribute to WordPress?
These are some of the teams that make WordPress which contributors in this article are involved in supporting.
Contributor Day at WCEU 2020 Online
Join us at this year’s Contributor Day on 4 June. Find out more about what’s involved and how you can take part on our Contributor Day information page.
Try out the Contributor Orientation Tool and discover a team to start your #ContributorStory with.
Read more contributing stories
Patricia, Ana and Marco are just three of the many individuals across the world who together to support the WordPress community. Read more contributor stories at: