HeroPress: Helping People See Their Own Greatness with Topher DeRosia, Thu, Apr 16, 2026, 6:00 PM | Meetup HeroPress has grown to be a worldwide phenomenon, giving voice to people from dozens of cultures, countries, and backgrounds. This is the story of how it grew from a plea f

On Thursday, April 16th at 6pm EDT, I'm going to be speaking to the WordPress Grand Rapids Meetup about HeroPress. This will be a virtual event, so anyone in the world can attend, I'd love it if you could come. #WordPress #HeroPress www.meetup.com/wpgrandrapid...

Perfmatters - The #1 Web Performance Plugin for WordPress Slow WordPress sites have higher bounce rates and fewer conversions. The perfmatters plugin was created by web performance geeks to speed up your site!

Today Perfmatters became the most recent in-kind supporter of HeroPress! That means they let me use their awesome plugin. :) Super grateful. perfmatters.io

When I posted Ray Mitchell's HeroPress essay last week I totally forgot to put i
n his desktop, annotated with Draw Attention, one of my favorite #WordPress plugins! That has been fixed, check it out: heropress.com/essays/an-ei...

An Eighth Grader's Dream Comes True Ray Mitchell writes about how WordPress and its associated community helped him fulfill his childhood dream.

This week's HeroPress essay is titled "An Eighth Grader’s Dream Comes True" by Ray Mitchell from Winston-Salem, NC, USA. #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/an-ei...

I Don’t Have It All Figured Out. I Show Up Anyway. Indira Biswas from Akola, India writes about how she didn't wait to be ready to join WordPress contribution, she just went for it.

"It wasn’t always easy. I completed my primary schooling in the regional language, and things as basic as speaking and writing fluent English required a lot of effort. On many occasions, I doubted myself."

— Indira Biswas #WordPress heropress.com/essays/i-don...

"I am still a month away from WordCamp Asia 2026 as I write this. I don’t know yet how it will go. But I said yes, and that feels like something."

— Indira Biswas #WordPress heropress.com/essays/i-don...

I Don’t Have It All Figured Out. I Show Up Anyway. Indira Biswas from Akola, India writes about how she didn't wait to be ready to join WordPress contribution, she just went for it.

"Being part of [contribution] teams helped me understand open source in a new way. I started to see how many different kinds of work go into building and supporting a project."

— Indira Biswas #WordPress #OpenSource heropress.com/essays/i-don...

As an experiment I set up a SoundCloud account for HeroPress, and will be posting the audio versions of essays there. Is this something you'll use? soundcloud.com/heropress

"I was too reluctant to ask whether there was a place for a QA engineer in the WordPress contributor community."
— Indira Biswas #WordPress heropress.com/essays/i-don...

I Don’t Have It All Figured Out. I Show Up Anyway. Indira Biswas from Akola, India writes about how she didn't wait to be ready to join WordPress contribution, she just went for it.

This week's HeroPress essay is titled "I Don’t Have It All Figured Out. I Show Up Anyway." by Indira Biswas Akola, Maharashtra, India. #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/i-don...

"In 2022, during my time in the mandatory national one year paramilitary service, I organized a three week program where I demonstrated to my colleagues the possibilities with WordPress."

— Chidiebere Chukwudi #WordPress heropress.com/essays/wordp...

WordPress: the untapped treasure for leverage. Chidiebere Chukwudi leveraged WordPress to accelerate his career and then grew to teach the community how to do the same.

This week's HeroPress essay is titled "WordPress: the untapped treasure for leverage." by Chidiebere Chukwudi from Imo State, Nigeria. #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/wordp...

"WordPress wasn’t just a tool for me. It helped me evolve from a designer and developer into a more complete professional."
— Edo Begagić #WordPress heropress.com/essays/findi...

Finding autonomy through WordPress Edo Begagić writes about how WordPress gave him autonomy in his career, allowing him to learn what he wished, and choose his life.

"The feeling of being able to provide a complete product to the client and own the entire process felt exciting because it satisfied my need for autonomy."
— Edo Begagić #WordPress heropress.com/essays/findi...

Finding autonomy through WordPress Edo Begagić writes about how WordPress gave him autonomy in his career, allowing him to learn what he wished, and choose his life.

"As time progressed and I became more fluent in WordPress, I stopped thinking only from a design and frontend perspective and started seeing the bigger picture." — Edo Begagić #WordPress heropress.com/essays/findi...

Finding autonomy through WordPress Edo Begagić writes about how WordPress gave him autonomy in his career, allowing him to learn what he wished, and choose his life.

Der dieswöchige HeroPress-Essay trägt den Titel „Autonomie durch WordPress finden" und wurde von Edo Begagić aus Rijeka in Kroatien verfasst. #WordPress heropress.com/essays/findi...

Finding autonomy through WordPress Edo Begagić writes about how WordPress gave him autonomy in his career, allowing him to learn what he wished, and choose his life.

Ovotjedni HeroPress esej nosi naslov „Pronalaženje autonomije kroz WordPress“, a napisao ga je Edo Begagić iz Rijeke, Hrvatska. #WordPress heropress.com/essays/findi...

This week's HeroPress essay is in THREE languages! English, German, and Hrvatski (Croatian). This is our first essay in Hrvatski, and we have all three in audio this week. If you're a Hrvatski speaker and appreciate this, please let me know. heropress.com/essays/findi...

Finding autonomy through WordPress Edo Begagić writes about how WordPress gave him autonomy in his career, allowing him to learn what he wished, and choose his life.

This week's HeroPress essay is titled "Finding autonomy through WordPress" by Edo Begagić from Rijeka, Croatia. #WordPress heropress.com/essays/findi...

WP Podcasts Search every episode of every WordPress podcast and find what you need to hear.

I just noticed that WPPodcasts.com has surpassed 15,000 podcast episodes! What a historical treasure trove! #WordPress #podcast

One of my favorite quotes from this week's HeroPress essay is this: "what you study at twenty does not have to determine your profession forever." Did you pivot? From what to what? heropress.com/essays/wordp...

WordPress y su comunidad: el diseño de una vida libre Ana Cirujano escribe desde Madrid, España, sobre cómo se enamoró primero de WordPress y luego de la comunidad de WordPress. Esta es la versión en audio de su ensayo en HeroPress, disponible en…

El ensayo de Ana también está disponible en audio, leído con su propia voz. #WordPress www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIGQ...

WordPress and Its Community: Designing a Life of Freedom - WordPress y su comunidad: el diseño de una vida libre Ana Cirujano writes from Madrid, Spain about how she fell first in love with WordPress, and then in love with the WordPress Community.

El ensayo de HeroPress de esta semana se titula "WordPress y su comunidad: el diseño de una vida libre" por Ana Cirujano de Torrelodones, Madrid, España. #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/wordp...

WordPress and Its Community: Designing a Life of Freedom - WordPress y su comunidad: el diseño de una vida libre Ana Cirujano writes from Madrid, Spain about how she fell first in love with WordPress, and then in love with the WordPress Community.

This week's HeroPress essay is titled "WordPress and Its Community: Designing a Life of Freedom" by Ana Cirujano from Torrelodones, Madrid, Spain. #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/wordp...

Sponsors HeroPress has accepted support in a variety of forms from a variety of organizations. This page is intended to give thanks and public recognition.

Today Ninja Forms became a financial supporter of HeroPress! Many many thanks to them for helping HeroPress to continue to operate. You can see them listed on the sponsors page. #WordPress heropress.com/sponsorship/

How Art School Led Me To Web Design Emily Rapport from Jamestown, NY writes about how her desire to share her art led her into a career as a WordPress developer.

From art to web design, Emily’s journey shows how creativity and community shape a career. WordPress turned her passion into a flexible, inclusive path where continuous learning is key.

Read her story: heropress.com/essays/how-art-...

#HeroPress

Made the feed… thanks to @wordpress.org and @heropress.bsky.social for supporting all of the different pathways to community and professional development.

How Art School Led Me To Web Design Emily Rapport from Jamestown, NY writes about how her desire to share her art led her into a career as a WordPress developer.

"WordPress has enabled me to build a career for myself and to wholly determine my own path." — Emily Rapport #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/how-a...

How Art School Led Me To Web Design Emily Rapport from Jamestown, NY writes about how her desire to share her art led her into a career as a WordPress developer.

"I studied painting in Chicago and New York in the mid-90s. After graduating, I did not get a job at a prestigious design firm." — Emily Rapport #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/how-a...

In this week's HeroPress essay Emily reads her essay out loud. If you want to hear her words in her own voice check it out. #WordPress
heropress.com/essays/how-a...