https://youtu.be/4pebdPs1PcQ

Transcript ↓

In this episode of Cache Up, host Michelle Frechette chats with Clem Omotoso and Mary Baum about WordCamp Canada 2025. Clem, a newcomer to WordPress, shares his journey from student to event volunteer, while Mary, an experienced organizer, discusses the event’s programming, community spirit, and accessibility. The conversation highlights the excitement around meeting fellow WordPress enthusiasts, the value of informal networking, and the unique features of the Ottawa venue. Listeners are encouraged to attend, volunteer, or sponsor, making WordCamp Canada 2025 a welcoming and memorable experience for all.

Top Takeaways:

• WordCamp Canada Fosters Community and Welcomes Newcomers: Clem Omotosho’s journey from student to WordCamp Canada volunteer highlights how welcoming and accessible the WordPress community is. With encouragement from experienced community members like Michelle and Mary, newcomers are not only embraced but quickly integrated into organizing teams and events. The spirit of connection, support, and shared learning was a central theme throughout the conversation.
• Hosting WordCamp on a College Campus Enhances Accessibility and Atmosphere: Returning to Carleton University in Ottawa, WordCamp Canada 2025 will benefit from a venue that naturally supports learning, accessibility, and social interaction. College campuses offer built-in amenities like classrooms, accessible pathways, and communal spaces, making them ideal for events focused on knowledge-sharing and community building.
• A Dual-Track Program Highlights WordPress’s Future and Foundations: The 2025 event will feature two main speaker tracks: one focused on practical sessions for users, developers, and business owners, and another forward-looking track exploring topics like AI, the fediverse, and the future of the open web. With keynote speakers like Dave Winer and Evan (surname TBD), the program aims to engage both seasoned professionals and curious newcomers alike.

Mentioned In The Show:

• WordCamp Canada

🐦 You can follow Post Status and our guests on Social Media:

• Clem Omotosho (Technical Solutions Specialist/ Engineer, StackAdapt)
• Mary Baum (Owner, RacquetPress)
• Michelle Frechette (Director of Community Relations, Post Status)
• Olivia Bisset (Intern, Post Status)

The Post Status podcast is geared toward WordPress professionals, with interviews, news, and deep analysis. 📝

Browse our archives, and don’t forget to subscribe via iTunes, Google Podcasts, YouTube, Stitcher, Simplecast, or RSS. 🎧

Transcript

Michelle Frechette 00:00:02  Welcome to the Post Status Cache Up. Where I like to catch up with the people in WordPress. And today my guests are Clem Omotosho and Mary Baum. Welcome, both of you. How are you? 

Mary Baum: Great.

Clem Omotosho 00:00:16  Good evening, Michelle.

Michelle Frechette 00:00:18  Glad to hear it. I want to let you introduce yourselves a little bit. Tell us where you’re located in the world, what you do with WordPress. And what’s your role with WordCamp Canada? Clem, you go first.

Clem Omotosho 00:00:31  Awesome. I’m located in Edmonton, Alberta, over in Canada. And what I do in WordPress. I’m a student. I’m just completing my associate’s degree in Digital Media, and IT. Last semester I took a course on Content Management Systems, mainly WordPress, and that was how I got introduced to it. And I thought it was great. I really liked the concept of open source software, and how it’s just a community that’s building and maintaining the software that everyone uses. And so I got curious, looked around for any local Meetups, any groups, you know, any anyone else that I could talk to about this and learn more. Found one over in Edmonton, and we’ve been meeting up every month. Just sharing wins, sharing stories and, you know, doing all things WordPress. And so that was how I got in touch with one of the organizers. WordCamp Canada signed up to be a volunteer. And, yeah, here we are.

Michelle Frechette 00:01:29  And what are you doing? What’s your role on the on the team for WordCamp Canada?

Clem Omotosho 00:01:34  Yes. So I’m with the Social Media and Marketing team, so I help manage our social media accounts, help with content on the website, writing articles and, communications, you know, appearing on episodes like this in different public spaces. And, you know, any, any other tasks that I can help out with.

Michelle Frechette 00:01:53  Fantastic. Well, welcome. You’re a fairly new person to WordPress, and this is probably then your first WordCamp also. So welcome to the whole experience. I will promise you that once you’ve joined us, we never let go. So it’s nice to have you here for the rest of your life.

Clem Omotosho 00:02:10  Happy to be here.

Michelle Frechette 00:02:13  Mary and I can both attest we’ve been around for a little bit of time here with WordPress. But, Mary, why don’t you go ahead and tell us about yourself, too?

Mary Baum 00:02:21  Okay. I am sitting in Saint Louis, Missouri, which is in the US. I’m in WordPress currently. I’m an editor of the Developer Blog, the WordPress developer blog, and I’ve been on a number of releases. Used to speak a lot at WordCamps when we had a lot of WordCamps. And two of my editors on the Developer Blog are lead organizers for WordCamp Canada, and they invited me to be a lead organizer for WordCamp Canada. So here I am, and I am running the Comms team. Which of which, Clem is one of the greatest members. I’ve been doing a lot, and he’s all over our social media.

Michelle Frechette 00:03:13  Excellent.

Mary Baum 00:03:15  We have a couple of other terrific members, too, who are busy doing writing posts and doing actual journalism. And, I check in every once in a while and edit a post and try not to take any credit because I’m not really doing much other than saying, go!

Michelle Frechette 00:03:41  Nice job, team. Keep it up.

Mary Baum 00:03:44 Nice job team, yes!

Michelle Frechette 00:03:46  That’s awesome.

Mary Baum 00:03:47  Cheerleading. Yes. And looking forward to Canada in the fall.

Michelle Frechette 00:03:52  Very nice. So last year was the first ever WordCamp Canada. I was fortunate both to attend and speak at that event and it was done very, very well. I was very impressed. The location this year has changed. WordCamp Ottawa used to take place at Carleton University. Last year, WordCamp Canada was moved to a conference center. But this year, we’re back to Carleton. And so, can you tell me a little bit about, what you’re looking forward to, why you’re excited to have it on a college campus again?

Mary Baum 00:04:28  I think college campuses are great places for WordCamps. We had WordCamp Saint Louis on the campus of Washington University, for many years. Well, five or so. And, I like that mostly because it’s about seven minutes from this very chair. And also the parking garage is really easy to deal with. But a college campus is just great because it represents everything we want a WordCamp to be, you know, getting togethe,r the hallway track, the seeing old friends, making new friends, learning stuff. Teaching stuff. What could be a better venue?

Michelle Frechette 00:05:25  And classrooms are already set up for exactly what we need.

Mary Baum 00:05:29  Yes, exactly.

Michelle Frechette 00:05:32  And one of the things I love about college campuses is, by and large, they are fairly accessible for people who are using mobility devices like I do. And so I don’t worry that I won’t have access when it’s on a college campus, which I think is pretty cool. Clem. 

Mary Baum 00:05:49  Now you.

Michelle Frechette 00:05:50  Oh sorry go ahead, Mary.

Mary Baum 00:05:52  And for those of us who are trying to get steps in. There’s there’s also plenty of opportunities to do that.

Michelle Frechette 00:05:59  There are endless sidewalks, indoor and outdoor. Hallways and sidewalks at college campuses. This is true. And Ottawa is pretty special. I don’t know if either of you have been to Ottawa before, but the Byward Market is pretty cool. Like, the city itself is really neat. The Rideau Canal and all the things that you can do there. Years ago, I did a pretty fun, what do you call it was it was both a bus and a boat. So that you’re on this bus and you are traveling. I was sightseeing around Ottawa, and next thing you know, we’re driving right down into the river. And it was one of the most interesting.

Mary Baum 00:06:40  Was that one of those ducks?

Michelle Frechette 00:06:42  Yeah, it was called the Lady Dive Tour, which I thought was really. It was a lot of fun, no air conditioning, so it was a little warm, but it was a lot of fun. A lot of things to see and do. Clem, you’ve not been to a WordCamp before, so clearly you weren’t at either last year’s or in Ottawa before. But what are you most excited about when it comes to either having it at a college, university, you know, college campus, or just in general about attending your first WordCamp this year?

Clem Omotosho 00:07:14  With attending my first WordCamp this year, there’s a lot of things I’m looking forward to. The first one being meeting all the fellow volunteers and organizers in person for the first time. But, put a face to the slack handles. And also, new connections, new friends, and everyone’s experience in WordPress, in WordPress. So far, one of the beauties of WordCamp is, you know, there’s a lot of folks from different backgrounds, different, different, different walks of life. And so they will all have their own personal experiences with WordPress, whether they’re using it professionally, whether they’re using it personally, whether it’s with a side business. And yeah, just lots and lots of stories, lots of things to connect over. And I think that’ll be great. I also applied to be a speaker at WordCamp Canada. I still haven’t heard back, fingers crossed.

Michelle Frechette 00:08:08  Yeah, same, same.

Clem Omotosho 00:08:09  So you’ll be my first time. It’ll be my first time speaking at a, at a conference. So nice. Kind of nervous, but it’ll be it’ll be a great, It’ll be a great experience.

Michelle Frechette 00:08:20  Absolutely. I’m excited for you, because if, when I think back to my very first WordCamp, it was in Buffalo. It was a smaller camp. I was about 120 – 130 people, I think, and I was I don’t get nervous easily, but I was not a tech person and I was not a part of a tech community. And this was my first foray into that. And so I was kind of nervous when I when I went there and honestly had this kind of like, I don’t know, like expectation that I was going to say or do something stupid, but none of which happened. So it was very exciting to be part of a community that was just so enveloping and so just, you know, open and wonderful to, to spend time with. So I think you will enjoy that as well. Now, I know that the, the, the speakers haven’t been informed yet. So I know that there’s no schedule on the site yet. It will be out soon. If people are looking, it’s Canada.WordCamp.org/2025. You can go buy your tickets now. But when, when you do announce that, do you know how many tracks there will be for speakers? How many you know, sessions you’re looking to fill?

Mary Baum 00:09:33  At least two. I can tell you for sure that there will be two.One of them will be very interesting and new, which is it’s going to be more about the future of the web and how AI and open sourced it together. And the other will be a more practical, typical WordCamp track with business and developer, and user talks. We that track might expand to three, but it’s not at all clear yet whether or not it will. But that second track, that’s the one that is the reason our keynote speakers, Dave Winer and Evan, whose last name I’m forgetting. They’ll be promoting that track. Dave has a tool that now works with WordPress.com, but also, I think, is coming to WordPress, you know, is coming to the plugin repo. He’s going to teach people how to use it and how to particularly use it to help federate WordPress even more than it is now. And he’s blogging on the WordCamp Canada site extensively about that. And Evan is approaching things, I think, from an AI, but also a fediverse point of view. So that’s very forward-looking and weather. And you don’t have to be a developer to follow that conversation. I think if you are at all interested in the future of the world as we know it, which basically is the future of the web, I think that’s very exciting. and we still, we are possibly having one more keynote who will be on the traditional WordCamp site that we hope particularly potential speech speakers of the future will really be thrilled to hear from.

Michelle Frechette 00:11:55  Nice. Now, Clem. Mary mentioned earlier the hallway track. Are you familiar with what that is? It’s different than the tracks that we have speakers in.

Clem Omotosho 00:12:08  Not extensively. No.

Michelle Frechette 00:12:12  Mary, why don’t you tell everybody what the hallway track is when we talk about WordCamps?

Mary Baum 00:12:17  There are some people who come to ward camps only for the hallway track. And what that is, is the people you meet in the hallway. The friends you make, the conversations you have, you know, all that stuff people talk about. About trying to get developers to, like, go to an office all day and code like, except really what they’re doing is being in Zooms with people who are not in the office. That is corporate managers trying to build a hallway track and clearly failing.

Michelle Frechette 00:13:01  Yeah, it’s the networking. It’s also the swag. Don’t let anybody lie to you. It’s all about the swag sometimes. I have a lot of swag in this office. I’m not going to pull it all out because we’d be here for a day and a half. But swag is always fun too. But it’s about getting to meet other people. It’s about networking. It’s about growing your space in the community by, you know, by meeting new people and forging those relationships. So one of the things I can say unequivocally is the food last year was on point, especially the after-party. They had beaver tails, they had poutine. They had all the things that you know, that Canada is known for. Can we look forward to similar things this year? Will the food be amazing?

Mary Baum 00:13:50  I’m sure it will be. We have an we have an actual Carleton employee, dealing with the venue, and we’re expected to see food choices coming in September, so I don’t know for sure, but,

Michelle Frechette 00:14:13  I would guess it’ll be good.

Mary Baum 00:14:14  Certainly going to be Canada centric.

Michelle Frechette 00:14:18  Very nice.

Mary Baum 00:14:18  Though I did look on the map. And Ottawa is awfully close to that Quebec border, so.

Michelle Frechette 00:14:24  That’s true.

Mary Baum 00:14:24  We could do a little French stuff too. 

Michelle Frechette 00:14:28  You never know. You never know.

Mary Baum 00:14:31  That would be merveilleux (French for wonderful)

Michelle Frechette 00:14:33  That’s true. It would. one of the things that I noticed too is when when we do have WordCamp Montreal, for example, there are talks in both English and Canadian French. And so are we looking to have only English-speaking tracks this year? Will we have some also in Canadian French?

Mary Baum 00:14:54  I think there might be one in French. I would imagine there will be French subtitles.

Michelle Frechette 00:15:03  Okay. Very good. So that we’re.

Mary Baum 00:15:06  Accessible subtitles.

Michelle Frechette 00:15:08  Yeah. And I know in Canada that there are laws about at least. At least in the Quebec, you know, a province, laws about having websites in both English and French. So I imagine we’ll see some of that.

Mary Baum 00:15:22  The WordCamp Canada website is in both English and French.

Michelle Frechette 00:15:26  Which makes sense. Absolutely. Absolutely.

Mary Baum 00:15:29  I haven’t read completely through through it. Yeah, the French version yet, but I still plan to.

Michelle Frechette 00:15:36  I’d have to. I’d have to get on Duolingo to bring back some of my high school French to be able to read it in French. So I’ll stick to the English for now. But yeah. So Chem? What else are you looking forward to? What are some of the things that you can tell us might be different this year, or that our, you know, things that we should spotlight and really pay attention to that are coming up with WordCamp Canada.

Clem Omotosho 00:16:03  I can’t speak on different this year just because I haven’t been, any previous WordCamps. But at the talks, I know the talks are going to be really, really great. lots of opportunities to learn new things about WordPress, especially if you’re like me, you’re a beginner. You don’t really have a background. It’s a lot, of a lot of sessions that are going to be really easy to follow. You’ll pick up something new and regardless of, you know, what your background is in this space, whether it’s your hobbyist, whether it’s professionally. There’s going to be lots that you can take away and apply to whatever you’re using WordPress for. So. 

Michelle Frechette: And 

Clem Omotosho: Really looking forward to that. And, oh, did I interrupt you? 

Michelle Frechette: Oh go ahead. go ahead. Yeah. 

Clem Omotosho: A lot of the there’s going to be some after parties, the after party going on and a lot of that’s the word that I’m looking for a lot of opportunities to really, collect, connect with people, learn from them. A lot of experts in the space, Mary, Michelle, you’ve been in you’ve been in the WordPress space for a long, long, long time. I think, Mary.

Michelle Frechette 00:17:13  Not our first rodeo. 

Clem Omotosho 00:17:14  Mary, you were designing before the internet even became a thing?

Mary Baum 00:17:20  Yes, I was.

Clem Omotosho 00:17:21  Yeah. I was looking through your work. I noticed you had some designs with Light Chef. ConocoPhillips, Marissa Automotive, and I’m a web designer and developer, so I’m, I’m even excited to show you some of my designs.

Mary Baum: Absolutely.  

Clem Omotosho 00:17:37  And see what you think. Yeah. And see what you think. So mostly things around, around the community side of WordPress that I’m excited for meeting new folks, building new connections and really seeing where seeing where that leads.

Michelle Frechette 00:17:49  Nice. I was just looking at the website. There are still spaces available for sponsors, so if you’re looking to sponsor an event like this, please go to Canada.WordCamp.org/2025 and you can find the call for sponsors there. And tickets are available, of course. it’s still kind of early, so I imagine you haven’t sold a ton of tickets yet. Because WordCamp is coming up at the end of mid-October, but tickets are $100, and I don’t know if that’s 100 Canadian or 100 American, do you know?

Mary Baum 00:18:23  I suspect it’s Canadian.

Michelle Frechette 00:18:25  Okay. So that’s that’s the cost for the two-day event?

Mary Baum 00:18:29  Yes.

Michelle Frechette 00:18:31  And do we know where the after party is yet? Is that something we can talk about or is that still in discussion?

Mary Baum 00:18:39  I think that’s still in discussion. 

Michelle Frechette 00:18:44  Okay. Awesome. Well, what haven’t I asked you about that you’re dying to tell me about WordCamp Canada 2025? Am I just that good? We’ve got all the information.

Mary Baum 00:18:57  You’re just that good. 

Michelle Frechette 00:19:00  Awesome. I love it. Well, if anybody’s interested, the call for speakers is closed, but you can still sponsor. And absolutely you can still attend. Canada is.

Mary Baum 00:19:12  Still volunteer in fact.

Michelle Frechette 00:19:13  Yes.

Mary Baum 00:19:14  Thank you. if you are watching this and you are an experienced WordCamp volunteer. And if you’ve been on an organizing team, we actually are still looking for an attendee experience person to write visa letters and answer attendee questions as they come up. And we could use a little more help. Well, we could use more volunteers. We have finally, landed a volunteer wrangler. So there will be somebody to like walk you through the venue and tell you where you’re going to be if you’re a volunteer. But we do still need on-site volunteers. And we could use a couple more people with social media, actually, to promote the event.

Michelle Frechette 00:20:12  Awesome. So if people are interested, is that still one of the open calls? Is that something? Oh, there it is. So, Call the Volunteers is still open on the website, so you can absolutely go and apply to volunteer at WordCamp Canada.

Mary Baum 00:20:25  And we have deals for hotels too.

Michelle Frechette 00:20:27  Oh very good. So you can look at the blocks of hotels that are there. Excellent. Well, I for one am looking forward to it. I plan to be there, you know. Barring anything else, it’s my birthday weekend. It’s the day, my birthday is October 15th, so I can celebrate with my Canadian, Canadian friends and some American friends, obviously on the 16th and 17th. I like to think when it’s when I attend a WordCamp around my birthday, I pretend the after-party is all about me, but nobody else does. But I pretend it.

Mary Baum 00:20:58  Well, I’ll pretend that too. 

Michelle Frechette: Okay, thanks!

Mary Baum:  We will be coming from a birthday party for our grandson’s third birthday. 

Michelle Frechette: Oh, exciting. 

Mary Baum: Yeah. And if you hear any high pitched noises coming from my mic, that’s who that is. They just arrived from Connecticut.

Michelle Frechette 00:21:18  Oh. Very good. Well, I’m excited that you.

Clem Omotosho 00:21:23  That’s so funny that you mentioned that my birthday is on the 12th of October.

Michelle Frechette 00:21:27  There you go.

Mary Baum 00:21:27  That’s when Leo’s is.

Michelle Frechette 00:21:31  We’re just going to have a giant celebration. I think I’m older than you. That’s okay. Oh. Very good. Well, thank you both so much for spending some time today talking about WordCamp Canada. Looking forward to it. Second, second year this year if people have questions. Canada.WordCamp.org/2025. Follow them on all the social channels and make sure you get your ticket and apply to be a volunteer. If that’s something that is something that you’d like to do too. You can learn so much from volunteering at a WordCamp for sure. Thank you both so much for spending some time with me today. It’s been delightful to learn a little bit more about each of you and what’s coming up for this year’s WordCamp.

Clem Omotosho 00:22:14  Thanks for having us

Mary Baum 00:22:15  Thanks for having us.

Michelle Frechette 00:22:17  My pleasure.