E132 – Christie’s Last Episode (and Her Takeaways from 2 Years of Hosting)

In today’s episode, Joe and Christie pick out the top episodes they hosted together for the past two years, why these episodes made it to their favorite list and the stories behind the guests. They also talk about their individual growth in podcasting and the benefits of being a host. 

Sadly, this is also Christie’s last episode as co-host in the WPMRR podcast. Listen in to learn what will change and what to expect in the coming weeks! 

What to Listen For:

• 00:00 Intro
• 01:49 What’s up, Joe?
• 04:09 Sad news: This is Christie’s last episode
• 07:53 The truth about why Christie is leaving
• 11:50 Don’t do a podcast if you aren’t passionate about it
• 14:03 Some of the best moments happened off-record
• 17:10 What’s it like recording a podcast for the past two years?
• 19:57 Podcast is just a conversation between 2 to 3 people
• 22:20 The benefits of being a podcast host
• 26:30 Pod episodes on our favorite list
• 37:15 Parting words from Christie Chirinos!

Episode Resources:

• Visit Christie’s website
• Tweet Christie
• Christie is on LinkedIn
• Leave an iTunes review or binge-watch past episodes
• Send questions to yo@wpmrr.com for the next Q&A pod
• Visit the WPMRR website

Favorite Podcast Episodes:

• Should Your Business Take Political Stances or Stay Silent?
• What an Automattic IPO in 2021 means for WordPress Professionals (Brian Krogsgard, Post Status)
• What it’s really like to be people of color in the WordPress community
• The future of funding in WordPress

Podcast Transcript:

Joe Howard: [00:00:00] How would he folks Joe Howard here? So today’s episode is unfortunately a little bit of a sad one, as you probably already know from the title of the episode that you clicked to hear me say this, uh, we have. Some news today from Christie, uh, that we’re gonna really get into in today’s episode. And Chrissy doesn’t know that I’m recording this as a little intro, but I just wanted to send a quick message to her.

That man, it’s been a fantastic couple of years getting to record with you, Christie. You’re one of my best friends in the WordPress space, but really just one of my best friends period. And I’m really happy that. This podcast got to bring us closer together. And yeah, it’s something that is really, I think, made my life better to, uh, to get to do this podcast with you.

And also just to chat off-air about all sorts of stuff, WordPress or non WordPress. So thank you, Christie for everything also, just so listeners. Now we say this in the episode, but the podcast is not ending. Christie’s time has come to an end, but podcasts will continue to going out. We’ll be continuing to host.

We’ve got actually some really exciting guests coming up in the near future. So stay tuned in, and maybe if we’re lucky Christie we’ll hop in to a few episodes in the future, I’ll be sure to pull her into a few episodes. Cause we all know how great she is. Anyway, without further ado. Enjoy today’s episode.

Christie Chirinos: [00:01:38] Oh, WordPress people. Welcome back to the WP MRR WordPress podcast. I’m Christie. And you’re listening to the WordPress business podcast. What is going on in your life this week, Joe?

Joe Howard: [00:01:51] Let’s see, uh, I am in Mexico. That’s kind of like, I guess the big thing, uh, listeners probably know, um, uh, my wife and my son and I are taking a little time in Mexico for the winter.

It’s a little warmer here than it is in Washington, DC, as people can, could probably see if you’re watching on YouTube, you can see I’ve got some nice sunshine coming in and got some nice. This is, but that’s like in my house, that’s not outside of my house. Like that’s inside my house. And then like the front door is.

Past that. So half of my houses nature. So it’s, it’s great. Everyone here is super we’re in Marietta, Mexico. Everyone here is super friendly. The weather is great. Food’s awesome. We’re not doing a whole much different honestly, than we were back in DC. We’re being pretty safe. Um, everyone here is super safe around COVID like everywhere you go is like Tran sanitizer.

Taking temperatures, like stepping on mats with sanitizer to sanitize your shoe. Everyone’s like masked up. Yeah. Yeah. It’s really, uh, people are intense down here in a good way. So yeah, staying pretty safe, enjoying the warm weather. So that’s, what’s going on with me right now and we’ll be here through March, March ish.

So yeah, nothing much has changed besides just location, but that’s a big change. So it’s

Christie Chirinos: [00:03:07] been good. That’s so nice. I mean, DC. It’s not the coldest plates. But it’s cold and frigid and uncomfortable during the winter. And

Joe Howard: [00:03:18] it’s hilarious. I talk to people who were in like way colder places and, um, I have to be like, I have to admit like, yeah, I’m a weenie.

I know, I know it doesn’t get that calls, but like, I really just like warm weather more than I like cold weather. So even though it’s like gets into the thirties and DC, Oh my God. I’m so cold. I would still rather it be in the eighties.

Christie Chirinos: [00:03:37] I think that’s cold. I think that’s cool. And I, and I lived in colder places and getting into the thirties and getting into the upper twenties.

Fahrenheit is cold. If it’s cold enough for me to pull out my parka and wear it over my clothes, that’s cold because you don’t have to do that in Meredith, Mexico.

Joe Howard: [00:04:01] No, you do not. And I am thankful for that for sure. So that’s, what’s up with me right now. Now we shift to what’s new with you, which is something definitely now

Christie Chirinos: [00:04:14] big pausing for dramatic effect.

Drum

Joe Howard: [00:04:17] roll, please. We

Christie Chirinos: [00:04:19] have some sad news drum roll, please. We have some sad news and it is that my time on WP MRR. It’s coming to an end.

Joe Howard: [00:04:32] Oh man. Oh man. Obviously I’ve known for a little while. Since we were like doing this, she got everyone. She just surprised me on the podcast, but I didn’t even know that I had, obviously I’ve known about it for a while, but it’s uh, yeah, sad for me.

And also. Full transparency to the podcast will continue. I’m going to keep doing the podcast. We’ll keep having guests on twp. MRR podcast will continue. So this is not the end of the WP MRR WordPress podcast in its entirety, but it is the end Christy of your time here, which does like, it changes a lot.

You know, we’ve been doing this for a long time, so I’ll let you go ahead. I mean, interrupt your announcement.

Christie Chirinos: [00:05:11] No, that’s extremely important and yeah. I have had so much fun doing this podcast and moving on is so bittersweet. I’m so glad that it’s going to continue and that guests will continue to come on because.

We’ve had some amazing guests so far, and there are so many people still left to have on. And part of that is that the community more sun changes and gets new people and lets go of other people and other people move on. And same thing with podcasts companies, teams, it’s all the same, right. People come in and people come out and I think what’s really cool is just making sure that.

We all stay in touch. Uh, Joe and I were talking before we started the recording about the way that in a work in 2016, we heard this idea that I honestly had never even considered up until that point that every single podcast either gets passed on to a new group of people or it eventually ends. And then you grieve and its own way.

Those are the only two ways that. A podcast can finish. And I had never considered that about the shows that I love and that I listened to when I’m walking and cooking and doing all the different things where I consume podcasts. But it’s true. We heard that at work camp 2016, right? From, yeah, from the folks over at apply filters, which then.

Published that’s last podcast in 2017. From what I see on the website,

Joe Howard: [00:06:47] I remember that I remember thinking like, cool, like almost like it hadn’t occurred to me. Like you would, and like you would just end the podcast. I think probably cause back then, like we, they, weren’t doing this podcast so podcasting, like this big cool thing.

And it was like, why would you end it? You could you have a podcast? Did you not want to do it anymore? But I think we’ve learned obviously over two years that. You know, running a podcast is awesome. We’ve had a lot of fun doing this together. We’ve gotten to know each other really well. Like we’ve become good friends because of the podcast, which may be like the best benefit.

Oh man, I’m going to tear up because Mike we’ve gotten from the podcast. It’s just like becoming really good close friends, but at the same time, not everything has to continue on. Forever. Right. I think about like professional athletes that like played for like two or three years too long. And it’s like, you should have stopped when you were doing, you would like stop on top, you know, and not go into those sad last two or three years of your career.

You know, we’re stopping on top and at least for the two of us on this podcast, and I think that’s special in its own way.

Christie Chirinos: [00:07:52] Yeah. And you know, for the listeners, I want to tell you the truth about why I’m moving on and how I had this conversation with Joe. And the reality is that over the last two years, my life has changed a lot.

And my perspective on what I need to focus on has changed so much. Three years ago, work was my entire life to a point where I never want to live in a God and I have found more balance. And right now at this moment in time, I’m putting a lot of attention into other parts of my life. That are still work because I have a very demanding job within the company, but I’m trying to look for more balance.

I’m trying to look for what’s going on in those eight hours that I’m not working in sleeping every Monday through Friday and think about how that time is also filling my values and other ways. And, um, that just means. Paying attention to other stuff. And it feels really bittersweet because I have loved doing this.

And it’s interesting to see the ways that things more from change. And, um, okay. I know I’m going to cry

Joe Howard: [00:09:11] this wasn’t the point.

I always like to think of. Uh, you know, listeners know I’m a big scifi fan and, you know, I love the matrix. And I always think about this quote, when I think about things ending, you know, everything that has a beginning has an end, Mr. Anderson, and it’s a little bit more intense in the matrix movies because it’s like the end of humanity, but like that’s quote itself always stuck with me because it is true, you know?

And it also, like when I think about that core, I think about, you know, an ending isn’t necessarily. A bad thing. Like it’s a change and change is always going to happen and it’s okay to embrace change and to embrace things in the end. Because again, you know, like I already said here, like we’ve had a great run, we’ve done a hundred plus episodes here on the podcast.

Like we should be proud of what we did and we are proud of what we did. And yeah, just because your time on the podcast is coming to a close doesn’t mean our friendship is coming to a close. I told Christie before. Well, you know, while she was telling me this, I was like, okay, yeah, full transparency. I was like, totally fine, Christie.

Like, I support you in whatever you’re doing, but we got to hop on like a monthly call or like try to, because like, we have to like, keep in touch and keep like the friendship going. Cause that’s been the most important part for us. So, you know, that will continue. I have no doubt of that. And, um, yeah, we’ll be able to look back, I think on all the episodes you’ve done together, I already do.

And I’m like, wow, like what a collection of content we have, you know, not to toot our own horn, but like, wow. Like, it’s great. Like. Enormous value. It provides, you know, probably, Oh yeah. Hundreds of hours worth of content for people who are new to WordPress, we flew, want to learn about a certain type of thing can come in to snore show.

And that is a huge accomplishment and definitely something I’m not a, you know, don’t have to necessarily just be sad just because, you know, your time has come to an end. So we

Christie Chirinos: [00:10:56] want all the listeners to know that while our co-hosting of the podcast may be wrapping up our BFF friendship, but. Is strong and continuing.

So that’s extremely important for everyone to know, but. Yeah, I don’t know. I think that that’s actually one of the biggest things from the last two years that I got out of this podcast was just getting to stay in touch with you, Joe, and also with everyone else. The guests that we’ve had on the episodes that we both had, the conversations that have come from the podcast, right.

People messaging me being like, Hey, this was really great or good job on this episode. Or this episode taught me something. I didn’t know. It’s just an incredible way to. Stay connected. Right? A podcast is such an incredible example of just enjoying the journey, because let me tell ya for those of you who may be listening, thinking, should I start my podcast?

You’re not going to get rid of doing a podcast. You got to do it because you like it. And it’s fun. I’m sorry to break it to you. And especially their independence, just having this outlet to. Stay connected and talk to people and just make sure that people are doing okay. And then record that people are doing okay.

Has been really important.

Joe Howard: [00:12:22] Yeah. I totally agree with you. I think, you know, looking back and it’s like, what is WP M R R like, we could have done this podcast, like under WP bus as a brand, we could have done it. Like under liquid web is a brand like there’s, there were other like, kind of more, probably like business related ways that we could have.

Probably, I dunno, push more business towards our podcast or towards our businesses, or just made it like monetize the podcast better. Like we definitely could have done that. But the thing I enjoy about seeing like on my Google calendar, like doing a WP MRR recording episode, whether it’s with you Christie or whether it’s with the guest or whether it’s with you and a guest is that it’s.

Time in my calendar, like I’m pretty busy. I like to stay involved and WP buffs. I like to find new people to hire and I like to bring in new folks and I like to. Do work. Like I like working at Ws, but it is nice to have a thing on my calendar that is kind of independent of that. And that is much more, it’s more focused on, like, I get to have a cool conversation with someone and I get to kind of like relax for a little bit, even though it’s recorded and people are listening to this, it’s a relaxed thing.

That’s why this podcast is so informal. And that I think has been great for me because to have your calendar so filled up with all business stuff all the time, like. Again, I like all that stuff, but you got to change the pace sometimes. And so it’s refreshing when, you know, Thursdays would come along and I’d be like, Oh, cool.

So like part of my day is like, woo, I got an hour Kristy and I get to hang and hang out or any other day of the week, I get to just sit down with the guests for a week and just kind of like shoot the shit a little bit. So I think that’s been nice to have that as like a built in. Breather, you know, into the day-to-day is hectic life of, you know, business stuff.

Christie Chirinos: [00:14:00] Right. And there were so many times that we got onto that scheduled recurring event and we didn’t even record. We just talked to process 2020 was insane. And how many times did we just sit back and say, let’s not record, are we surviving right

Joe Howard: [00:14:18] now? And listeners should probably know. This is honestly, this has been one of the hardest parts about doing this podcast is that so many, like, I very much enjoy recording this podcast and all podcasts episodes with you, Christie.

But some of the best conversations we had were the times where we said, we’re not recording today. Like something is going on, or maybe we just have, we just wanted to like sit down and chat. And like, sometimes those are the best moments, but those moments wouldn’t have happened. Had we not had a podcast spot where we said, we’re going to come in.

And then we just happened to decide, Oh, we’re not gonna record a day. Cause there’s something else you want to talk about that honestly, we didn’t. Sometimes we just didn’t want to talk about it on air. Like it’s not something you wanted to record or it’s something as much as we want to be honest and transparent about everything in our lives.

Like there’s some things it’s like a better conversation. That’s probably not recorded and uploaded online. So, but those are some of the best times, and we wouldn’t have had those opportunities. Had we not been doing a podcast and then skipping out on same, ask her the podcast this week. Let’s just, uh, let’s just chat, you know?

So I’m thankful

Christie Chirinos: [00:15:20] we stayed up to date on big life changes. We had so many big life changes. You became a dad.

Joe Howard: [00:15:29] Can we start recording before? Like Sterling was even pregnant? Like, I don’t even remember. Like we must have, it was like two, two years ago now. Right. So man. What happens? I don’t even remember what episode that was.

I think it was called Joe’s big news or something. Big something. Yeah. I’ll try to look it up here, but man so much has happened. Uh, you know, you’ve moved from one WordPress company to another, so like new professional things happening

Christie Chirinos: [00:15:59] too. Yeah, the job change was big. You know, some of our listeners know some more, none, or one of the details of a serious health situation that I went through while we were recording this podcast.

And so, so much has happened.

Joe Howard: [00:16:16] Lots of changes. And this is just another, another one of those changes. Right? And like, no one goes through a year of their lives, especially 2020 everyone’s goddamn wife changed, but nobody goes through a year of life regardless. And like, has nothing changed in it. Right. And so, yeah, I mean, we’ve been through, you’ve been through a lot in somehow.

We’ve remained the consistency over two years of doing a podcast together and releasing episodes every week. And I know that there are podcasts out there who have done five years or 10 years and never missed an episode and like good for them. I’m happy for those people. I’m proud of those people.

That’s great. But I’m proud of two years also. You know, I think that two years is a huge accomplishment with so many life changes. Like it’s hard to stay completely consistent through that time. And like, we did that. So kudos for us, I think, round robos, Pat ourselves on the back for that one. That’s right.

Yeah. Cool. I I’d honestly like to dig into maybe some of the, I don’t know if you had anything else you wanted to say about like things that you enjoyed about recording a podcast, so you can think back to, or like, Things that you benefited from about recording a podcast. We may have, I’m not looking at our show notes right now.

I apologize. Maybe you went through them all already, but that part is really interesting to me. Like just reflecting and thinking, like transition time. What am I taking away from this? No, I have a whole list.

Christie Chirinos: [00:17:35] The ability to say in touch with you and was everybody was big. And I think that’s the biggest reason to start a podcast, right?

If anybody here is listening and you’ve been thinking about starting a podcast, starting a podcast about work, about some other interests about whatever you might be thinking of as such a good way. To stay connected and that’s been a big one, but also having this podcast forced me to learn how to talk on podcasts, to learn how to talk on video, to up my camera and microphone skills and set up an understanding of how to.

No, those things right at those sort of hard audio skills, weren’t something I had when we started doing this podcast. And the other part is just how to present on a podcast. This week. I also recorded an episode for Bob WP, who is also a podcast host for very popular. I will commerce podcasts. And yeah.

Whew, exactly. And so that episode will be coming out on to stay after this. So it’s going to be next Tuesday, whatever date that is. And we recorded this podcast with a guest, the owner of recaptured Dave, and after the podcast ended, all three of us were like, That was the perfect podcast

Joe Howard: [00:19:09] often. You’re like, Whoa, that was an insanely good episode. And you just kind of know it like innately, you know, I totally get it.

Christie Chirinos: [00:19:17] Perfect. That’s an overstatement. It wasn’t perfect, but it definitely was a piece of content. It was about an hour long that all three of us innately knew we were proud of. And then Dave says, That’s because we have three podcasts, so that are experienced on this podcast.

And I was just like, wait, hold on. There’s two podcast hosts that are experienced on the podcast. Who’s the third one. And then I was like, Oh,

Joe Howard: [00:19:45] still faking it to a naked. Yeah, I am. I feel that way too.

Christie Chirinos: [00:19:48] Totally making it, you know, and that’s a skill. That I think is going to come in handy for the rest of my life.

Joe Howard: [00:19:55] Totally with you. I think it may not be exact same skill as public speaking, because there’s something about like getting in front of people and having their literal eyeballs on you that can make you nervous. That can make you forget what you’re saying, that kind of thing. And it’s a little bit different with like an online webinar.

Like a live webinar, you know, people are watching you, but it’s to their computer. So there’s another level of separation there. This podcast is even like another step back. I think it’s like, yes, we have an audience. People are listening to this right now, but not live. And we can kind of treat this as just a conversation between two or three people.

And then the audience just kind of gets into the guest to listen to them afterwards. And I felt like doing, you know, a hundred plus episodes on this podcast that I learned to. I think about it as like my brain usually moves pretty fast. And so trying to get my brain and my mouth to sync up in terms of like speed people who are on YouTube or watching the, like, do this weird thing on my face with my mouth and my brain.

But I think that kind of makes it makes sense. Like my brainwaves, my mouth have to be able to move at the same tempo in order to like actually say meaningful things in those podcasts that make sense and add value to people who are listening to help them do what we try to do, you know, grow their MRR, grow their small businesses, run a comfortable business, you know, that kind of thing.

So I think that. When we started the podcast, you know, we go back and listen to the first 10 episodes. We were probably okay. At talking, I’m sure we were a little janky and we were kind of like, you know, the here and there and yeah. Thoughts were floating around a little bit. Now. I think we do one. I think we probably do a better job now of just speaking more, a little bit more eloquently and thoughtfully, but also.

I think just like we’ve developed a good rapport together to where we kind of, I don’t know when you’re saying something, I kind of like can predict where you’re going. Sometimes that feels like this magical thing, but it’s because we’ve done so many episodes together, you know, it’s not just not just a random thing.

So I think we’ve also like develop the sense of how to do that as well. And that’s a really valuable skill because listening is so important, you know? Instead of trying to think about the next thing I want to say on this podcast, because I have to say it, I’m trying to focus more on what you’re saying and then go off what you’re saying and not come back.

Just so the thing I was thinking of, just because I like have to say that thing and sound smarter, something it’s like, no, like, listen, and then move forward. We don’t have to say things just for the hell of saying them. Let’s. You know, keep a good template going. So I don’t know. That’s some of those are some of the things I feel like I’ve learned them.

It’s right there with you in terms of what you were

Christie Chirinos: [00:22:17] saying. That’s been huge for me too. I think that I’ve learned a little bit more about how to hook into a conversation. That’s not something that I felt very comfortable doing two years ago. And I think I just learned how to fix a move my bad habits in speech.

Now, obviously, honestly, when you talk to me in person and it’s not even something I have an outline for in, and I’m just talking about stuff, especially if you’re asking me for my opinion or my ideas, I’m really going to struggle to finish my sentences. I’m going to be like, but what about this? You know, I’ll go in like three different sentence fragments.

I do this when I write too, if I ever write just sort of stream of consciousness to get all the ideas that I want to do in there. My writing has parentheses around all these weird ideas. It’s just how my brain works. But in podcasts, especially listening to myself, look, I just did it. It’s frustrating. So I had to learn over time to stop myself from doing that.

And that’s going to help me for the rest of my life because it’s a really annoying

Joe Howard: [00:23:23] habit. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I didn’t know that about you look at this, our last episode together. I’m still learning new things about how you write and how you think so. Um, yeah, I liked also what you said about the gear situation.

I never like would have had an excuse to get like a nice nicer microphone. Not too expensive, a hundred buck microphone, but like sounds so much better. And some, when I’m not mobile here, like my home setup, I had stuff pretty laid out pretty nicely, but just to get a good tech setup at home, it was kind of just an excuse to do that.

You know, we started off, we were just like, whatever, equipment’s fine. Whatever equipment you have is probably fine. And then like, you know, over the course of time, we kind of upgraded things a little bit and now we kind of have a, it’s like a little bit more built into our day-to-day digital life, regardless of podcasting stuff, you know, we kinda know, Oh, maybe need a nice camera or, and that can be talking on this crappy MacBook camera, sorry.

Uh, but you know, usually we want to try and get a good camera and we’re not as mobile and, you know, a nicer microphone for good audio. And that’s just really important, especially if you’re working. All the time digitally. So I think that helped like cement in that piece of like, you know, if you’re going to work digitally, if you’re going to work remotely, like.

Do it, you know, invest a little bit in it when you can and when you’re, when you’re able to. So

Christie Chirinos: [00:24:37] if you have the money, it’s totally worth it. You know, gear hadn’t even been on my list that I made, but it’s actually huge. And it has also helped me in other parts of my life. One of the things that I am making room for in this effort to find more balance in my life and to allocate more time to things that aren’t work and living is music and I’ve written.

So much in 2020, because we had nothing else better to do. Everybody else is doing something everybody’s life has changed in some way due to this completely unprecedented event. And the way that my life changed, one of the ways in which my life changed was I started writing a ton and I have so many interesting things coming out this year that you’re going to see as you follow me on social media about.

Art and creativity, but one of the people who has been helping me grow in that area asked me what I have at home to record vocals and record demonstrations of the things I’ve written. And I told him, and he was like, what?

And I was like, I mean, I did this podcast. Yeah. So I have this microphone and he’s just like, Okay, so you’re ready to go. You don’t need to buy anything. And I was like, yeah,

Joe Howard: [00:26:00] it feels good. Already leveled up. So yeah, I’m with you. We wanted to get through on this episode is just some of our favorite episodes from the podcast.

We have a nice little list here of some of our favorite ones. So maybe we can do a little lightning round of some of our favorite episodes of the podcast we’ve done together. So Christie, you want to start us off or maybe you can just present them and I’ll just, you know,

Christie Chirinos: [00:26:21] Yeah. Oh my gosh, absolutely. I’ll present them, especially because I had strong stances on the selection of this list.

Um, but the first one that I put on here was episode 94, which was the future of funding and WordPress. I, I love this episode because it’s the thing that I’m passionate about. I think that we’re going to watch this industry mature and expand in ways that nobody could have imagined when WordPress started.

And I’m a huge advocate for getting excited about it and thinking that more entrance and more attention is good. And it’s an opportunity to get the really great parts of the WordPress open source project, more embedded into how the web works. So I’m really excited about it. And I just thought it was such a fun episode to talk about.

And. Play around with the ideas about how to make sure that that development is good and that we push it in the right direction. So I don’t know. I love that one. What did you think?

Joe Howard: [00:27:25] Yeah. I’m with you. Those are always fun conversations to have too. Think about not only like the businesses we work in or the sectors we work in, but how does the whole industry we work in affect our business and how does our business affect the industry as a whole?

How does the industry fit into tech as a bigger ecosystem? And how does that fit into the world as a bigger ecosystem? Those are like bigger 30,000 foot conversations. Like really get my brain like. Woo. Like I’m in my happy zone when I’m talking about that stuff. And especially when I’m talking to somebody who’s like super knowledgeable in this area, like you, like, you give me all sorts of like the light bulb moments.

And so that was a great episode is actually interesting time to talk about it. I think a little bit about like acquisition stuff in that episode, as we’re recording this, it is not announced yet, but when this episode goes live, we WP buffs will have made an announcement, Christie that. You know, we launched our acquisition unit last year.

We’ll be announcing our first acquisition soon, next Tuesday. So keep an eye out for that. Well, I guess it will have already gone live once the podcast comes out. So WPZ is now part of the WP buffs family. It’s another care plan company and yeah, more details about that. Will you, people can find it anywhere.

So I’m not going to talk about it here on the podcast, but. That is exciting. And so WF is kind of becoming part of the, like this word for sequences. And we talked about, so like, man, like a lot of moving pieces, but I anyway, I enjoyed that episode a lot and I thought that was, that was really fun. So cool.

Episode 94, the future of funding in WordPress, any other. What are their favorite episodes that you

Christie Chirinos: [00:28:55] have? Wait, I have final thoughts on the future of funding and word WordPress. You know, one of the things that I, I just love that episode so much. And one of the things that I know will be true for my life and probably for everybody’s life.

People just have varying degrees of comfort with this idea is that chances are, you’re not going to be doing the same thing from the time you start working to the time you retire. You’re probably going to do all kinds of different jobs that you couldn’t possibly imagine. Many people change careers, many people change levels of income up and down and up and down, up and down.

And for me, I know that I just want to be able to pursue the things that I’m passionate about and I want to not be afraid of change and embrace it. And something that I have thought about in the past is I want to document. Things like episode 94. I want us to really have an understanding on this fundamental and academic basis as to what happened and how WordPress was born and how it evolved into an industry and how an open source project like that.

Evolved into this ecosystem of plugins and automatic and web hosting companies. And I think there’s something so fascinating about that because it has broken down the traditional model of commerce, right. Buy something, sell it for more. That’s not quite what’s happening here. And I think it’s so interesting to think about it that way and think about the fact that we’ve participated in something that is pretty revolutionary, even if right now that revolution feels largely undefined.

Joe Howard: [00:30:47] Well, you’re not allowed to say big, awesome stuff like that. And then make me want to record like 10 more episodes about that. So often not to the pockets anymore. So yeah, you’ll have to, you’ll have to come back and do some guest appearances so we can, yeah, we’ll

Christie Chirinos: [00:30:58] start a new podcast. I will do guest appearances.

So. Because honestly, we’re going to have this monthly catch-up and you know, there’s going to be new. So I’m going to be like, I really want to talk about this and then we’ll start a new podcast. Yeah. So I don’t know. I just think that that episode was so cool because I’m so interested in that particular topic.

So I loved

Joe Howard: [00:31:22] that. Of our favorites episode one 19 that we did with, uh, Brian Krogsgard, who runs post status and who, uh, uh, does the post status podcast, although I’m not sure if he does the, all the podcasts still, but you know, one of the premier podcasts in the WordPress space as well. So people should go tune into that one as well.

But we didn’t episode with Brian, uh, that was what an automatic IPO in 2021 means for WordPress professionals. And that was really good. Brian, super smart dude, watching YouTube, like. Just boom. Talk about financial stuff. It was like super eye to me. Who’s like fly on the wall. Like I’m cool. I pretty much know what you’re saying.

I know, I know what Bitcoin is and I understand, you know, that stuff, but that was a great episode and really cool to hear about again, bigger picture WordPress based stuff. Yeah. That

Christie Chirinos: [00:32:09] one was fun because I like dreaming about the future and I think that’s what a lot of that episode was about. Right. It was what could happen.

What if this happened? What would. This look like if this event preceded it and that was kind of a blast. I think that Brian is someone that likes to do that kind of thing, and successfully built a community around. Thinking about the future and believing in the future. And so it was closely related to episode 94, and

Joe Howard: [00:32:41] I liked that.

Agreed. I don’t mean to rush us through the end of this podcast, but I have to watch Mo in seven minutes. So we’re going to run through these last couple of episodes, quickly episode 122, a sugar business take political stances. That was super interesting. Really good question. You know, there’s, I don’t know if there’s a right answer.

But it was really interesting to have the conversation and think about all the different aspects of it. Yeah. You liked that episode

Christie Chirinos: [00:33:04] too. I love that episode because so much of my work so far has related political stances and activism to technology. Right. I think WordPress is an inherently political thing.

I say that in episode one, 22, and I also explicitly used WordPress in political non-profits. Settings before caldera forms and then liquid web. And so I love talking about that episode. I think that it’s worth thinking about it. Um, definitely. I think my views on this have evolved and morphed since we recorded that episode.

And that is part of what is interesting and fun about this podcast. And I think evolved and morphed often sounds like change. I don’t think it’s really changed, but it’s definitely evolved and become more nuanced.

Joe Howard: [00:33:55] Yes. Agreed. And then we go back to listen to episode 50 episodes ago. We’ll probably look back and hear ourselves and be like, I don’t necessarily a hundred percent with what I said before, or maybe I totally disagree.

Maybe we have totally changed her mind, but definitely you will evolve. And you’re thinking in terms of what you used to think and what you think now. So cool. Last favorite that you had down, and that’s definitely a favorite of mine too, was what it’s really like to be people of color in the WordPress community and that’s episode 99.

Very important episode for, you know, 2021. Why’d you have that one down, just one of your favorites that you did or that we did, honestly,

Christie Chirinos: [00:34:32] I think that for me, episode 99 was a turning point in the kind of thing that I felt I could say, because one of the things that we discuss in that episode is that a lot of the time you, as a person of color, do not protest what you see around you because you have a mission to accomplish.

So you figure out. Which fights to fight and which fights are going to get delayed for later. And for me, it was a very powerful experience to know that I’m in a position in life where I can get on the recorded podcast that I co-host and say, this are the things that I don’t think are right. And that was a really powerful moment.

Uh, and I think that a lot of our listeners felt that because I, I don’t know about you, Joe, but I probably got the most feedback on that episode of all the ones that we’ve.

Joe Howard: [00:35:25] Yeah, it was a lot. I also got a lot of people saying I’m really glad you to do this podcast. Um, because I’m not trying to talk down on white males who also run WordPress podcasts, but most of the people who run WordPress podcasts.

Look pretty similar. And again, I’m not trying to talk down on anybody. I absolutely know what I’m doing, but we do stand out, I think a little bit from the crowd in terms of like what we look like compared to what other WordPress podcasts do and our perspective, it makes our unique perspective, importance on a host of issues, whether they’re business or whether it’s race or whether, you know, anything like that.

It’s important to hear unique viewpoints from the perspective of people who may not look like you, or may not act like you were, or just. Different than you in a lot of ways. And so that’s important. So I’m with you. Very good episode there.

Christie Chirinos: [00:36:13] Yeah. And the last bit on that, for me, that is so important to mention is that for the last two years, I was so proud of this.

We have been a podcast hosted by minorities that isn’t about being a minority. We’re talking about hustling, about business, about running our teams about the future of the technology. And this was the only episode that we ever did. That was about being minorities. And we did it because this summer we saw a significant.

Protests about these long and systemic injustices in the United States. And it’s just been so amazing for me to be a part of this. I’m not going to cry for

Joe Howard: [00:36:53] real stop. My gosh, I was going to do our usual ending here, but people know, people keep listening, you know, how we end the show. So I was going to hand it off to you, Chrissy.

I wanted to just, I wanted to see if there was anything. That you wanted to kind of say in partying, this is not goodbye forever. Again, you’ll be back on the podcast. Don’t worry. We’ll will come back on. But like for now taking a breather, anything you’d like to say listeners over the past hundred plus episodes that have been here for us and anything.

Yeah. Anything you want to say? It’s honestly

Christie Chirinos: [00:37:22] been an honor. I feel like we just spent an hour saying everything I wanted to say about why is this happening? Where my life is going and just. How grateful I am to have been a part of this experience and extremely clarifying that Joe and I are staying in touch and keeping the awesome going.

So actually, I’m going to end the episode the way we normally do, which is I’m going to tell you where to find money for the rest of the time being. I won’t be on the podcast, but seriously. Find me, you can reach out to me on Twitter. I’m at  that’s X, T I E C H I R I N O S. My DMS are open and I just want to know what you liked about WP MRR and what you’re thinking for the future.

You can also find me on my website, Chrissy cherry.com, C H R I S. T I E C H I R I N O s.com and send me a message. There’s a contact form over there. There’s several things out there that just, uh, let you know a little bit about me, what I’m doing, where I’m going. Uh, I’m on LinkedIn, but LinkedIn is blessed.

Joe Howard: [00:38:38] That’s still a thing.

Christie Chirinos: [00:38:43] I don’t remember. I would have to look. Yeah, well, you know what. I, I probably still own it. So you can probably also go to business.business. Honestly, I’m just going to replay it through my personal website and yeah, send me an email. Um, my email is on my weapon. It’s on Twitter and, um, yeah, it has

Joe Howard: [00:39:06] been an honor.

Yes. Well, we will be in your podcast players again. Next Tuesday, WP MRR, WordPress podcasts. We’ll be Christy will be in your podcast players in the future of this. Maybe not every week, we’ve been forward, but as always, thanks for listening. And we’ll catch you next Tuesday.