Weekly WordPress News: iThemes Acquires Restrict Content Pro

Hey, WordPress friends.

In big news this week, iThemes acquired the popular Restrict Content Pro plugin from Sandhills Development, the same company behind Easy Digital Downloads. It’s yet another big acquisition in the WordPress space after iThemes themselves were acquired by Liquid Web in 2018.

Beyond that, there’s a new WordPress maintenance release in WordPress 5.5.1.

Let’s get to all of this week’s WordPress news…

WORDPRESS NEWS AND ARTICLES

• iThemes has acquired Restrict Content Pro from Sandhills Development – a big acquisition of a popular membership plugin.
• WordPress 5.5.1 Maintenance Release – a new maintenance release.
• WordPress Plugin Authors Should Avoid Confusing Users When Naming Blocks – what do you think?
• Jetpack 8.9: New ways to grow subscribers and collect donations – it adds new newsletter signup and donation blocks.
• Stepping Into a Market With Major Players, Mario Peshev Acquires WP-CRM System – another acquisition in the WordPress space.
• Founders Yoast SEO take a stake in WordProof to push timestamp relevance for SEO results – WordProof getting even more attention.
• 700,000 WordPress Users Affected by Zero-Day Vulnerability in File Manager Plugin – make sure to update if you’re using this plugin.

TUTORIALS AND HOW-TOS

• How to Create a Custom WordPress Registration Page (Easy Guide) – create your own registration page.
• How to Use Shopify With WordPress (Display Products on WordPress) – how to combine Shopify and WordPress.
• WordPress mu-Plugins: Your Guide to Using Must-Use Plugins – learn what mu-plugins are and how to use them.
• How to Password Protect WordPress Site – how to password protect your site.
• How to Create an Addon for Local by Flywheel – helpful if you’re using Local for local development.

RESOURCES

• Placid Review: Automatically Generate WordPress and Social Media Images – this tool helps you automatically create unique images.
• Short Video Gallery Plugin Review: Like Instagram or TikTok, but for WordPress – use short video on your WordPress site.
• Launching products like he’s in the Matrix w/ Iain Poulson – a new episode of the Matt Report podcast.
• How Aaron Bowie Left His IT Job to Build a Full-Blown WooCommerce Extensions Business – a new episode of the Freemius podcast.