I'm really liking the recent acquisitions from Automattic. I'm just starting to use Day One and really enjoy it. Pocket Casts is a fantastic podcast app, though I prefer to use AntennaPod. WordPress is also starting to make it easy to plug into the Fediverse using your blog. I'm excited for Texts and what that might offer in the current siloed messaging landscape.

Automattic, the company that runs WordPress.com, Tumblr, Pocket Casts, and a number of other popular web properties, just made a different kind of acquisition: it’s buying Texts, a universal messaging app, for $50 million.

Texts is an app for all your messaging apps. You can use it to log in to WhatsApp, Instagram, LinkedIn, Signal, iMessage, and more and see and respond to all your messages in one place.

...Mullenweg says he’s bullish on solutions like Matrix, which offers a decentralized and open-source messaging network, and other up-and-coming standards for messaging. He’s already thinking about how Texts might gently nudge people toward more open protocols over time.

Mullenweg and Automattic see a big future for messaging, as more online interaction shifts away from public-first social networks and toward things like group chats. Hardly anyone has figured out how to build a meaningful and sustainable business from chat, but Mullenweg thinks it’s possible. And he thinks it starts with making your messaging a little less messy.