Devin Walker has stepped into the role of Artistic Director (head) of Jetpack at Automattic. Best known as co‑founder of GiveWP and creator of WP Rollback, Devin brings broad experience across development, design, marketing, and support. After GiveWP was acquired and a stint at Liquid Web, he left in August 2025 and chose to lead Jetpack because of its reach and the chance to make a meaningful, wide‑ranging impact across the WordPress ecosystem.
Why Jetpack
Devin weighed launching another independent project versus joining Automattic. He chose Jetpack for its scale—installed on millions of sites—and for the engineering and product challenge it represents. He acknowledged Jetpack’s polarizing reputation and the frequent “jack of all trades” critique, but sees a real opportunity to tighten focus, improve polish, and give the product clearer product direction so it serves users better.
Scope and immediate priorities
Jetpack is a bundle: site stats, backups, security, performance, social sharing, forms, VideoPress, basic SEO and more. Devin’s near‑term goal isn’t to keep adding isolated features; it’s to refine the existing set and prioritize what moves the needle for most users. Forms is a top priority—recent updates (15.2 and the forthcoming 15.3) introduce significant improvements, and Devin is leading the push to make forms genuinely useful for the majority of site owners while recognizing that highly specialized power users will still need dedicated tools.
Organization and how work gets done
Automattic is shifting from a traditional functional structure to a more matrixed model. Instead of siloed Jetpack teams, architecture and design resources now span .com, Jetpack, WooCommerce, and other products. That creates both opportunity and complexity: tighter integrations become possible (with Jetpack providing cloud services and “secret sauce” to enhance self‑hosted sites), but coordination across teams and shared roadmaps are essential.
Devin describes the working environment as more fluid and collaborative. Engineers and designers can concentrate on initiatives like forms and then move to other priorities as needed. That flexibility supports cross‑product work—Jetpack + WooCommerce, for example—but makes careful resource choices and clear roadmapping more important than ever.
AI and the future of site building
AI is a central investment area. Jetpack already includes subtle AI features—auto‑generated excerpts, suggested featured images, and other content aids—but Automattic is building a much larger platform to bring .com capabilities to self‑hosted WordPress through Jetpack. A dedicated engineering effort is rebuilding the foundation for AI features to act as a content companion across the WP admin: helping authors, improving visitor engagement, aiding conversions and presales, and more.
Devin points to Telex, Automattic’s block‑generation tool, as an example of where this can go: AI could generate custom blocks or visual effects on demand, and Jetpack could manage, deploy, and update those generated elements across sites. The vision is not just add‑ons, but an integrated toolset that amplifies site creators’ productivity.
Focus, simplification, and user experience
A recurring theme for Devin is simplification. Jetpack must reduce confusing overlaps—too many toggles, scattered controls, unclear relationships with wordpress.com, and inconsistent behavior between classic and block themes. His plan includes consolidating controls, streamlining onboarding, and applying frameworks like Jobs to Be Done to design flows around user goals rather than feature lists.
Because Jetpack runs on millions of sites, changes must be measured and reliable. Automattic releases monthly and prioritizes stability; historically, breaking changes and support gaps drive negative reviews. Devin intends to balance cautious rollouts with targeted, faster improvements where safe, using better onboarding and clearer navigation to explain Jetpack’s value.
Marketing and public communication
Devin sees an opportunity to strengthen Jetpack’s marketing. The plugin once benefitted from being an early, broad solution, but the ecosystem has matured and competitors now use focused marketing to win users. He plans to publish more of Jetpack’s internal thinking (many updates currently live on P2s), refresh public messaging, and clarify who Jetpack is for and what it does. Improving public perception will be pursued alongside product work.
Community, feedback, and accountability
Devin emphasizes doing this work with user feedback, not in isolation. He’s been meeting across teams, mapping product history and ownership, and publishing a P2 called “Connecting the Dots.” He invites users to try Jetpack today, share feedback, and follow the roadmap.
Contact and a promised check‑in
For feedback Devin points to [email protected] and jetpack.com/feedback, and he’s reachable on Twitter (@innerwebs) and via his site (devin.org). He and Nathan agreed to a public check‑in in 12 months to review progress and measure improvements in UX, reviews, and product cohesion.
In short
Devin took on Jetpack to bring clearer focus, better UX, and deeper AI integration to a sprawling but powerful product. His approach is to consolidate and polish core capabilities (forms, onboarding, SEO basics), build AI features that act as a content and site‑building companion, improve public communication, and make changes carefully given Jetpack’s large installed base.