The benefits and drawbacks of working from home — or having employees working from home — has been a big topic of discussion in the online advertising and publishing worlds, ever since new Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer told the company’s telecommuters to come into an office or say bye bye to their jobs.

One contrary point of view came from an interesting and influential voice this week — WordPress founding developer Matt Mullenweg, who was interviewed by AllThingsD’s Kara Swisher at SXSW Interactive.

“Why are so many companies set into this factory model?” Mullenweg asked. “Find the best people you can and let them do their work.”

Of Automattic’s 150 employees, only around 20 come in to the company’s headquarters in San Francisco, Mullenweg said. The rest are spread around the world. And that has been the company’s philosophy from its founding 7 years ago.

“We have the technology,” the well-known tech innovator said, referring to software that allows employees to connect in a variety of different ways, such as video and text, both synchronously and asynchronously.

For more on Mullenweg’s comments about the future of blogging and WordPress, check out our wider coverage. 

Full disclosure: many employees of Marketing Land’s parent company, Third Door Media, work from home offices.

Related Topics: Blogging | Channel: Content Marketing | Yahoo: Business Issues

About The Author: Pamela Parker is executive features editor of Marketing Land and a contributing editor for Search Engine Land. She’s a well-respected authority on digital marketing, having reported and written on the subject since 1998, including a stint as managing editor of ClickZ. She’s also worked to help monetize independent publishers’ sites at Federated Media Publishing. She blogs about media and marketing at The River and about cooking, gardening and parenthood at Free Range. See more articles by Pamela Parker

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