I honestly thought my site had been hacked – some sort of warning please?

We’ve updated the plugin to add the announcement. Here’s the full post:

https://www.monsterinsights.com/welcome-to-monsterinsights/

Sorry for the confusion ??

I’ll second that… Broken on the first day it was taken over!

https://snag.gy/Zq4Cc.jpg

5.4.8.1 was just pushed. Some how the translation files were corrupted.

I appreciate the overall change and re-brand. This will be good for the plugin in the long run. I get why it happened.

But WOW – this was bad for users.

• NOTHING in the plugin changelog to say that this happened.
• It was a MINOR 0.0.x release. I get that it didn’t change any functionality, but a larger version number bump might have drawn attention to what you just did.
• A green monster icon appeared in my Dashboard menu without notification. A MONSTER?! I TOTALLY freaked out.

At the very least, update the changelog in the README to say what’s happened. Please.

Poor change control!!!
Don’t like the Green Monster in my menu. Please remove it.

I agree with Ross. There is absolutely no mention of the transfer of ownership in the changelog or anywhere in the plugin description. I thought the plugin got hijacked when I looked at the changelog from my dashboard. It makes me a bit apprehensive to update to the latest version. You should have handled the transfer differently and made it transparent.

Hi there,
So to address some of the concerns:

The versions were bumped so they’d be in sync. For the free version, this meant a 2 minor version bump. For one of the addons this meant 2 full major version bumps.

I thought I had included information about the acquisition in the changelog, but I apparently didn’t. That’s totally on me, and I can certainly understand why people might be a bit upset over that. I’m going to be adding some information about it after I finish writing this reply.

The green icon, Charlie, is our new mascot. The first version of it was a bit too bright, but I did try to correct that with an update to adjust the opacity about 10 minutes after we first got requests for it. We’re working on bringing it more into line with the rest of the menu design in future releases.

We’re working as hard and as fast as possible to address concerns as they arise.

-Chris

Hi Chris,
i have updated the plugin(s) today.
We are using Google Analytics by MonsterInsights and the Google Analytics by MonsterInsights eCommerce tracking addon.

I am getting an error now:
“You need to install or update either Google Analytics By MonsterInsights or MonsterInsights Pro before you can use the MonsterInsights eCommerce addon!”

Both plugins are updated to the newest version…
Thank you for your help,
Philip

Thank GOD I still have control over the updates. I also thought that the plugin got hijacked.

NOT a very good first impression!

I have deactivated and deleted Yoast, but the green monster is still there. How do I get rid of it?

@mysticguy9 you might have uninstalled Yoast SEO instead of Google Analytics by Yoast which is now Google Analytics by MonsterInsights.

Hey guys, in regards to this switch up I thought I’d add my impressions as well in the interest of transparency before we abandon ship and as we’re trying to figure out what to do. We were also initially caught off guard and suspected foul play. (no need to dwell on that, what’s done is done)

For something that for many sites is set-and-forget when just using it for adding the tracking code this is not a very welcome change.

It is very visually prominent:
– Color / mass of icon
– Positioned at top of menu
– the word Monster is very aggressive and an out-of-nowhere brand term. Some of the other “monster” brands in our realm have less than stellar reps…

It doesn’t make any mention of analytics in the menu item. Insights is a far more engaging term than analytics and maybe it hints at plans for the plugin – it just doesn’t seem to fit with the Google Analytics part being core to the purpose. I understand the change and the desire to brand it but I find these changes a bit problematic.

Perhaps give some easy options to move it to within Settings menu or at least down low?

We use some of your other plugins and they are solid and you have a great rep. Frankly, for this plugin’s function we’re now less likely to use it and may even start switching sites out (several hundred). It is just too brash / bold for what it is and our clients’ WordPress admin experience is already strained.

@panagiotis yep, you are right. Thanks.

Not a great first impression, I agree. I think this will alarm some of my clients and will be looking at alternatives.

Mojo Themes what?