Joshua Strebel Interviews Alex King 10 Days Before His Death

In September of 2015, Joshua Strebel, founder of Pagely, announced that Alex King would be one of the speakers at Pressnomics 4, an annual conference devoted to the business aspects of WordPress. Unfortunately, days after the announcement, King passed away from colon cancer.

Due to health reasons, King would not have been able to attend the event in person. Instead, Strebel flew to King’s house and recorded a 40 minute bedside interview. In the interview, which is edited beautifully, the duo discuss King’s career, lessons learned managing Crowd Favorite, and if Automattic is the empire, who fills the role of Darth Vader.

Jeff Matson who writes and maintains documentation for Rocketgenius and who’s attending the event, describes the crowd’s reaction after watching the interview, “Insightful and full of emotion, where a standing ovation was not only warranted, but mandatory. The crowd’s reaction truly showed how loved and respected Alex King was.”

As I watched the interview, it was difficult not to cry. King passed away 10 days after it was recorded and even then, he had a sense of humor. King is survived by his wife Heather and his daughter Caitlin.