It looks like the hammer just dropped at Wordpress.
What I find most interesting is how many people are making comments with complete convinction, yet not entirely correct, such as this one:
"The GPL (current version, if you must ask) demands that any derivative work of the WordPress codebase must be available for free. It matters not what licensing you apply to code you create that depends on WordPress code for its own functioning; it matters that you understand that it is a derivative work and that you must make it available for free."
That clearly shows they misunderstand the GPL.
Bookmark
Email this
Hits: 4918
Comments (18)
Show/hide comments
brianteeman
said:
|
... to be fair the guy does stand corrected on the meaning of free later on in one of the comments. there is also a very interesting discussion regarding "child themes" which is worth reading in the comments. |
barrienorth
said:
|
... Well, I would say his absolutist comment has more issue than that. The GPL says you must make the SOURCE CODE of derivative works available IF you DISTRIBUTE them (and yes, they don't have to be free) To see that some fundamentals of the GPL are being misunderstood and then the misunderstandings are being laid down as law is... worrying. (IANAL) |
alledia
said:
|
... The real problem here is a lack of communication. Wordpress needed to announce and discuss what they planned to do at least a couple of weeks and ideally a couple of months before they acted. |
barrienorth
said:
|
... Here is another good onennWARNING... INACCURATE LEGAL ADVICE WAS CONTAINED IN THAT POSTnn"You are free to remove those links from the theme that author tried to forbid you from (even from sponsored themes). Even when an author slaps a CC (Creative Commons) license on the theme, and demands you respect the links or work, you do not have to as they are actually violating the GPL by putting CC over it."nnThis is not true and I would advise against any of those blog readers to do this.nnIf Wordpress.org say the themes are GPL, then THEY (specifically Matt as I think he is the copyright holder) are the ones that must take the legal action.nnIf the end user removes the links then THEY are the ones violating the copyright that theme was shipped with and could be liable. |
Vimes
said:
|
... "The solution exists and is technical in nature. For plugins you can develop your whole code as a library under your own licensing model. Then you would have the wordpress plugin which will call functions from your library. The plugin itself becomes GPL but the library not and you are free to slap any kind of license and restriction to it." Wasn't this approach studied by the good folks at SMF and then discarded because the Joomla team's interpretation meant that the GPL would virally infect the bridging library and thereby your plugin? |
Hendry Lee
said:
|
... I'm anxiously awaiting for someone at WordPress to announce their stand on this issue. It is important for the entire community to set a new direction for their business, if it needs be and make sure most theme and plugin developers have a business that comply to the license. |
kristarella
said:
|
... @alledia I think WordPress.org is entitled to support any themes they want and I think it's a good move to support themes that use GPL. It would have caused less of a stink if there was some communication I suppose, but I wouldn't call it a "problem" per se. @Hendry I agree. I'm searching for something from WP that actually states what they consider to be derivative. Calling WP functions may be using rather than deriving and there is GPL software out there that allows for this sort of thing. This article wasn't really helpful. Thanks to the other commenters for adding more value, but if you think the statement misunderstands the GPL state how. Yes, the GPL clearly says that it is not monetary freedom they're concerned with, if that the only thing wrong with the quote? |
barrienorth
said:
|
... @kristarella The intent of the post was simply to highlight the news. I don't really want to get into my opinions about the issue. I did that with the Joomla debate and had crazy people calling me "evil"....  But as you asked... There were four gaping holes in the statement given by an unqualified blogger: 1. GPL doesn't have to be free (that got addressed) 2. That templates are derivative is legal opinion, not legal fact 3. Actual derivative work only needs to be GPL if you *distribute* the derived work 4. You have to make the source code available, not the finished product |
tj.baker
said:
...4. You have to make the source code available, not the finished product In the case of a template, would one have to distribute images as part of the 'source code'? |
barrienorth
said:
|
... Its my understanding (and one indicated by GNU) that CSS and images are not part of the source code. For a Joomla template that would be the index.php file. Matt and Wordpress seem to ignore this tiny point though. |
Jerren
said:
|
... Now I'm curious Barry, what legally constitutes "distribution" of a GNU derived work that would require full disclosure of the code? It may sound like a silly question but hear me out as a quasi-technical lawyer could really make a mess of it for the rest of us. 1) Does putting your template on your website where it is downloaded and rendered on a local PC enough? (presumably not as the css and images do not count per GNU) 2) If you install you template and code on a customer's server yourself? 3) Same question as #2 but you do not charge for this as part of a larger services agreement as a vehicle for dissemination of other information which is not derived work. 4) If you make the compiled/encoded product available for download versus traditional "distribution" methods? (pull versus the traditional push method of cd's or magnetic media) You could potentially make a case for or against all four scenarios in my mind but I'm wondering where the case law stands right now around this issue as I don't think it has really been widely publicized in the mainstream media to date. |
Compass Design
said:
|
... One of the issues here is there is hardly any case law... close to zero. Thus much is legal opinion rather than legal fact. Its my understanding that 1, 2 and 3 are *not* distribution..... |
brianteeman
said:
|
... Distribution exists when you pass an item to another party 1. this is not distribution under GPL V2 2 & 3 probably is distribution but may depend on your locality as "worker for hire" regulations may apply. 4. this is distribution. The method use to "pass" the item is irrelevant it is the act of transfer that is |
brianteeman
said:
|
... I knew you'd get it evenntualy Barrie - listen to Brian he knows his stuff and only comments when he is confident in his answer  |
julienJ
said:
|
... interesting discussion. I think i can talk for thousand of people, web designer, web developer or how ever one can call himself; there are so many different licenses around, and of course when you read them, they are all written in legal terms which most of people still don't understand much (lawyers need to justify their hourly rate, if legal text would be simple to read we would not need them, wouldn't we?). it would be a good thing for all developers to add the main point on top of labeling which license they apply to their product, such as "you can use it on commercial site", "you can resell" etc.... as some are already do. ps: i stumble upon a site once that gives all the main point in "vulgar" (in the first definition of that word) manner for each license. Does anybody has that link by any chance? |
Write comment
Show/hide comment form
