[wp-trac] [WordPress Trac] #16898: Fix plugins about page license requirement

[WordPress Trac]

#16898: Fix plugins about page license requirement
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 Reporter:  scribu              |       Owner:
     Type:  feature request     |      Status:  new
 Priority:  normal              |   Milestone:  WordPress.org
Component:  WordPress.org site  |     Version:
 Severity:  normal              |  Resolution:
 Keywords:                      |
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Comment (by Rarst):

 Disclaimer - I don't have any issue whatsoever licensing my own code under
 GPLv2 or compatible. We don't have such issue at work either.

 However - there is plenty of code out there that is meant to be used by
 developers as libraries/components, that is not compatible to GPLv2
 (typical case is Apache License).

 Just from personal experience:

  - I had to use inferior JavaScript solution for charting, because my
 first choice was under Apache License;
  - I had to write from scratch PHPDoc parser because best fitting ready-
 made library I found moved on from GPLv2 to GPLv3;
  - I need to upgrade library to accommodate Google API changes and I can't
 use official Google's library which is under Apache License.

 And another issue is - this rule is not respected de-facto. There are
 hundreds of files in repository licensed under Apache (just google
 {{{"Apache License" inurl:trunk site:http://plugins.svn.wordpress.org/}}}
 ). Probably as many GPLv3 only and others. I've seen as bad as "all rights
 reserved - do not copy without permission".

 Developers trying to follow rules are forced to use inferior libraries or
 invent the wheel.

 Developers who don't give a damn about rules (or ignorant of them) just go
 on filling repo with incompatible code, because this rule is paper tiger.

 For the inclusion in core argument it would probably be easier to not get
 into trouble by assuming that anything in repository is not compatible and
 needs checking. Because in current situation just seems more likely to get
 one into trouble by assuming that everything there is GPLv2 - it isn't.

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Ticket URL: <http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/16898#comment:8>
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