[wp-hackers] 500 euros for WP + plugins

[Robert Deaton]

I think that you've never read the GPL or any real resources on it, nor 
understand the purpose of the GPL. I highly suggest that before you accuse 
someone of being in violation of the GPL you read up on what exactly the GPL 
is for.

On 7/9/05, Amit Gupta <amit at igeek.info> wrote:
> 
>  On Fri, 08 Jul 2005 "Matt Mullenweg" <m at mullenweg.com> wrote:
> > I'm curious how people feel about this:
> > http://www.semiologic.com/projects/sem-theme-pro/
> what are you curious about? that someone's making money by way of 
> WordPress? Or is he doing any violations of the license? or something else? 
> :)
> I doubt that its the first time someone's making money through WordPress. 
> There are a lot of people who provide consultancy for WordPress and setup 
> WordPress for clients for a fee. Its just that its the first time(as I see 
> it) that someone is doing this in such an advertised way.
> 
> 
> On Fri, 08 Jul 2005 "Firas D." <fd at firasd.org> wrote:
> > Although that part about 'An entire collection of (debugged) third party
> > plugins, all one click installs' does make my stomach churn a wee bit. 
> > Which plugins, how debugged, going to share the source..?
> is there any thing in GPL under which he's required to share the source if 
> he modifies it? I don't think so!! As I understand GPL, it states that the 
> person is required to give out the source of the application and any changes 
> he makes, but he can do that at his own discretion!! He may agree to provide 
> you the source and not to me, that's his choice, but nothing stops you from 
> sharing it with me or anyone else, that's GPL's freedom. So why does it 
> makes your stomach churn?
> 
> 
> On Sat, 09 Jul 2005 "Peter Westwood" <peter.westwood at ftwr.co.uk> wrote:
> > If the product _is_ support then it would seem above-board - the 
> > wording though implies that you are paying for
> > WordPress + 3rd party plugins rather than for support which I'm not 
> > sure is above-board.
> Yes, I don't think its above-board as well, as by what he's stating is 
> that you are paying for the plugins/themes/wordpress, which under GPL can't 
> be sold. Because an additional note on the page states that the buyer is on 
> his own as far as support is concerned, unless he pays extra for the 
> support. That I think is the violation of the GPL as you can't sell anything 
> licensed under GPL for money or any other monetory gain. I think Matt should 
> take this up with Denis reminding him that he's in violation of GPL.
> 
> > I would think it fair for him to sell plugins/themes that he has 
> > created because to me that would be the equivalent of
> > developing them specifically for a client to use and as such I don't 
> > think they would need to be GPL/GPL Compatible
> > licenced.
> The licensing of Plugins & Themes has been discussed at the support 
> forums.
> http://wordpress.org/support/topic/21169
> I think that the Plugins & Themes should(must?) be GPL compatible as they 
> use the WP code which is licensed under GPL. Earlier when we had just CSS 
> based styles, it was ok to release those styles under any license that the 
> author desires, but now that we have themes which have WP Code in them, then 
> their licenses must be GPL compatible, the styles however can remain under 
> any license as they don't use any WP code.
> Besides, I think that he's mentioned the fact on that page that even his 
> plugins & themes are GPLed, or did I read it wrong? So he can't sell them 
> anyway.
> 
> I don't and wouldn't say that Denis is doing something wrong. He can do 
> that, technically and ethically, and people who do don't like him doing 
> this(or whine that instead of selling his code he should've released it to 
> the community or anything like that) can take a hike, they are of no concern 
> to anyone(not atleast to me). The idea of Open Source is afterall(as I 
> understand it) is to combine collective efforts of more than 1 developers 
> and create a product that is beneficial to them and then distribute it among 
> them and other people. People who claim to be Open Source supporters & voice 
> that everything should be Open-Sourced(to them, Open-Source is a synonym of 
> FREE), they don't ever think what will happen if everything is made 
> available for free. What will happen to companies like Microsoft, Apple, Sun 
> etc. that spend millions & billions in research every year so that they can 
> bring out new features, new stuff that we all love & cherish!! will these 
> same people work for free full day/5 days a week? I don't think so, because 
> if they do, how are they gonna pay their bills? Will the electricity company 
> waive your bill b'coz you are an open-source contributor? Will the 
> supermarts provide you with free food b'coz you develop free software(and if 
> its running their online store and their billing system)?? I don't think so.
> 
> But what I think is that Denis should consider revising his words at that 
> page(or any other page which is about selling his CMS) because those words 
> imply that he's selling WP+Plugins+Themes which he can't as per GPL.
> 
> just my $0.02 on the topic. :)
> 
> -----
> Amit Gupta
> 
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-- 
--Robert Deaton
http://somethingunpredictable.com
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