[wp-hackers] On Submitting Code

[Ryan Bilesky]

Just to clarify I'm not trying to shoot down GPL or anything. I personally
would license my works under GPL, I just think that its not a "legal
requirement".  In fact I have found many sites distributing wordpress themes
not under GPL license, but creative commons license (not sure if that would
be considered GPL compatible but my initial guess would be no)

On Tue, Aug 31, 2010 at 1:10 PM, Mike Schinkel
<mikeschinkel at newclarity.net>wrote:

> On Aug 31, 2010, at 3:48 PM, Ryan Bilesky wrote:
> > On Tue, Aug 31, 2010 at 5:17 AM, Jeremy Visser <jeremy at visser.name>
> wrote:
> >> ...Even without a code submission policy, it is 100% clear that all
> >> contributions to WordPress fall under the GPL. There is no doubt about
> >> that. The LICENSE.txt file is included with every copy of WordPress,
> >> which clearly talks about derivative works. A code contribution policy
> >> will not clarify that....
> >
> > I disagree.  The GPL license talks about derivative works, but it depends
> on
> > what you constitute as derivative works.  I personally would not consider
> a
> > theme or a plugin a derivative work.  Now granted I am not a lawyer, and
> idk
> > if there has been some sort of precedent set in some court case about
> what
> > constitutes a derivative work.  But in my mind, a pluigin or theme is its
> > own unique work, the fact that it connect to a GPL based software don't
> make
> > it derivative.
>
> FWIW even though I know that the majority of the WordPress community do not
> share your opinion I have had long discussions with a prominent local IP
> attorney on that subject and his opinion agrees with yours. Opinion to be
> published somewhere in the near future.
>
> -Mike
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