[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 mikeschinkel):

 Replying to [comment:26 Otto42]:
 > > I'm as close to 100% sure as I can be that your statement does not
 apply to Google's desire related to their Official APIs Client Library for
 PHP. Instead Google was almost certainly and ironically attempting to
 provide as much flexibility in use of their APIs as possible.
 >
 > And yet they used an incompatible license. Ain't that a B?

 Not incompatible with GPLv3.

 > I would suggest to Google that perhaps using a strongly restrictive
 license such as "Apache 2.0" might not be the best way to get their
 libraries widely used in other projects.

 Restrictive?  [http://www.oss-watch.ac.uk/resources/apache2.xml Apache 2.0
 has fewer ''requirements'' of users] than GPLv2; not sure how you see it
 as more restrictive than GPL.  Maybe it's ''different'' restrictions, but
 certainly one is not ''objectively'' ''less'' restrictive than another.

 > Of course, I don't know. Maybe that is their goal? Who can say for
 certain. Regardless, I wouldn't use their library code because of the
 restrictions the Apache 2.0 license places upon me as a developer.

 What restrictions would those be, specifically?

 And is this about the WordPress plugin repository policies, or about
 Otto's personal preference?  Or are they one and the same? If not, would
 you support a policy that you strongly dislike if it were in the best
 interest of the WordPress community at large, or fight for your
 preference?  This is a serious rhetorical question.


 > > 3.) **Remove existing plugins** that use non-GPLv2 compatible licenses
 from the repository and ignore Google and other vendor's Apache 2.0
 licenses and anyone who might need to use one of them.
 >
 > We do this already. We do this *daily*, when we find plugins that have
 incompatible licensing.
 >
 > This really isn't a new situation, by any means.
 >
 > If you find a non-GPLv2-compatible plugin, then tell us, and it *will*
 be de-listed from the repository. The authors will be emailed and asked to
 fix it. If they do so, then it will be re-listed.

 Then @Rarst and I will be compiling a list of plugins for you to remove.
 We'll get it to you as soon as we've compiled it.

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Ticket URL: <http://core.trac.wordpress.org/ticket/16898#comment:27>
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