GPL and Ethics

[chipbennett]

First, a link to GPLv2

Next, a couple of quotes from that license:

1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty; and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License along with the Program.
You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.

And:

2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change. b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License. c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively when run, you must cause it, when started running for such interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on the Program is not required to print an announcement.)

And:

6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein. You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to this License.

So, taken together, what do these clauses mean?

To my reading, it means that anyone is wholly within his rights to re-distribute WordPress unmodified, even for cost. It means that anyone is wholly within his rights to distribute and sell WordPress-derivative works.

It would appear that these points are undisputed.

The current point of dispute is that exercising these rights without giving back to "the community" or to WordPress is "unethical" (and other, more pejorative terms).

However, read that third quote (clause 8) more carefully, bearing in mind that WordPress is itself a derivative of a GPL work. Money quote:

You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.

Therefore, it is my contention that it is in violation of the GPL to impose upon distributors of WordPress or WordPress-derivative works the extra-GPL restriction that such derivative works must be made available for free, or that such distributors are obligated to "give back" to WordPress.

I welcome anyone to explain to me how one can restrict the selling of WordPress-derivative works, or obligate the developers of WordPress-derivative works to give that code back to WordPress, and not be in violation of Clause #6 of GPLv2.

Further, I welcome anyone to explain to me how it is "ethical" to impose restrictions in violation of the license you are purporting to uphold.

[Brad]

<?gpl include( THOUGHTPATH . '/spirit.gpl' ); ?>

It seems some people prefer the "Spirit" to be a part of the GPL where others do not and therein lies the problem.

Perhaps we need a written definition of the Spirit then people could license their software as:
GPL2 Spirit 1.1

;-)


Oh Wait, after reading Chip's post again, to license my work as GPL2 Spirit 1.1 would likely violate the GPL in the first place. I'm so confused.

[chipbennett]

<?gpl include( THOUGHTPATH . '/spirit.gpl' ); ?>

That is awesome! (Hopefully you're releasing that under GPL? ;)

It seems some people prefer the "Spirit" to be a part of the GPL where others do not and therein lies the problem.

I've really been putting thought into this, in trying to resolve the apparent conflict between the unambiguous text of GPL, and the ethereal concept of the "spirit" of the GPL.

The conclusion I've come up with is that the term "spirit of the GPL" just needs to be abandoned. Any ethical consideration otherwise described as the "spirit of the GPL" is, in fact, by definition external to and conflicts with the GPL.

Perhaps we need a written definition of the Spirit then people could license their software as:
GPL2 Spirit 1.1

;-)


Oh Wait, after reading Chip's post again, to license my work as GPL2 Spirit 1.1 would likely violate the GPL in the first place. I'm so confused.

I think what needs to happen is that the WordPress community needs to adopt a Community Code of Conduct, in which such ethical considerations as are deemed appropriate can be incorporated.

Thus, the community could rightfully say that while anyone is free to exercise their rights as expressed in the GPL, if one wishes to be included in and considered to be part of the "WordPress Community", one must abide by the Code of Conduct.

If the Community wishes, that Code of Conduct could address such issues as selling (per-download and/or subscription) themes, plugins, and services, and what is expected with respect to contributing code back to WordPress.

[wpmuguru]

As far as the GPL dispute goes, I agree with Brad. The difference in opinion really boils down to whether one believes that any activity that is legal is ethical. It's legal for me to run around the community and have relations with as many women as are willing, but alot of people (including me) find that unethical.

Linux became a popular OS because enough people believed that we should have a choice in operating system. MS had essentially taken over the x86 OS market through partnerships, etc. The thing which precipitated the last couple rounds of inflamatory posts was Matt saying he wished people would write free versions of the wpmudev premium plugins. IOW, he believes we should have a choice in plugins.

[Brad]

I always find myself conflicted with this whole GPL thing.

On one hand I truly believe that most of the WordPress theme innovation has come from paid commercial theme developers and so I cringe a bit when people start distributing commercial themes for free even if it is well within their rights to do so. If that were to become popular, it would likely have a negative effect on commercial theme devs, they would lose their incentive to innovate and they might resort to a hybrid license where I am once again limited to theme use on a single domain. That is the part of the GPL that I enjoy; I can reuse a theme from StudioPress, WooThemes or other on as many domains as I please or even mash the two up into something unique without having to worry about a restrictive license.

Makes a country boy's head hurt.

[andrea_r]

To me, the "spirit" of the GPL has been a reference to the unspoken "play nice". In other words, it ties in directly to your proposed Code of Conduct.

:)

[Jeffro]

What I find wrong with the 'Spirit' is that the definition seems to vary depending on who you ask. I think the best idea you have come up with Chip is the GPL side of things but also seperate ethics or Code Of Conduct into a separate document. So while there would be no argument regarding GPL, Loopholes etc, the Code Of Conduct would be the spirit of the WordPress community. Something that says hey, you are well within your rights to do so and so but, if you really want to make a difference in the community, we suggest so and so.

[wpmuguru]

On one hand I truly believe that most of the WordPress theme innovation has come from paid commercial theme developers and so I cringe a bit when people start distributing commercial themes for free even if it is well within their rights to do so.

Same here. Innovation requires time and funding from somewhere. So, I've never had an issue with commercial enterprises involved in GPL (or other open source) software. A good example of that is RedHat and Fedora. Fedora is essentially the feeding & testing ground for RHEL. While RH/FC do have some critics, it seems to be a viable project structure.

[Mike Smith]

Yeah. I agree that the facts and the spirit are two different things and that a lot of theme developers went a bit too far with the "we support GPL" statements - until someone called them out on it and then there were 100+ comments in an interview with the first people to re-release their work.

I do think a "code of conduct" would be nice to have. Something that states what should and shouldn't be done - based on what's "right". But until that happens, anyone releasing their themes under the GPL should realize what they got themselves into and move on the best they can.

And am I getting this right, but the clause 6 is basically saying that once you release your work under the GPL, you're not able to enforce any extra "rules"? So if I release premium wordpress themes and don't release them under the GPL, there's really nothing from a GPL standpoint to be said, since the person who released the original GPL product (wordpress) cannot enforce those extra "rules"?

Just trying to get a better understanding.

[chipbennett]

Yeah. I agree that the facts and the spirit are two different things and that a lot of theme developers went a bit too far with the "we support GPL" statements - until someone called them out on it and then there were 100+ comments in an interview with the first people to re-release their work.

I do think a "code of conduct" would be nice to have. Something that states what should and shouldn't be done - based on what's "right". But until that happens, anyone releasing their themes under the GPL should realize what they got themselves into and move on the best they can.

That's really what I'm getting at: eliminating the confusion and ambiguity, by properly separating the GPL from the community ethos.

I'm one of the most passionate debaters of GPL issues, but not without reason. I think we can take something that could be a potential downfall (or at least, unnecessary distraction), and turn it into a very positive aspect of the project and community.

Hopefully the idea can find some traction.

And am I getting this right, but the clause 6 is basically saying that once you release your work under the GPL, you're not able to enforce any extra "rules"? So if I release premium wordpress themes and don't release them under the GPL, there's really nothing from a GPL standpoint to be said, since the person who released the original GPL product (wordpress) cannot enforce those extra "rules"?

Just trying to get a better understanding.

No, I think you're reading it backwards.

As a distributer of a derivative work of a GPL-licensed work, you cannot release your work under a more restrictive license. Any such restrictions you attempt to impose are legally unenforceable under the terms of the GPL of the original work. (This concept is "GPL inheritance".)

Thus, you could say that your theme is released under a "single-site license", but you would have no legal recourse to enforce that restriction.