[wp-forums] How To Handle Links/Recommendations to non-GPL Themes/Plugins

[Andrea Rennick]

I would lean more towards an in-thread reply, as the tags get overlooked,
especially by the kind of person who would mistake a forum user
recommendation as an official one.

a.

On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 11:19 AM, Chip Bennett <chip at chipbennett.net> wrote:

> See reference topic, here:
> http://wordpress.org/support/topic/looking-for-the-right-templatetheme
>
> To spare a click-through: a user recommended/linked to a non-GPL-compatible
> Theme (the IMHO "worst-offender" type, that claims Theme is licensed under
> GPL, and then adds (the usual) extra-GPL restrictions).
>
> This was Mika's response:
>
> Clarification - You can link to a non GPL theme/plugin, there's nothing
> wrong with that. You can't host it on the repository on wordpress.org, and
> you should put up a warning that the plugin's in GPL-Vio and, as such, most
> people won't help you with it, but we're not going to link-nanny that far
> down the rabbit hole. (I suppose we could use non-gpl as a tag, like we use
> nsfw ;) )
>
> But I'm going to drop them a line pointing out the theme's license.txt is
> in
> violation of GPL.
>
>
> And I reiterate my concern:
>
> My problem, in this particular thread, is that a non-GPL-compatible Theme
> is
> being*recommended for use*. Such recommendations, when taking place in the
> official WPORG support forums, gives the imprimatur of endorsement.
>
>
> She suggested we bring it here for discussion, so, here we are: what is the
> best/appropriate way to handle such situations? She suggests a "non-GPL"
> topic tag, which is an idea I like. However (and laying aside my own
> beliefs, for the sake of adhering to WPORG philosophy when contributing to
> the WPORG forums), I do believe that the average user will not parse the
> difference between an "official" WPORG recommendation and an
> arbitrary-forum-user recommendation. Anyone who finds such a thread as the
> one above will likely see the recommendation, click through the link, and
> think that the Theme they then download is endorsed by WPORG, via the WPORG
> forums.
>
> Thus, I see this scenario as contrary to the principle of only promoting
> 100% GPL code from the WPORG site.
>
> Also, if we *are* to police such links/recommendations, what is the
> best/most efficient way to do so? In this case, I "modlook"ed the topic,
> which solicited Mika's reply. Is a "non-GPL" tag appropriate? Does a mere,
> in-topic reply in lieu of tagging suffice?
>
> So, what are your thoughts?
>
> Chip
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-- 
-- 
Andrea Rennick, http://wpebooks.com and http://ronandandrea.com
Co-author of WordPress All-In-One For Dummies http://rml.me/aio