[wp-hackers] [ wp-hackers ] A question about donation link

[Jordi Canals]

2010/1/19 Mike Little <wordpress at zed1.com>

> 2010/1/19 Matt Mullenweg <m at mullenweg.com>
>
> > On 2010-01-15 1:47 PM, Jordi Canals wrote:
> >
> >> I refer you to the message I sent about a question asked about this. FSF
> >> understands that the link conforms the section 2c for GPLv2 and cannot
> be
> >> removed.
> >>
> >
> > I strongly disagree with this, for the record.
> >
> >
> Jordi,
> I too disagree with this interpretation. You don't credit the author of
> this
> response, so it is difficult to understand what qualifications, if any,
> they
> have to make this interpretation. Additionally it is dated 2002, and the
> FSF
> interpretation of GPL v2 has changed since then (for example with respect
> to
> Java, and Javascript).
>
> I refer you to this FAQ on the FSF we site
> http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl-faq.html#IWantCredit
> "...The GPL requires all copies to carry an appropriate copyright notice."
>
> That explicitly refers to copies of the program not the program's output.
>
> There are several other FAQs about a programs output, and they all seem to
> support the Joomla interpretation someone referred to. It is OK for a user
> to remove a credit in the output.
>
>
Ok.

Maybe I'm wrong with my interpretation of the clause. I don't remove the
author's attribution on the software I use and probably the author
attribution can be removed.
Anyway If my interpretation is wrong or not, and as seen probably it is, I
don't see here any problem with this to submit my theme to the repository.

As I said I explicitly allow end users to remove the page footer author
attribution just to avoid the this question:

- If you understand that the license allows itself to remove the attribution
output, allowing it explicitly on the code will not violate the GPL as both
say the same thing.
- If you understand the license does not allow to remove the attribution
output, also does not not violate the GPL, as you get an additional explicit
right allowing to remove it.

On another note you mention GPLV3, I must point out that GPLv3 is not
> compatible with GPLv2.
>
>
Here I would have a new question, as I didn't found the license notices nor
disclaimers on the WordPress core. Is WordPress licensed only with the "GPL
2 only" license or is it release under "GPL 2 or any later" version? I think
could be a good idea to include the GPL disclaimers with the WordPress core
to know what are we allowed or not. I ask that because if it is released
with the "GPL 2 only" license, I cannot use GPLv3 on our themes and plugins
and a change would be required here.

All this said, the original question was about the checkbox to remove the
public author attribution (as I removed the donation link that was beside
it) . Do you think that explicitly granting the user to remove the author
attribution from output violates the GPL license? Just that is what blocked
my theme on the repository. If there was a problem because my theme uses
GPLv3, I had no problem to switch the theme to GPLv2.

Thanks all for your valuable comments.
Jordi Canals