WordPress Themes and the GPL License

First, let me apologize for adding yet another 2 cents to this tired GPL license debate within the WordPress community.  But it’s something I feel must address as I prepare to open the doors to my new WordPress themes offering.

So here’s my take:

The only thing that really matters are the users

The vast majority of users don’t even know what the GPL license is or means.  They only really care about what it means for them.  They care about what the limitations are.  In the eyes of users/consumers:  The less limitations, the better.

Some of the limitations that users look out for are:

• Can I use this theme on more than one website?
• Can I use it on my client’s websites?
• Can I remove the footer credit?
• Can I customize the theme to suit my needs?

Offering products under a license that clearly answers these questions is the most important thing.

Embracing the GPL

ThemeJam themes will fully support the GPL license.  Not only because WordPress themes are derivatives of WordPress, which itself is licensed under the GPL, but because I believe it’s important to lift the most important restrictions that users care about.

I never understood those sites that offer “single-use” licenses.  How would they even go about monitoring their customers’ use of their themes / plugins?  Outside of implementing a programmatic way of limiting the use to a single domain, they likely rely on some type of honor system to police multi-use of their themes.

Forget all that.  I’d rather be fully GPL compliant and allow users to use my themes on as many sites as they want, including their client’s sites.  That’s what I look for when shopping for themes, so that’s what I’ll be offering.

Digging deeper into the GPL license

Of course, there are other rather important freedoms that come with the GPL license.  The biggest one being that users are allowed to re-distribute and even charge for GPL licensed works.  There was a raging debate when someone actually exercised this right, which I guess you can say was inevitable.

I’m really not concerned about the potential loss of business due to re-sellers of my themes.  GPL or not, there will always be piracy out there, especially with digital products.  Piracy and re-selling issues are simply inevitable and calculated risks that it seems many premium theme companies are already willing to take.

It’s much more important to focus my efforts on serving those who purchase my products from ThemeJam.  Only paying customers will have access to my personal support, and free theme upgrades.  They will also be reassured that the theme they download won’t contain malicious or broken hidden code (as many pirated themes do).  Customer support is the most important benefit of purchasing a premium theme from the original author and this will be a primary focus of ThemeJam.

The bottom line

To answer the questions I posed at the beginning of this post:

• Yes, my themes can be used on unlimited domains.
• Yes, web designers can use my themes for their client’s sites.
• Yes, the footer credit can be removed – in fact, it’s as easy as one click in the built-in theme options panel ; )
• Yes, our themes can be easily modified by anyone with even light knowledge of CSS and HTML.
• And to those who are interested in the fine print, ThemeJam WordPress themes will be 100% GPL licensed and we will embrace all the ramifications that come with that.