Hi, Ive got a wordpress premium theme which i have not bought myself and im using it to create a company website... will it get me into trouble? Is there any way to check for the developers of the theme to check?
Hey there, My advice would be to try and get in contact with the people who created the theme or the people where you got the theme froma and ask them if its ok to use the theme for commercial purposes. I should imagine if its a premium theme you'll need to pay and its best to be on the safe side.
That's a complicated question. Some "premium" themes are released under the GPL (as some people maintain that they should be, based on the GPL under which WordPress itself is released). With those themes, paying the price entitles you to online support, updates, access to a support forum, etc..., but as long as you don't care that for a nominal savings you are giving up those extras, then you are free to use those themes without payment, Other themes are expressly NOT released under a general public license of any sort. While some people argue that violates the Wordpress GPL, the fact that the developer may be violating the Wordpress GPL by retaining his copyright does not give you the right to violate his copyright. At least that is my view of the world of copyright in the U.S. You would be liable to the developer for copyright infringement. He might be liable to the Wordpress development community for breach of the GPL, but that wouldn't benefit you. If there is any question as to which of these two categories the theme falls in, you should assume it is not free to use.
Intersting point of view, but aren't wordpress is released under the http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.txt which means the themes are also under GPL http://wordpress.org/news/2009/07/themes-are-gpl-too/ So unless the premium paid themes is released using their own framework I don't think Premium Wordpress theme developer have any ground to sue legally. This means basically the price paid is for easy access to download the themes and also for the support. Please correct me if I am wrong etc. Thanks
Here is my logic, step by step. Granted, it is a legalistic approach, but I'm a lawyer after all. What do you expect? 1. Wordpress.org owns the copyright on the Wordpress code. 2. Wordpress releases WP under the GNU GPL. 3. The GNU GPL requires that users MUST license any work based on the WP code under the same GNU GPL. 4. A theme developer develops a theme based on the WP code. 5. The theme developer owns the copyright on his own theme. 6. The theme developer licenses his theme under a license that does not comply with the GNU GPL 7. The theme developer is infringing on Wordpress.org's copyright because he only has the right to use the WP code if he himself complies with the terms of the GNU GPL. 8. Wordpress.org can seek appropriate relief for the infringement of its copyright. Note that while Wordpress.org can require that a user satisfy the terms of the GPL in order to use the WP code, that is an agreement between Wordpress.org and the developer. If the developer violates the GPL, Wordpress.org has the right to take action against the developer, but the GPL does not automatically operate to cause the new work to be released under it. Let me give you an analogy to think about. You lease a house on a private beach to a tenant. You think that the beach should be public, so in the lease you require that the tenant allow access to the beach across the property. He puts in flower beds, erects a fence and refuses to allow people to walk through. He is in breach of the lease. You can seek to terminate his lease or require that he remove the fence. The provision you put in the lease does not, however, give Joe Public the right to knock down the fence and trample the flower beds. Joe Public was not a party to the lease and has no rights. You, as the landlord, are the one that must take steps to enforce your wishes. Now, there is a concept known as "third party beneficiary" that might come into play. In some cases, where there was a clear intent that a third party would be a beneficiary of the contract (e.g., the GPL license in this case), a third party does have rights to enforce a contract. That might apply in this case. However, it is an exception to the basic rule that only the parties to the contract can enforce its terms. On a related point, the post you cited states: Themes, by their very nature, consist of both PHP/HTML as well as images and CSS. The opinion concludes that a theme developer may apply restrictive copyrights to the images and CSS. So even if the GPL automatically caused the derivative elements (the PHP and HTML codes) that interact with the WP code to be free to use under a third party beneficiary argument, that does not give a user the additional right to use the copyrighted elements (images and CSS) which are not subject to the GPL.
@Business Attorney - very nice summary. thanks a bunch. Wanted to add rep but apparently So in a simple summary, you can use the theme as long as you change the derivatives elements which is CSS and the images. However I must note that CSS is a global open language just like how PHP is. One just can't simply claim its his eventhough technically he compiled the code. That leaves us with the images which again can be customized by any average wordpress user. This perhaps leaves the question that some truly premium wordpress themes sites prefer to create their own framework so that people cannot use this excuse to use their premium themes legally. Also another fact why most Premium Themes have to provide support to ensure people have a reason to subscribe to their themes. Personally I wouldn't be using other works which he asks for payment freely. It just doesn't ethically feel right. Which was why when I bought a website from a person in the past I never discovered if it was a premium theme. I did some research and thought it leas to a site named appthemes, contacted them and never got a reply. Whatever the case, a nice example of a loophole in a widely used opensource CMS. Cheerio
How to get contacts with the professional theme makers, I want to get a theme up to date and easy to sell
Go to the DP marketplace or any other professional theme marketplace like 99designs etc. In most cases, it would be much cheaper to get a designer and coder from DP rather than a developer it self for a theme. Here is the design forum for PSD design and programmer forum to code the PSD to wordpress (DP User recommended: Clive). Alternatively you can also request for a design contest for your wordpress theme if you have a bigger budget here.