We all know that Matt Mullenweg, founder of WordPress, is engaged in a nuclear war with WP Engine, but there is another, much quieter, related battle happening simultaneously that has likely been overshadowed.
Automattic’s lawyers have also been recruited to fight another, more covert war against various websites that, for a modest fee, provide access to a massive number of WordPress themes and plugins, even in their professional or premium versions. How is this possible?
Once again, the GPL2 license is somewhat behind all of this. It’s an open-source license that requires any contributor to grant the same license to any product derived from WordPress or its plugins, meaning that you can pay for the premium version of a plugin and usually receive that software under the GPL2 license, not a private license.
Then, the clever ones, pirates, or however we want to call them, typically create websites that host a large collection of products they have purchased once and then distribute hundreds or thousands of times at a low price. Sometimes they even accept a one-time payment and grant lifetime access, so it’s relatively common for a group of people to pool money together, raise the amount needed, and then all gain access to a large portion of WordPress paid content for life at a very affordable price.
This is the case with FestingerVault, a Dutch website whose Twitter description reads: “Get access to over 25,000 incredible premium WordPress themes and plugins. Now directly from your WordPress dashboard. Think I’m kidding? I’m NOT. Start today!”
I personally came across it through one of these joint purchases I mentioned earlier on well-known forums. In the thread, 30 people were recruited, each contributing $10 to pay the $299 for a lifetime subscription to FestingerVault, which provided access to those over 25,000 incredible premium WordPress themes and plugins.
Everything was going well until Automattic set its sights on the website, which was clearly taking advantage of the community’s work for its own profit. Their lawyers have suspended the website, which is currently down, and now displays the following notice:
“10 Oct 2024: The short hearing took place on October 2nd, and we are currently awaiting the court’s verdict on the legal claims of Automattic trademark usage and GPL compliance. Our lawyers have requested the court’s decision to deny Automattics and WooCommerce’s claims that contradict the open-source philosophy. We are 100% dedicated to providing GPL-compliant, open-source plugins and themes for WordPress and are confident in the legal process. Please stay tuned; we will inform you as soon as possible. Don’t worry—this is a brief pause, and we’re not going anywhere!”, says FestingerVault.
In this case, it seems this website, based in Rotterdam, is subject to the courts of its country and the European Union and may face litigation and comply with verdicts deemed fair. However, in other cases, these websites are located in more remote places that may not heed claims.
This is yet another case where a few profit by exploiting open-source code and the work of others, the community, Automattic, and other companies, while grossly misusing the GPL2 license, or at least its spirit.
Another issue that may arise is that the plugins and themes, not coming from their original source, may have been modified along the way, and the version installed could contain malware, viruses, backdoors, and anything else you can imagine.
* Article written by Jorge Mediavilla, translated with ChatGPT, and reviewed in English by Jorge Mediavilla.
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