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Dear Matt Mullenweg: An Open Letter from Wix.com’s CEO Avishai Abrahami

210 点作者 yoava超过 8 年前

29 条评论

weinzierl超过 8 年前
This response still doesn&#x27;t address the core issue:<p>The Wix mobile App uses GPL code but the rest of the source code of the app has not been made public so far as required by the GPL. At least they missed to add a written offer to distribute the source code. If they will publish the source if someone requests it has to be seen.<p>When it comes to attribution it gets more difficult. As far as I understand the code from Wordpress is under plain vanilla GPL 2 without any supplements [1], so attribution is not required.<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;wordpress-mobile&#x2F;WordPress-Editor-iOS&#x2F;blob&#x2F;develop&#x2F;LICENSE" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;wordpress-mobile&#x2F;WordPress-Editor-iOS&#x2F;blo...</a><p>EDIT: If anything, this whole controversy shows one thing: Open source licenses (particularly the GPL) are still not widely understood.<p>(I assume ignorance on WIX&#x27;s side).
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pavlov超过 8 年前
<i>&quot;Yes, we did use the WordPress open source library for a minor part of the application (that is the concept of open source right?), and everything we improved there or modified, we submitted back as open source ...&quot;</i><p>That is not the concept of the GPL though. They need to release the source for the entire derived work, not just that one component. It&#x27;s not Wix&#x27;s choice -- it&#x27;s required by the license, and the act of incorporating code under that license makes them bound by it.<p>For a letter written by a CEO, this one seems strangely oblivious to the real issues. Did he run it through the legal department at all? (Presumably not, since it&#x27;s the weekend.)<p>Abrahami writes: &quot;If you believe that we need to give you credit&quot; -- but that&#x27;s not the issue at hand. It gives the impression that he doesn&#x27;t understand the differences between open source licenses, and that can be a serious liability for a company that builds so heavily on other people&#x27;s code.<p>[Edit] I actually wish the GPL were finally tested in court, because that would resolve a long-standing question around its enforceability. The CEO of Wix admitted that the derived work in this case contains &quot;more than 3 million lines of code&quot;... The copyright owner of the GPL&#x27;d module could sue them to have all that released under the GPL, and (assuming Wix wouldn&#x27;t comply) then we would finally know if the license holds up in court or not.
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gk1超过 8 年前
The post being referenced: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;ma.tt&#x2F;2016&#x2F;10&#x2F;wix-and-the-gpl&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;ma.tt&#x2F;2016&#x2F;10&#x2F;wix-and-the-gpl&#x2F;</a>
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zachruss92超过 8 年前
Yea, this is a question of GPL Licensing and Matt is right. WordPress and Automattic have both been huge proponents of open source and without GPL existing I would not be able to make a living (as well as the millions of software engineers in the world who use OSS every day).<p>The GPL is pretty clear about using GPL software and creating derivative work (i.e. an iOS app that, in part, uses GPL Licensed code) then distributing it to others, that you have to also include the source code along with the GPL license.<p>Wix should just open source the app and put an end to this - as it&#x27;s obvious that they&#x27;re violating the terms of the license.
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potatosareok超过 8 年前
What the hell is this these are companies that make millions of dollars a year arguing on the weekend with public blog posts. This is what lawyers are for. I automatically assume if you try to argue online you&#x27;re in the wrong and are counting on public opinion to save you.
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athirnuaimi超过 8 年前
Given that this is from the CEO of a public company, it does not reflect well on WIX. CEOs set the tone for the rest of the company. Mr. Abrahami should have had the issue investigated and if what Wordpress says is true (and it looks like it it), apologize and take corrective action. That probably means removing the mobile app from the App Store while they rewrite parts of the app. Or they can release the source code. There really aren&#x27;t other options.<p>I&#x27;ve worked with and for several large software companies. They have all taken GPL licenses very seriously. Mistakes can occur but GPL is not something they trivialize.
pulse7超过 8 年前
WordPress has GPL license and not LGPL! This means that if Wix uses&#x2F;links ANY part of WordPress, the whole Wix should be under GPL license and source code must be made public because Wix is distributed and not used internally only (GPLv2, <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;softwareengineering.stackexchange.com&#x2F;questions&#x2F;158789&#x2F;can-i-link-to-a-gpl-library-from-a-closed-source-application" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;softwareengineering.stackexchange.com&#x2F;questions&#x2F;15878...</a>)
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blintz超过 8 年前
&gt; &quot;we did use the WordPress open source library for a minor part of the application&quot;<p>Well, now you must release the source code of that whole application, immediately. There&#x27;s no argument to be had, no &quot;I did not even know we were fighting&quot; - there&#x27;s no fight, just legally binding requirements on what you release.
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llamataboot超过 8 年前
The weird snarky passive-aggressive tone of this is really off-putting to me. &quot;Hey dude, we&#x27;e released some cool stuff, check it out, maybe your business can use it&quot;
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jwebb99超过 8 年前
Wait. What&#x27;s going here?<p>I&#x27;ve been reading some of the HN comments in response to this story and it seems you guys are saying that ANY codebase built on WP must be visibly released to the public.<p>So does that mean, millions of WP sites with custom mods must relase release their code in some capacity? If so, where? And how am I supposed to declare where the sourcecode can be found--a dedicated page on my site, a comment in my HTML?<p>I&#x27;m really struggling to understand how the guys at Wix are the villains in this story. It seems every year Mullenweg issues a Fatwa in response to some imagined violation of WP&#x27;s GPL licence. He&#x27;s really becoming quite belligerent over this crusade of his.<p>Seriously, do we all need to release our source code if we build stuff on WP? If not, why the hell is Wix getting so much shit?
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beejiu超过 8 年前
It is always amusing for people to debate about &#x27;open source&#x27; and how licenses work. They, as the CEO of Wix has, repeat the same misunderstandings time and time again. You don&#x27;t need a lawyer. You don&#x27;t need an opinion. Set aside 15 minutes of your day and actually read the license. It is not complicated.
alanh超过 8 年前
Not a good first impression, Wix: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;alanhogan.com&#x2F;files&#x2F;wix-blog-first-impression.png" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;alanhogan.com&#x2F;files&#x2F;wix-blog-first-impression.png</a>
snorrah超过 8 年前
WOW DUDE<p>Clearly a great opening line. If you write an open letter, try not sounding terrible in your letter.
bdcravens超过 8 年前
&gt; There are more than 3 million lines of code in the Wix application<p>This always bugs me and feels disingenuous. Should I count all the modules&#x2F;gems in my app? (A quick check of a Rails app found about 1.4mloc but about 25kloc is code I wrote - which should I count?)
gargarplex超过 8 年前
I think Wix is a superior product for many businesses, but this post did not address the question of GPL violation.
detaro超过 8 年前
&gt; <i>If you need source code that we have, and we have not yet released, then, most likely we will be happy to share, you only need to ask.</i><p>Well, the initial blog post makes clear what source code Automattic thinks they (and everybody) needs...
mpcod超过 8 年前
Matt hits on part of the issue clearly in his update on his post.<p>&quot;I will say we look to Wix, Weebly, and Squarespace as innovators in the space with products that reach many small businesses, and Wix especially should be commended for its success and growth as a public company.&quot;<p>It is unfair to take the best parts of your competitors work and so freely use it while ignoring the overall scope of the license which permitted you to do so in the first place, pretending there isn&#x27;t long established precedent. If Wix wasn&#x27;t a successful competitor, nobody would know about their use of this code. Nobody would care.<p>Personally - it is why I love the GPL. I removes code from the equation because everyone who takes distribution has the code. So for services and apps, defense comes through excellence in execution, not defense through proprietary code (since running something successful requires so much more than simply code). It&#x27;s why companies like to defend their market positions through proprietary code. They are afraid (and know) someone else could do it better, so they protect their investment at least by making someone else have to do it over as a hurdle to entry.<p>Anyone can take WordPress.org, make a WordPress.com-like free blog hosting company, and completely compete with Automattic. Many try to with their own stacks, and clearly are not doing as well as WordPress.com. That&#x27;s telling, and why Matt is in the right.<p>My opinion is that it is a complete sin to include the good work of your competitor in your proprietary code. It is very revealing about the greediness and capacity of Wix&#x27;s management to pull something like this. Even if they try to come off as good guys. They are hiding something bad. Why?<p>No company this dishonest should be trusted with anything. If I was with Wix, I would move to someone else on principle. So ... what else are they doing? What are they doing with your information they have about you then? And I will for sure highlight this behavior to people I know who use Wix.<p>Their only course of action to fix this is to admit their error and to fully open source their code. If they decide to retreat and remove the GPL&#x27;d code, it is a greater admission of what they were trying to do in the first place behind closed doors, and were just &quot;unlucky&quot; enough to get caught.<p>Shame on you Wix. Fix it. I have pity on you for falling victim to Wall Street&#x27;s greed. You owe the internet more than that.
JoshMnem超过 8 年前
It seems like there are misconceptions about the GPL in both Wix posts.<p>It&#x27;s interesting that Wix advertises &quot;Start Your Own Stunning Blog&quot; to customers:<p><a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wix.com&#x2F;start&#x2F;blog" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wix.com&#x2F;start&#x2F;blog</a><p>but they are using WordPress for their own company blog.
mk3超过 8 年前
People should realise that Matt also has for profit company Automatic and it&#x27;s mostly defending his cash cow rather than spirit of open source.<p>Also speaking about originaly MIT licensed editor code which suddenly becomes GPL: Taking someones work adding modifications on top and slapping different license on top wildly unethical. As it benefits only the person who slapped GPL on top. As I know if you use GPL licensed code you must have GPL license. At least in wordpress case: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;wordpress.org&#x2F;about&#x2F;license&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;wordpress.org&#x2F;about&#x2F;license&#x2F;</a>. So author can not use the improvements Automatic engineers made while using his library for profit.
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tarboreus超过 8 年前
This is pure obfuscation. He doesn&#x27;t even mention the GPL in this post. He&#x27;s legally obligated to release the entire application, and is probably scrambling now to find an Apache or MIT-licensed alternative to the WordPress editor.
Lazare超过 8 年前
The tone of the response really rubs me the wrong way.<p>&gt; Wow, dude I did not even know we were fighting.<p>It&#x27;s not a fight; it&#x27;s a dispute over licensing.<p>&gt; you say we have been taking from the open source community without giving back, well, of course, that isn’t true.<p>No, you were accused of not following a specific license on a specific piece of code.<p>&gt; Here is a list of 224 projects on our public GitHub page<p>Open source is not a swap meet; you can&#x27;t violate a license if you voluntarily release some other code to make up for it.<p>&gt; and we will release the app you saw as well.<p>If that means &quot;we were inadvertently not in compliance, but we are releasing the code and will be in compliance shortly&quot;, then that needed a tweet at most, not a rambling blog post about the fact you&#x27;ve got 224 projects on github. So I&#x27;m guessing this does <i>not</i> mean they&#x27;re taking steps to become compliant?<p>&gt; Yes, we did use the WordPress open source library for a minor part of the application (that is the concept of open source right?)<p>Yes, along with following the actual terms of the actual license when you use an open source library. You weren&#x27;t accused of not adhering to the spirit of open source; you were accused of not following the letter of a license (which, if true, means you aren&#x27;t adhering to the spirit of open source either).<p>&gt; If you need source code that we have, and we have not yet released, then, most likely we will be happy to share, you only need to ask.<p>That&#x27;s...what they did. You need to comply with the licenses of the libraries you use, you were asked to do it. You will &quot;most likely&quot; be happy to do it? You were asked; you&#x27;re replying to being asked, and your answer is that you don&#x27;t have an answer, but the odds are good that you&#x27;ll have one someday? What does this even mean?<p>Considering the sheer mass of words, it&#x27;s amazing that the word &quot;license&quot; and &quot;GPL&quot; don&#x27;t occur even once. There&#x27;s no attempt to address or discuss the actual accusation being made, just vague assertions that some stuff will be released someday, maybe, if you&#x27;re asked, and hey how about a coffee.<p>All this needed was a tweet: &quot;Thanks for heads-up; will be compliant shortly.&quot; Or maybe: &quot;On advice of lawyers, we believe we are in full compliance, thanks.&quot; Reminds me of an old lawyer joke: If the facts are against you, hammer the law. If the law is against you, hammer the facts. If both are against you, hammer the table.&quot; I&#x27;m going to mark this down as &quot;table hammering&quot;, and I think it rather sugests that <i>Wix</i>, at least, thinks their position sucks.
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prh8超过 8 年前
I think that was very well done by the Wix CEO. It doesn&#x27;t matter that he doesn&#x27;t seem to understand GPL. His job is not to put out a blog post saying <i>yes, we&#x27;re idiots, liable for everything.</i> His job is to put out a good look for the company, and then deal with this behind closed doors. This is meant as a fluff piece, and he knows better than to provide any definitive statements on what Wix will do, that they could be held too. Again, positive spin, and handle the rest in private.
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tlogan超过 8 年前
IANAL, but these guys are also not (but I think wix.com did consult them).<p>The WordPress component in question is based MIT license which might not included in valid way as GPL and Wix.com is using that component. I assume Wix.com&#x27;s layers told them that this component cannot be protected under GPL so they are ok to use them.
hellofunk超过 8 年前
The Wix CEO previously left a comment or two here in this thread but I see he has removed them. I think the heat is on, it is clear that he not only did not follow GPL but actually accidentally admitted to that in this own blog!
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jondot超过 8 年前
FYI: Wix has tooling for verifying their OSS policy <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;wix&#x2F;wix-oss-ci-police" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;github.com&#x2F;wix&#x2F;wix-oss-ci-police</a>
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benguild超过 8 年前
Does Avashai Abarhami know what an &quot;open letter&quot; is?
Kiro超过 8 年前
I hate GPL. I don&#x27;t want to publish my crappy code and make a fool of myself. No-one would want to use it anyway. I would be extremely impressed if they could even understand anything with all the esoteric and ugly hacks it exist of.
jondubois超过 8 年前
Most people who are seriously involved in open source know that GPL is ironically one of the least free licenses. So, basically, if any company wants to incorporate a GPL product into their project for distribution, they would have to essentially make their entire project&#x27;s source code public also under GPL - Which is a completely undesirable thing to do for any company. The bad part about GPL is that it applies to everyone except the licence owner.<p>GPL is just the FSF&#x27;s way of saying f<i></i>* you to companies who didn&#x27;t bother to read up on what GPL actually means. It doesn&#x27;t actually fulfil its purpose as an open source license - It just puts all the leverage in the hands of the license owner.<p>Hypothetically, if the GPL also applied to the creator of the GPL product THEN it would be fair - But that&#x27;s not possible because the creator would never sue themselves for breaching their own GPL.
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harperlee超过 8 年前
I think this is a golden example of how to reply to an accusation: lay down the facts, don&#x27;t get down to the mud, but clearly expose the other side&#x27;s errors - with class!
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