Deleted member 752298 Legality

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Deleted member 1622952

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I was just wondering how legal is a business like Deleted member 752298? how are they able to operate without any legal issue?

Wordpress plugin authors or theme authors can potentially sue Deleted member 752298 right?

Just asking this out of curiosity , nothing personal against Deleted member 752298, i have personally used them in the past :)
 
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Wordpress is a gpl licensed software. So are the themes and plugins and any other derivative work in wp ecosystem. So, it’s not really “illegal”, although it is unethical in my personal opinion.

As long as such a service doesn’t claim the theme/plugin being sold as their own, it should be fine. Not a lawyer though.
 
karmathered said:
I was just wondering how legal is a business like Deleted member 752298? how are they able to operate without any legal issue?

Wordpress plugin authors or theme authors can potentially sue Deleted member 752298 right?

Just asking this out of curiosity , nothing personal against Deleted member 752298, i have personally used them in the past :)
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because WordPress and WordPress plugins/themes are all under GPL license authors can't sue Festinger.
 
I think the vault doesn't offer nulled scripts.
What it offers is the download file, now if the plugin requires a key for full functionality that means you can't have full functionality.
 
A plugin can theoretically be released under any and also proprietary license. The plugin developer/rightholder/licensor is the one who decides what license will apply to his/her work. Now, if Wordpress is licensed under GPLv2 and the plugin developer would violate a requirement for derived work constituted by the GPLv2, then this is a problem between Wordpress and the plugin developer. It does not allow a third-party (like any user or Festinger) to play judge and decide themselves what they want to do with the plugin developer's work. It is up to Wordpress to, for example, ban the plugin from their library or take other legal actions if it violates the license agreement BETWEEN Wordpress and the plugin developer. BUT the GPLv2 actually allows derived work to be published under a different license IF it "can be reasonably considered independent and separate works". So this means it is up to at least subjective interpretation and STILL it is not up to a third-party to judge by themselves if they accept a license or not. So any third-party that claims that they use and share a nulled or unnulled plugin according to the GPLv2 should make sure that this plugin was originally actually really released under GPLv2 and no other license. It cannot automatically be considered published under the GPLv2 just because it is a Wordpress plugin. So, do you trust Festinger that he has checked this thoroughly for all plugins? That's a question every user needs to answer for themselves, because every user is also liable themselves in case it was not checked correctly and the license/copyright has been violated.
 
What's even more unethical is when plugins/themes claim to do something and you have to spend hours to figure out how to get them to function as they claimed, only for you to realize that what they offer isn't what you originally wanted and you wasted your time and money.

I'm thankful that Festinger has collected all of this, because then I can actually see under the hood and try the theme/plugin completely. Most of the time I end up deleting the plugins because of how badly coded they are.

As far as I'm concerned he can have my money.

If I need to consult a plugins support team to get it to work, that's not a finished product - that's a beta that they hope sells with the hope that the buyers have no problem donating their time trying to get it to work or have their support team fiddle with it.

No thanks. If it's a solid product I'll buy a license, but most aren't.
 
I'm not a lawyer or anything and I'm not super familiar with this, but to my knowledge, only the 'core' has to be GPL-licensed. Mostly meaning the PHP code and the scripts that interact with the WordPress API.
Though, some JS, CSS, and HTML files might not be required to be licensed under GPL, and can be under a different license.
Some plugins and themes also include media, such as pictures and video material, which to my knowledge are usually licensed under proprietary licenses.
 
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scanningthru said:
What's even more unethical is when plugins/themes claim to do something and you have to spend hours to figure out how to get them to function as they claimed, only for you to realize that what they offer isn't what you originally wanted and you wasted your time and money.

I'm thankful that Festinger has collected all of this, because then I can actually see under the hood and try the theme/plugin completely. Most of the time I end up deleting the plugins because of how badly coded they are.

As far as I'm concerned he can have my money.

If I need to consult a plugins support team to get it to work, that's not a finished product - that's a beta that they hope sells with the hope that the buyers have no problem donating their time trying to get it to work or have their support team fiddle with it.

No thanks. If it's a solid product I'll buy a license, but most aren't.
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I feel your pain, but it is not up to everyone to decide what laws to follow or not to follow. If a plugin does not live up to its promised features and functionality, then you can ask for a refund or initiate a chargeback and try a different product, can't you?
 
RoiBox said:
Are you a lawyer and tried the GPL in court? If not, who are you to say that people are wrong?
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Yes and no. You can rely on people's feelings or on laws. It's up to everyone to decide what will pay off in the long run in a moral and monetary way. If someone has enough money or power, then why would they really care? But not everyone is in such a position, so an informed decision is pivotal for most users, especially if they use assets for their businesses and client projects as bad reputation or legal claims can destroy them easily.

And don't think that everything in the world of alleged GPL plugins and themes is wonderfully peaceful and without problems. For example, when you search for the term festinger and yith on Google you will quickly be informed that several hundreds of URLs have already been removed due to successful DMCA complaints and festinger is among them. Furthermore, some providers like GPLDL [.] org decided to remove plugins from these bigger developers completely from their database. Why would that be if the GPL was really applying here and allowing such business models? Undoubtedly these are out of court proceedings at the moment. There are ways to host your content outside of relevant jurisdictions and with protection against DMCA complaints. They are even promoted here on BHW. And with that it is a matter of time, cost and how bulletproof your setup is. We are talking about plugin developers and not some big music label or movie producers. Most of them are just not financially capable of defending their rights against such setups, so such schemes can work for a long time. But think one step ahead. They might not be able defend themselves against these "GPL" providers, but what about the small agency owner who believed in "people have said" and uses these problematic plugins/themese for websites of clients and businesses with a real and listed address. They don't have the protection that Festinger and Co. have. This is a risk, everyone should be aware of, before making decisions.
 
Xenios said:
For example, when you search for the term festinger and yith on Google you will quickly be informed that several hundreds of URLs have already been removed due to successful DMCA complaints and festinger is among them.
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DMCA is a law in US only, last time I checked US laws are not for the rest of the world, it is only Google that are afraid of US.
 
Xenios said:
If a plugin does not live up to its promised features and functionality, then you can ask for a refund or initiate a chargeback and try a different product, can't you?
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Yeah but then I'd need to go through that process and some will further waste my time just to get my money back.

I want to try the whole thing out, not some lite version, and then buy.
 
scanningthru said:
What's even more unethical is when plugins/themes claim to do something and you have to spend hours to figure out how to get them to function as they claimed, only for you to realize that what they offer isn't what you originally wanted and you wasted your time and money.
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Isn't that the real intention of festy's vault?
Try the theme/plugin in it's full form with no strings attached, if it is what i want then buy it :P
or is that just what remi does :(
 
RoiBox said:
DMCA is a law in US only, last time I checked US laws are not for the rest of the world, it is only Google that are afraid of US.
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Correct, it is a quick out-of-court instrument in the US. Other countries (for example in the EU) have similar out-of-court instruments which can sometimes already be combined with a damage fine and it usually consittutes the first step in further legal prosecution. While the country-specific copyright laws differ in nuances, the main aspects are harmonised among western countries. So a rights holder in the US can prosecute a violation of his rights in many other countries. And depending on where the stuff is hosted and where the rights holder is located, it can be a long and expensive proceeding and with that it might be impossible for smaller rights holders to go through with it. Still, it does not turn an illegal act into something legal which is also relevant in regard to the question the creator of this thread asked.

xReminisce said:
Isn't that the real intention of festy's vault?
Try the theme/plugin in it's full form with no strings attached, if it is what i want then buy it :p
or is that just what remi does :(
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If we hide the legal implications, that would be an amazing approach. But does it really work? :D
 
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