Is Thesis hostile to the GPL?

FUD – source: ckelty at flickr

First a declaration…

I am employed by Automattic but these are my personal opinions and not a statement on behalf of Automattic. More relevantly I am a contributor to WordPress but this is by no means a statement on behalf of that community.

Now, to the point…

I’ve been following the discussion over at pomomusings which follows a post where Adam Cleaveland listed the Thesis theme as one of the top 10 reasons for switching to WordPress. Matt Mullenweg (who can make statements on behalf of WordPress) posted an early comment where he suggested that the WordPress Theme “Thesis” was “hostile to WordPress’ core freedoms and GPL license”. The obligatory GPL debate ensued with Thesis developer Brian Clark refuting the claim. His comments so far have culminated in a statement where he indicated that he suggested to Matt that “we consider a declaratory judgment action” to resolve the question of whether the Thesis theme should by law be distributed under a GPL license.

I’m going to skip over the part of the discussion where Brian seems to get mixed up about derivative works with regard to copyright as opposed to as it is defined in the GPL (that’s intellectual property law versus contract law, conflating the two is erroneous at best and deceptive at worst). Rather I take issue with this notion of taking the whole matter to court. As I see it, the suggestion is a tactic in managing public perception.

WordCamp Presentations

I’ve just finished my hastily re-factored presentation for WordCamp San Francisco and I promised a few people afterwards that I would make it available online in some form.

The presentation was titled “Hassle-free upgrades for WordPress”. I kind of shoe-horned in a large chunk of my presentation from WordCamp UK on Upgrading WordPress using Subversion into the end. I’ve removed that last part of the presentation in the file here and uploaded the more detailed presentation from WordCamp UK as well.

That’s about as clear as mud…

Here are the presentations converted to PDF.

Hassle-free upgrades for WordPress

Managing a WordPress 2.6 installation with Subversion

Thanks to Sheila Ellen for the photo and for taking it during one of my prettier slides.

WordCamp, WordCamp, WordCamp

WordCamp UK 2008

WordCamp UK is on Saturday the 19th and Sunday the 20th of July, 2008 and the organisers have made it “over the hump” after some indecision about the venue. They have ended up with a very appropriate venue in Birmingham, enough generous sponsors to secure the event financially and a decent programme too.

You can buy tickets online now.

I’ll be there presenting two topics:

• Using subversion to manage a complete WordPress install
• Integrating bbPress into a WordPress install

Not sure I’ll need a full hour for either, maybe I can give everyone early marks when I’m done.

I’ll also be on a discussion panel. Attendees should be well sick of me by the end of the conference.

WordCamp San Francisco 2008

WordCamp San Francisco is on Saturday the 16th of August, 2008. [Update: It’s only one day but contains two tracks]

This is the original WordCamp on it’s third time around, but it will be my first. Should be a hoot. I’ll possibly be presenting one or both of the topics I’m preparing for WordCamp UK.

It’s looking like it will be pretty popular again this year if Upcoming is any indication.

WordCamp Australia 2008

The first WordCamp Australia has just had it’s dates announced. It will be held on Saturday the 6th and Sunday the 7th of December, 2008, somewhere in Sydney.

It’s early days yet, but you can register your interest on Upcoming now.

If you are flying in from out of town it is a good idea to book flights sooner rather than later.

Alternative uses for your WordPress Mug

If you’re like me and don’t drink coffee or tea very much, or even if you just don’t drink coffee and tea very much, then you must be wondering how you can justify buying a fantastic WordPress mug for your home or office.

Well, today I’m here to help you lighten your wallet with my first suggestion for alternative uses for your WordPress mug…

Who doesn’t like receiving flowers? What’s more, who doesn’t like WordPress? Nobody! So let’s juxtapose those once disparate concepts in a WordPress handled posy vase (pictured above).

A perfect Mother’s Day gift!

Keep checking back for more of this enthralling series of posts in the coming days.

What does Matt Mullenweg do all day?

He goes here, and hits the reload button many times.

Congratulations to the WordPress 2.5 team.

Behold my eleventh hour contribution to WordPress 2.5!

Behold my eleventh hour contribution to WordPress 2.5! With which I bend time using sheer willpower and win the love of the people.

To the people of the mountainous nation of Nepal, I salute you! I will not let your blogging be incorrectly time-stamped by fifteen minutes. As much as the hounds of assimilation (in the form of half-hour incremented time-zones) may bark at your personal publishing door!

To the great blogging warriors of Kiribati, whose expansive nation sweeps across the ocean. Your wish to keep your fellow citizens crossing the same day off your calendars at the same time by breaking the international date line standard will be honoured in WordPress 2.5!

To the Tongans your theoretically impossible +13:00 timezone is safe and sound.

To the coastal dwellers of south-east Western Australia, what on earth were you thinking?

And finally, to the residents of the Chatham Islands, both of your unusual timezone offsets will be supported! Yes, that’s one timezone for every 300 people on your fair isles.

To one and all in these proud nations, I remain your humble non-standard timezone champion.