Theme Stolen / Copyright Infringement – Shame on this guy

ok, im not trying to disagree with your underlying point — as youve made it clear repeatedly that you dont want your themes posted on other sites for downloads.

However, I fail to see the signifigance of the “added his links” statement, as it relates to your complaint.

Here is what he adds,

<p class="foot2">Distributed by <a href="https://www.wpthemegallery.com/
">WordPress Theme Gallery</a>

Frankly, I dont see a problem with that. Am I missing something, because Im surely open to other opinions?

That, in and of itself, is NOT theft.

I guess im also not understanding how you call this a copyright violation either On your own site you link to this, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/

which clearly states, “you are free to share”.

Additionally, he is clearly and accurately providing the original theme author on the pages. Hes not removing your links from the footer, either. Atleast the one I looked at, which happened to be one of yours.

Again, I am not arguing against your underlying point regarding the themes being hosted without your permission, I think youre just not being clear on what the problem is, and youre calling it other things, and its very misleading.

I am not a legal expert…
You have a license that says “attribution SHARE alike” etc.
So, the possibility of sharing = offering for download, while keeping the link to the original author (you) is in the license.
I know you have a sentence on your License info page saying ‘you don’t want your themes distributed from other site’ – but, sorry, a wish is not a legally binding thing.

According to the license anybody can distribute your themes if they keep the link to your site – that’s the bottom line.

According to the CC License, the “guy” isn’t doing anything wrong: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.5/legalcode

He can COPY, DISTRIBUTE AND DISPLAY your themes. The only limitations are that

1) He must keep the attribution in tact, which he has done.
2) He must also release it under the same CC License, and there is no evidence that he hasn’t.

So, legally, you don’t appear to have a leg to stand on. You may well have chosen the wrong CC License for your needs. It is, nevertheless, less than courteous to not discuss it with you first.

Edit: Moshu beat me to it, but at least I expressed the point with greater clarity ??

OK. I know I chose the wrong license.

I am glad and thankful that so many of you spent some time in this matter.
The original idea of allowing a ‘share alike’ is to have people to release their own versions of our themes, if they want to do that. but not like what this guy did.

I know it is not illegal, but I want that guy to respect my repeated comments on his site, under my coffeespot theme.

since he did not even care to write a reply, i was irritated and hence you see me using the word “stole”.

Knowledgable people over here, please let me know what license should I use to prevent this from happening.

Thanks.

Knowledgable people over here, please let me know what license should I use to prevent this from happening.

To prevent “what” from happening? What are you trying to enforce?

That would be a good place to start before anyone tries to answer that question.

The original idea of allowing a ‘share alike’ is to have people to release their own versions of our themes, if they want to do that. but not like what this guy did.

I guess I fail to understand what he did that’s so wrong… He created his own version of your theme and released it, pretty much what you just said. Okay, so his change was minor.. a mere nothing, really. But still, either it’s free or it’s not.

If you want to have control over who does what, then don’t have any license. Just say it’s copyrighted by you and anybody who wants to do a modded version needs your permission.

Of course, you cannot stop him from doing what he’s doing, since his license was valid at the time he did it and you can’t change that sort of thing retroactively on him.

Thanks otto42,
I updated my license-info page according to your input.

now I have a question though.
in order to be considered as a derivative, should that have a different name ?

Sadish

in order to be considered as a derivative, should that have a different name ?

No, not necessarily. Not unless you specified it in the license.

The site owner contacted me personally and on my website, and updated his site removing the theme download link.

As many of you pointed out here, what he did was legal [at that time as I put Creative Commons License 2.5 for my themes], but I was irritated by the fact that he did not respond to my requests to remove my themes from his site.

I appreciate each one of you taking your time in resolving this issue and Since he has agreed to resolve it, I think we can put a full stop to this thread.

Thanks a lot people.
Sadish

Good for you, Sadish! I’m glad you solved the problem.
Christine