Important Notice regarding the future of UHP2

[Administrator]

I wanted to post some information about a recent decision regarding the interpretation of the GPL license that Joomla is distributed under, and how it affects customers and users of UHP2.

From its inception Joomla(and before that, Mambo) encouraged commercial developers to create products for Joomla and stated that these products could be supplied under a licence of the developers choosing. In fact Mambo still encourages this same freedom for developers.

I have written a Component, Module, Template for Mambo. Do I have to release it under the GPL?

No. The GPL allows you to write your own extensions for Mambo and to release those extensions under whatever license you choose.

One of the main reasons cited by a lot of Joomla users for its popularity is the large choice of high quality, low-cost extensions and templates for Joomla.

The Joomla project is now stating that commercial products may violate the GPL license and that they wish to bring all developers into full compliance with the GPL. Their view is that Joomla extensions form a "derived work" of Joomla and must also be licenced under the GPL.

As you may know UHP2 is released under a non-GPL license and some of the code is encrypted. This allows us to provide a free version for most users and a paid for version for those who need it, licenced on a per site basis.

Under the GPL model, we could still charge you to download the product, but we can then not place restrictions on your usage or re-distribution. So, one customer could buy a product, use it on as many websites that they wish and then make it available for download to everybody else for free. They could even sell it on themselves if they wished.

You may think that this sounds like a great idea!, but consider the implications for a moment. At the moment UHP2 is available for free download, you can try it out and use it for as long as you like, it is updated regularly and support is provided to all via the forum, knowledgebase and Service Centre. It is unlikely that this could be sustained under a GPL model. Income from licences is what pays for ongoing development and all of the support infrastructure.

As you can probably gather this has generated a lot of discussion, fear and uncertainty about the future of commercial extensions and even the future popularity of Joomla itself.

An online petition has been posted to ask the Joomla project to reconsider their stance, I would encourage you to sign this.

Our position and what it means for you..

- We will continue to support UHP2 users and customers during this uncertain period
- We will not currently be charging for support, documentation or updates for UHP2
- UHP2 will not currently be developed for Joomla 1.5, it will continue to be supported on Joomla 1.0 and Mambo 4.5
- We will continue to participate in discussions to reach an acceptable solution to this problem
- We do not believe that our products are "derived works" or that they infringe on Joomla's copyright in any way
- We believe that the strict enforcement of GPL licences on all Joomla extensions will be detrimental to users, resulting in less choice and higher costs.

Thanks you for reading this far, I think it's important that UHP2 users become aware of this issue, and I encourage you to participate in the discussions.

Cheers

John

p.s. Here are some links that show both sides of the issue:

* The forum that started everything (it's very long!)
http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,163492.0.html

* Joomla announcement from Friday, June 15 2007
http://www.joomla.org/content/view/3510/1/

* Announcements from the Joomla Commercial Developers Alliance
http://jcd-a.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=15&Itemid=33
http://jcd-a.org/component/option,com_smf/Itemid,28/topic,84.0/
http://jcd-a.org/component/option,com_smf/Itemid,28/topic,100.0/

* Joomla Petition
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/keep-freedom-of-choice-for-joomla.html

* Mambo Licencing
http://www.mamboserver.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=240&Itemid=86

* Video - Fred Davis a long-time technology analyst comments on Joomla GPL license debate
http://www.ijoomla.com/Blog/Joomla_Blog/Fred_Davis_comments_on_Joomla_GPL_license_debate/

[Jim]

Hi John,

I'm very upset by the recent announcement of the core J! team that commercial licensing is not allowed to 'co-exist' with GPL based Joomla! core code. This is a little late IMO (and suspicious), to enforce GPL compliance on devs who have helped to get Joomla where it is today in regards to its global standings.

I especially feel sorry for the devs who have hammered out *many* hours at their keyboards, only to be blind-sided like this...NOT COOL.

I'm sure you are uncertain as well at this point where this will take Ravenswood, but for what its worth, Mambo doesn't seem to have these problems and I will follow the developers I'm using now to any other CMS if the need arises. You have not abandoned us, and I won't abondon my commercial devs either.

I just wanted you to know that some of us are following this all very closely, and I side with the devs at this point. Keep up the hard work and excellent support. We will follow you

Jim

[Administrator]

Jim,

Thanks for the support it is appreciated..

Discussions are still ongoing within the 3PD community and we hope that there will be a resolution soon..

UHP2 works just fine on Mambo btw!

Cheers

John

[zesource]

Hi John,
I just found out about UHP2 component because  I am looking for component that would allow me to build a number of mini sites within joomla site. But I am saddened to read your decision not to make this product compatible with Joomla 1.5 because of license dispute

I read similar concerns form Ijoomla team but they decided to stay with joomla and they are now converting all of their products to j!1.5. Have you change your mind and dicide to convert to Joomla 1.5 as well? I am build about two huge joomla site which I am planing to use UHP2 at least on one of them.

Please keeps us up-to-dated.
Tura