How Grey Is Your Valley: Making Money From Open Source

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1. commenter
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:27 am

   Capitalism is good. Open Source is good. The more profit potential available to people, in general, the higher the quantity and quality of the products.

   What irks me is when companies CLAIM to be open source (profiting from the buzz word), but have restrictive licensing (we show you the source, but you can’t do anything with it. Or worse, if you do something creative with it, you have to take off our logo, and then we’ll bad mouth you anyway).

   *Ahem* Sugar….

2. Francisco
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:39 am

   The main difference between what Matt does to profit from Opensource, and what others do is:

   b) It adds a service, a value added service.
   a) Non intrusive.

   We love you Matt!

3. anonoymouse
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:41 am

   Your post should include your obvious personal issues and conflicts with matt as well duncan.

   Matt’s point is a good one, and attacking him as an individual (for the “link stuffing”) does nothing to further this discussion.

   Which is a shame, because until that point the post was a good one. Somehow it went from “how should open source projects make money” to “how can matt ask if open source projects should make money”.

   And all because of your personal bias.

4. Matt
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:45 am

   1. I never criticized Pligg for selling their site, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.

   2. I did criticize Vanilla for selling links to spam sites promoting casinos, home loans, and mortgages embedded in every download of the software. If you posted those links in a comment Akismet would block them as spam. Just because you can make money from something doesn’t mean you should. It pains me to see other developers make mistakes similar to the one I did even years later. I took the links down within a day of the article you linked as soon as I was able to get online.

   3. WordPress.com was designed to mirror WordPress’ code as closely as possible even though it would have been easier to branch. We did this so the time and money we invest in that platform directly benefit WordPress.org, and vice versa, aligning the economic and social incentives. We’re not legally required to give back code under the GPL, but I think we’d be dumb not to give as much as possible. WordPress development has sped up since Automattic was founded and numerous other companies have adopted WordPress as their platform (including Techcrunch) and many more contribute back like we do.

   4. I wrote numerous anti-spam plugins before Akismet, including a peer-to-peer decentralized approach, they just did not remain effective over time the way Akismet has. Akismet now has plugins for or is built directly into more than 25 other platforms besides WordPress, so obviously there has been a market demand and appreciation for the product. I think it’s rather rude to suggest I’d deliberately cripple WordPress to profiteer from spam.

   5. I have no idea what you mean by “your valley,” or why it would be grey or not.

5. Richard Corsale
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:51 am

   The problem is intrinsic to the GPL, OSS was never intended to be a free labor mechanism for startups. But it’s abused on both sides of this coin. For example I recall Limewire was-> was sorta -> now fully OSS (Open Source Software). Basically it was copied by unscrupulous adware affiliates, add a new logo atop the app then slammed with adware and Trojans (”Bundles”) .

   Limewire employed most of the programmers who worked on the project, but not all and they made money by “bundling” as well. So they paid for development, servers and maintenance while many others reaped by outbidding them on download.com , overture etc. They obviously didn’t have offices and teams of developers in Manhattan to maintain

   so its not all flowers and kittens.

   – Richard Corsale

6. Duncan Riley
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:54 am

   anonymouse (3)
   my only issue with Matt is that he continues to criticize others without dealing with his own conflicts. If you look at my history I’ve been amongst the biggest backers of WP out there from the time of the MT3.0 issue, so it’s not as though I’ve got a history of being anti-WP or what not, indeed I built an entire VC funded blog network on the platform.

   I still believe that one shouldn’t criticize others for making a quid when you are yourself. Money is money, no matter how you make it. Let he who is pure criticize others

7. Joe Draper
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:54 am

   To me, as an observer (not even a Wordpress user) it just seems like Automattic are doing what they can to block any other attempts by anybody to make money from a product or service built on Wordpress. Automattic totally control the Wordpress development process, and have built a non-open source platform (wordpress.com) on top of the effort of others. I dont think that is what open source is supposed to be about.

   For some reason putting a link in a theme you wrote yourself is bad, but having links back to Matt’s blog in the default blogroll (which built his pagerank and gave him the #1 ‘matt’ result which he constantly brags about), as well as many links back to Wordpress.org (and in-turn Wordpress.com), and bundling a semi-commercial plugin (Akismet) into an open source project is completely fine..

   Great of you to bring this up. You will be beaten up by the fanboys but those of us who know what open source is really supposed to be about completely agree

8. Joe Draper
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 5:56 am

   “I took the links down within a day of the article you linked as soon as I was able to get online.”

   How quickly would you have taken it down if it wasn’t discovered? You mean to say you had a sudden moral awakening

9. Matt
   

   August 22nd, 2007 at 6:09 am

   For the record I support all of the freedoms afforded by the GPL.

   Dozens of old and new media companies run their blogs on WordPress: Techcrunch, GigaOM, Venturebeat, b5media, All Things D, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, CNET, Reuters, Le Monde.

   Hundreds of design firms and consultants use WP as the basis for the sites they sell. Some even search and replace our name and logo with their own. One of the largest hosting firms in the world did that. That’s fine!

   Even the people who sell sponsored links in their theme, or redistribute WordPress as a spam package, or do other things I may personally abhor with or consider unethical are perfectly welcome to use the software, that’s the freedom the GPL provides to them.

   However on our non-commercial WordPress.org sites run for the good of the community we choose not to promote the themes, plugins, or packages with include or encourage what I consider (and Google, and much of the web) consider to be spam. I don’t see that as trying to control all the money made with WordPress, it’s just trying to do the right thing in the spaces we control. This was not a unilateral decision, it was voted on by hundreds of people and discussed for months.

10. Jack
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:13 am

    Whether open source or not somewhere down the line you are going to have to connect with some money. I don’t think many landlords or web hosts take PHP code in lieu of rent.

    Selling links in a free template doesn’t seem bad so long as there is disclosure to any potential user of the template. Nobody is forcing anybody to use them.

11. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:13 am

    Matt
    1: context. I’d find it hard to believe you slipped it in that post as a positive.
    2: You still make money: Wordpress.com and Akismet profits from the very same code. How it pains you is bizarre.
    3: Wow, that’s great: but you’re still profiting from the Wordpress code. You can justify it all you want, but as the title of the post suggests, how grey is your valley/ justification. Again: simple fact, you profit in the same way link sellers do. Who is to say that link sellers aren’t amongst the folk contributing to the Wordpress code.
    4: I didn’t say you cripple Wordpress code, but it’s certainly not in your interest to develop the Wordpress code to prevent comment spam, is it? Conflict of interest.
    5: How Green is your Valley is a Hollywood classic. Sorry, I forgot your age

12. Cem
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:23 am

    Matt Mullenweg (and his entire team!) is doing a tremendous & fantastic job every day with Wordpress and Akismet. He delivered a great reliable code and a “publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability”. Indeed, Mr. Riley. He has all the rights to protect the cleanness of his code. To keep it clean from advertising and shady people who are just surfing on the WP wave…

    Btw, you say “for someone still very young he deserves much admiration for all he has achieved”. You know, there is an old saying in Turkish, which says “Wisdom is not the age, but in the head of somebody”.

13. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:27 am

    Cem
    Sure, he has the rights to keep his code clean, but he doesn’t have the moral right to say others cant profit from open source code when he does. If it’s to be kept “clean” it should be from his own corporation as well. That after all, would only be fair, as I’m sure you would agree.

14. Brian Knoblock
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:28 am

    Wow

    ” Money is money, no matter how you make it.”

    Ok you really believe that?
    Anyway TechCrunch in general, not just this post , seems to me recently has been to be used to air personal items. Just my opinion.

    BK

15. lisa chen
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:33 am

    “Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg has spoken out against a number of open source projects for profiteering from their code.”

    the first sentence is where i stopped reading the article further more. There are many ways to profit from your own open source code, embedding paid links to home mortgage sites which has nothing whatsoever at all to do with that open source project is not one of them. That’s what Matt pointed out in his blog.

    It’s so you to generalize and choose such a sensationalist title. ^_^

16. Matt
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:37 am

    1. I think it’s too bad that the Pligg developers didn’t want to continue the project, but there’s nothing wrong with what they’re doing. I think it’s better than embedding spam in it.

    2. We make money, but at the benefit of our users, not at their expense. I think selling spam links to put on their sites would be at their expense. Having better, faster, more featureful software for free benefits them.

    3. Nothing pains me about WordPress.com making money. But I am happy that our development and investment there directly helps the broader community. WordPress has grown immeasurably because of the great people who are able to work on it full-time, just like it grew a lot when CNET gave me the job that pulled by out of college and away from Houston to get paid to work on WordPress.

    We do not “profit in the same way link sellers do” in any way, shape, or form.

    4. If someone submitted a patch that stopped all spam on all WordPress blogs I would accept it in an instant. Akismet would be fine, it has a lot of usage (and most of its paying customers) come from things other than blogs. It’s entirely in my interest because it would be the right thing to do.

17. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:43 am

    lisa chen
    you missed the whole point: it’s all shades of grey. Making money from selling links or selling spam solutions is still making money. The question is who gave Matt or you for that matter the right to call wrong or right? The objective is the same, the only difference (the grey) is the method. By all means if you are all without sin (sorry money) cast the first stone…

18. Jay
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:44 am

    erm let me think about this one………

    Wordpress is open source and i s used by X amount of blogs. Many are problogs like i dunno the Blog Hearald, Techcrunch, Giga Om, and many many many more who have profited from GPL open Source project called Wordpress.

    Hosting companies have used Wordpress MU for their own blog sites, no one is forced to use Askismat or any wordpress plugin and all links are easily deleted in the sidebar. and you can easily remove the wordpress.org link in the footer. It aint hard if you can edit source code or understand html.

    LoL Wordpress is free and always will be (hopefully). it be cool that now wordpress is so big that it didnt have the defualt links in the sidebar (i remember 1.2 and now i feel old when it was a lot smaller) but its upto the user to delete them or keep them or the community to speak up about the links in the sidebar which maybe they will or wont. Perhaps you should ask in the forums for a consensous opinion.

    Maybe the question should be, should blogs make money with wordpress like hundreds or thousands and not give anything back to community who have created, modified and maintain it, and continues to do so who without whcih if it wasnt for them, it wouldnt be there in the first place.

19. David N. Welton
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:48 am

    It’s all about scarcity:

    http://journal.dedasys.com/art.....o-scarcity

    There is no way around it. To make money, you have to have a scarce good, whether it’s a product you sell, or your time because you are head and shoulders above the competition in terms of providing consulting for something.

20. Dominic
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 6:53 am

    It appears Duncan has an axe to grind. I do NOT believe in ‘ everything’ free’ without a cost of some kind. This is why most of Web 2.0 sites will perish.I am sure Duncan doesn’t work for Arrington without remuneration.

21. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:01 am

    Dominic
    You missed the point: I’m not arguing that everything should be free, I’m simply saying that you cant have it both ways: saying that some shouldn’t profit whilst you do. You are either for making money or against it. If you are against it you should simply practice what you preach.

22. Darren Stuart
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:07 am

    I think this is 2 seperate issues.

    1. making money from open source
    2. method of making that money

    There is nothing wrong with making money from open source if its legite.

    Making money by adding spammy links to the source is wrong and devalues the product.

    Now there needs a happy meduim between the 2. You create a great piece of software and release it to the wild, it becomes a success and leaves you with a bandwidth bill. To Matt how do you pay for this without funding?

    Maybe there could be a way that people can turn on adverts that rotate ads for the open source project as well as their own.

23. Jay
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:08 am

    LOL this is gonna turn into one hell of a a long comment flame post, especially when people wake up to it their RSS readers and probably techmeme.

    Okay i find it ironic that Duncan is critiszisng Matt when, Duncan used to write and own the Blog Herald which was a wordpress powered site. He made money from the site from advertisng and then selling it. Which there is nothing wrong with but he too has made money from ‘GPL Community Built FREE@ wordpress software, just like matt has and many many many many many many many many many many more people have and is still earning money too from writing on Wordpress Powered Blog.

    So is this the pot calling the kettle black?

    My apolgies if i got mixed up Duncan and you wern’t the one who owned the Blog Herald which was apart of the b5 Media network and this wasnt meant to flame but this is just too ironic a post.

24. Richard
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:12 am

    Has Duncan pulled a Dvorak here (posted something controversial just to get comments)?

    Wordpress just like any other project has evolved, changed, grown, matured and in the process the people at the core of it experimented with various ways to support their passion. Is TechCrunch as an entity any different? Evolution is generally a messy process and as someone both inside it as a user of wordpress and outside as an observer of wordpress’s evolution I’ve tried to allow for the inevitable messiness.

    Maybe the mistake is holding Matt and wordpress to a particular standard based solely on the label “open source.” I may be ignorant but I’ve never heard of a single definition that applies to all projects that are run in an open source kind of way.

25. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:14 am

    Jay
    as I noted in the comment thread, some (including you) seem to be missing my point: I’m not saying that folks shouldn’t make money from open source (if I am, point out where, I cant find it), nor am I saying Matt shouldn’t either: The whole grey thing in the title is the give away.

    I’m simply saying that it’s rich for Mullenweg to criticize and ban others for making money when he is doing so himself, and worse still is that there is an obvious conflict of interest as well. Good for the goose and all that.

26. Matt
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:15 am

    I never said “some shouldn’t profit,” I simply criticized a particular user-hostile way of making money. I don’t think anyone every asked for someone else to sell a casino link on their site and keep all the money, but there are plenty of models to provide value in ways people want. Techcrunch writes every day about companies that make money and delight their users at the same time. Spam or “sponsored” links are just the adware of Web 2.0. Despite some folks making a lot of money from it, users are going to revolt just like they did with adware and malware.

27. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:17 am

    Richard (comment 24)
    I’m simply holding Mullenweg to the same standard he applies to others. I’m not trying to be controversial here, it’s Mullenweg on the purge, not me. All I’m saying is lets apply an equal playing field. People can make money from open source or they cant. Matt isn’t the judge, jury and executioner as long as he’s profiting as well.

28. Jay
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:19 am

    Cool ty for clarifying duncan.

29. Duncan Riley
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:22 am

    Matt
    you keep calling text links out at the lowest common denominator to further your argument. As a long term TLA user I’ve never once had a casino, porn or otherwise link. As I’ve said to you previously before: calling all people who use text links spammers is like calling all black people criminals on the basis that some of them are. There are many, many good folks who make an honest living from text links, many of them who don’t face the same conflicts you do. They are as MUCH entitled to make a crust as you are. WTF did someone do to you BTW? Where did this hatred come from?

30. Pasi
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:31 am

    I’m going to use open source blog software.

31. anonoymouse
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:32 am

    Wow, more comments being deleted at techcrunch. The hypocrisy of that is pretty steep.

    People that don’t agree being banned next?

32. Tula
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:36 am

    I think what Duncan is saying is that WHO CARES?? If Vanilla wants to make money on their open source software so be it. There’s no irony if Duncan made money with a blog. He’s saying it’s OK!!!

    He’s also saying that who the f&^$% is PhotoMatt to tell others that they can’t make money when he does as well.

    Where is the irony in that?

33. anonoymouse
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:38 am

    The irony fo duncan supposely only calling matt out because he’s deleting themes - while at the same time deleting comments is pretty funny.

    Besides, matt? Hatred? That’s funny.

34. Matt
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:39 am

    Duncan I never criticized or mentioned the fact that you have paid links promoting concert tickets, the “best web hosting,” epson printers, and a bunch of broken proxy links, and I also never mentioned TLA. (Though maybe you should disclose that above.)

    I specifically criticized and linked to Vanilla, which is embedding paid links promoting a casino, home loan, and mortgage site.

35. anonoymouse
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:40 am

    Whoo, now up to 4 dissenting comments deleted! Yay for open conversations…

36. Justin
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:41 am

    “indeed for someone still very young he deserves much admiration for all he has achieved. ”

    Wow, just .. wow. What a pompous thing to say from a site that just empties press releases into blog posts.

37. Jeremiah
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:42 am

    Hold fast, Duncan. You have written your first good post.

38. Tula
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:48 am

    Matt,
    I happen to run a casino site, a home loan site, and mortgage site. Do you think I should be ashamed for making money off of those enterprises? Do tell.

39. Michael Martine
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:49 am

    Akismet is a service that relies on the failure of the WordPress code to be able to natively deal with comment spam

    Funniest definition I ever heard for Akismet! That was a snort. However, I think it makes sense to have it as a plugin so that it can be used for more than just WordPress. Also, I find it to be less and less effective at blocking spam the longer it goes without an upgrade. I recently felt it necessary to employ the Bad Behavior plugin as well as Akismet.

    I love WordPress dearly, but you can smell the hypocrisy all the way here in Vermont. I don’t know whose definition of a “dashboard” includes an ugodly amount of screen real estate devoted to unwanted default feeds from all the WordPress developers and associates, but mine doesn’t. And then you say sponsored links in WordPress themes are bad? ORLY?

40. Konkoff
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 7:53 am

    Breaking news!
    Blogger is down.

41. Uthfull
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:00 am

    All I can say is that Duncan just crossed all limits and got too personal here.

    The same way you don’t like people leaving dozens of links in the comments they give on this blog which are irrelevant to the content, the same way those links in Vanilla make so sense.

    It has just turned into an ego issue for you Duncan and you’re just trying to madly defend yourself and as a result you’re coming out as a fool.

    Matt is not a judge.. that’s his blog and he has the right to comment and criticize what he wants to. Just the way you’re criticizing him. I’ll say this to you - “Practice what you preach”

42. Deals and Coupons
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:05 am

    I am a big fan of Wordpress and see nothing wrong with Matt is doing!

43. Ric Johnson
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:09 am

    I create a blog post about this at http://www.opendomain.org/2007.....pensource/ , but it appears the pingback did not take. Here is a copy:

    There seems to be an argument between Duncan Riley of TechCrunch and Matt Mullenweg of Wordpress on whether it is moral to make a profit from Open Source.
    There is no doubt that Matt has worked hard and created fantastic software that millions of people use for FREE. I admit I was a little surprised he took some venture capital ( http://photomatt.net/2006/04/12/a-little-funding/ ) - but only because I was wondering what the other people that contributed to WordPress would get. (How can I invest?)

    As a Microsoft developer, I have struggled to learn what “open” really mean for years. My first attempt was a failure, and caused a serious problem between Matt and myself. All I can say is that we worked everything out (and I am sorry Matt!)
    I tried to learn from my mistakes and donated the domain Drupal.com (http://drupal.org/node/86768 ), and made a friend with Dries Buytaert. He did originally agree to link to OpenDomain, but the Drupal community was upset so I gave it no strings attached.
    There is nothing wrong with making some money – in fact I find it difficult to understand how Open projects will succeed otherwise. I have tried to make OpenDomain a charitable organization – to give back to Open groups. However, I can not continue for long without help – I am NOT rich, and this project almost cost me my marriage. It has been very difficult road – but I am VERY PROUD of some of the domains out there that I have helped – including our recent one: http://www.EcmaScript.Org
    When people use an OpenDomain, we do ask for a link - not an Advertisement. We serve no Ads on our site and are not for profit. I use the link only to spread the word about OpenDomain. TextLink ads may very well the the only way Open groups can keep alive.
    Disclosure: I read subscribe to TechCrunch, and consider it an insider’s blog the newest technology.
    Disclosure: I also use Wordpress to power my blog and Akismet has caught 10,232 spam for you since you first installed it. I LOVE it!

44. chris
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:15 am

    Michael

    Duncan’s posts are getting more and more embarassing each day. Save yourself and TC’s reputation and take some action! Or else, you will be doing what he is doing on this post, defending yourself over and over again on a losing battle

    Chris

45. Anonymous
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:20 am

    Did everyone completely miss that Wordpress.com was stolen, anyway? It was an OpenDomain donation. Here’s an archived shot from August 28, 2005 of the site with the open domain link (required for all donations):
    http://web.archive.org/web/200.....press.com/

    Then here’s a shot from Sept. 24, 2005 where the link was removed, and left with the text instead saying “domain donated by Ric Johnson”. Currently, there is no link.

    Here’s more to the story…
    http://akbourne.com/2005/10/20.....domainorg/

    I don’t think everything is squeky clean on Matt’s side of the table.

46. danae
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:28 am

    Matt, how are (removable) sponsored links in Vanilla different from the default blogroll in Wordpress? To my understanding, each is as irrelevant as the other: most forums have nothing to do with mortgages, and most blogs have nothing to do with your personal blog, either.

47. beng
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:30 am

    COME ON GUYS !

    This is simple, if you don’t want someone making money from your open source project, then don’t open source it.

    Quiz, which of these passes the litmus test ?

    1 - hosting a wordpress blog with porn and affiliate links ?
    2 - hosting a wordpress blog with porn and no affiliate links ?
    3 - hosting a wordpress blog with matt’s email address below every pic ?
    4 - running a wordpress blog with porn and affiliate links on linux using apache and mysql ?

    I guess with # 4 just about the whole open source world would be pissed.

    Grow up folks.

48. Robbie Wright
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:32 am

    Most of the time founders can do what they want to with their own software. If Matt wants to remove the paid links in themes on his site, more power to him. He is preserving his vision for his software. If he wants to put links to his blog, his company, or his 2nd cousin’s blog, good for it. It is his software. But the beauty of open source is if you don’t like it, change it! WordPress has amazing ability to add functionality to all aspects of it. Don’t like the dashboard with incoming RSS WordPress themes? There’s dashboard plugins. Remove the links in the blogroll. Remove the powered by WordPress link in the footer. The point is, it provides everyone the flexibility to do what they want with WordPress. Matt has a vision for the software and it is pretty good. I love WordPress. But the same shoe doesn’t fit everyone and WordPress has the flexibility to change easily.

49. mushmoosh
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:33 am

    Extremely interesting discussion.

    I think there is a major difference between making money from sponsored links [Vanilla] and making money from providing an additional service [Akismet].

    I love Vanilla, but I did not know that it includes links within the code. That’s definitely a shady approach to making money.

    Duncan’s focus was on the act of monetizing an open source product, rather than the approach of monetizing. I think he feels that any additional service should be included under the “open source” label instead of using this weakness as a source of revenue. It’s an interesting point and it sparked a much needed discussion.

    I am happy that Matt spoke out.

50. Uthfull
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:35 am

    Danae the links that Matt places in the blogroll are related to Wordpress… the people who contribute to the code and regularly keep their blogs updated on the latest and the most relevant information regarding the product. That ways newbies know the places to check out for more information regarding Wordpress. I know it helped me a lot.

    You guys are just taking shots at Matt. Super lame of you.

    I agree with B S meter. Duncan it seems doesn’t like people who don’t agree with him and he makes every effort to counter them with his nonsensical comments. Go on a holiday Duncan. Take some time off. You need it to re-ignite your writing skills.

51. m
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:41 am

    How Grey Is Your Valley? - it’s a relevant question. Open Source Software is monetizing itself in lots of ways these days.

    I am a WordPress fan too but I don’t like having those links pre-added to my fresh installs of WP each time. I setup a Wordpress.com blog yesterday and found I didn’t like the requirement to pay a subscription fee just to edit my CSS. Blogspot.com has it’s issues but at least they let you edit CSS for free and they don’t stick in Google Adsense Ads once in a while like Wordpress.com says they will do. I didn’t expect that at all.

52. Matt
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:41 am

    Danae, the links in the blogroll were not paid for, and they’re not advertisements for commercial sites.

    They were added almost 4 years ago when no one thought of links as currency, a more innocent time, the idea was like the original Macs had signatures inside. Now they’re just used as an excuse for people to attack WP. We’re probably going to replace them with something boring like documentation links.

    As for removability, I mentioned about 20 WordPress sites above, and you’re on one now, you can see how many have the default blogroll. There’s even a mass delete button. Some WP users could probably speak to whether it bothered them or not.

53. danae
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:46 am

    I’m not taking shots, I was just pointing out (as Duncan did) that this whole issue is such a grey area and actions will be seen differently by everyone. What one person views as appropriate advertising is horrifying for someone else, and to me that means we should all use a little caution before calling each other out on our blogs.

    If Vanilla were doing something like The Deck or contextual ads instead of using mortgage links, this would probably be much less of an issue — surely the real issue is just ensuring that advertising is relevant and reputable? I for one don’t see why it’s a bad thing to make money from your hard work (over and above hosting costs), especially if you’re distributing it for nothing.

54. danae
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:47 am

    Thank you for the answer about the blogroll, Matt — I had always wondered about that.

55. Elliott
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:49 am

    Duncan, I actually like most of your articles, but I can’t believe how far off base you are here - and then continue to dig yourself into a hole.

    You keep stating that your point is that Matt does one thing and then tells others it’s bad if they do it. Well, first, there’s no proof that is true, and second, Matt keeps explaining to you why you’ve got your facts wrong.

    That’s just weird. Please, give it up and write your next article.

    If you’re having a bad day, just close your eyes and decide to start it over again.

56. rob
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:50 am

    Man, I really don’t see how making money could be a problem for the creators of Wordpress. There have got to be thousands of ways to make up any loss. They have more leverage than many major news networks. The could call in a favor from all the big bloggers and make Quarter of a MealTicket in a week!

57. beng
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 8:54 am

    - matt should get together with all his holy buddies
    - right down a list of what is ok and no ok
    - and ADD THAT TO THE LICENSE
    - or stop whining about links they don’t like

    It’s not shades of grey, it’s spelled out in the license.

58. Deals and Coupons
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 9:06 am

    @beng - Good points!

59. trehus
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 9:07 am

    Why do you, Ducan give you a right to critisize others about they critisized others????

    It’s his own blog and he can write down what he likes and he dislikes. End of story. And it seems that you misinterprete his article as well.

60. Tula
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 9:13 am

    Beng brings up a good point. Maybe Matt should create a 10 Commandments of Open Source Monetization.

    Thou Shall not use the GPL to sell Mortgage or Casino Links
    Thou Shall not claim Hosting costs as an excuse
    Thou Shall not have .com domains for open source projects
    Thou Shall not have peanut butter with cream cheese
    [etc. etc.]

    Come on, Matt. Tell us what else we can and can’t do with open source.

61. Matt
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 9:30 am

    I already left a comment saying what you can and cannot do with open source, all the way at the top.

62. Tula
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 9:47 am

    I know. That’s what makes it so sad.

63. Truden
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:02 am

    I don’t think that WordPress is open source in the meaning of REALLY OPEN.
    It can not be open if the work of the contributors is sifted through the “official sites” thus making their own web sites “unofficial”.
    (If you contribute, your work must go through the “official” WordPress sites, where it will make money for them, but you can not make money with two links in your theme)

    I don’t believe that WordPress community is open community, since the owner of the Akismet (Matt) is moderating (by default) the comments in his weblog.

    I don’t believe that “If someone submitted a patch that stopped all spam” the patch will be implemented, since PHPBB2 forums stop the spam with simple CAPTCHA while the most sophisticated one is helpless in WordPress comment form.
    What do I mean?
    I mean that WordPress developer team is either not that good (which I doubt) or Akismet is making (or expecting to make) some good money.

    The worst think about the WordPress leaders is that (as Joe Draper noted) they don’t like seeing someone else making money with WordPress.

    And last thing to say: Matt is good guy. He is very good guy, but he is still in the age when the EGO is ruling (not the heart).
    If you like him, criticize him even harder.

64. huer
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:04 am

    There is an interesting presentation on slideshare about this topic; found it weird when I read it first…

    http://www.slideshare.net/nice.....tributors/

65. Kevin Joseph
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:05 am

    Duncan, you bring up a great point regarding profiteering off open-source. Many open source projects claim to be just that, however charge for their services and have so many statutes of limitations, that you’re cornered into paying for use, maintenance, etc. It’s basically a wolf in sheep’s clothing,

    However, I’ve been reading through all the comments, and I fail to see why Matt is getting slammed on his stance towards open-source. He’s done nothing wrong.

    1) WordPress has strongly supported capitalism. As stated many times above, there are loads of people who have made a pretty penny off the platform with and without giving WP the proper credit they deserve.

    2) Matt has admitted that they have made money off WP themselves, he isn’t hiding anything. What’s the wrong in this? He and his team are the leaders of this platform, is it fair that everyone else makes money off this however they don’t?

66. Ross Turk
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:06 am

    I think a lot of these comments are right on. From my perspective, it’s always been considered appropriate for people to make money off of open source software. Even the most ideological free software organization, the FSF, believes that. I just simply don’t think it’s up for debate.

    I think that where some people go wrong is by not upholding the core values that the ideas of open source and free software are built upon: the freedom of end users to do what they want, the availability of information, and the transparency of process and communication.

    That said, we’ve recently built some features over here at SourceForge.net for this specific purpose. Users with expertise on open source projects or technologies can sell services through our Sour

67. Ross Turk
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:07 am

    Doh. Sorry

    …can sell services through our SourceForge.net Marketplace to interested buyers. We hope that allowing folks to make a living off of the open source projects they love will make for a more mature industry.

    Thx,
    Ross (the SourceForge.net community guy)

68. Dan
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:16 am

    Duncan: I don’t see your point. You mention that Matt can’t have it both ways but by writing this article and placing *your* issues into a “gray area” you’re rewarding your terms with two-ways to lean; neither for or against, making you’re actually opinion irrelevant. And isn’t this just an opinion piece? I don’t see any facts–that are correct–, it’s all lambasting for self-promotion, similar to your friends at Vallywag.

    No matter how many times you’ll be told that your statements are false and irrational you’ll always be clinging to that “gray area” message.

    In your response to the question you pose to Matt, “WTF did someone do to you BTW? Where did this hatred come from?”. What exactly made you criticize Matt–and by association the entire wordpress community of developers and supporters–? All without one ounce of research of how to properly run a business through OSS, the business model of automattic and how Matt runs it, the history of wordpress or even get to know how spam works? Instead of reporting you glued your self-important thoughts together and lambasted the very person AND the community that built the infrastructure for you to get paid from.

69. Matt
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:20 am

    I don’t believe that “If someone submitted a patch that stopped all spam” the patch will be implemented, since PHPBB2 forums stop the spam with simple CAPTCHA while the most sophisticated one is helpless in WordPress comment form.

    Even putting aside the numerous CAPTCHA accessibility issues, and the fact that it treats everyone badly and often I can’t even solve them, all it does is prove that the comment is coming from a human, which doesn’t mean it is or isn’t spam. Human labor is very, very cheap in some parts of the world. That’s why for a long-term solution you need content-based analysis.

    Also the majority of our spam is not from comments, it’s from trackbacks, which were designed for machine-to-machine communication so CAPTCHAs don’t apply.

70. Tula
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:23 am

    I “think” what Duncan is saying is that everyone’s wallet is “grey.” Even Matt’s.

    Matt seems to think the Pope of Open Source, when he’s really just as grey as Vanilla is.

71. Truden
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:34 am

    It is not here the place to argue about the way WordPress works, Mat, but you can stop trackback SPAM in the core code. You don’t need Akismet for that.
    I have proved (I can prove it again) that SPAM robots don’t even load the CAPTCH image in WordPress comment form, which comes to show that they don’t use the comment form, which respectively proves WordPress weakness in the comment POST.

72. Kevin Dangoor
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:34 am

    I think that what Duncan is clinging to is this belief of his: “Money is money, no matter how you make it.”

    I’m pretty sure that’s the main sticking point in this debate. There are ways to make money legal that are less ethical or, at the very least, less friendly to the user/consumer and *that* is the real gray area. It’s not about whether or not someone should make money from open source. It’s completely about *how* that money is made.

    By the way, I’ve gone through some of these thought processes myself as the founder of an open source project (TurboGears) and a businessman. I was very conscious of whether or not my commercial actions around the project were adding value to the community or taking it away. Something like adding text ads that automatically appear when you create new TurboGears sites would never have occurred to me, because it’s obnoxious and devalues the software.

    TechCrunch is handy as a source for interesting new sites and new features on those sites. This kind of opinion piece really detracts from the site. Anyone know of a better place to get similar news without the dreck?

73. Francisco
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:44 am

    Thanks Matt for replying to those comments. It is funny to see how a media guy criticises you for criticizing. It is also fun to see how you are treated as “a freshman” or something like that. That’s not “2.0 manners”!!!

    Cheers from Madrid (Spain)
    Francisco

    Disclaimer: I have no relation either with WP or Matt. But both are so cool it is worthwhile speaking out!

74. Velioncho
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:49 am

    who won? from the comments here , seems like Matt won. It is an art how to drive the comments the way you want them to be.

75. Travis
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:50 am

    Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg has spoken out against a number of open source projects for profiteering from their code.

    Referring to above quote from the article…I’m kinda new in town. What’s the deal with open source and advertising? Is the idea that open source (as one of the staples of Web 2.0) is a new clean way forward that leaves behind the norms of old? How is it that a large open source project makes money as surely the service offered is mighty taxing when it comes to human resorces? Do I sound like a loon? Just trying to make sense of this.

    Comments please…

76. Deals and Coupons
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:53 am

    I think Open Source is about building mass acceptance at first, then profitability later, and this is what happened to WordPress. It is not wrong to be making money off of WordPress as long as it is not abused.

77. Dan
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 10:56 am

    nice article.. Some very varied views in the comments ^_^
    The Wordpress Themes that do include text links are growling in popularity quite quickly..

78. anuj
    

    August 22nd, 2007 at 11:03 am

    wow…now thats some discussion…

    Duncan kept saying ” you dont get the point” and to be fair to him he is making a very very valid argument ….

    Some people always assume moral high ground and start preaching which annoys a whole lot others. Whether Matt is guilty of it…I dont think am qualified to comment on that…

    But yes am against moral high grounds… So am on Duncans side

    on an aside i dont remember when was the last time techcrunch had the post author leave comments so frequently…

    and does anyone knw what is the “personal bias against Matt” that ev