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I have a WordPress theme developed by GoDaddy (license: GPL-2.0).

The footer of all pages has this copyright:

Primer WordPress theme by GoDaddy.

I want to remove it, is it allowed?

I have made modifications to the theme, should I write that I have done these modifications? If so, where should I write this?

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    The theme in question has a hook in place to display this message (see credit.php:39), which implies they have configured you to be able to remove the message from the output if you wish (without needing to modify the source). GoDaddy even has instructions on how to do it here: github.com/godaddy/wp-primer-theme/wiki/…
    – Brandin
    Jan 22, 2018 at 11:11

1 Answer 1

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The GPL License this theme links to explicitly states that:

You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program’s source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty;

So no, you may not remove this notice.

If you perform your own original modifications, you should probably list bost authorship statements together. e.g.: "Original Primer WordPress theme by GoDaddy; Additional modifications [possibly, list them] by Darroosh."

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    The message "Primer WordPress theme by GoDaddy." is part of the output of the software. I'm not sure if it counts as belonging to "all the notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty." The message in question also does not mention the GPL nor does it mention absence of warranty, so I don't see how the GPL could be interpreted as forbidding you from removing it.
    – Brandin
    Jan 22, 2018 at 11:13
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    The part you quote is about the source code. But OP wants to remove the attribution from the program (i.e., in this case: what is visible on the HTML page), not from the program’s source code.
    – unor
    Jan 22, 2018 at 16:22
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    copy and distribute verbatim copies ... provided that you ... publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice as the theme has been modified it is not a verbatim copy. Notices in the source should be kept and it would be polite to give credit to the original developers where you show your own credit, but you aren't required to publish the notice on all pages.
    – sambler
    Jan 26, 2018 at 4:42
  • Still not sure from the correct answer, due to conflict between the comments. Any other suggestion?
    – darroosh
    Feb 3, 2018 at 19:17

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