Things You Need To Know About WordPress
One of the foremost often asked questions by our users is “Do I even have to pay to use WordPress?”. We tell them that WordPress may be free and open-source software, which is typically followed by, “Why is WordPress Free?”.
In this article, we’ll discuss why is WordPress free, what’s the value of running a WordPress site, and what’s the catch?
WordPress is free
WordPress is open-source software. it’s free within the sense of freedom not within the sense of free beer. you’ll ask what’s the difference between these two?
Open-source software comes with the liberty for you to use, modify, repose on, and redistribute the software in any way you wish without paying any fees.
However, there could be costs involved in other areas. we’ll discuss the value of using the open-source WordPress software later during this article.
Why Don’t They Sell WordPress as a Software?
We often get asked, why don’t people and corporations behind WordPress sell it? If WordPress is nearly as good as everyone says, then they might obviously make tons of extra money by selling it.
This statement would add up if one company or a private owned WordPress.
WordPress is an open-source community project where tens of thousands of talented people have made contributions to form it into an excellent software that it’s today.
There is an important group of developers that guides the project development, but anyone can contribute patches, fix bugs, make features, suggest features, etc.
Furthermore, project leaders change from one version to a different. If you get deeply involved within the community, then you’ll become a core contributor to WordPress also.
The Philosophy behind Open Source Software
The philosophy behind the Open Source software movement is that software isn’t like other tangible products. Once the software is made, it is often copied repeatedly with little cost.
Let’s take the instance of a toy factory. Each toy manufactured has different parts and every part features a cost. The manufacturing cost of those parts is often calculated by the factory to make a decision an inexpensive margin of profit for the merchandise.
On the opposite hand, the value of making software and making copies of it’s not an equivalent. Some groups believe that with each copy sold, the margin of profit of the software becomes more unfair.
How Do People Make Money with WordPress?
The two main profitable parts of any open-source software are products and services supported by an equivalent open-source software.
People often confuse WordPress with WordPress.com, but they’re actually two various things. WordPress (often mentioned self-hosted WordPress or WordPress.org) may be a free blogging platform and website builder.
Matt Mullenweg, the co-founding developer of WordPress, launched a corporation called Automattic which provides a “restricted” free blog hosting service at WordPress.com, and you’ll pay/upgrade to unlock features and take away ads.
However, to urge the complete power of WordPress on the WordPress.com platform, you’ll get to check in with their WordPress VIP service. This costs over $5000 per month for hosting + $5000 found out fee.
Automattic has raised a complete of $317.3M in funding over 7 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on Jan 1, 2015, from a Venture round. (Source)
Other developers have also gone ahead to create successful multi-million dollar businesses around WordPress by creating commercial plugins, commercial themes, and even offering WordPress hosting.
Some samples of successful multi-million dollar WordPress companies are:
-WPEngine – a managed WordPress hosting company that has raised over $290 million dollars and now also owns StudioPress commercial themes.
-Great Motive – guided by Syed Balkhi is another multi-millionaire dollar company located around WordPress. the corporate manages WPBeginner, OptinMonster, WPForms, MonsterInsights, SeedProd, and other popular WordPress plugins.
-Yoast – is that the company behind the favored WordPress SEO plugin that’s employed by over 5 million websites.
-ElegantThemes – multi-million dollar theme company behind the favored drag & drop page builder: Divi and a number of other plugins.
Good WordPress developers and consultants also make a cushty full-time income by building custom websites, applications, and plugins around WordPress for his or her clients. tons of them are making over six-figures in annual earnings by themselves.
Is WordPress Copyright Free?
No, WordPress isn’t copyright free. it’s licensed during a way that permits everyone to use it, but each contribution made to the software is copyrighted.
It is released under GPL, so you’re liberal to use, modify, and redistribute the code. you’ll have the copyright to modifications you create to the software, not the whole code.
GPL requires that any derivative work you release or distribute should be licensed under GPL also. you’ll have the copyright to try to anything you wish, your derivative work automatically inherits the GPL license, so others are liberal to use, modify, and redistribute your code in any way they choose.
Does this mean that each one premium WordPress Themes and Plugins are Licensed GPL?
According to a politician blog post on WordPress.org, themes are GPL too. Images, CSS, and Javascript used inside themes and plugins are often excluded, but all PHP and HTML parts of themes and plugins extensively use WordPress functionality thus they’re a derivative work therefore are licensed under GPL.
While some folks don’t accept as true with that, most trusted WordPress businesses follow and abide by the community guidelines.
The Content Published with WordPress also inherits GPL?
No, you’re entitled to license your content any way you wish. Unless the content you’re publishing is really a derivative work of WordPress or the other GPL licensed work.
For example, if you’re sharing your articles, photos, or the other artwork on your blog, then you own full copyrights of it.
However, if you’re writing a blog post showing people the way to use a WordPress function with examples, then that specific blog post might be licensed differently. The code utilized in examples is really derivative work and automatically inherits the GPL license.
The WordPress Trademark
The code of WordPress as a software is released under GPL but the words WordPress, WordCamp, and therefore the WordPress logo are registered trademarks owned by the WordPress Foundation.
To distinguish between a site or resource that’s official or community run, the inspiration asks folks to not use “WordPress” in their name.
This is the rationale why our site is named WPBeginner rather than WordPressBeginner. Any website, training course, or resource that you simply see has WordPress in their name is perhaps being travel by someone who doesn’t know enough about WordPress. this suggests you almost certainly shouldn’t pay them any of your money 🙂
Most legit businesses built around WordPress are conscious of the trademark policies, and that they respect the principles.
Cost of using WordPress
The cost of using WordPress as a software is always free for you to get and use. However, to use WordPress on the online, you’ll need WordPress Hosting.
You can use WordPress.com to make a free blog, but remember that there are some differences. See our comparison of WordPress.com vs WordPress.org for more details.
The cost of using WordPress is comparatively minimal and holds true for running the other sort of website also. the sole real cost is web hosting ($7.99 per month) and name ($14 / year).
However, WPBeginner users can get a free name and 60% off web hosting from Bluehost which suggests you’ll start an internet site for as low as $2.75 per month. Bluehost is an officially recommended WordPress hosting provider.
Additional costs might be commercial WordPress themes also referred to as premium WordPress themes. However, you’re not required to use those because there are over 6000+ free WordPress themes that you simply can use.
People often use commercial plugins, but you’re not required to use those also because there are over 54,000+ free WordPress plugins available.
We have created an in-depth guide on what proportion does it really cost to create a WordPress website with instructions on the way to start an internet site on a budget and economize.
We hope that this post answered your questions on WordPress licensing, the prices of running a WordPress site, and therefore the business around WordPress.
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