In reply to Mike McAlister.

With respect Mike, when you uploaded version 1.0.1 of the Ollie theme on the org theme upload page it states “Read the requirements before updating a theme”, and “In order to have your theme hosted on WordPress.org, your code is required to comply with all the requirements on the Themes Team handbook page”.

Then there are three check boxes that have to be checked before uploading the theme, two of which are: []”The theme complies with all Theme Guidelines”, and []”The theme, and all included assets, are licenced as GPL or are under a GPL compatible license”.

Mike, I’m sure you know all this, but for anyone reading who may not be aware, the theme review process is supposed to work in way where a reviewer checks the theme and comments with any issues that they have found. The theme author then has the opportunity to fix those issues and upload the theme with those issues fixed. If the theme author does not agree with the reviewer that is fine and you can comment and make your disagreement known. The reviewer will then take into account any reasonable objections, I know I certainly would. However what happened in the Ollie ticket was that you first began by ignoring my concerns, and to keep this comment from getting too long I’ll talk specifically about the issue of loading videos externally from YouTube which does not appear to be GPL compatible (see the checkbox mentioned above). You uploaded five newer versions of the theme without addressing this issue or even commenting about it. If I am wrong about this issue, you could simply have explained why I was wrong i.e. “this is not an issue because…” or “I’ll check this and think of a way to make this work…” or something, anything instead of trying to freeze me out. Can you see how this may look like an attempt to disregard GPL rules, whether intentional or not intentional?

Issues in v1.0.1 include putting your own copyright on the users frontend, the external resources (js via CDN, YouTube videos), the GPL issues, the frontend links, missing licensing & copyright info, and the non-compliant admin notification. Any other theme with the above issues from any other theme author would have seen the ticket closed by an admin reviewer with a comment such as “please make sure you read and fully understand the requirements, fix the issues and upload a newer version of the theme”, which would mean a new ticket created at the back of the queue. I’m not talking about the onboarding functionality here, but the other issues that would, at any other time, have resulted in a closed ticket. I could perhaps understand these issues from an inexperienced theme author, a rookie WordPresser or such like. But Mike, you are are well known in WP circles and have a vast wealth of knowledge and experience. Is there any part of you that could perhaps, just maybe see how this may look like arrogance and entitlement? An attitude of “I know better than the theme requirements”, or “those requirements don’t apply to me” may be inferred, and not to mention the many many other theme authors who genuinely try their best to work within the theme requirements. Then along comes a theme that disregards many of those requirements that a lot of other theme authors take time to read and understand, and the intital reviewer approves the the theme without any mention of these issues. Can you see how that may be perceived as disrespectful?

Sorry for the rant above, and I again apologize if my tone in the ticket was confrontational. I could and should have done better in the way my words were written. I felt it was important to provide a counterpoint for the sake of the integrity of the theme requirements, and other theme authors who maybe don’t want to speak up.

Congratulations on the upcoming birth of your first child. You’ll soon have your hands full that’s for sure. All the best. Peace x