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> Blender’s scripting API is an integral part of the software. Blender add-ons work, look and feel like Blender features. And as for any other Blender feature that means – it has to be free, free and free forever! Paying for an add-on can only mean access to the add-on download service… offering it to you as GNU GPL. Your freedom as a user and developer is guaranteed.

This is the same issue that wordpress has faced in the past, I believe - are proprietary plugins allowed to a GPLed product?



I’d genuinely like to see this challenged in court.

IANAL but I don’t think it is enforceable. It’s the whole “You used our interface” question similar to the Google v Oracle debacle all over again.

In my mind it’s the same issue as selling 3rd party printer ink, or aftermarket car parts. The manufacturer should have no say.


They treat addons as GPL'd. The same issue comes up with Blender Game Engine, requiring the whole game to be GPL.


Notice that the Blender Game Engine is discontinued anyway. People seem to instead use Armory3D[1], which has full Blender integration and is zlib licensed[2].

1: https://armory3d.org 2: https://github.com/armory3d/armory/blob/master/LICENSE.md


I reckon a fair way is if blender has a proprietary licence available to plugin vendors who wants to sell non-GPL version of their plugin. I suppose the proprietary licence can be a small share of the profit from the plugin sales.




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