The code is GPL ("GPL2 or newer"). That gives WPEngine (and you and me) a clear license to use, copy, modify, and redistribute the code, with some very well understood restrictions (which do require you to share your modifications under the same GPL, but absolutely do not require "contributing back to the community" or paying a competitor 8% of your gross revenue).
For about 2 decades up until last week the WordPress trademark page explicitly told everyone that the use of "WP" was not covered by any of their trademarks.
US law has a concept of "Nominative Use" of trademarks: "Nominative use, also "nominative fair use", is a legal doctrine that provides an affirmative defense to trademark infringement as enunciated by the United States Ninth Circuit, by which a person may use the trademark of another as a reference to describe the other product, or to compare it to their own." -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominative_use
I guess a lot of lawyers are about to get richer determining whether or not WPEngine's use of the "WordPress" trademark was "as a reference to describe the other product, or to compare it to their own." To me (remember, not a lawyer) it seems quite obvious that "We sell WordPress hosting" is a reference to the trademarked Wordpress product, and is exactly what is allowed by Nominative use.
> Can they rebrand to something other than Wp?
I doubt they need or want to. They can fork Wordpress core itself under their rights granted by the GPL and they could name that something like WPEnginePress, or choose to use any other fork like ClassicPress or AspirePress. The Nominative Use "or to compare it to their own" clause allows them to say "We sell WPEnginePress Hosting, which is 100% compatible with WordPress and has an identical admin interface for users."
The wordpress.org theme/plugin repo is a bigger problem, but most (all?) of that is under the same GPL2.0 or newer licence, so WPEngine or any other fork can copy/modify/redistribute those as well (and WPE are already mirroring it), and at least AspirePress has said they've planning on getting plugin/theme authors to use their repo as well as the wordpress.org one.
Not paying $30mil a year in extortion?
> Are they legally in the clear?(Note:Legally)
IANAL, but:
The code is GPL ("GPL2 or newer"). That gives WPEngine (and you and me) a clear license to use, copy, modify, and redistribute the code, with some very well understood restrictions (which do require you to share your modifications under the same GPL, but absolutely do not require "contributing back to the community" or paying a competitor 8% of your gross revenue).
For about 2 decades up until last week the WordPress trademark page explicitly told everyone that the use of "WP" was not covered by any of their trademarks.
US law has a concept of "Nominative Use" of trademarks: "Nominative use, also "nominative fair use", is a legal doctrine that provides an affirmative defense to trademark infringement as enunciated by the United States Ninth Circuit, by which a person may use the trademark of another as a reference to describe the other product, or to compare it to their own." -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nominative_use
I guess a lot of lawyers are about to get richer determining whether or not WPEngine's use of the "WordPress" trademark was "as a reference to describe the other product, or to compare it to their own." To me (remember, not a lawyer) it seems quite obvious that "We sell WordPress hosting" is a reference to the trademarked Wordpress product, and is exactly what is allowed by Nominative use.
> Can they rebrand to something other than Wp?
I doubt they need or want to. They can fork Wordpress core itself under their rights granted by the GPL and they could name that something like WPEnginePress, or choose to use any other fork like ClassicPress or AspirePress. The Nominative Use "or to compare it to their own" clause allows them to say "We sell WPEnginePress Hosting, which is 100% compatible with WordPress and has an identical admin interface for users."
The wordpress.org theme/plugin repo is a bigger problem, but most (all?) of that is under the same GPL2.0 or newer licence, so WPEngine or any other fork can copy/modify/redistribute those as well (and WPE are already mirroring it), and at least AspirePress has said they've planning on getting plugin/theme authors to use their repo as well as the wordpress.org one.