I will have to dig up the links, but I am not sure this is an accurate characterization of the situation.
My understanding was that the recent dust-up was due to re-licensing in a way that wasn’t compatible with GPL.
All it really says is that you can do whatever you like but anything built on top of the GPL must be GPL itself. That’s the crux of it. There are over 10,000 GPL plug-ins. There are several thousand GPL themes. There are many GPL based theme businesses such as Blutheme, StudioPress, iThemes. You had 80 on the show. That’s how the WordPress system works.
Thesis has stated publicly that they believe in a different interpretation of the GPL. The GPL doesn’t apply to them. That WordPress’ license doesn’t apply and they don’t need to follow it. That’s obviously harmful to the WordPress community and I would love them to join and be GPL.
I agree that there is some nuance here to the issue of themes and plugins and we’ll certainly clarify there. But to say that “WordPress is using the GPL to poison their community” and “it is essentially impossible to make a living legally selling WordPress themes and plugins” are just not true.