How to protect? I've seen tons of themes from Themforest ready to download on Torrent sites!

Does Themeforest provide any helps to protect themes from people who steal and make it free on Torrent sites?

As an author, what is the recommendation for protecting this?

Does author have to encode PHP, HTML, JS, etc code before uploading theme to Themeforest?

Anyway, to my knowledge, any encoded things are finally able to be decoded.

This seems to have no way out.

Any recommendations?

My recommendation is: don’t bother.

There’s no point. And your code needs to be clean, also in de demo’s since potential buyers check it out. So just let it be and focus on creating :slight_smile:

I’m not aware of anything Envato does to curb torrenting directly.

The recommendation is as ChapterThemes said, don’t worry about it. Don’t let it get to you. These are usually just people who are hoarding themes just to have them and usually don’t use them anyway.

Having said that, if you still want to do something, then I would suggest making sure your clients know that the only official place to get your themes is on ThemeForest, or on your site, or wherever you want. Warn them that downloading from torrent sites usually comes with viruses or malware. A lot of themes have been altered before they get turned into torrents, and the only way to know you’re not getting malware is to pay for the theme through legitimate, legal channels.

Also, this is another reason why theme authors provide private support on their own sites. This is something that you need a “product key” from Envato in order to access. You only get a product key when you purchase the theme. No key, no support.

Good luck!

Scott

Thanks ChapterThemes,

Since I’m a newbie on Themeforest, you mean no theme here does any license protection (e.g. license key validation, etc.) ?

Also, I’ve never purchased any theme here.
If I’m a buyer, I just pay for a theme > then receive link to download > download all the code of that theme?
Is this process correct?

What if the buyer gets the theme and re-distribute it for free on the internet?
:frowning:

@dyspersion

Thanks for your response.

You mean that the buyer will get product key from envato after purchasing a theme, right?

What is the private support?
Is it like a support forum which the buyer must have product key so he can access and get supports from the theme creator?

Sorry I’m a newbie and may ask some nonsense questions.

Yes, that’s mostly correct – you pay for the theme, and then you have a “download” area where you can click a link to download the theme in a .zip file.

Licensing of themes on TF is a hot issue at them moment as Envato recently allowed authors to release themes under “100% GPL” as well as the standard mixed license where design elements and Javascript are protected, but (most) php code is not. Because of the license for WordPress, any code which references a WP API function cannot be considered protected, but other code that doesn’t reference WP can be protected under license. (I’m not a lawyer, this is my interpretation of the WP license).

But, licenses don’t keep people from “repurposing” your code. Mostly, this seems to be an acceptable practice as I’ve seen several themes with the same code in them. The community pretty much polices themselves and vigorously defends designs, though. If someone rips off a theme, Envato will usually take the offending theme down. Or if it’s selling on another theme site, usually those companies will take the offending themes down, too. Or, you can do DMCA takedown notices for copyright violations.

I don’t work for Envato, and I’m not an authority on the subject. These are just my own understandings from observations over the years. I could be wrong. :wink:

Don’t let any of this discourage you, though. There is risk in everything. But, there are also several authors making very nice livings selling themes on ThemeForest. And it’s a great community of people who are all very supportive. Nothing great comes without risk.

Hope that helps!
Scott

deviantwp said

@dyspersion

Thanks for your response.

You mean that the buyer will get product key from envato after purchasing a theme, right?

What is the private support?
Is it like a support forum which the buyer must have product key so he can access and get supports from the theme creator?

Sorry I’m a newbie and may ask some nonsense questions.

Yes, they get the key after purchase.

Private support is what most authors provide on their own websites. You have to register on their site with your product key in order to get access.

Scott

Items found on this types of websites are usually packed with malicious code. When someone uploads it on his (or a client) server he just give a nice backdoor to their websites.

Always purchase from trusted sources so your data, your online presence and your sanity is preserved.

Agree with “Don’t bother yourself” :slight_smile:

People who download your theme from torrents or … will not pay for your theme even if there was no free download sites too. So you don’t loose money and they don’t get any updates/bug fixes and support in return. (Actually most of them, don’t even use the stolen themes)

Just focus on your work and make your works better for the real users.

doru said

Items found on this types of websites are usually packed with malicious code. When someone uploads it on his (or a client) server he just give a nice backdoor to their websites.

Always purchase from trusted sources so your data, your online presence and your sanity is preserved.

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