Unlike its previous iterations, the GPLv3 was borne out of an unusually open and transparent process. The drafting of GPLv3 was not confined to a chosen few, but rather involved thorough and heated discussions and consultations within the free and open software community. The suggestions were considered, assessed, and at times, incorporated into the drafts that were then released to the public yet again, for further comments and scrutiny. Mailing lists, public commentaries, and in-person events all fed into what became one of the most extensively debated software licences ever written.
The FSF Compliance Lab also hosted discussions on IRC, where all concerned could engage directly with those involved in shaping the terms of GPLv3. In October 2007, I reported on one such meeting in an article published on Linux.com. That discussion, led by Brett Smith, went directly to the heart of what would become one of the most contentious aspects of GPLv3, the treatment of additional terms under Section 7.
Section 7, Attribution, and the Limits of Additional Terms
I had specifically asked Smith the objective behind permitting the inclusion of additional terms in Section 7, yet also allowing downstream licensors to remove them at will. In response, Smith drew a careful distinction between different categories of additional terms. First, there are additional terms that that grant permissions. Next, are terms that supplement the licence, and, finally, there are terms that cross the line into further restrictions.
It was made clear that while licensors may add terms that belong in the first, or second category, they cannot impose conditions that undermine the core freedoms guaranteed by the licence. In essence, if the license terms belong in the third category and pose restrictions on the freedoms granted by the license, those can be summarily removed.
Although the discussion at the time was framed around GPLv3, the same Section 7 framework applies to AGPLv3. Both these licenses share the same architecture of permissible and impermissible additional terms.
Smith's explanation expanded on what has been the core philosophy of the Free Software Foundation. The four freedoms granted by the license are supreme and paramount, and their protection must be ensured. GPLv3 was structured to prevent licensors from using additional terms as a backdoor to reintroduce restrictions that the licence was intended to eliminate.
This is also where a well-established principle of legal interpretation becomes relevant. What cannot be done directly, cannot be done indirectly. GPLv3 and AGPLv3 expressly prohibit the imposition of further restrictions on downstream recipients. A licensor cannot therefore circumvent that prohibition by recasting a restrictive condition as attribution.
"What cannot be done directly, cannot be done indirectly. GPLv3 and AGPLv3 expressly prohibit the imposition of further restrictions on downstream recipients" — Shashank Sharma
If a requirement operates in substance to control how a derivative work is presented, branded, or distributed, it cannot be legitimised merely by labelling it an attribution obligation. To hold otherwise would allow precisely the kind of downstream control that Section 7 was designed to prevent.
Courts and legal scholars have long recognised that any interpretation of a statute which defeats the evident purpose of the framers must be rejected. The intent behind GPLv3, and by extension AGPLv3, is unusually well-documented. The drafting process was explicitly aimed at preventing licensors from imposing downstream restrictions that would inhibit modification, redistribution, or independent development.
The OnlyOffice Dispute: Attribution or Control?
Nearly two decades on, the dispute between OnlyOffice and Euro-Office brings that question into sharp focus.
OnlyOffice's position rests on a requirement that downstream distributors must retain the original OnlyOffice logo in the user interface of the programme. This, it argues, is a permissible attribution condition under Section 7(b). But that framing bypasses a crucial distinction. Attribution, in the legal sense, has consistently been understood as the preservation of authorship and notice, typically through textual means such as copyright statements and licence references. A mandatory logo requirement goes beyond this. It does not merely identify authorship, it imposes a form of branding.
The practical implications of this position reveal its weakness. If Euro-Office were to comply in the manner suggested, it would result in software developed, maintained, and distributed by one entity being presented under the branding of another. This is not attribution, it is compelled co-branding. It risks misleading users as to the origin of the software and interferes with the downstream developer's ability to define its own product identity.
Even on a plain reading, the clause is overextended. The requirement applies when distributing the Programme. Euro-Office, however, is not distributing OnlyOffice as such, it is distributing a derivative work. GPLv3 and AGPLv3 explicitly permit the creation and distribution of such derivatives. Treating a modified work as though it remains the original Programme for the purposes of branding obligations collapses that distinction entirely.
There is, in addition, a deeper doctrinal problem. Attribution is a matter of copyright law. It concerns the identification of authorship and the preservation of legal notices. Logos, by contrast, are governed by trademark law. Their use is controlled, not compelled. No court, in any context, has required attribution to be effected through the mandatory display of a logo. To the contrary, attribution has consistently been satisfied through textual and legal means. To recast a logo as a required form of attribution is not an extension of existing doctrine, but a departure from it.
OnlyOffice's position effectively attempts to use a copyright licence to enforce a trademark outcome. That is a category error. Trademark rights may restrict the use of a logo, they do not ordinarily mandate its use, particularly by third parties distributing modified works.
"OnlyOffice's position effectively attempts to use a copyright licence to enforce a trademark outcome. That is a category error. Trademark rights may restrict the use of a logo, they do not ordinarily mandate its use, particularly by third parties distributing modified works." — Shashank Sharma
OnlyOffice's Own Words
The clearest evidence that OnlyOffice's logo requirement functions as a commercial lever rather than a genuine attribution obligation comes from OnlyOffice itself. In a January 2025 email exchange between OnlyOffice's legal team and developer Dan Brown, the contradiction at the heart of their position was exposed in precise terms.
Brown observed that the licence terms are irreconcilable. OnlyOffice simultaneously requires downstream distributors to display its logo and prohibits them from using its trademarks. If a distributor retains the logo as required, they are using a trademark they have been expressly denied permission to use. If they comply with the trademark restriction, they are in breach of the logo retention requirement. There is no path to full compliance.
OnlyOffice's response did not resolve this contradiction. It acknowledged that the logo requirement exists to protect brand identity and prevent user confusion, objectives that are recognisably commercial rather than attributive in nature. More significantly, OnlyOffice confirmed that the ability to remove branding is available under a commercial licence. In their own words, dual licensing exists to offer businesses "the ability to remove branding" as a paid option.
That admission is dispositive. If removing the logo requires a commercial licence, then the structure of the licensing scheme becomes clear. One hand takes away what the other has given. While the AGPLv3 grants downstream recipients the freedom to modify and redistribute the work, those freedoms are effectively curtailed through the imposition of trademark-linked conditions that operate as restrictions in substance. This is not attribution. This is a case of weaponizing trademark law to claw back rights that copyright law expressly grants.
A Parallel in the Courts
This is not merely a community dispute. The precise legal question, whether licensors can use additional terms as a vehicle to impose restrictions that the licence itself was designed to prohibit, recently arose before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Neo4j, Inc. v. Suhy.
The appellant, Andreas Suhy, had challenged the enforceability of additional licensing restrictions imposed on AGPLv3-licensed software. The dispute arose from Neo4j's insertion of the Commons Clause, a commercial use restriction appended to the licence text as an additional condition.
However, the appeal did not proceed to adjudication. Following the rejection of a motion to stay enforcement of garnishment proceedings, the appellant moved for voluntary dismissal. The Ninth Circuit granted that motion by order dated December 10, 2025.
The absence of a judicial determination does not diminish the significance of the issue. The underlying question remains unresolved, whether downstream recipients may remove conditions that function as restrictions rather than genuine supplements. The Free Software Foundation had filed an amicus brief in the appeal, reiterating its position that the GNU licences do not permit licensors to impose additional terms that curtail the freedoms guaranteed by the licence, and that such terms may be removed by downstream recipients.
That question now returns, in a different factual setting, in the dispute between OnlyOffice and Euro-Office.
The Broader Principle
A requirement that forces downstream developers to carry forward upstream branding runs directly counter to the intent and structure of the AGPLv3. It does not preserve freedom, it curtails it. Euro-Office's approach, retaining core licence obligations while removing what it and the FSF consider impermissible additional terms, aligns with both the structure and purpose of the licence.
OnlyOffice's stance seeks to transform attribution into a mechanism of control, and its own correspondence confirms it. GPLv3, and AGPLv3 by extension, were designed to ensure precisely that this cannot happen.
Having miserably conflated the issues of trademark law and attribution, OnlyOffice is unlikely to succeed at trial should it choose to pursue this dispute before the courts.