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AGPLv3 only requires preservation of attribution but not full branding
They use a modified version of the AGPL that includes a requirement to use their logo.
They also, in a separate subsection, note that no permission is granted to use their trademarks.
As far as I can tell, the goal is to create a catch-22 that prevents you from forking the project: if you don't include the logo, they complain that you didn't include it, and if you include the logo they complain that you're infringing their trademark.
Edit: Or more specifically, OnlyOffice's position is that the logo requirement is not a modification because they think it's an attribution requirement allowed under section 7(b).
Fun fact - GNU / FSF doesn't let you claim it's a GPL variant if you have added claims to it. If you say it's GPL then others gets to assume it's GPL proper
https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#ModifyGPL
You can legally use the GPL terms (possibly modified) in another license provided that you call your license by another name and do not include the GPL preamble, and provided you modify the instructions-for-use at the end enough to make it clearly different in wording and not mention GNU (though the actual procedure you describe may be similar).
If you want to use our preamble in a modified license, please write to licensing@gnu.org for permission. For this purpose we would want to check the actual license requirements to see if we approve of them.
Although we will not raise legal objections to your making a modified license in this way, we hope you will think twice and not do it. Such a modified license is almost certainly incompatible with the GNU GPL, and that incompatibility blocks useful combinations of modules. The mere proliferation of different free software licenses is a burden in and of itself.
As for attribution requirements;
https://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/gpl-compliant-legal-notices-author-attributions
However, requirements to preserve notices could conflict with user freedom.
Please note that "copyright notice" is a notice that contains: the word copyright (or the (C) symbol), the year of first publication of the work, and the name of the copyright holder. Any other information is not part of a copyright notice
In summary, people who modify programs released under the GNU GPLs can still change where and how an interactive program displays those notices. For example, if the original program put these notices at the bottom of every page, someone modifying the software could conceivably remove those and have them appear only on a single "About this software" page.
Apart from some specific situations, logos are neither "legal notices" nor "author attributions" as normally understood.
Putting trademarked links or logos in the program's interface and explicitly declining a trademark license thus gives the trademark holder a way to stop uses harmful to their reputation, balanced by the users' option to remove the trademarks in order to distribute modifications freely
Instead of continuing the fight over branding, OnlyOffice has proposed what it calls a "constructive" path forward. The letter demands that Euro-Office change its UI and source code.
I love this.
This is the problem with everyone going opensource to get away from big tech. No one wants to put in the work to help open source projects, and can't even be fucked to attribute the original code. It's all take, take, take, and the shareholders love it because they only thing they heard was "free."
Nextcloud tried to work with OnlyOffice, but they refused and don't look at any PR's
So Nextcloud forked it and created EuroOffice. Now OnlyOffice is pissed
It's pretty funny on its face ("If you want to use a different logo, then use different code too"), but I have the feeling that this schism is just going to make open-source office projects worse in general.
FSF has already called out OnlyOffice (just without naming them) and says GPL doesn't allow it.
Additionally you're not allowed to claim you're using GPL if you add impermissible additions to the license
I agree with the FSF; I'm just a little worried Onlyoffice will seek some vindictive retaliation. I don't know what that'll look like, but I certainly wouldn't have predicted this response from them either.
Then you call FSF as an expert witness and watch them tear them apart
That's not what this is at all.
Onlyoffice is Russian
5d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need not make them do so.
I don't get where do they come with the logos and branding. While it's fair and just to give credit. I would understand this section as permission (if they were really mean about it) to leave any and all pages out of the fork and it wouldn't bind them to even have any UI attributions, to anybody, but if they have something like about or license page then that should contain licenses and attributions? That is as long as the work has reasonable attributions somewhere. Or does the license limit modification in those parts of the UI code? I don't think it does. I could be wrong.
The license explicitly allows you to change how it is displayed as long as the new attribution sufficiently identifies the prior author(s) and remain discoverable
this post was submitted on 23 Apr 2026
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