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So you've got this thing that's of non-zero value. Because the company shut down, and didn't get acquired, it's probably still owned by a largish number of folk
by jhugg 10y ago
So you've got this thing that's of non-zero value. Because the company shut down, and didn't get acquired, it's probably still owned by a largish number of folks. Getting the right approval to sell it for a song would seem tricky without majority shareholders being really into the idea.
- jkarneges 10y agoYeah, it's hard. I worked on a video game that was canceled 16 years ago, and only recently released in unfinished form. It was very difficult to get consensus among the team to allow a release, and ultimately we had to settle on a non-free license (CC non-commercial. better than nothing). We had some commercial offers, but they were low enough that it made it seem like we could seek a better offer, even though no such better offers really exist. I can easily see the same thing happening with RethinkDB: Buyer: I'll give $10K for all of RethinkDB's IP. Owners: LOL, no thanks. You know how much we spent building this? Buyer: I'll give you $100K. Owners: Ehh starting to turn into real money, maybe we'll hold out for a bigger number? Buyer: I'll give you $1M! Owners: Now we're talking! But, no. Surely if you'll offer this much, there's someone to beat it. Let's go looking. I don't see a way out... Fortunately, they picked a FOSS license. As much as people like to gripe on the AGPL, we have code we can freely modify and use, even commercially. That's pretty awesome, and more than I can say about my much less valuable video game.