I don't disagree with your general point, but I don't think we can ascribe a singular objective to Facebook as an entire organisation. It was quite clear from

I don't disagree with your general point, but I don't think we can ascribe a singular objective to Facebook as an entire organisation. It was quite clear from the discussion around the recent github issue asking them to consider relicensing that there are many parties internal to Facebook with a say in the decision, and it's unlikely they all agree on everything. The React developer's motives for releasing React as open source are probably more along the lines of "creating communities to build better software together", and there are obviously others within Facebook who are motivated by protecting Facebook from lawsuits. What we see on the outside is the resulting compromise. See Dan Abramov's comments in the issue, particularly [1] & [2] 1: https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-316223034 https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-... 2: https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-316739812 https://github.com/facebook/react/issues/10191#issuecomment-...