> The companies can make him go away simply by complying with the GPL, no? That's not clear. If you copy someone's work and don't have a license to use it then

> The companies can make him go away simply by complying with the GPL, no? That's not clear. If you copy someone's work and don't have a license to use it then you've violated the copyright holder's rights. Just because you come into compliance with a license to copy the work doesn't absolve the violating party of the original liability. Additionally, there is some disagreement specifically around the GPLv2 and license re-instatement; specifically, it's not clear that license re-instatement is possible in the face of unwilling copyright holders.