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If there are any software companies on this planet that can afford to keep tabs on the legality of its own source code, I hope that Microsoft with their trillio

If there are any software companies on this planet that can afford to keep tabs on the legality of its own source code, I hope that Microsoft with their trillion-dollar market cap (and already very complex licensing situation) is one of them. It would be very sad for everyone in this whole industry if they weren't. It's honestly getting very tired to hear excuses about these F100 companies not being able to afford to do something. That isn't why they refuse to do it, and you know this.

acdha 7y ago
Remember: it’s not whether their code is legal to use but to redistribute in a new way. If they have a contract their existing usage is covered without needing to go through line by line checking who wrote the portions which are still in use. One you add redistribution they have to go through and assess what needs to be renegotiated to add those terms. Given the age of the codebase I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s not even clear who owns the rights given how many small companies sold code libraries back in the 80s and 90s before disappearing or being multiply acquired. That’s a non-trivial amount of new work which only has to be done to release the code.