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I am not a lawyer, so this is not legal advice. The copyright is held until it expires. If the code is explicitly GPL, then you can still use it - but you can'

I am not a lawyer, so this is not legal advice. The copyright is held until it expires. If the code is explicitly GPL, then you can still use it - but you can't change the license or remove the copyright, and you have to abide by the clauses in the GPL version used. There are organizations that might sue to enforce the GPL license, even if the original copyright holders might not because they are defunct. Note that someone owns that copyright, because someone owns the IPR of that company, even if it is defunct. It might be worth checking to see what company bought their intellectual property, or who the founders are (they may be the IPR holders too). It's a big longshot, but you might get permission to relicense the code under a different Open Source license, or a transfer of the copyright.

dbolkensteyn 5y ago
> There are organizations that might sue to enforce the GPL license, even if the original copyright holders might not because they are defunct. This is exactly what I'd like to dig into further. Who else besides the copyright owner has the legitimacy to enforce the GPL? Afterall, how can a random external entity know whether or not I have a legitimate non-GPL, commercial, license granted by the copyright holder? There are many dual licensed GPL projects out there. > Note that someone owns that copyright, because someone owns the IPR of that company, even if it is defunct. This is very interesting as well. So basically you're saying that as part of the closing of the company, the IPR must be transfer to some other entity/individual.