No, of course not, that would be dodging their responsibility just as much. They sold a license to all future updates of mIRC, I expect that to be honored (or r

No, of course not, that would be dodging their responsibility just as much. They sold a license to all future updates of mIRC, I expect that to be honored (or refunded if not reasonably possible to honor) - and not for the author to try to play games to get out of this commitment. The author could start a new project, not based on mIRC, and sell that separately.