Very good points, and well researched. "It's highly unlikely a judge is going to find you have the same rights as the open source license, unless you were actu

Very good points, and well researched. "It's highly unlikely a judge is going to find you have the same rights as the open source license, unless you were actually relying on all of those rights. You certainly would not be able to sublicense those rights further, except to those you had already. This is not the same as Novus's ability to "stop licensing the software to new parties", it means you would not be able to give others the rights you had gotten through estoppel."--I agree 100%. My apologies to other readers if I implied the opposite. I do still think that estoppel would protect licensees themselves insofar as they had relied on the software in, e.g., the development of their businesses. Your point about sub licensing is well taken and deserves further exploration. It would appear that, estoppel or not, those who are now rereleasing the software may be on shaky legal ground. As you said, estoppel would probably not give you the right to sublicense, which is effectively what these folks are doing. "Essential to the creation of apparent authority are words or conduct of the principal, communicated to a third party, that give rise to the appearance and belief that the agent possesses authority to enter into a transaction"--Agreed. I was under the impression this had transpired in the present case. I'm not sure about New York, but in many jurisdictions a principal's failure to act (given some other criteria) can be enough. I was thinking that would come into play here. Naturally it would depend on the exact facts, of which I am uncertain. I would also raise the question of jurisdiction. Novus may be in New York, but what of licensees in other states? They could potentially make the argument that their states' laws apply, because part of the "transaction," i.e. the downloading and licensing of the software, occurred there. Would this argument succeed? I dunno.