Re:The terms of the AGPL are pretty easy to comply with
by belorn on Monday July 27, 2020 @07:18PM
(#23970523)
That depend on the industry they are in and how much of an monopoly position they got.
Ask what would happen if a email project at google that was estimated to be released this year got delayed an additional year. How much would that impact their revenue and stock values, or even the general market share of gmail?
Then take a an high competition area where multiple companies are in heavy competition. How much of developers focus can you shift away from the main product in order to re-implement code that is already written and could be used today?
Companies in a low competition market that are large enough to already be in a dominant position can just re-implementing AGPL code. Being risk averse might also be an effective strategy, and having higher costs and slow development won't cause any direct harm to the core part of the company. In worst case they will just scrap the project and cut their losses.
In a high competition industries you can not afford that. Every single advantage that can give you an edge will be used unless it goes against the core business model. Unsurprising this is also the places where I personally have seen the least amount of license purity. The most extreme examples are from the game industry which tend to use what ever software they can get their hand on in their games and support systems as long it does not prevent the core business model.
Ask what would happen if a email project at google that was estimated to be released this year got delayed an additional year. How much would that impact their revenue and stock values, or even the general market share of gmail?
Then take a an high competition area where multiple companies are in heavy competition. How much of developers focus can you shift away from the main product in order to re-implement code that is already written and could be used today?
Companies in a low competition market that are large enough to already be in a dominant position can just re-implementing AGPL code. Being risk averse might also be an effective strategy, and having higher costs and slow development won't cause any direct harm to the core part of the company. In worst case they will just scrap the project and cut their losses.
In a high competition industries you can not afford that. Every single advantage that can give you an edge will be used unless it goes against the core business model. Unsurprising this is also the places where I personally have seen the least amount of license purity. The most extreme examples are from the game industry which tend to use what ever software they can get their hand on in their games and support systems as long it does not prevent the core business model.