I think the real risk is not measured in dollars, but potential damage 
to reputations, ill will, the perception that it's not legal or kosher, etc.

So I completely understand this well-founded caution.

However if anyone was interested in approaching the license holders and 
seeing if licenses could be obtained or purchased, I'm interested in that.

On 03/15/2023 04:30 PM, Warner Losh wrote:
>
>
> On Wed, Mar 15, 2023 at 3:56 PM steve jenkin <sjenkin@canb.auug.org.au 
> <mailto:sjenkin@canb.auug.org.au>> wrote:
>
>     "What “uses” would SysV codebase have now?" may be a better Q.
>
>
> A System V release 2 might have very limited use (old VAXen are all it 
> ran on from
> AT&T though there were at least a few ports: 68k for sure).
>
> The successor code base of OpenIndiana which forked from OpenSolaris 
> which was System Vr4 plus a bunch... And that's open... illumos is 
> still using that for its distribution... They'd have been totally 
> dead, imho, were it not for OpenZFS using illumos for so long as the 
> reference platform (that's changed, so now Linux and FreeBSD are the 
> reference platforms, though one of those two is more equal than the 
> other).
>
> But the successor code base being open isn't quite the same as System 
> V being open. There's no 'orphan exception' or 'abandonware rider' 
> that would allow us to distribute this without any legal risk.
>
> But there's the rub: what's the legal risk. The legal risk here is 
> that somebody could show up and assert they have rights to the 
> software, and that we're distributing it illegally. Actual damages 
> likely are near $0 these days, but statutory damages could become 
> quite excessive. But to get damages, one would likely need a lot of 
> money to fight it, and there's not any kind of real revenue stream 
> from System V today (let alone from System V r2). Plus, were this 
> successfully prosecuted, it's not like that would increase that 
> revenue stream: TUHS has no assets, so the current IP owner would have 
> to somehow assess there was blood to be had from this stone, which is 
> unlikely... So, how do you rate the risk of a low-probability, high 
> damage outcome vs the near certainty of a no-damage outcome. Since 
> it's none of our butt's but Warren's, he gets to decide his comfort 
> zone here. :)
>
> So the risk of adverse consequences is likely low, but not zero were 
> we to distribute this without a license to do so. There's plenty of 
> others that are doing so today, but that's between the others and 
> whatever IP owners
>
> Disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer, and this isn't legal advice...
>
> Warner
>