[captainmuon]

The demo is already unlimited. People wo want to free-load (or can't afford a license) can already now user it for free.

I know there are many people who will obey the license, but would not donate. If you dual license it (commerical and GPL), they'd just accept the GPL "deal". So it still makes sense to not have a GPL option business wise.

But what about, instead of open source, they make it "source open" or "source available"? Here is the source, you may not use it unless I die. Or you may use it, but not sell it. Or you must contribute changes back if you release a changed version...

They have no big trade secrets in the source. They already rely on the fact that customers obey licenses that they materially don't have to. So I believe they have nothing to lose by making the source available.

[pjmlp]

Other than having others packing the software and selling it as theirs.