ehhh i hear you, “abandonware” can be defined as “software which is no longer supported or updated”, but that is a very broad definition. I think one could also define abandonware as “software which is no longer supported or updated, and which has no clear IP owner anymore”, and I think that that is the colloquial definition for a lot of people. I think we need a new word for one of these two definitions.
Fair point. I think there needs to be a legal definition of IP’s that no longer have a claimant and therefore go public domain by default. If nobody can show ownership then nobody owns it.
The term for this is “abandonware”
Not really. There’s a lot of abandonware where the IP holders still pull out the lawyers.
ehhh i hear you, “abandonware” can be defined as “software which is no longer supported or updated”, but that is a very broad definition. I think one could also define abandonware as “software which is no longer supported or updated, and which has no clear IP owner anymore”, and I think that that is the colloquial definition for a lot of people. I think we need a new word for one of these two definitions.
I propose “orphanware” for that subset of abandonware that has no clear owner.
Consistent with the broader term “orphan work”.
Fair point. I think there needs to be a legal definition of IP’s that no longer have a claimant and therefore go public domain by default. If nobody can show ownership then nobody owns it.
lord, if only we lived in a world where things made sense…