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Research record, not legal advice. This issue is a remedies hypothetical. It does not propose or record a decision to adopt the AGPL, GPL, or any other license. Human open-source counsel must validate the conclusions before they inform license text or enforcement policy.
Question
Assume a copyright holder has offered a codebase under AGPLv3 and an infringer modifies, distributes, or operates it without satisfying the applicable source-code obligations. What relief can a judge ordinarily order, and how does that differ from a negotiated compliance settlement?
This is a focused continuation of the broader remedies discussion in #3.
Short answer
The ordinary judicial remedy is to stop unlicensed conduct, not to have the court publish or relicense the defendant's code. A court may enjoin further copying, modification, or distribution except in compliance with the license; award copyright or contract damages; order impoundment or disposition of infringing copies; and award costs or fees where available.
A mandatory order requiring delivery or an offer of complete corresponding source is possible under a contract/specific-performance theory, but it is not yet a routine, finally adjudicated U.S. AGPL remedy. In practice, source publication, recipient notice, a compliance program, payment, and reinstatement are commonly negotiated settlement terms.
A court cannot ordinarily force the defendant to purchase a commercial license. A separately offered commercial license may nevertheless provide evidence of a reasonable royalty or contract-damages measure.
Copyright-remedy path
If noncompliance is held to violate a condition limiting permission to exercise an exclusive copyright right, the post-violation acts may be infringement. Potential relief includes:
Impoundment/disposition ? impound and potentially destroy or otherwise dispose of infringing copies and reproduction materials. 17 U.S.C. ?503: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/503
In the Ninth Circuit, MDY Industries v. Blizzard requires a nexus between the violated condition and an exclusive copyright right. A condition attached only to disfavored conduct during software use may sound solely in contract: https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2011/02/17/09-15932.pdf
This distinction is especially important for an AGPL ?13 network-interaction claim because merely providing a network service is not itself conventional distribution. A claimant would normally plead both copyright and contract theories and tie the condition as closely as possible to authorized modification, reproduction, or distribution.
Contract/specific-performance path
A claimant may request an affirmative order requiring the defendant to provide or prominently offer the exact Corresponding Source promised by the license. This is different from an injunction merely stopping infringement and depends on contract formation, standing, governing state law, adequacy of money damages, and equitable discretion.
The current U.S. record does not establish mandatory AGPL source publication as an automatic remedy:
Software Freedom Conservancy v. Vizio seeks GPL source through third-party-beneficiary specific performance. It remains ongoing, with trial reported for late 2026, so it is not final authority establishing the remedy. Status: https://sfconservancy.org/copyleft-compliance/vizio.html
Discovery may require confidential production of the defendant's source to attorneys and experts under a protective order. That is evidence production, not public source disclosure.
What courts and parties have actually done
Prohibitory judicial order
The U.S. BusyBox/Westinghouse default judgment enjoined continued distribution of out-of-compliance GPL software. It did not judicially relicense the defendant's surrounding proprietary code: https://sfconservancy.org/news/2010/aug/03/busybox-gpl/
Negotiated compliance package
The BusyBox/Monsoon settlement included publication of previously distributed BusyBox source, notice to prior recipients, appointment of an open-source compliance officer, financial consideration, and reinstatement of GPL distribution rights: https://softwarefreedom.org/news/2007/oct/30/busybox-monsoon-settlement/
Settlement: verified source compliance or removal, notices, audit/process commitments, payment, reinstatement, and possibly a separately negotiated commercial license and release.
Commercial-license valuation
Artifex v. Hancom is directly relevant. The court distinguished between impermissibly imposing a commercial license on the defendant and using comparable commercial-license value as evidence for damages. The latter could be presented to a jury under the governing state law.
Practical consequence: a real, consistently offered commercial license with documented arm's-length transactions may strengthen a reasonable-royalty damages theory. An arbitrary penalty invented only after infringement is materially weaker.
Role-played outcomes
1. First notice; prompt cure
The defendant immediately supplies complete source, fixes notices/source offers, and stops every violation within the applicable reinstatement framework.
Likely result: prospective rights may be reinstated; an injunction becomes less likely without continuing harm; past liability is not necessarily released but may have limited monetary value.
2. Refusal plus continuing distribution
The copyright owner proves ownership, copying, a covered modification, noncompliance, and continuing distribution.
Likely result: preliminary or permanent injunction against continued out-of-compliance distribution; damages/profits or statutory damages as available; possible fees. The defendant then chooses whether to comply, remove/rewrite the component, cease the product, or negotiate.
3. Network-only AGPL ?13 dispute
A modified program serves remote users but provides no prominent source offer.
Likely dispute: whether ?13 is an enforceable copyright condition tied to the derivative-work right, an affirmative contractual covenant, or both. A court may enjoin conduct tied to copyright; source-offer specific performance requires the contract/equity path. There appears to be no square, final U.S. appellate decision ordering public source release solely for ?13 noncompliance.
4. Component removed before judgment
The defendant removes the covered code or replaces it independently.
Likely result: prospective injunction is less compelling, but claims for past infringement, damages, attributable profits, costs, or declaratory relief may remain. The replacement code does not become open merely because an earlier version infringed.
5. Violation of an entered injunction
Continued prohibited conduct can lead to civil contempt, coercive fines, compensatory sanctions, and enforcement proceedings. This is enforcement of the court's order, distinct from license damages.
Implications for FastLED drafting ? without choosing AGPL
Do not state that a judge must compel disclosure or purchase of a commercial license. A license cannot dictate a court's statutory and equitable powers, and an exclusive-remedy clause could accidentally narrow relief.
A safer architecture for any reciprocal condition is:
state clearly that the obligation is a condition and limitation of the relevant copyright permissions;
anchor it to reproduction, preparation of modifications/derivative works, and distribution rather than to commercial status alone;
define cure and prospective reinstatement without purporting to erase past infringement;
reserve all nonexclusive remedies available under applicable law; and
treat verified disclosure, removal, or a commercial license as settlement/compliance paths rather than the only remedies a judge may order.
Questions for counsel
In each likely defendant forum, is the proposed disclosure duty a copyright condition, contractual covenant, or both?
Can the steward establish standing and ownership for each copyright claim?
What source-specific performance is available, and to whom must source be delivered?
Does later compliance cure only prospectively, and what past claims survive?
What registration program preserves statutory damages and fee eligibility?
Can actual commercial-license transactions support a reasonable-royalty calculation?
Should an enforcement policy specify notice, verification, cure, escalation, and settlement practices separately from the license?
Research status
Preliminary / attorney validation required. The strongest supported proposition is the availability of an injunction stopping out-of-compliance activity. The least-settled proposition is a mandatory public-source-release judgment for a network-only AGPL ?13 violation.
Note
Research record, not legal advice. This issue is a remedies hypothetical. It does not propose or record a decision to adopt the AGPL, GPL, or any other license. Human open-source counsel must validate the conclusions before they inform license text or enforcement policy.
Question
Assume a copyright holder has offered a codebase under AGPLv3 and an infringer modifies, distributes, or operates it without satisfying the applicable source-code obligations. What relief can a judge ordinarily order, and how does that differ from a negotiated compliance settlement?
This is a focused continuation of the broader remedies discussion in #3.
Short answer
The ordinary judicial remedy is to stop unlicensed conduct, not to have the court publish or relicense the defendant's code. A court may enjoin further copying, modification, or distribution except in compliance with the license; award copyright or contract damages; order impoundment or disposition of infringing copies; and award costs or fees where available.
A mandatory order requiring delivery or an offer of complete corresponding source is possible under a contract/specific-performance theory, but it is not yet a routine, finally adjudicated U.S. AGPL remedy. In practice, source publication, recipient notice, a compliance program, payment, and reinstatement are commonly negotiated settlement terms.
A court cannot ordinarily force the defendant to purchase a commercial license. A separately offered commercial license may nevertheless provide evidence of a reasonable royalty or contract-damages measure.
Copyright-remedy path
If noncompliance is held to violate a condition limiting permission to exercise an exclusive copyright right, the post-violation acts may be infringement. Potential relief includes:
In
Jacobsen v. Katzer, the Federal Circuit recognized that open-source conditions tied to rights to modify and distribute can support copyright enforcement: https://www.law.berkeley.edu/files/Jacobsen_v_Katzer_-_Westlaw.pdfIn the Ninth Circuit,
MDY Industries v. Blizzardrequires a nexus between the violated condition and an exclusive copyright right. A condition attached only to disfavored conduct during software use may sound solely in contract: https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2011/02/17/09-15932.pdfThis distinction is especially important for an AGPL ?13 network-interaction claim because merely providing a network service is not itself conventional distribution. A claimant would normally plead both copyright and contract theories and tie the condition as closely as possible to authorized modification, reproduction, or distribution.
Contract/specific-performance path
A claimant may request an affirmative order requiring the defendant to provide or prominently offer the exact Corresponding Source promised by the license. This is different from an injunction merely stopping infringement and depends on contract formation, standing, governing state law, adequacy of money damages, and equitable discretion.
The current U.S. record does not establish mandatory AGPL source publication as an automatic remedy:
Discovery may require confidential production of the defendant's source to attorneys and experts under a protective order. That is evidence production, not public source disclosure.
What courts and parties have actually done
Prohibitory judicial order
The U.S. BusyBox/Westinghouse default judgment enjoined continued distribution of out-of-compliance GPL software. It did not judicially relicense the defendant's surrounding proprietary code: https://sfconservancy.org/news/2010/aug/03/busybox-gpl/
Negotiated compliance package
The BusyBox/Monsoon settlement included publication of previously distributed BusyBox source, notice to prior recipients, appointment of an open-source compliance officer, financial consideration, and reinstatement of GPL distribution rights: https://softwarefreedom.org/news/2007/oct/30/busybox-monsoon-settlement/
This illustrates the practical difference:
Commercial-license valuation
Artifex v. Hancomis directly relevant. The court distinguished between impermissibly imposing a commercial license on the defendant and using comparable commercial-license value as evidence for damages. The latter could be presented to a jury under the governing state law.Practical consequence: a real, consistently offered commercial license with documented arm's-length transactions may strengthen a reasonable-royalty damages theory. An arbitrary penalty invented only after infringement is materially weaker.
Role-played outcomes
1. First notice; prompt cure
The defendant immediately supplies complete source, fixes notices/source offers, and stops every violation within the applicable reinstatement framework.
Likely result: prospective rights may be reinstated; an injunction becomes less likely without continuing harm; past liability is not necessarily released but may have limited monetary value.
2. Refusal plus continuing distribution
The copyright owner proves ownership, copying, a covered modification, noncompliance, and continuing distribution.
Likely result: preliminary or permanent injunction against continued out-of-compliance distribution; damages/profits or statutory damages as available; possible fees. The defendant then chooses whether to comply, remove/rewrite the component, cease the product, or negotiate.
3. Network-only AGPL ?13 dispute
A modified program serves remote users but provides no prominent source offer.
Likely dispute: whether ?13 is an enforceable copyright condition tied to the derivative-work right, an affirmative contractual covenant, or both. A court may enjoin conduct tied to copyright; source-offer specific performance requires the contract/equity path. There appears to be no square, final U.S. appellate decision ordering public source release solely for ?13 noncompliance.
4. Component removed before judgment
The defendant removes the covered code or replaces it independently.
Likely result: prospective injunction is less compelling, but claims for past infringement, damages, attributable profits, costs, or declaratory relief may remain. The replacement code does not become open merely because an earlier version infringed.
5. Violation of an entered injunction
Continued prohibited conduct can lead to civil contempt, coercive fines, compensatory sanctions, and enforcement proceedings. This is enforcement of the court's order, distinct from license damages.
Implications for FastLED drafting ? without choosing AGPL
Do not state that a judge must compel disclosure or purchase of a commercial license. A license cannot dictate a court's statutory and equitable powers, and an exclusive-remedy clause could accidentally narrow relief.
A safer architecture for any reciprocal condition is:
Questions for counsel
Research status
Preliminary / attorney validation required. The strongest supported proposition is the availability of an injunction stopping out-of-compliance activity. The least-settled proposition is a mandatory public-source-release judgment for a network-only AGPL ?13 violation.