Right-to-Use Transfer License Considered a non-issue

["William D. Gooch" <ai.gooch@MCC.COM>]

    The only argument I can see
    for the transfer fee (besides just wanting to bring in more money) is
    that this is the price that Symbolics stipulates for undergoing the
    risk that one more (gasp) entity will be looking at the source code
    and *might* do something unethical with it.  (Forgive the sarcasm.
    I just don't see it happening.  Now if it were written in CLOS ...)

This 1has0 happened to Symbolics in the past, back when they were far less
cautious about protecting their proprietary interests.  Perhaps this
helps to explain the degree of care with which they approach the subject
now.    

I doubt Symbolics makes any significant amount of profit from transfer
fees.  At a time when they are probably shorter of money and even more
highly resource-limited than ever, they might just be trying to make
sure they don't lose money in the resales process.  It does, after all,
cost something to do the paperwork associated with license transferral,
keep the proper records for software and hardware support, etc.