> I mean the GPL actually defends your right to do whatever you want with the software including selling or renting it out.
But realistically, practically, you can't. There is nothing to sell if the software has to be open source. The list of commercial GPL applications is really short compared to the millions of applications which include BSD-licensed code.
This is not true. Many small but successful companies are released their code using AGPL3 license, so you can see and contribute to the code, but cannot compete with them using the same code.
The typical business model is a paid hosting and paid support for the product.
> so you can see and contribute to the code, but cannot compete with them using the same code.
You actually can.
You just cannot without giving back.
That's the intended beauty of it.
Edit: let me point out that I am not an AGPL evangelist. I'm less annoyed at it than I used to be but I still prefer liberal licenses for almost everything.
But realistically, practically, you can't. There is nothing to sell if the software has to be open source. The list of commercial GPL applications is really short compared to the millions of applications which include BSD-licensed code.