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When you release your software under the GPL, it means you give anyone a license to use your software under some terms and agreements. If somebody violates the agreement, they are in breach of contract with you. This means you can sue them in a court of law.
A non-exclusive copyright license (such as most FOSS licenses) can be revoked at any time only if there was no consideration involved.
Yes, it is possible to make an open source project into a closed source project. The copyright holder can change the license of a project at any time, or cease to distribute source code of new releases. New releases can therefore be made closed source.
Because open source licenses flow directly from the author/owner to the licensee, the only party in a legal position to enforce the GPL is the author or owner of the copyright. Intermediate distributors do not have the power to enforce except with respect to any contribution they may make.
Don't get legal advice from coders.
My guess: if you break the terms of a licence (not a contract, as has been pointed out) then the other party could go to court and get an order or injunction to stop you selling your software until the GPL code portions are removed. If you were to disobey the courts then the courts may well be able to fine you, send you to jail etc.
I can't begin to guess how likely such an outcome would be.
There do seem to be many less onerous licences than GPL, and lots of good stuff under those licences.
Here is the best explanation ever: http://lwn.net/Articles/61292/ The main idea is that GPL is License, not Contract, thus not exchange of obligations.
Don't assume that just because most OSS developers will be to lazy to sue you, you'll get away with it. I know lots of OSS developers (myself included) who would just transfer the copyright of their code to the FSF if they found out you stole their code. The FSF would then go after you with a burning passion. This has happened several times.
Bottom line, don't steal from the OSS community. It's really bad karma.
I guess you might get sued by the FSF, but I believe your worst problem will be terrible PR and karma.
I've been told that there's alsoa special "bolgia" in Hell for people that do that, but I can't tell for sure.
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