I saw that the Unreal Engine is going open-source on github (see link1 and link2) and that made me wonder: “is open-sourcing a previously commercial engine a smart move?”
What’s the benefit to Epic Games in open-sourcing their core code in this manner?
How can they not be concerned about people stealing parts of it just because they put a copyright and license statement on the code?
It seems like there has to be a catch. How does releasing their source code benefit Epic Games?
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You seem to misunderstand a key part: the unreal engine remains a commercial engine. This means that they will still get the licensing fees from every developer and each game sold. The EULA even specifically states that you can’t share the source with anyone that isn’t also a licensee.
The major benefit is that there are now programmers that are paying you to get the chance to upgrade the engine.
As for discovering if part of the engine was used in another project, I’ll refer to this question. Mainly embedded string and residual debug information is key part in discovering illicit use of open source parts.
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