The legal fees would add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars at a minimum. There just aren't many people / organizations who have that kind of money to spend just to get some open source code. Perhaps adding some language about legal fees would make the license more attractive to lawyers.
I own the copyright to some GPL code. Nothing major or very important, but it's out there nonetheless. If I find out that a company has taken my code and is violating the license, here are the two outcomes I'd want, in order of preference:
1) The violator release their code under the GPL, as the license said they should have.
2) If they refuse my request for #1, I want to forget the matter completely and put it behind me.
If a lawyer offers to represent me pro bono and help me get the code, with no talk of getting paid, I'd accept that offer. I wrote the code with no expectation of getting paid for it. If a lawyer wants donate his labor to the project as I donated mine, that's fine with me. Otherwise, the lawyer can crawl up his own ass and die there. I'd rather have scenario #2 than see a lawyer getting paid to sue somebody over my code.
> 2) If they refuse my request for #1, I want to forget the matter completely and put it behind me.
The likely result here is that the request will be refused (or just ignored) by default. Which means that there is no chance the license will ever be complied with, and users will never receive the modified code that they are entitled to under the GPL.
What's the point of licensing under the GPL if users never get the rights the GPL grants them?
My point is that the GPL should include a clause that if you sue for a breach of contract and win, then the violator of the license needs to pay your legal fees. This would (theoretically) allow a lawyer to sue with your permission and on your behalf and get paid while still forcing the infringer to respect the contract and release their code.
