See the response about that to one of the users:
http://coda.uservoice.com/pages/general/suggestions/102373-if-you-get-sueued-make-others-easy-to-clone-this-site-

I’m aware of what software can go for.
I just don’t think this particular code is worth 5 Grand, as it could not possibly be very complex.
And, as Henry mentioned as well the vultures will be out there waiting to sue everyone who adopts it.

@Jon:
“SeeqPod is ‘branded’ and I’ll bet they won’t be turning down offers.”

What would be the good of a brand, if it’s going to be sued out of usefulness?
(Whether they’ve got a case or not.)

You’re right in general terms, but they’ve certainly generated some valuable PR for the sale.

SeeqPod is ‘branded’ and I’ll bet they won’t be turning down offers.

Cheers!

1. It’s common knowledge that opening a project (like, for example under GPL or one of the BSD licenses) ensures that it spreads like wildfire — at least in comparison to if you charge for it. The RIAA is already trying to destroy them — like they attempt to destroy anything even remotely innovative, so, to use the kind of capitalist-speak I usually don’t like: where’s the “financial incentive” for other folks to “buy” the API for their own projects?

2. Look at the growth of firefox add-ons etc: firefox (and it’s mutant offspring Iceweasel) don’t charge people for the “privilege” of working with their codebase or API, and as a result, the development of Firefox is really fast in comparison to closed-source efforts like IE. If they really want to checkmate the RIAA’s efforts in this direction, GPL’ing the code would probably lead to a mess of startups: more versions makes the thing harder to kill.

3. They’re already getting sued, and look at the big deal the prosecution tried to make about the ads on TPB? They attempted to paint TPB as some kind of extremely commercialized thing that it wasn’t, simply because of a few ads.
Now you get Seeqpod selling/licensing their API at 5 grand a pop: It’s not going to be very difficult to spin that as a money-grab, which can easily be reinterpreted into “well, it’s obviously a seriously commercial site, so we’ll gouge them for millions.”

Actually this isn’t that clever of an idea: GPL’ing the codebase (or directly ceding it to the public domain outright) would go a lot further toward ensuring that even if they beat Seeqpod, another crop of ‘pods grows in it’s place.

Restricting that to folks with 5 grand to blow just strikes me as….counterintuitive.

Just seems a bit steep for, essentially, a software code.