Originally Posted by
ok360tours.com
Jwigum, I think you are misreading the purposes of the Hugin and Panotools licenses. They are saying that no other entity can copy, modify, or put up for sale any version of their product, without their written approval. I am sure that any for-profit GUI for panotools is paying rights or has written consent to make use of the algorithms contained. This does not mean that you can't use it to produce products for commercial sale, so long as they are products of using Hugin and not variations of Hugin. In fact, what you said would be like saying that you cannot use your PC to create panoramas based on the copyrighting of Windows by Microsoft. As long as you don't take a Microsoft- or Hugin- product and sell it as a creation of yours then you are fine.
Programming code is intellectual property owned by the creator, much the same as the photographs you produce. When you "sell" your VTs commercially you are not, or rather should not, hand complete rights of them over to the client. Instead, common practice is to license the use of your intellectual property (photographs and VTs) for use by the client. This goes without saying that if a client was willing to pay extra for exclusive rights that you should not try to sell it to them, but in general practice you still "own" the VTs you produce for others.
Many programmers design applications like Panotools and Hugin simply for recognition and to showcase their talents, to bring in further clients. Much of the opensource projects you see are built on the premise that the attention begotten from it will lead to more business for the creators.