Software development is extremely complex and involves teams of diversely talented individuals, such as programmers, graphic artists, and writers. Because software publishers have invested such a large amount of time and resources in the development of their intellectual property, they typically do not sell the software to users – they license it. The license grants the user the right to use the software along with certain restrictions.
Use of software consistent with the terms of the software license agreement is software compliance. Software licenses are complex and vary from software publisher to software publisher, from product to product by the same software publisher, and even from release to release of the same software title. A thorough understanding of software licenses is critical to comprehensive IT governance.