> any company >5m is also going to give a big legal fight

I don't know about any company doing that. I guess some would do so on principle. But I honestly suspect it'd be a cost/risk based decision.

Who knows. But there is seemingly no carrot to entice those with money to give some of it to support the project, so a stick it is.

I like the Blender way of, contribute money = your features requests get some priority. But that only works if the company needs something.