The fact that Core is not willing to just start from the old dump publicly available already shows that it's not just "rent-seeking". Core clearly wants what Rebble has spent significant effort in not just maintaining but also building.

They're entitled to it just because in some sense Core is a successor to Pebble? No, not really.

Of course it's rent-seeking, akin to squatting — Rebble took Pebble apps developed at no cost to the users, and then maintained them and added cost. In some cases they might actually be required by the licenses of individual apps to open source their maintenance.

No one's actually entitled to anything here on either end (legally), I see 0 work being done to actually contact the original authors to seek permission or licensing details.

AFAIK, there wasn't a blanket license that covered all apps in the ecosystem... so each app would vary. In the absence of a license all rights are held by the original developers.

> Rebble took Pebble apps developed at no cost to the users, and then maintained them and added cost.

Again, if that's all it were, Core could and should just take that old Pebble dump and use that. Why bother Rebble if they haven't done anything as you imply.