If I am the sole owner of a work, I can change the license of newly distributed copies from any previous license to any new license that I want to, even if the new license is more restrictive. The new license doesn&#x27;t retroactively apply to copies that were distributed under the old license, only new copies distributed under the new license.<p>However, my original question still stands. If I hack privately on a git repo and never distribute it, and then I only add a license in commit N right before first releasing it publicly, what is the license of commits 1 through N-1, which do not contain a license themselves (or perhaps contain a different license) but were never distributed separately from the license contained in commit N?