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[cemaphonic]

46. At that point, it was actually a vestige of the pre-personal computer software business.

Most software then was sold to large institutions (corporations, banks, governments, etc.) and was built to spec with service agreements and formal, signed contracts. Clauses like the "leasing-not-owning" ones were built into the contracts because the software vendors wanted to create a long-term business client, instead of a one-time sale. (Plenty of software is still created & sold on this model). But when PCs came around and companies started selling off-the-shelf retail software in the 70s-80s, they left in these restrictive licenses, even though they were of dubious legality in a retail context, and there was no practical way to enforce them anyway.