>> No Kickstart ROM version is freeware.

> AROS/68k ROM is.

True. But if you have a look you'll see that I wrote that back in April 2011 when the AROS Kickstart reimplementation wasn't really usable yet.

> politicking between OS4 and AROS

I don't see much of that. There was a remarkable incident in 2007 when Hyperion's managing partner Evert Carton "continued to generate controversy by stating under oath that the open-source AmigaOS reimplementation AROS was "probably illegal"" but according to some AROS developer this isn't anything to worry about:

"Also the 'probably illegal' comment of Evert in a legal court filing has long been discussed off-the-record by me with him. I notified afterwards the AROS devs that I don't feel any reason to be worried and we (AROS) moved on. We don't need other guys taking a stance for AROS and beating on dead horses."
https://morph.zone/modules/newbb_plus/viewtopic.php?forum=3&topic_id=7824&start=38