Posted on 11/14/2009 3:58:16 PM PST by Swordmaker
Apple won a sweeping legal victory against Macintosh clone maker Psystar Corp. Nov. 13 when a federal judge in San Francisco ruled (PDF, courtesy of Groklaw) that Psystar had violated Apple’s copyright and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Judge William Alsup struck what may be a death blow for Psystar by granting Apple’s motion for summary judgment while denying Psystar’s counterclaims.
The only real surprise here was the swiftness and thoroughness of Apple’s victory. Judge Alsup basically ruled that the OS X End User License Agreement (EULA), which prohibits the installation of the software on non-Apple hardware, is legal and means exactly what it says. It is just the latest in a long string of ruling upholding EULAs, sometimes called shrinkwrap or click-wrap licenses.
Judge Alsup sidestepped Psystar's claim that it was protected by the first sale doctrine, which generally gives the buyer of a protected work the right to resell it without the permission of, or any payment to, the copyright holder. The judge said first sale only applies to legal copies and that the way in which Psystar had modified the software to let it run on clones meant that the copies did not meet this standard. The judge rejected out of hand Psystar's claims that it made legal use of Apple's trademarks and that Apple has misued it copyrights.
A hearing on remedies is scheduled for Dec. 14. The order does not cover several other claims by Apple, including breach of contract and trademark infringement, but the ruling suggest that Apple would be heavily favored to win should the remaining case ever come to trial. There is also similar litigation pending in Florida, where Psystar is based.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessweek.com ...
Doubt it. The Software Licenses have been upheld too many times to be appealed... and now there is a STRONG precedent for the Miami case. Judge Alsup did not make his ruling restricting it only to OS X.5 Leopard. Every instance in the ruling is OS X... no point limitation or name restriction. Ergo, it is inclusive of OS X.6 Snow Leopard... which Psystar is contending is a separate product and deserving of an entirely new case in which they can open the identical anti-trust arguments that have already been adjudicated and tossed out as meritless.
No it isn't, and no you shouldn't. This is just another in a long line of decisions which limit what you can do with what you purchase. I'm not talking about copyright violation, but about fair use, which is gradually being eroded by companies like Apple, Disney and Microsoft.
And it is Linux and FOSS which are the last bastion of free choice.
I thought it was over when you ruled on this case earlier!
:-)
Pystar never had a chance, IMO. There a guy selling computers without an OS that one can install OS X onto without needing any hacks. Quo computers I think the name is. He has the right idea, IMO.
As it stands here, still using the Macbook as a defacto iMac for DAW work and a Toshiba laptop with Linux for everything else.
If there are ever any Linux apps that = the quality of Logic Express...look out Apple cuz as an OS, Linux is pretty much on par now, IMO.
You should read that Miami New Times treatment on them that I linked to. Los Hermanos Psystar have plenty of fight left in them and now are also selling a bootloader CD so that you build your own Hackintosh
There are some slam dunk Hackintosh configurations out there such as the Gigabyte GA-G31M-ES2L with an 8500GT video card or similar one http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?t=1506699
I went down to the nearest electronics stores to buy a Unix based notebook computer (I would have settled for a desktop). I couldn't find any that did not run Microsoft Windows except for Macs, so I bought a Macbook Pro. Never regretted it. It has all the Unix goodness I've come to love over the last three decades.
And it is Linux and FOSS which are the last bastion of free choice.
You're welcome. I've contributed software fixes for dozens of different software packages, more on Linux (including the Linux kernel and glibc) than on the BSDs, but whatever. Unfortunately, even RedHat and Canonical do not offer a line of hardware that comes preinstalled with their OS on it.
That sounds like a pretty good idea. RAM is cheap now.
It was... but, unfortunately, I don't draw a paycheck from the Federal Court system. However, I did know the founder of the Federal Judiciary School (where newly named judges go to learn about how to be a Federal judge) before she died... used to play bridge with her.
Macbook Pro 17” is my first Mac, and I adore it! You won’t be sorry. Not once have I said “I hate you” to my Macbook. I say it on a regular and repeated basis to my hubby’s Compaq and to the pc’s at work. :)
Which is also in violation of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of which this ruling found them in multiple violation. AND it is inducement to breach of contract which is still scheduled for trial in California. . . their continuing willful acts of selling their OS X Rebel product, which does exactly that and of which there are existing precedents, will go a long way in sealing their fate on that trial. It won't be long before injunctions are flying left and right. Are you aware that DMCA violations carry criminal sanctions.
I’m pretty much a PhotoShop power user, and do some large, photo-intensive color catalogs, so the RAM has been maxxed out always. But, I’m lazy about shopping around for such things, so I’ve always bought it installed if possible. Good to know that it’s actually cheaper my way now, lol.
Major portability is not what I’m looking for, just the ability to work from a recliner in front of the tv, lying in bed, whatever feels most comfortable, rather than being anchored to a desk. It rarely leaves the house, unless I’m travelling.
The PowerBook I have is something of a brick from a weight standpoint, so I doubt I’d even notice, with the exception of the larger form factor.
Punks? Guess you don’t recall Jobs first product was to steal phone service.
The company in Miami was able to get Mac OS to run on a clone. They legally bought the copies of Mac OS that are for sale. Good for them. I guess you people never really dealt with Apple. The company is loaded with libs.
Two brothers get a MAC OS to run on clones and the Apple users call them terrorists. Prattle on about runing the Mac experince. Get a life. A lot of Apple’s stuff is overpriced. I am no Microsoft fan either.
Welcome to the club. I guess that makes you a Mac fangrrl, lol.
My first exposure to the PC was right out of college in the mid-eighties. Lotus 1-2-3 on a pre-Windows DOS IBM machine. Everybody was so impressed that it wasn’t a dumb box of a Honeywell, but it was honestly miserable. I can still hear the racket that dot matrix printer made, continuously. A year later, I went to work with a graphics company, and began working with the Mac, the first generation with a decent sized color monitor and the processing power to handle the sort of files generated in PostScript.
I’ve used them ever since for my work, although I do use Windows machines for other tasks. The difference between the two has narrowed considerably over the years, but the Mac is by far and away the more pleasant to use. It just works.
I’ve owned a Mac clone, made by Power Computing in Texas. Apple is right to avoid allowing this to happen again. It worked better than a contemporary Windows PC, but that’s not saying much. It’s still somewhere in the house, probably up in the attic, put back in the original box. It wouldn’t make a good aquarium, unlike very early Macs, but I can’t bring myself to toss it, so there it sits. Still have a retired beige G3 tower too. Am I a hoarder, lol?
If the people who buy it are willing to pay the price how is it over priced? It seems to me it is the people who don't buy it, those who like to buy parts and build their own or just tinker with their PCs, are the ones who complain about price.
I guess you never dealt with MicroSoft when it was the 800 lb. gorilla driving startups out of business. I can't imagine what sort of hideous kludge of a Rube Goldberg contraption Windows would be today, if it were not for Apple, for MS to expropriate, legally or not so legally.
Lots of other people got it to run on commodity hardware first, not just those guys. Hackintoshes were around years before Psystar.
Thing is, Apple doesn’t care if you build unlimited numbers of Hackintoshes for your own use - in fact, with the Darwin version of OS X, they rather encourage it. They *do* care if you start selling them to other people, which is their right.
Psystar, if they had been smart, would have sold their computers as “technically capable of running OS X” and not bundled the OS with the machine.
Add to that, Apple does not “pre-install” Windows.
Further, MS’s eula allows their properly purchased (aka - legal) software to be basically installed anywhere you want to install it. MS makes money primarily through software/OS sales. Their interest is to sell the maximum number of installs/licenses. Period. You want to cobble together your old Commodore 64 and run some flavor of Windows - they don’t care, as long as you have a properly licensed (purchased) copy and unique serial number - all is good (except they still won’t support you if it isn’t hardware that meets their minimum requirements).
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