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Apple wipes the floor with Psystar in court, EULA upheld.

cwa107


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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.

Full article here.
 
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I've been following this since I first heard about this grimy little company from Florida a couple of years ago. Apparently Apple has been EVERYWHERE trying to kill Psystar. Then Psystar went under this year. Now they're DEAD.

Yay! Apple! Whooooo!!!
 

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That actually just made my very bad day have a great ending.
 
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I think what happened is that Psystar's backers pulled out, I really do think that company wasn't keeping alive on there own. It's good to see them come to an end, but the odds are that there is another company that will sprout up and follow in suit of them.
 

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I think what happened is that Psystar's backers pulled out, I really do think that company wasn't keeping alive on there own. It's good to see them come to an end, but the odds are that there is another company that will sprout up and follow in suit of them.

What Psystar did was infringement and I seriously doubt that any company that tries to follow in Psystar's foot steps is going to win any battles in court.
 
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Mess with the bull... you get the horns.
 
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Just finished reading the case decision and I've come to the conclusion that Psystar's legal counsel was either incredibly lazy or tremendously stupid. It's like they either didn't care enough to put together a half decent defense or they actually wanted to lose. It's really sad how thoroughly Apple crushed Psystar.

However, I don't agree with the article's contention that this case has upheld an EULA as a legally binding contract. Sure, it upheld several provisions but even those, and also the bulk of the argument, were focused on violating the DMCA and the Copyright Act and not the license agreement. So don't take this case to mean that violating the EULA is a crime.
 
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What Psystar did was infringement and I seriously doubt that any company that tries to follow in Psystar's foot steps is going to win any battles in court.
There will always be companies that will try to sell mac clones or hackentosh computers, Psystar was just the face of the problem. There is many other companies and people that work on the hackentosh software and EFI faking devices.
 
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cwa107

cwa107


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There will always be companies that will try to sell mac clones or hackentosh computers, Psystar was just the face of the problem. There is many other companies and people that work on the hackentosh software and EFI faking devices.

It should be interesting to see what happens to the other international companies that are starting to do the same thing. I have a feeling this is going to turn into a game of 'whack a mole' until Apple either finally gives in and starts licensing or does a more effective encryption scheme (and who knows how much Apple hardware that will alienate).
 

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The people who want apple to make OSX work on all PC hardware really bother me. Windows, if all that support was taken out for OLD hardware, would run a lot nicer. Sorry, but I have talked to 100's of programmers and all feel the same. I am totally against Apple making OSX like Windows and work on everything.

I am all for Apple making stronger protection BUT that could hurt some of us also with some even older Intel Macs like CWA just mentioned.

Also (And I truly hope this never happens) if Apple gets mad enough they might start doing what Microsoft does and have Product Activation and keys for OSX. God Forbid.
 
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cwa107

cwa107


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The people who want apple to make OSX work on all PC hardware really bother me. Windows, if all that support was taken out for OLD hardware, would run a lot nicer. Sorry, but I have talked to 100's of programmers and all feel the same. I am totally against Apple making OSX like Windows and work on everything.

I am all for Apple making stronger protection BUT that could hurt some of us also with some even older Intel Macs like CWA just mentioned.

I don't think Apple should go willy-nilly with licensing OSX to third parties, but I think if it were carefully controlled, they could nip this issue in the bud, while still making money and dramatically increasing market share.

Mac-Forums Blog ObjectApple Is the time right for Apple to start licensing OS X?
 
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I don't think Apple should go willy-nilly with licensing OSX to third parties, but I think if it were carefully controlled, they could nip this issue in the bud, while still making money and dramatically increasing market share.

Mac-Forums Blog ObjectApple Is the time right for Apple to start licensing OS X?
Agreed if they were to give it to a third party that allowed "PC"s to run it with a controlled list of supported hardware Apples profits would go through the roof.
 
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But their machine sales would crash!
 
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Looking at Psystar's defense its almost as if they were just trying to make as much money as they could before Apple took them to court.
 
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Just finished reading the case decision and I've come to the conclusion that Psystar's legal counsel was either incredibly lazy or tremendously stupid. It's like they either didn't care enough to put together a half decent defense or they actually wanted to lose. It's really sad how thoroughly Apple crushed Psystar.

However, I don't agree with the article's contention that this case has upheld an EULA as a legally binding contract. Sure, it upheld several provisions but even those, and also the bulk of the argument, were focused on violating the DMCA and the Copyright Act and not the license agreement. So don't take this case to mean that violating the EULA is a crime.

Very good point!
 
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I don't think Apple should go willy-nilly with licensing OSX to third parties, but I think if it were carefully controlled, they could nip this issue in the bud, while still making money and dramatically increasing market share.

Mac-Forums Blog ObjectApple Is the time right for Apple to start licensing OS X?

I think not. Because I think they make a big profit margin on their hardware. Computers, iphones, ipods etc all good sellers. And if they licensed OS X then heck any two bit joe could make a computer or phone and undercut Apple on price and just use OS X as the system.

Then all Apple would have for revenue making would be software sales and licensing fees to the others who want to use OS X. Hey that's just like MS. They lisence their software to others and have to have some silly number of versions of their system at all different crazy prices just to mek the profit they want to.

Plus it'd make the hackintosh scene much bigger cause of the cheap comuters. So in my opinion for the time being OS X's exclusivity to Apple branded computers is a good idea.

And yes it would be strictly controlled by Apple if it were to happen. But it'd set the precident. Where by others could more sucessfully challenge the why not OS X on my company's computers too. And I think the others might fight it more

And refering to the original topic here, I think Pystar's lawyers knew the case on court would be won by Apple before it started. So they put a half assed effort into it. Just enough to say "hey we are lawyers we will fight any case to the best of our ability" but also not spending too much effort on a lost cause.
 
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And refering to the original topic here, I think Pystar's lawyers knew the case on court would be won by Apple before it started. So they put a half assed effort into it. Just enough to say "hey we are lawyers we will fight any case to the best of our ability" but also not spending too much effort on a lost cause.

That's what I don't get. This whole Psystar endeavor reeked of an ulterior motive, that there were people who wanted to see if Apple's EULA could be broken and so I don't understand why Psystar's lawyers weren't as aggressive and thorough as they could be. I've read papers written by my peers in our first year of law school written better than the briefs offered by Psystar's lawyers. Something's not right here.
 
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So the question is, if Microsoft started making computers and said that you could only run Windows on Microsoft hardware, would it be considered a monopoly?
 

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So the question is, if Microsoft started making computers and said that you could only run Windows on Microsoft hardware, would it be considered a monopoly?


If Microsoft went the way of Apple, then you would have 2 choices, Apple or Microsoft. Only thing is if they did that now all the hardware companies who have made companies off of Windows all these years would be out in the cold. Apple has always been a complete solution. Microsoft could have gone the same way but decided to sell to everyone and just be a software company (Besides the XBox, Keyboards, Mice and Zune).
 
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If Microsoft went the way of Apple, then you would have 2 choices, Apple or Microsoft. Only thing is if they did that now all the hardware companies who have made companies off of Windows all these years would be out in the cold. Apple has always been a complete solution. Microsoft could have gone the same way but decided to sell to everyone and just be a software company (Besides the XBox, Keyboards, Mice and Zune).

There's a lot of things that Microsoft has it's hands in in the business world that Apple doesn't, meaning that companies would only have one choice until some one else stepped up and filled in the void with their platform.
 

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