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Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!rochester!pt.cs.cmu.edu!cadre!jas
From: jas@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU (Jeffrey A. Sullivan)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac,comp.windows.ms,comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Apple gets favorable ruling
Keywords: Apple vs. Microsoft
Message-ID: <2574@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU>
Date: 23 Mar 89 17:37:26 GMT
References: <6271@bsu-cs.UUCP> <1068@Portia.Stanford.EDU>
Organization: Decision Systems Lab., Univ. of Pittsburgh, PA.
Lines: 42

In article <1068@Portia.Stanford.EDU>, jln@Portia.Stanford.EDU (Jared Nedzel) writes:
>> [Stuff about the Apple-MS ruling]
> 
> Nevertheless, I think that Apple's suit is bad for the industry. If they win
> it, I hope that Xerox has its lawyers warming up in the bullpen to sue
> the pants off Apple.
Why exactly do you think it's bad?  It's just business.  Apple does
have copyrights filed, valid or not, and in order to keep them, they
must take active measures to protect their copyrights.  Vis, this
lawsuit.  If they fail to try to protect their copyright, it falls
into the public domain.  Now can you really fault Apple for not
wanting the interface they spent millions of dollars on to become PD?

Also, this bit about Xerox keeps coming up.  Two points here.  One, I
think Apple licensed some of this technology from Xerox.  Two, even if
they didn't, it seems to this [obligatory disclaimer: NON-LAWYER] that
they have not made any active attempts to keep their copyrights from
being infringed upon.  Now, if the first is true, which I believe,
then everything's hunky-dory, unless Xerox sues Apple for expanding
beyond the original license (just like the Apple-MS suit), but I doubt
this, since the Mac interface and the current Xerox interfaces I know
of (D-Machines) are not all that similar in specifics, and I'm fairly
sure the basics would have been covered in the original agreement.
And if the second point is true, then Xerox has lost by inaction their
copyrights to begin with.

Anyway, the main issue is that it IS NOT bad for the industry for
developers to protect their creations.  It is the root of capitalism
(please no arguments about the inherent evilness of capitalism!).  Try
to put it in your perspective:  You develop a whiz-bang new piece of
software that everybody -- but EVERYBODY -- wants to run (e.g., an
OS), and start making millions on it.  But all of the sudden, all of
your competitors bring up amazingly similar OSes and your profits
decline dramatically.  Wouldn't you seriously think about suing?



-- 
...............................................................................
Jeffrey Sullivan               DELPHI: JSULLIVAN  |    University of Pittsburgh
jas@cadre.dsl., jasper@unx.cis. {pittsburgh.edu}  | Intelligent Systems Studies
jasper@PittVMS.BITNET, {jasst3 | jasper}@cisunx.UUCP