Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!lll-winken!uunet!mcrware!pgthor!dev386!beckman
From: beckman@dev386.UUCP (Zacharias Beckman)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Subject: Re: Apple gets favorable ruling
Summary: Bad for the industry...
Keywords: Apple vs. Microsoft
Message-ID: <446@dev386.UUCP>
Date: 28 Mar 89 15:22:24 GMT
References: <6271@bsu-cs.UUCP> <1068@Portia.Stanford.EDU> <2574@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU>
Organization: University of Iowa, Iowa City
Lines: 31

In article <2574@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU>, jas@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU (Jeffrey A. Sullivan) writes:
> In article <1068@Portia.Stanford.EDU>, jln@Portia.Stanford.EDU (Jared Nedzel) writes:
> > 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

I agree; this lawsuit does seem bad for the industry from my perspective.  In
this day and age, it would be much more profitable to work toward a
standardization -- consider the amount of profit that would become available
if applications would run in similar environments on both Mac and IBM style
systems (such as Pagemaker (desktop publishing by Aldus); it runs on both the
Mac and Windows and provides a marvelous amount of portability).

However, there is much more to the issue than this.  I also agree that
programmers and inventors have the right to protect their inventions.  But,
Apple did not invent the windowing environments.  I believe it to be just too
broad a concept to try and copyright.  If Microsoft had produced an exact
duplication of the Apple interface, there would certainly be cause (DRI's GEM
was nearly a mirror image).  However, they have not; indeed, I develop
applications in Windows and have often used the Mac system.  I don't see how
Windows infringes upon Apple's copyright.

All in all, it simply seems that all concerned parties would come out better
in the end if they would stop attacking each other for the sake of protecting
a concept such as this.  Cooperate... nah, that's too much to ask.

Zacharias Beckman.