Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!brunix!rjd From: rjd@cs.brown.edu (Rob Demillo) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: Xerox sues Apple!!! Message-ID: <23708@brunix.UUCP> Date: 26 Dec 89 21:40:47 GMT References: <4540@ur-cc.UUCP| <111700188@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu> Sender: news@brunix.UUCP Reply-To: rjd@cs.brown.edu (Rob Demillo) Organization: Brown University Department of Computer Science Lines: 82 In article <111700188@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu| krb20699@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu writes: | | It all boils down to Apple wanting the most profit it can get from it's |excellent graphics interface (=suing potential competitors.) This, if I am |not mistaken, is what Xerox wants to do. I don't know much about the Star |system, or the Berne convention, but it seems Xerox is trying to be a hero |by suing Apple in exchange for what it's done in the courtroom. Do two |wrongs (according to at least one person here, defending a company's copyright |makes that company "scumbags from hell." Applicable to Xerox, don't you |think?) make a right? Xerox is doing the same thing Apple has done. What's |the damn difference? It may be a picky thing for Apple to do, but the inter- |face is so easily copiable (OS/2, Windows, etc.) that the lawsuits seem to |be at _least_ partially justified. | | ....[more defending Mac's right for sueing...] Normally I don;t get involved in this kind of a flame war, but... None of what you have said is (unfortunately) the issue. For years apple has kept its battalion of lawyers busy suing Mom & Pop companies out of business. None of these cases made it to court because the smaller companies couldn't hire the lawyer-power to defend themselves. Apple claimed moral victories, and smugly went on its way... Last year, it decided to throw its weight around a little more and tried to sue Microsoft and HP...now its playing with the big boys... Microsoft, more than a little upset that Apple was playing word games with a legal contract that they had with Apple, countersued. Along about the same time, Apple increased its Mac prices 42% *across the board.* Coincidence? Now, what is Apple sueing everyone about? The "look and feel" of an operating system. No lawyer I know (and I've talked about this with several) would take this seriously. It akin to Ford suing GM because GM's cars looked and felt like Ford cars. (They each had a steering wheel, they each had 4 tires, etc) And what was the "look and feel" they were protecting? The Mac OS, which has its dubious roots in the Xerox Star system. (The Mac's "founding father" brazenly went into Xerox Palo Alto and hired its programmers on the spot. Admitedly, nothing wrong with that, but I wouldn't go trying to claim that the "look and feel" was mine, when it clearly sprung from another source.) Now Xerox wants to recoup the losses from some of its Star system using Apple's disgusting practice of sicing lawyers on a company... ...and you expect *me* to feel pity for Apple? Like its the good guy in all of this? I'll tell ya...I love computers, I really do. In my job(s), I've had to develop expertise on quite a few diverse and esoteric platforms: Suns, Apollos, VAXens, DecStations, IBM PCs, Macs, Atari's, Amigas, UNIVAC's, IBM Mainframes, PDP's, homebrewed hardware, Harris, etc. I also have (understandable) had to master a variety of operating systems: UNIX, VMS, VM/CMS, Vulcan, GEM, DOS, OS/2, etc. And you know what, out of all those, there are only two computer combinations that I refuse to work on...don't even list them on my resume anymore because I want nothing to do with them: IBM VM/CMS - because although the hardware is ok, the operating system is braindead Any Apple product - The hardware is ok, and the OS is just ok...but the policies of the Apple Corporation are so warped and so perverted, that I cannot, will not, bring myself to support their products. Apple has to change corporate hands and policies before I begin to suggest to any of my employers, colleagues, or clients to use Apple products. And you know what? I'm not alone.... - Rob DeMillo | Internet: rjd@brown.cs.edu Brown University | BITnet: DEMILLO%BRNPSG.SPAN@STAR.STANFORD.EDU Planetary Science Group | Reality: 401-273-0804 (home) "I say you *are* the Messiah, Lord! And I ought to know, I've followed a few!"