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LinSpire LPhoto and LSongs: bring on the lawsuits!
Sir Joltalot writes "Over at OSNews they're covering the newly-renamed LinSpire's LSongs and LPhoto apps. Take a look at those screenshots, and you'll notice a striking resemblence to Apple's iTunes and iPhoto. Take a look at this flash presentation and you'll see that LPhoto and iPhoto are almost exactly alike. They look like nifty apps, to be sure, but how long will they last? I would have thought LinSpire might have learned from the whole Lindows name fiasco..."
Look at how ugly that interface is. Apple should sue just over that!
It's either on the beat or off the beat, it's that easy.
I moderate therefore I rule!
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Call me a cynic, but before this entire thing, I never gave Lindows/Linspire a second glance. Now, they've been in the top of the news here at Slashdot several times. Nothing like staying in the eyes of your target audience, I guess?
I thought the whole debate over "Look & Feel" was resolved. I thought you couldn't patent, trademark, or copyright "Look & Feel". It certainly can't be a trade secret. What's there left to sue over? Am I wrong?
Should change his name to Gill Bates or Job Stevens...
MR has done this before, and now everyone knows the Lindows OS (now to be referred to as LinSpire).
/.-reader now knows that he has these 2 apps out. And as soon as Steve Jobs realises it, and sues MR/LinSpire, all the WORLD will know, because the news will be covered at every Magazine/E-zine with an Internet section.
He's pulling the same stunt again.
It's an ingenious move. Look at what he has accomplished. Every
By the time he changes the layout of those apps, a lot of people will have tried it out. Voila, instant market-share, no costs but a simple layout-redesign (which is probably resting on the shelfs as we speak).
It's amazing how similar the apps are, and yet LTunes still manages to look pants in comparison to iTunes. All this despite having almost exactly the same set of controls on the screen. There's more to this design business than you think.
This argument doesn't hold water.
Someone brings out a nice product, then someone brings out an OSS clone of it. If anyone complains, slashdotters insist that you can't patent 'usability', and that the original product was somehow the obvious end result of solving a particular usabiliity problem
Then someone brings out another product that solves it in a different and superior way. Then someone clones that, etc...
It's blatantly not true that the iTunes or iPhoto interface is the only possible way of solving the music/photo management usability problem. It's blatantly true that the Linspire dudes are saving money on R&D by ripping off Apple (& Microsoft) so they can invest it in other things like marketing (and legal defence).
But what happens if the innovating companies go away? What happens if nobody bothers with R&D? Who will Linspire rip off then?
Just take a look at OpenOffice...look familiar to anyone? Down to the toolbars and icons, it is a clone of Word. By design, to make the transition between the two apps easier.
So it's OK for "our" apps to copy the look and feel of a competitor we don't like, yet not OK for an "outsider" to copy the look and feel of a competitor palatable to many of us?
Give me a break...
Here's some interesting background into Look and Feel lawsuits. I remember in college having long debates that Windows 95 was a ripoff of Apple's System 7. Apple has "Trash" and MSFT has "Recycle Bin". Apple list their icons on the right and MSFT list them on left...so on and so on.
-- ladies and gentlemen we are floating in space!
It reminds me of something one of my college professors once told me. McDonald spends a lot of money and effort studying the best locations to put a new franchises in a city. Burger King then just looks for places where they are building a new McDonalds. (I don't know if the story is true or not, but he had an interesting point)
Now that's just annoying. it's like having a reatrded little brother who keeps following you around and swearing at strangers.