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Apple Settles with Tiger Leaker
The Hobo writes "CNet is carrying a story about Apple reaching a settlement with one of the Tiger leakers, 22-year-old Doug Steigerwald. The terms of the settlement were not released, but it was said that money will be paid to Apple. To quote Doug, 'As a member of Apple's Developer Connection program I received a pre-release version of Apple's Mac OS X 10.4 'Tiger' software, which I promised to keep confidential, instead, I disseminated it over the Internet, and thousands of unauthorized copies of Apple's software were illegally distributed to the public'"
Man, is apple is REALLY in that dire of need for cash??
are you honestly saying you believe a corporation has the right to overthrow fair use laws and the right to make backups of software you own just because they've asked you to sign away rights?
You might, but then when the government comes down and requires everyone to sign away more and more rights just to live in the country I guess you'll be first in line.
Some of us still believe in freedom.
...Because you're not going to get it.
A financial settlement with a fresh college grad? You ought to be ashamed of yourselves.
Not even Microsoft is this obnoxious.
high. you agree, you abide.
Apple is a compnay that is supported by fanatics; people love their products and always want to be in-the-know, that means running the latest beta software they can get their hands on. Where there is supply, there will be demand and the fact that it was leaked is of absolutely no suprise atall.
Yes this guy broke the NDA, but he also fed into Apple's viral marketing scheme, and is now ruined for that. The fact is that Apple, a big, usually not-so-facless corporation, is strongarming an individual that did something that is 'wrong' but IMO pretty low down on the scale of of how bad it is. Will the leak (not the lawsuit) have hurt Apples sales? No. Would it have lead to support problems? No; on the contrary it would give more people a chance to pre-emptively check and fix their apps to work on the new build. Would it have satiated some of the fanatics who would then post page long pieces about every little change? yes.
Apple feeds off of this energy and their evangelical fanatics, and is now taking a stab at their very base.
This is why sooo many people are at arms about this IMO.
I believe rights such as doctine of first sale, fair use, right to backup, right to sell are rights that it is illegal to ask someone to sign away
Should I be able to ask you to sign away your right not to be enslaved if you want something from me? I bet you'd object if you did that and I then tried to sell you into slavery.
You might even go so far as to claim it is illegal, which would mark you as a hypocrite.
and only a meek brainwashed little follower will believe they must do what apple wants when it comes to a product they bought from apple.
If I sell you a car, would you accept that I say a condition of sale is that you cannot drive it for your purposes except on your own property, and must still drive me to and from work on weekdays with it?
No?
Hypocrite.
Remember, big corporations crushing kids is bad and evil, especially if it's M$ ... unless it's Apple doing it!
I really dont think he would have had to make a case that it wasn't him, he could have just said "well I was just expecting apple to disable my license or something, I didn't know I was subject to pugnitive damages, you'd think apple would know better than to trust people on the internet like that". I certainly hope they were thoughtful enough to fine him $500 or something, even $100,000 to apple is chump change. If word gets out that they settled on anything over $1000, I'll never buy an apple product again.
There aught to be some laws against that sort of lawsuit, it is really up to apple to make their software copy proof. Aren't they the pioneers of DRM? Fuck!!!!!
man, those apple folks sure are mean, guess thats one more reason not to buy there crap... haha like you need more.