Slashdot Mirror
CherryOS On Hold
aberkvam writes "MacWorld is reporting that CherryOS is "On Hold - until further notice." Does this mean that they are going to confirm that they used PearPC's code or is this just a delaying tactic due to the potentially pending lawsuit? Slashdot has covered this saga before."
Maybe holding the release because a sold copy of CherryOS would give PearPC's lawyers ammo for bigger damages?
Which reminds me, if your really want Mac OS, then just get the real thing.
Reminder: Apple owns 1/255th of the internet.
the last i checked, cherry harvest begins in june
It's frustrating that everything takes so damn long... since it's trivial to show that CherryOS is a rip-off of PearPC, why does this guy still even have a home to sleep in? Justice is too damned slow.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
Without undermining due process, i think its pretty obvious that they are as guilty as a man with shit on his dick standing stark naked next to a goat.
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I'm glad I donated my $5 to PearPC. It's about all I can really afford, and I only use Apple's anyways, but people who put all that effort into source-code like PearPC (which is amazing, by the way), deserve some help when theiving bastards like CherryOS come along. Viva la Open Source!
I thought Netsniper already did that for them? http://www.ht-technology.com/cherryos-pearpc/cherr yos-pearpc.html
Is it just because there are tonns of people who are dying to get OS X running on their PC, because for various resons (mainly financial) they can't or won't buy a Mac? And, aforementioned crowd is so hot about it that it would hang on lips of any snakeoil vendor promising them just that despite being an obvious fraud?
And this means what? That they dont deserve it?
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Due process is a pile of horse shit.
We should firebomb the home of anyone suspected of violating a software license agreement the moment suspicion arises.
--
the strongest word is still the word "free"
Guess they're like a hot virgin at a Star Trek convention, too afraid of a bunch of nerds popping their Cherry.
ShortFormBlog: Writing a little. Saying a lot.
... They are waiting for PearPC to finish up all of the CherryOS promised features first!
In other news
Cherry OS has decided to restructure and rename their company/product, in response to a possible lawsuit.
Their new name is no Cherry O's, and they well now be selling breakfast cereal.
Later that day Kellogg's has announced they are seeking to sue Cherry O's claiming that the company "Just slapped a sticker on our boxes of Apple Jacks"
A Cherry O's spokesman was quoted in saying "I don't know what the problem is, we both use the cereal language."
While i think it is wrong, it must say:
It is not stealing/piracy/buzzword of the week. It is copyright infrigment.
Freedom or George Bush
It would be an interesting test case to see if the GPL can hold up in court. My guess is that it wouldn't in the real world (money vs. no-money), but the evidence seems to be pretty hard to sweep aside in this particular case.
Stole? Don't you mean copyright infringed?
As I understand it, the original developers were not deprived of their source - thus nothing was acutally "stolen"?
At some stage would it be possible to run OS X through a Linux back end w/o having X or a Linux DE running at all?
What I'm saying is, could it evolve to where you boot right into OSX? Or does it have to run in a window (like the screenshots show)?
No sig for you!!
Indeed, I stand corrected. But I figure that difference is only an argument of semantics. Seems pretty much the same thing (in this case) to me.
Why is this under a an APPLE heading? It's Window/Linux/Know your rights/GPL.
The issue in NOT with the emulation of a PPC systems that can run LINUX too, it is an issue about theft!
There was an unknown error in the submission.
Why does everyone still care? It became incredibly obvious about 2 weeks after the first beta came out that it was simply an alternative GUI for PearPC. Knowing that, people should have stopped paying attention to it except for noting that it is another instance of someone abusing open source code and EULAs. You don't think that they would/could ever release a full version of their product, sell it for money, and live up to the performace claims?
Heheh, you used "cherry" and "pulled out" in the same sentence. You dirty, dirty bird.
Yeah, I've seen this issue raised before, however, when I download a song I don't start a record company and try to sell it under my label.
Yes, both cases are copyright infringement, but I guess "it's worse" when you take code, repackage it, call it your own, deny you stole it, and try to sell it.
All I'm getting is a black screen. Is there something wrong, or am I playing the game already?
There are two sides to every story. It's clear that the Slashdot crows believes the publisher of CherryOS should burn in hell, but what is his story/argument? Surely he didn't think that he could get away with a clear violation of the GPL, claim all ownership and intellectual property of CherryOS, sell it, make millions, and not get anyone suspicious. Is he thinking that he's doing an allowable fork and then selling some slightly modified version with support or something?
No it's not worse ... it's the same thing ethically speaking. I will now remove the log from my own eye ...
"This isn't a study in computer science, its a study in human behavior"
They plainly stole PearPC
They are plagiarists and they are copyright infringers. They are not thieves.
and are trying to profit off of others hard work.
So what? Redhat do that too. The profiting isn't important. The copyright infringement and plagiarism is.
In this instance, I think copyright violation would take precedence over the GPL, and since it's a clear violation of copyright... that the GPL aspect of things wouldn't even come into play in court.
500GB of disk, 5TB of transfer, $5.95/mo
[Copyright infringement that identifies the author and copyright infringement that does not identify the author are] the same thing ethically speaking.
Not necessarily. There's copyright infringement (violating a government-granted monopoly), and then there's plagiarism (not identifying the author). European "moral rights" make plagiarism an offence per se, while the United States handles plagiarism under the "passing off" provisions of trademark law and under 17 USC 1202 of copyright law.
From a former press release: Jim Kartes, 866-661-5699 jim@vx30.com From VX30.com: Maui X-Stream, Inc. 1068 Limahana Pl Suite #5 Lahaina Hi, USA 96761 Phone: 1 (808) 661-5699 Fax: 1 (808) 667-7002
1. They realize now they are not going to get away with it.
or
2. They still think they can, but they need more time to hide code. Obviously they didn't do a good enough job. LOL
or
3. Lawyers scared them.
Then again I don't know. I've refocused myself on PearPC and helping with it. I could care less anymore what these monkeys do anymore. Let the lawyers sort this one out.
"why don't you just slip into something more comfortable...like a coma!"
Waaa, waaa! It's not theft it's copyright infringement. Waaa, waaa!
Forget the whales - save the babies.
IIRC, you said IIRC four times in one paragraph. IIRC that's just too much, if IIRC from school. We don't need to know IIRC, because IIRW, someone will correct me, IIRC how Slashdot works.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
So are you saying C/C++ are obscure? Er, did I miss something? Then again, maybe I shouldn't have even bothered replying to flamebait. (GNAA is troll, parent was an opinion)
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
Surely he didn't think that he could get away with a clear violation of the GPL, claim all ownership and intellectual property of CherryOS, sell it, make millions, and not get anyone suspicious. Why would he not be thinking that? If it's a legitimate fork, he would not be claiming that he wrote it.
Why do authors plagiarize literature, or painters copy Van Gogh? Because they think they will find customers who don't know the difference, or who don't care.
What keeps me going is my inertia.
You also have to remember that this company's primary product, the VX30 video codec system, has been suspected (and somewhat proved) to have taken code from other open source projects too - they admitted to taking code from JOrbis (and they're still in violation of the LGPL with that), and it's suspected that they also used XVid and maybe LAME.
My whole info archive (with demo releases of CherryOS, VX30, etc) are all at
http://www.tliquest.net/ryan/cherryos
-eventhorizon
#Secret Windows Source Code, in MS C% - if (uptime >= "24 hours") then bsod() else print "Windows License Violation!"
Open Source is not opposed to commercial. Open Source is opposed to secret source, not commercial. There are definitely companies who's sole purpose is to make a profit on Open Source software. If that's not commercial, I don't know what is.
Need a Python, C++, Unix, Linux develop
or whateverelsely
controversially?
Arguably?
Considering the inevitable arguments regarding the fact that the owners still have their software, and are in no way deprived of the use of it, there are many people who disagree.
Religion doesn't enter into it.
Morally, morality is a personal thing.
Practically there's a key difference. The PearPC creators still have their code.
If you're arguing that it fits your definition of stealing, fine. I'll argue its jaywalking because it fits my definition of jaywalking. But then we might as well be talking different languages.
The only reason to call it stealing is because the term has negative connotations. How about using a less emotive term?
Ok, so if I decide to steal CherryOS and market it as GrapeOS, can CherryOS sue me? I can change some of the code to not look like theirs...
Parent appears to know what he's talking about. I know that's against the site rules, but I won't grass him up if you don't.
I guess today is a passable day to die.
Interesting that the date on the page source is from 11/25/04... Have they been contemplating this for 4 months?
Splitting hairs I guess, but this is my interpretation...
Distributing CherryOS against the terms set forth by the copyright holder is copyright infringement, not theft, because the copyright holder is still in posession of the original code. Therefore CherryOS code is NOT "stolen".
What IS stolen are the rights granted by the copyright holder. When you pirate closed software you "steal comparatively little because the copyright holder grante very few rights (it is still wrong nonetheless). When you pirate free software you steal away a lot more valuable rights.
Can you be "pirating free software"? Of course it can, although you do it is different. Both involve violating a license agreement though, and IMHO I think the law should treat piracy of any software equally, free or not.
CherryOS could be a knock-off of PearPC and could still be packaged and sold as is and it wouldn't be piracy because this wouldn't violate the licence of free software. However when you buy CherryOS as they planned to sell it you do not get everything you should. There is no source code on the disc, or on the website for download, or in printed form or anything--only binaries. Furthermore, even if you obtained the source your rights to modify and redistribute it are also being denied. Thus, the license is violated, your rights have been taken away--STOLEN--and all copies of CherryOS are pirated software just like all those copies of Photoshop people get using their favourite P2P app.
The GPL is invalid, its an illegal and immoral license and is non-enforcable. That is why I will never use Linux or any GPL software EVER. I would only use Solaris for any UNIX development I had to do.
It's Netcraft that confirms things around here, not Netsniper.
Where can I download the source for my Series 2 Tivo, and how can I compile and use it?
Aww shoot, I can't.
CherryOS just needs to encrypt their binaries, and the source is absofuckinglutely useless.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Yes, both cases are copyright infringement, but I guess "it's worse" when you take code, repackage it, call it your own, deny you stole it, and try to sell it.
Yes, it's worse. No, it's not theft. No matter how bad an infringement is, it's never theft. An infringement can cause more harm than a simple theft might, but it still wouldn't be theft. That's because they are fundamentally different things.
People don't say that it isn't theft because they want to make it seem like less of a crime. People say that it isn't theft because it isn't.
If I walk into a shop and take a CD that doesn't belong to me, costing the record company maybe $5, then that is theft. If I rip it and distribute it on the Internet to hundreds of thousands of people, costing the record company a million or more, that is not theft, that is still copyright infringement.
"Theft" isn't a synonym for "really bad copyright infringement".
If SCO can get the kind of funding they did for their campaign-o-crap, don't you think certain companies might step up and chip in a couple mil to help the GPL stand up in court?
1)Only the greediest of the greedy care less about their work being falsly credited to someone else than they do about potential DRM dollars from copyright artificial scarcity.
Power to the Peaceful
I'm reminded of the Terrible Proposals from Nomic World - particularly #6, which (if adopted) would have required all future proposals to include page 106 of the 1961 Vladivostok telephone directory. (Nomic is a family of games in which changing the rules is a type of move. The Terrible Proposals were designed to exploit a rule that awarded points based on voting.)
What??
While I agree that those that infringe on the GPL should be pursued and prosecuted, I don't agree that "untreated" actions have any bearing on the validity of the GPL as a software copyright license.
From my vantage, there are two avenues for pursuing violators--one equals cash (as in lawyers), the other (in this case) equals exposing the truth (as you have indicated). As the article states numerous bloggers and others have pointed out that CherryOS is a blatant rip-off of the PearPC project. If the distributor had abided by the license (GPL) they could have packaged it under any name they wanted (barring trademark infringement) and sold it for whatever they wanted to... (providing they supply you the binary + the SOURCE code).
(If I may be redundant), as it is, they tried to sneak it under the GPL radar and market it as their own devise (device?), which is clearly and blatantly wrong, not to mention illegal.
However, and to the point: NOT challenging them in either of the two manners I have suggested does NOT in any way invalidate the legal strength of the GPL as a software license.
I totally reject the claim that the GPL has not been tested in court. As Eben Moglen says, it hasn't been 'tested' in court because the defendants have always known that they would lose.
I agree with part of your statement. CherryOS was exposed by 'countless websites' and this had the appropriate effect. Nevertheless, the GPL is a solid license whether anyone sits on their butts (regarding infringement) or not.
are we sure at this point that Jack Campbell doesn't run CherryOS?
Indeed, I stand corrected. But I figure that difference is only an argument of semantics. Seems pretty much the same thing (in this case) to me.
It is not even close. Nobody can "steal" GPL'd code - it is there for all to see and modify as they see fit. That's the whole point.
What you can't do is take that code, modify it, sell the binaries and then refuse to give your contributions back to the community. That is what the CherryOS people have done, and that is a GPL violation. As the copyrighted code is provided under the GPL only under the terms of said GPL, violation of it is by extension a copyright violation.
But you can't "steal" something that is freely available, so it is not just semantics whether or not it was "theft".
Yes, it was wrong - that's not the issue. But just as we're constantly berating the RIAA/MPAA for their hyperbole on such issues, we have to be careful in what we say about GPL-related copyright violations too.. especially as this is even further removed from "theft" than what people do when they download music or movies.
Clarity and precision of language are very important, especially when discussing anything having to do with law.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
It very much is piracy, because every major dictionary lists "Committing copyright infringement, eg. software piracy" as one of the definitions of piracy. Saying copying software is like attacking a ship may be OK for a cheap laugh in RMS's talk, but people like you need to stop taking that joke too seriously.
<note>This is completely OT, so feel free to mod me as such!</note>
And just because the "theft" doesn't remove the item in question from the rightful owner doesn't mean it's any less of a theft.
Should you still be clinging to your dictionary definition, then I'd like you to explain commonly used phrases such as:
You don't lose your identity because someone knows your SS# and your credit card number and "claims" to be you. At least, if your entire identity is based on relatively few informations, then it's just plain sad.
You don't actually lose the stolen data, but someone broke into your system and made copies of the data. (Just look at the whole ChoicePoint incident.)
When will people realize that dictionaries only gives clues about a word-meaning and usage --- they're not in any way the ultimate definition?
It's the language users that form the language, not the other way around! Otherwise you'd have to go back to saying "a napron" instead of "an apron" and "an eekename" instead of "a nickname".
"Live free or don't."
I'll just reply with a link to a post I did earlier on in this thread...
"Live free or don't."
Last time I check, SCOX is known as SCOXE
My point is that neither action is theft, not that the actions are the same.
Forget the whales - save the babies.
Near as I can tell, he just thought he could get away with it.
That or he would be stupid.
I am unamerican, and proud of it!
No, it's the same thing *legally* speaking (or not?). If you want to get into ethics, simply copying information is perfectly fine so long as credit goes where credit belongs.
Check out natural law sometime... and also realise that it is impossible for you to do anything without copying information into your mind... and impossible for you to do anything creative while preventing yourself from making use of what you remember seeing earlier.
Luke-Jr
Why does your definition of "steal" require that the victim be deprived of the stolen item?
Designed to run on a G3, no. Doesn't run? Not true. Plenty of people with G3 upgrade cards in their machines still running BeOS to this day... http://www.lowendmac.com/backnforth/010430.html
[UID-HeinzIntel]
Because that seems to be a definition most people agree on.
Because it distinguishes it from plaigerism.
Because that's where the harm is.
Check a dictionary. To steal is to take someone's property. All of the definitions are about taking and removing something, or something like "to commit theft". Theft is defined as "the felonious taking and removing of personal property with intent to deprive the rightful owner of it."
You can steal a car, or steal something more abstract like liberty, or an election -- but in all cases, the victim is deprived of the item stolen. Even when you steal a base in baseball, the opposing team "gave up a base", right?
There's no definition of "steal" that says anything about duplicating and redistributing someone's property.
Don't muddy the issue of copyright violations with misused, inappropriate words.
...attacking a ship, murdering/raping all on board and take all of valuable. How poor are all sofware companies, if they feel illegal copying/copyright violation like piracy described above...
What modern Obelix would say today? Of course, "Those crazy Americans!".
They are plagiarists and they are copyright infringers. They are not thieves.
They are! I saw them coming from the PearPC website, carrying a huge bag with "PearPC sourcecode" written on it!
USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
No they aren't poor. You're just a fool who doesn't realize that some words have more than one meaning, and belong to a class of fools who keep making that stupid argument.
If I rip it and distribute it on the Internet to hundreds of thousands of people, costing the record company a million or more, that is not theft, that is still copyright infringement.
Such a thing never happened. People who downloaded your song already decided not to buy it. If you didn't post it, they would just keep looking, borrow friend's CD, or would just record it off the radio. That's the real reason why "thief' or "pirate" are not appropriate labels for P2P users. They are just benefitting themselves without really hurting others.
Specially for you I will start marking posts like [irony], [sarcasm] or [text for idiots whom don't understand it anyway]. Oh, nevermind...
What modern Obelix would say today? Of course, "Those crazy Americans!".
You might want to learn to spell correctly and use proper grammar before trying to act too clever.
Bzzt! Thanks for playing. Being physically deprived of something is not the standard for theft; it's unauthorized use. "Morally, morality is a personal thing." What a self-serving, navel-gazing crock. When one person's so-called "personal morality" affects someone else, it's no longer personal.