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Mac OS X on x86 Videos Get Apple's Attention
RetrogradeMotion writes "The OSx86 Project is reporting that Apple has served a legal notice to MacBidouille, a French news site that posted videos and instructions on running Mac OS X on x86 hardware . You can find an English translation of the MacBidouille notice on the OSx86Project's forums. This is the first known legal action by Apple regarding the hacked version of OS X and calls into doubt the future of other news sites, similar to the OSx86 Project." Slashdot previously covered the story of hacking Mac OS X onto non-Apple hardware and followed up again a few days later.
it should be noted there is an English translationversion of MacBidoulille always available. Just go to www.hardmac.com instead of MacBidoulle.
you're assuming there's no profit from stamping OSX on a circular piece of polycarbonate plastic and putting it in a cardboard box and selling it for $129.
You're assuming that people will pay for the OS, instead of pirating it.
Piracy doesn't dent MS's revenues, since they get the Dells and HPs of the world to pay them for every box they ship. Apple doesn't have that luxury.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
I swear to God we need a "bullshit" tag for moderating /. Your ignorance wrt EULAs, the GPL, licensing, copright law and basic tenets of private property is astounding. That or you are trolling. Please quite while you're ahead.
1. Software is no different than any other intellectual property like a book or music CD.
2. You own your copy of OS X, Windows, Linux, *BSD, including the physical media. It is only copyright law and nothing else that prevents you from distributing copies. However, the GPL is the author's public declaration that you may distribute.
3. There is a whole wealth of information of what consititutes a valid contract, and a EULA is not one. If you press a "button" on your screen that says "I Agree," that does not mean you have agreed to anything in a legal sense.
4. Apple, Microsoft, Linus own the *copyright* on their respective works. It means they get to dictate the terms of *distribution* and nothing else. Otherwise, you can use the software any way you want.
5. The GPL only pertains to distribution of code and has nothing to do whatsoever with usage. If you don't agree to the terms of the GPL, you can still use the software.
Bottom line is that anything you buy in a retail transaction is yours to own and use, although you are restricted from distributing copies per copyright law. There are *real* software contracts out there (ie Microsoft site licenses, Bloomberg feeds, etc), however.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
Try this: Apple is neither a hardware company nor a software company. Apple sells a service called "vertical integration." The hardware, OS, middleware, userland, and network services all fit together in a single package that Just Works, Right Out Of The Box.
IBM is in the same business in enterprise space, and it's done pretty well for them. For that matter, Red Hat also sells vertical integration, it just services a shorter stack.. only OS, middleware and userland.
Yes, Apple makes most of its profits from the hardware, just like Red Hat makes most of its profits from circles of plastic. That doesn't make Apple exclusively a 'hardware' company, though. It does, however, mean that Apple wants to protect the part of its integration stack that brings in the bulk of the money, and supports development across the rest of the stack.