Slashdot Mirror
Apple Suit Demands That Psystar Recall OpenMacs
Da'Man writes "The Psystar saga takes another series of turns. Not only is the website down but an examination of the suit filed by Apple shows that the Cupertino Goliath wants Psystar to recall all Open Computer and OpenServ systems sold by the company since April. It seems that Steve Jobs is out to totally sink Psystar and put an end to Mac clones."
The more you tighten your grip, Jobs, the more star systems will slip through your fingers!
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
um, you THINK?
Be honest - who didn't see this coming?
because it exposes the fact that today's Mac desktops are just commodity hardware with an extra $1,000 charge for an OS X dongle (TPM).
One CPU cycle wasted on digital restrictions management is ONE TOO MANY.
Notice that Apple filed approx a day after the WoW copyright decision. If there was some doubt on Psystar beating Apple on the validity of of the EULA...it is pretty safe to say that Psystar is about to get slapped down.
Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, religion destroys spirituality
...Steve Jobs called a "suit."
What if I do the same thing, and I do get different results?
Apple have no choice - if only IBM had retained such control over the IBM PC. And where are IBM now?
This was probably inevitable, but it's a shame to see Psystar brought down. Without any competition in the computers-that-run-OS-X market, Apple just keeps getting more obnoxious.
(If this kind of thing bothers you and you want to take a swipe back at Apple, I recommend passing up that shiny new iPhone 3G and looking at the equally shiny LG Dare instead. The screen is smaller but it's actually easier to type on.)
Visual IRC: Fast. Powerful. Free.
Take that Stevie!
http://nwbagpipes.com/
Ok, how about the thousands of us who demand a headless, non-pro, non-laptop computer, with actual desktop/decent parts in it?
Mac mini: piss-poor GPU and low-capacity/slow LAPTOP 2.5" drive in a DESKTOP computer?
iMac: fuckin' all-in-one computer with stupid glossy screens and low quality LCDs with not even average GPU choices.
Mac Pro: are you fucking insane? I don't need that much power (and even the GPU options for that one are ridiculous).
Make the Mac mini taller/bigger, put a 3.5" drive and a half-decent GPU in it (the ability to run Starcraft II and Diablo III at medium settings) and it WILL sell. A lot. You have no fuckin' idea how much people loathe all-in-one computers.
If Psystar were rich enough, they could win their case against Apple and we could see Mac clones on the market like we saw IBM PC clones in the 80's. But still, what would be the point in having Mac clones ? We'd start to see an OS (Mac OS) that crashes all the time because the hardware is "not supported officially". So we would be forced to install an alternative OS on the machine, like Linux or BSD. Ok it could work great but it works as great on PCs.
Really I'm not trying to troll/start a flamewar, I'm just wondering.
Has the price changed that much? Last I looked, Apple was actually competitive (within $100, sometimes cheaper) with commodity hardware. The only difference is, you can't get a Mac without the bells and whistles.
In other words, you get exactly what you pay for, which includes $1k of hardware you don't actually need.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
...the clone war.
What are the odds of people actually returning their much-less-costly Mac clone?
Bearded Dragon
That's not accurate. OSX does not use the TPM chip for hardware authentication. The reason OSX does not run without modification is that it requires EFI firmware instead of BIOS. Pystar uses an open source EFI emulator to boot.
Looks like I was right in my comments from yesterday--but I never figured they would fall apart so quickly! Build a product that might infringe but would definitely piss someone off, make & deliver a bunch of orders, pay bonuses, declare bankruptcy (how long until Psystar does this???), and disappear... Take the money & run. The funny thing is that if they fulfilled their orders, they might be in the clear from criminal prosecution and their customers are the ones that got exactly what they paid for (sans warranty once they file for bankruptcy)... Excluding the execs, who might be sitting on a beach somewhere, everybody loses--including Apple.
Windows 3.1x calc: 3.11 - 3.10 = 0.00
If you look around next time your out shopping, you'll see (part of) how IBM is doing so well. They got back into the BM (no, not bowel movement) part of IBM. A very significant portion of all point of sale terminals (amongst other things) are made by IBM. Whether or not Apple could pull the same move is hard to say.
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
Cribbed shamelessly from an Ars Technica discussion on the same issue:
"TPM DRM" In Mac OS X: A Myth That Won't Die
Amit Singh
http://www.osxbook.com/book/bo...chapter7/tpmdrmmyth/
Beating a Dead Horse
"In October 2006, I wrote about the TPM and its "use" in Mac OS X. Since Apple provided no software or firmware drivers for the TPM ...
"Apple's TPM Keys"
"The media has been discussing "Apple's use of TPM" for a long time now. There have been numerous reports of system attackers bypassing "Apple's TPM protection" and finding "Apple's TPM keys." Nevertheless, it is important to note that Apple does not use the TPM."
In short, while there was a TPM chip in some of the early shipping Intel systems, there were no drivers for it, and Apple did not use it. Current shipping Macintel systems don't even have the TPM chip, so there's no possible way for them to use one.
Dan Aris
Fun. Free. Online. RPG. BattleMaster.
Who here would expect Nintendo, Sony or Microsoft to NOT do anything if a competitor suddenly started to sell compatible systems or even just emulators for their own systems?
Remember that Apple sells systems, not computers. This may be an alien concept to kids today, but at the beginning, all companies were selling computer+OS systems and they were all proprietary (Apple II, Mac, Atari ST, Amiga, CoCo2+OS9, C64+GeOS, etc).
Also, don't be two-faced about this: you don't like it when companies don't follow GPL and other similar licenses, but when it's Apple or Microsoft, why wouldn't they be allowed to do the same?
I hope there's one good thing to come out of this mess: Apple selling a headless, iMac-specs computer (i.e. ATI/nVidia GPU with a 3.5" desktop hard drive). Heck, why don't they just make a case for the actual iMac motherboard to lower R&D costs?
If this were a story about Microsoft trying to stop vendors from building machines that can run their OS, there would be a million typical comments about them being an evil monopoly, etc. Since it's Apple, I'm sure it's somehow ok, in a shiny, trendy, hip way.
I suspect Apple is every bit as evil as Microsoft, just less successful.
because it exposes the fact that today's Mac desktops are just commodity hardware with an extra $1,000 charge for an OS X dongle (TPM).
Let's not get out of hand here. $1000 premium is a bit of a stretch when you compare pure hardware specs between vendors. Maybe a couple hundred, but certainly not $1000. Besides, I'll gladly pay a small premium for stability.
If you really want to bitch about premiums, then let's stop bullshitting here and talk about Vista MSRP. Those prices make OSX look like a bargain.
If I bought something, it's now mine (the hardware anyway). I doubt Pystar can actually repossess any of the boxes. The entire demand by Apple is pretty silly. Apple's copyright claims can't possibly cover the possession of physical hardware. Very bizarre. I think Apple only has a claim against Psystar itself over copyright infringement (the distribution of hacked Apple patches). Personal use of OS X in breach of Apple's license would have to be an issue that Apple would have to deal with on a per user basis, which I doubt they are willing to do.
Funny. This would almost make it seem like Apple is a very profitable company, who's investors seem quite pleased at the ROI they get from owning stock.
In fact, in almost every category that would define investor confidence AAPL outperforms MSFT, and leaves DELL and HPQ in the dust.
I fail to see any lost sales and profits in this equation. If I was a shareholder in AAPL, I'd be happy as punch right now.
Cool, it's gonna fit right in with my Panaphonic plasma TV and Somy PS3!
How about "PowerPC corrupts, x86 corrupts absolutely"?
apple will continue to suffer lost sales and profits in till they come out with a real desktop mid-tower and they update the mini it is a joke at the price that it is at right now.
Er, have you stepped foot inside an Apple store lately? It's rather busy, which is a LOT more than I can say for 95% of the other stores in the area in this morbid economy. I don't exactly see their stock price slipping either. In fact, it's one of the few that have rebounded rather nicely so far this year.
All that being said, it's simple why you don't see more hardware options. Their hardware serves the same purpose as their software. Simplicity. It's a niche market, one they are marketing fairly well.
But still, what would be the point in having Mac clones ?
Well, let's see... people looking for something that Apple doesn't currently produce could get a computer with OS X on it that fit those requirements.
Like... a conventional desktop with expansion slots.
Like... a laptop with a two-button trackpad and a decent keyboard.
Like... a laptop with a swappable drive bay. Or multiple hard drives.
Like... a compact Mac with a high performance hard drive and a real GPU.
Or, Apple could just quit being so damn insistent on making everything subservient to "style", and cut the market out from under the would-be clone makers by adding a couple of products to their product line... a "Mac mini Pro" for the desktop (it could even be cubical!) and a Thinkpad-equivalent laptop.
If they sell it as a boxed software package. Ok, I am not in the US, but here (Brazil) it is actually illegal to bind the sale of the OS to a particular hardware (or any two dissimilar things, in fact). It is in fact called a "bound sale". I guess you americans have something similar (can someone say for sure?) Not so sure about the copyright infringment part of the suit, but I guess that would be covered by the compatibility exception under the DMCA. Anyways, is Psystar american? If not then the whole talk about that (absurd) WOW ruling is moot.
Where is that guy who'd die defending what I had to say when I need him?
No, this is not just about the EULA.
If you look up Psystar and the open computer, you'll find that they also modify and redistribute Apple security updates.
They can't rely on software updates directly from Apple always working on the computers, so they distribute updates themselves.
Since they are very, very unlikely to have permission for this, it is a straightforward case of copyright infringement.
Also, what do you expect? You all know that Apple does not allow "clone makers", so when one happens, do you just accept them to leave them alone, because they are "small time"?
Wouldn't you then be even more outraged if they waited until Psystar was big before they sued?
Psystar must have known this would happen, and I suspect they just used the OS X machines as publicity for their other machines.
If you go by "sales record" then Apple has less than 8% marketshare anyway, which means that pratically nobody wants a Mac to begin with.
I wish I could mod this funny. Even when Apple is making money hand over fist in the middle of a freakin' recession, arm-chair CEO's are trying to save poor stupid Apple. LOL
I wish Mac's were cheaper too, but they aren't. I also wish strippers were free... (as in "beer" - and disease for that matter).
Some privacy policy Slashdot.
It's true that you can get laptops for under $1k, but it's quite a bit harder to find a 13.3" one like the MacBook for much less. I've seen the Toshiba Satellite for about $750 at Best Buy when it's on sale for $150 off list, but that's about it. Dells and Sonys are both >$1k, and HP and Gateway don't even offer that form factor. I bought a 13.3" myself recently since for me it's about the right spot between portability and usefulness, and in that niche the MacBook is not too badly priced (but I still didn't buy one). The MacBook Pro, on the other hand, seems way overpriced to me for what you get.
...wearing a skin-tight topless leather jumpsuit, with cutaway buttocks and transparent crotch panel.
I think the main reason they don't have a mid-tower is for profitability reasons. Apple could build one without a doubt but where would it be in the market? If you look at Apple's desktops, they operate in very niche markets. Apple offers a high end workstation in the Mac Pro. It offers a small footprint desktop in the Mac Mini. They have an all-in-one with the iMac. In the mid-tower, the product would not be unique enough to differentiate itself from Dell and the like. It really could not sell very well and wouldn't be profitable. Also, bear in mind that Apple has 1/4 the number of employees as Dell or MS. Expending resources to design a product line that they don't foresee as being profitable wouldn't make sense.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
It's not even that bad. Compare the iMac to the Dell One, a very similar system, and the dell, missing some of those bells, whistles, and a lot of quality software, costs MORE. The Mac Pro 17" machines are VERY competitive (within $300 +/- of other name brand systems, depending on how much attention you pay to package details, battery life, and weight concerns).
If you want to overstate, fine, but keep in mind, subtract the $1000 in "unneeded parts" and the iMac is a $200 machine... NOT!
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
Psystar could probably win this on antitrust grounds. Apple's EULA is probably an "illegal tying arrangement" and unenforceable. But Psystar may not be able to afford the litigation. Historically, IBM lost on this antitrust issue in the 1970s, which is why there were and are IBM mainframe clones and, indeed, IBM PC clones. In fact, IBM was forced to sell their mainframe OS and applications to users with mainframe clones from Amdahl and NCR.
The difference between this era of Mac clones and the last one was that the earlier generations (pre x86) of Apple machines had parts of the OS in ROM, which gave Apple more legal leverage. The current Apple machines are essentially Intel-based PC clones, with little or no essential Apple intellectual property inside.
Psystar does not seem to be redistributing Apple updates. They distribute an installer which, on the client machine, downloads an update from Apple and patches it.
Also, Psystar's web site is not down. It's just slow.
It's true that you can get laptops for under $1k, but it's quite a bit harder to find a 13.3" one like the MacBook for much less
Funny you should mention that. I've been saying for a while that when my current laptop finally dies, I plan to get a Macbook. Not for the looks, the spec or the OS, but simply because I wanted a 13.3 inch form factor. I carry my laptop around a lot, so a 17'' monster is out of the question, but I also use it as my primary machine, so an ultra portable is no use either. 13.3'' is, for me, the sweet spot between portability and usability. But no one seemed to make them except apple, so it looked like the macbook was the best option.
Lately though, I've noticed more and more 13.3'' laptops showing up in stores. A quick search on dabs turns up these results. As you can see, they have twelve 13.3'' laptops that are cheaper than a macbook. The Toshiba U400 for example, compares very favourably with the cheapest macbook in terms of specs. The macbook had a faster processor, but the toshiba has a DVD writer and is lighter, so it's pretty much a toss up. On price though, the Toshiba trounces the apple. £498 against £699. A £200 pound difference. Looks like I won't be buying a mac after all.
I won't get into the the relative merits and value of vista compared to OSX. I'd be formatting it and installing Linux anyway.
"I realise this is not a very popular opinion but it's the truth, and there for needs to be said" -Bill Hicks
Though the iPod and iPhone are popular, there is no way Apple could survive on those products alone. Mac is their core business. If they lose their supremacy to cloners, they're sunk.
On what do you base this assumption? This article is old, but it shows an opposing point of view:
Leading the charge for Apple was its line of iPods, with the company shipping 21 million of the market-leading devices during the quarter, a 50% jump from a year ago. Sales of the device accounted for $3.43 billion of the company's revenue, or nearly half the total.
Apple's total number of iPod sales now stands at about 90 million units since the device first went on sale in October 2001.
"After five years, the iPod is still going strong," said Shaw Wu, an analyst with American Technology Research. "It's still a very popular product." Wu holds a buy rating on Apple's stock. The results show that demand for Apple's products remains strong despite stepped-up competition from rivals such as Microsoft Corp. (MSFT: Microsoft Corporation News, chart, profile, more Last: 27.26+1.10+4.20% 4:12pm 07/16/2008 Delayed quote data Add to portfolio Analyst Create alert Insider Discuss Financials Sponsored by: MSFT 27.26, +1.10, +4.2%) , which is pushing hard to boost its share of the digital entertainment market with a new handheld media player and other consumer products.
"The iPod sales were shocking," said Gene Munster, of Piper Jaffray. "And the earnings power of this company is reaching record levels."
Macintosh computer sales also surged, rising 40% to $2.4 billion, while Mac shipments rose 28% to 1.61 million units, more than double the growth of the overall PC market. The Mac results were a slightly below many analysts forecasts, as several had expected Apple to sell between 1.75 million and 1.8 million Macs during the quarter.
However, Munster, of Piper Jaffray, said the holiday-quarter Mac sales needed to be taken into context, and were actually solid because they remained almost in line with Apple's September quarter results, which is when Apple sees strong back-to-school PC sales.
"People give iPods for Christmas, not computers," Munster said.
I don't think Apple could whether a storm...
"Weather". I know, I could of left it alone, but I'm sure that its bothering alot of people.
I know, I could "have" left it alone, but I'm sure that "it's" bothering "a lot" of people. You should have left it alone.
They can recall all they want I don't think the ones who bought the machine are obligate to return the unit. Correct me if I am wrong, but once a consumer buys a product it is theirs and the maker of that product doesn't really have any authority as to say what the consumer wants can and cannot do with it, not even ask them to return it (if it's not a safety issue) as the consumer paid for the product. At least that is the way I see it.
I don't think anyone with a /. UID thought that this Mac clone company would last very long. I'm surprised they lasted as long as they did. Think this is unfair? Hey, Mac OS X is Apple's product; it's a great piece of software despite its shortcomings; and, yes, to run it, you need a Mac, made by Apple. They do this to guarantee that it runs the way they tested it in the lab. On other hardware, OS X might rock equally well or it might be the suxx0rz, Apple has no way to know or to control that outcome, so they prevent it from running that way. You can take it or use the alternative, which is a computer made by anyone of your choice, running your choice of Linux, the *BSDs, Windows 2000, XP, Vista, or Server 2008 modified to function as a workstation per the instructions given in another /. story earlier today. Vote with your dollars!
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
Shouldn't that be
----------- Your head
Big empty space
----------- My comment
?
Alright. Label me a troll. A fan-boy. A zealot. I don't care.
Why can't a company create a product for the market they want? What gives us the right to buy a product that clearly states what it's for, then, get upset about when it doesn't work the way that we want it? Why do we feel that we have the right to create a market for a product that the creator didn't intend to?
Seriously.
Apple created Mac OS X. They specifically state that it's for Apple computers. They aren't hiding it from you. They made the decision to make this software for their hardware only. What's wrong with that? Why can't a company limit it's own market?
I don't want to hear this "Apple is monopoly" bullshit. They aren't a monopoly, they are a brand. Ford has a "monopoly" on Ford cars that run Ford engines and Ford computers and Ford seatbelts. Sony has a "monopoly" on the Sony operating system that's runs on the Sony Playstation. The operating system is an Apple product for Apple hardware. They just happen to also sell it in a box. Just because its in a box, on a shelf, and you can buy it, doesn't give you the right to decide that you can change what its for. No one is forcing consumers to buy Apple computers. There are other competitors in the market. Nope, no monopoly here.
It's just so aggravating to read the posts. Fuck Psystar. They deliberately tried to tired to sell a product created and sold by another company in a way they didn't want it to be done. Why shouldn't they go down?
Really. Someone explain it to me? Why is Psystar entitled to do this? Why are we entitled to install Mac OS X on hardware Apple tells us not to?
Anyone?
Is it anything more than people who just want to get their way. Why doesn't Apple make a headless Mac for me? Why can't I run Mac OS X on my Dell? Why why why... I want I want I want... wahhhh...
It's like reading a collective bunch of three year olds. Apple doesn't want to sell you their product, for whatever reason they see fit. Shut up and deal with it. It's not an issue of EULA's and copyright and DRM. It's the fact that people are just pissed of they can't get their way. It's why this country is going to shit... people going out of their way- way beyond the realms of common sense and moderation- to obtain their way. Your sense of entitlement sickens me. The fact that Apple is successful without you getting what you want pisses you off even more.
Honestly, you can replace Apple with any other company. It doesn't matter.
Operating systems exist out there that are licensed that you can do whatever you want with them. Go try one out. If you don't like it, learn to code so you can make it something you like.
And yes, I have more custom built Linux systems in my home and in my place of employment than I do Mac or Windows systems. So don't give me a lecture about free software or the GPL.
I feel better now. End of rant.