Psystar in this case is using legally purchased copies of OSX.
Psystar is (hopefully) using legally purchased copies of MacOS X that come with a license allowing installation on a single Apple-labeled computer. Which means they have no right to install the software on their computers, whether they paid for it or not. And since Psystar's claim that Apple didn't register the copyrights is just a blatant lie and Apple actually registered the copyright six months instead of the required three months before the court case, Apple can ask for statutory damages between $750 and $150,000 per copy made. Since a single song that can be purchased for $0.99 was deemed worth more than $9,000 in statutory damages quite recently by a jury, I expect Apple to ask for and get more than that.
It has been said before in this thread, but I think not clearly enough. Just because Psystar makes some outlandish claim (and how likely is it that Apple forgot to register copyrights on MacOS X ?), doesn't mean it is true. In this case, the fact is that Apple has registered the copyright on MacOS X Version 10.5 Leopard on 24/Jan/2008 under the registration number TX0006849489. You caln follow the link below, which will time out again; when it is timed out do a search for "Mac OS X Leopard" which finds Apple's copyright and three copyrights for books.
http://cocatalog.loc.gov/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?v1=4&ti=1,4&Search_Arg=Mac%20OS%20X%20Leopard&Search_Code=TALL&CNT=25&PID=wRSriYVKQl7vglCfQyV3qoEcDM4&SEQ=20081223043158&SID=3
What a waste of time this Psystar company is. Psystar also claims that Apple has code in MacOS X that prevents it from running on non-Apple computers and therefore is evil, but somehow this code isn't copy protection because Psystar would never, never circumvent copy protection and violate the DMCA act.
I did not know that a EULA is part of any business model, since anybody, including a 10-year-old can install any software in any computer. I have not heard that 10 year olds can enter into a binding legal agreement of any sort. Besides, does clicking a mouse or tearing some plastic wrapping constitute an agreement?
First, Psystar is a company, not some ten year old. So what ten year olds can and can not do doesn't affect Apple vs. Psystar at all (although I must admit that many ten year olds have more sense than Psystar seems to have).
But the ten year old in your example bought a box with a DVD and a license allowing installation of the software on an Apple computer. The fact that he can't enter a binding legal agreement means his parents can go back to the shop with the box and DVD and ask for his money back. If he installs the software on a non-Apple computer, he is committing copyright infringement. If caught, it wouldn't be him who pay any fines, but the parents. Similar situation to what happens if a ten year old is caught scratching their neighbours car.
Clicking a mouse or tearing some plastic wrapping doesn't constitute an agreement. The manufacturer puts these things just in your way to make sure you take notice of a license that is valid anyway. And as I said, without the license you have no right to make any copies of the software at all, including making copies by installing it.
People don't care about DRM per se, they care about whether they can use what they buy any way they like.
In the case of music with DRM bought from the iTunes store: I can play it on my computer with no problems at all. I can burn it onto CDs without any problems at all. I can play it in my car (by copying it onto my iPod) without any problems at all. I can't give it away to friends to play on their computers (which would be illegal, which I might or might not care about, and I can give CDs with the music on them to friends, which is just as illegal, which again I might or might not care about), and I can't convert it to MP3 which would allow me to put it onto a cheap 4GB memory stick which can be played in many places, or onto a DVD which my DVD player can play.
Most computer users that I know would have no idea how to put _any_ music onto a memory stick or a DVD, so I don't think there is very much of a limitation at all. On the other hand, the music is easy to buy, and looking in other places is effort as well.
In the case of movie rentals, DRM might very much keep people from using a movie in the way the intend, but it's not in their way when they try to get what they paid for out of a movie (at least with the Apple store).
On the other hand, years ago I tried to buy some eBooks, which came with DRM. Paid for four books (but only a few Euros), had to download bloody Adobe eBook reader software, the software crashed during the download, and all in all I was able to read one of the four books I paid for. I don't dare thinking about what hoops I would have to jump through to make these books readable on my current computer. So in that case, DRM was most definitely in my way and kept me from giving them any more of my money for years. They now sell the same books in unprotected PDF files, which means I can read them on a Mac using Preview, and they will be usable forever.
So the summary: I am not going to boycott DRM if it is implemented well and I trust the company doing it. And if it is implemented badly, you don't need to ask me to boycott it.
If they can't positively identify you, you're not paying the fine.
Maybe they cannot fine you, but if you routinely lend your car to people who don't respect the traffic rules (or if you claim to do so), they can ask you to keep notes of exactly who is driving your car where and when, and you can then be fined for not keeping those notes. So if you are caught again, you either show your notebook with your name in it and get fined, or you don't and get fined.
Did you know that the USA nearly voted for German as their main language?
They didn't. They had a vote somewhere whether the text of new laws should be published in German in addition to the English language publication, but that vote failed. That is not nearly the same as having "German as their main language".
I know you're trying to be sarcastic, but you're onto something now. Since that myspace chick got sentenced for fraud or whatnot because of registering under a false name then, legally, any name you put into facebook is either your real name and thus a legal representation of yourself, or you're a criminal and... well, if they find the papers weren't properly served because the name wasn't real then...
Lori Drew wasn't convicted purely for using a false name. She was convicted because she used that false name to harrass someone (with great success), which wouldn't have been possible under her real name, because the harrassed girl would have known that she wasn't talking to a 16 year old boy but to her 40 year old female neighbour.
You're right when you say that suicidal people aren't entirely rational when they think suicide is their best option to get revenge on someone. However the original essay's point is that the successful conviction of Lori Drew now validates this wayward thinking. Lori Drew was punished by Megan's suicide which just reinforces the thoughts some may have that suicide is an effective method of exacting revenge.
That doesn't make sense at all. The girl who committed suicide didn't know what was actually going on. She killed herself because she was dumped by her boyfriend in a particularly nasty way - at least that's what she thought. If that had indeed been the truth, then the ex-boyfriend would have gone free, because he didn't do the things that Lori Drew was convicted for. On the other hand, had the girl known that the neighbour was behind this and the boyfriend didn't exist at all, she wouldn't have had any reason to kill herself.
Last time I read up on the subject, I found Amit Singh's article claiming that various executable files in MacOS X are encrypted and require a 64 bit code delivered by the SMC chip to decode them. Quite foolproof (little chance of things going wrong for users of Apple hardware), not very difficult to circumvent, but 100% necessary to circumvent to get full MacOS X running. It doesn't prevent copying the installer DVD with the encrypted executables, it doesn't prevent installing MacOS X with the encrypted executables, but it prevents the _real_ code from every being available to your computer.
Amazon.com tracks what you search for and buy, and uses it to decide what ads to display. I like it, even though it makes me nervous to have them know too much about me. Amazon also gives you the option to say "I'm not really interested in that", so they can remove it from your list of interests.
Three years ago, my daughter developed an interest in some stuff, and I bought her five related items for Christmas from Amazon. Enough to last her a lifetime. I will never, ever buy that kind of item again. But Amazon hasn't forgotten. Not in three years. Totally gets on your nerves.
In the mid 1990s 'disk doubler' programs were popular, compressing data on the fly as it was saved to disk. After a few years, however, disk sizes increased sharply and the relationship between price and disk size is much steeper than linear (a 1Gibyte disk does not cost twice as much as a 500Gibyte disk). So hardly anyone bothers with dynamic compression any more. It is much easier to spend $40 more and get a drive that's twice as big.
What's really stopping on disk compression is the fact that the big files on a consumer's hard drive are already heavily compressed. Tons of h.264, divx, mpeg, jpeg, mp3, AAC and so on that can't be compressed any more. In my home directory, about four percent of all storage is used for files that are not music, videos or photos and might be compressible.
A 500 GB hard drive that fits into a MacBook can be had for less than £100. For me, the most important thing is storage capacity. If copying takes time, there is a cheap workaround: Waiting. If copying takes space that isn't there, there is no workaround.
So for me, SSD would have to offer about 500 GB at not more than maybe £160-£170 today to be anywhere near competitive. I don't think it will be competitive in 2009.
Ok, enough with the data recovery stuff. Can someone please explain to me why the victim was not allowed to testify? I tried to understand but it really is beyond me. Maybe someone can help out with a simple car analogy etc.
The woman was interviewed, the interview recorded on DVD, and the DVD was lost. The vague recollection of a policeman who was present was that she had said in the interview that she wasn't forced. Later she said that she was forced. Now this looks like there is conflicting evidence, and the police conveniently lost the evidence that was speaking _for_ the accused. If the vague recollection of the policeman was right, and if she then was allowed to testify again, there would have been two conflicting testimonies. One that says the accused was innocent, testimony conveniently lost and not shown to the jury, and one that says he is guilty, testimony proudly presented to the jury. I can see how the judge wouldn't see that as a fair trial.
The university may or may not have certain rights. Whether you agree or not doesn't matter, they have whatever rights they have and they don't have whatever rights they don't have. There is no way they can force you to sign over any rights. Either they have these rights, then they don't need you to sign them over. Or they don't have the rights, then you are under no obligation to sign them over.
(BTW I was told that in US law, you can't sign over copyrights that don't exist yet. Like the copyright for a book that you are going to write, or the copyright that you are going to develop. For the simple reason that the copyright doesn't exist. The signing over must happen when the copyright actually exists).
(mount soapbox) Having every little thing reviewed is a necessity, not a problem. Expert and lead programmers need to set the example by getting reviews. Always. The tiniest change has the potential for causing chaos. Teaching by example is just as important as producing. (dismount soapbox)
I once spent one full week debugging to find a bug when someone made a code change that was unnecessary, trivial, not reviewed, and wrong. (Someone thought that if (! p) looked better than if (p != NULL). Which one looks better is debatable, but one is the opposite of the other).
You just hit the nail on the head. What if Lori Drew was the guy she pretended to be. Would that make it better? Would he be on trial? Lets think this through. This girl thought she was talking to a boy (mistake #1) and believed what this internet person said (mistake #2) then acted on that information (mistake #3) to her own detriment. Three strikes and you're out as they say.
The definition of "fraud" is roughly to make someone else believe something that isn't true, which then causes that person to do something that is to your advantage, or their disadvantage, which they otherwise wouldn't have done. Clearly this is fraud: Lori Drew made the girl wrongly believe that a young boy who she loved suddenly turned against her, hated her, and felt the world would be a better place without her. If that boy had been real, and suddenly turned against her, and so on, there would have been no fraud.
Assume there are two people asking people for money. One says truthfully that he is collecting money for a children's home. I give him £100. The other also claims he is collecting money for a children's home, but he is lying, he is spending the money on expensive cars for himself. I also give him £100. In both cases I am left with £100 left in my pocket. But one is fraud and punished, the other isn't.
Buy a used Intel Mac Mini, download the iPhone development tools, and convert your software to Objective-C with UIKit. Once its done, for $99 you get access to the most professional and most profitable shop for mobile phone software - the iTunes App Store. Do a search about what has been reported about revenues. You set the price that the end user pays, and you get to keep 70 percent of that. In the last quarter, Apple was the third largest mobile phone manufacturer by revenue, and all of that revenue is iPhone. On top of that you can sell to iPod Touch users, and there are a few million of those around. And that is a market full of people who will actually _look_ at the iTunes App Store, so your application will be seen, and who are used to paying out actual cash for things.
So the guy drops his MacBook Pro into water, gets told that it won't be replaced under warranty, complains to the email address of Apple's CEO, and gets a reply "Well, that's what happens when you drop your computer into water. It is a pro computer, it doesn't like water. Looks like you are just looking for someone else than yourself to get mad at".
If you look at the court ruling (go to www.groklaw.net), here is a direct quote from the ruling:
As stated, Psystar asserted three federal claims: a tying claim under Section 1 of the Sherman Act, a monopoly-maintenance claim under Section 2 of the Sherman act, and an exclusive-dealing claim under Section 3 of the Clayton Act.2 Each of these claims requires plaintiff to establish market power in a "relevant market."
Actually, I meant "assessed", as I meant that the judge, having ruled in Apple's favour, would assess damages (if Apple counter-sued, which I expect they did), and that the judge would also make a costs ruling in Apple's favour. I'm not sure what you mean by "adjusted", is this the term more commonly used in US jurisdictions? Or are we thinking about different kinds of costs and damages?
I think this law case is running slightly different than you think. What happened is that Apple sued Psystar for copyright infringement and all kind of evil things; Psystar then replied by countersuing Apple for being an evil monopoly. Psystar's countersuit has been dismissed (Psystar has a chance to amend its claims and try again, but I don't think there is much hope for them), which means we are now left with Apple suing Psystar. Psystar and Apple will both carry their own cost for bringing this bit of light entertainment to us:-)
I can't understand why Apple don't describe the OSX retail boxes as "Upgrades" though - since you require a Mac and all Macs ship with Mac OS it amounts to the same thing, and I really can't see a court overturning the practice of selling "upgrade" products.
I wouldn't mind at all if they printed something like that onto the package. For the license terms, it makes very little difference. The license is a piece of printed paper, and you follow it, or you don't. Whether it says "install only on Apple-labeled computers" or "install only on computers with a valid MacOS X license", that doesn't make much difference. Either terms are equally enforceable (or unenforceable if you believe Psystar). It might make a psychological difference, but not a legal one.
If someone at Apple went mad and changed the license terms to "install only on Apple-labeled computers, or computers in a case with at least twelve really annoying flashing LED lights in at least three different colours", then these terms would be just as valid, even though we all (and the judge) would agree that the person setting these terms was a complete idiot.
Where are the "I don't believe in IP" people?
Apple makes the RIAA look friendly. At least the RIAA doesn't tell you what kind of stereo you have to play your music on.
Way off the mark. What annoys people about the RIAA is: A lawsuit tactics that forces completely innocent people to hand over extortion money (obviously some very guilty people are handing over extortion money as well), damage claims that are out of this world (like $9000 for copying a single song that can be bought for 99 cents), and the feeling that if these guys were not living back in the stone ages, then they could have worked out a system that gives us lots of cheap music, and them lots of profits, because the technology to do that is there.
What Apple does is more like if allofmp3.com opened freshly in the USA, offered lots of music for cheap prices without paying anyone for the rights, and told the RIAA to f*** off. And when the RIAA sues them, they would claim that the RIAA has a monopoly on all the music and therefore no rights to prevent anyone else from selling it.
Instead of taking the case of a drill manufacturer, let's take the case of Apple vs. Psystar. Psystar claimed in its counterclaims that Apple has monopolies in two markets: The market of the MacOS X operating system software, and the market of computers capable of running MacOS X. The second market, it claimed, was kept an Apple monopoly because of Apple's license that only allows you to install MacOS X on an Apple labeled computer. Clearly if such a license term was not valid then Apple would not have a monopoly in the market of MacOS X compatible computers (Dell, HP, Acer and so on would have been selling MacOS X compatible computers for ages, just nobody took much notice of it). So by its own counterclaims, Psystar admits that Apple's EULA is valid.
That company lawyer is exactly right: The time to boot is not work time, and should not be paid for. On the other hand, you shouldn't do anything you are not paid for, so you shouldn't boot. Solution: The employer has to make sure that everything is in place for you to start work when you arrive at work. They can either hire a small army of "booters" who walk around from 8 to 9 to make sure that all the machines are booted, or you arrive at work and wait (fully paid) until your machine is ready. Which could take the whole shift.
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Psystar in this case is using legally purchased copies of OSX.
Psystar is (hopefully) using legally purchased copies of MacOS X that come with a license allowing installation on a single Apple-labeled computer. Which means they have no right to install the software on their computers, whether they paid for it or not. And since Psystar's claim that Apple didn't register the copyrights is just a blatant lie and Apple actually registered the copyright six months instead of the required three months before the court case, Apple can ask for statutory damages between $750 and $150,000 per copy made. Since a single song that can be purchased for $0.99 was deemed worth more than $9,000 in statutory damages quite recently by a jury, I expect Apple to ask for and get more than that.
It has been said before in this thread, but I think not clearly enough. Just because Psystar makes some outlandish claim (and how likely is it that Apple forgot to register copyrights on MacOS X ?), doesn't mean it is true. In this case, the fact is that Apple has registered the copyright on MacOS X Version 10.5 Leopard on 24/Jan/2008 under the registration number TX0006849489. You caln follow the link below, which will time out again; when it is timed out do a search for "Mac OS X Leopard" which finds Apple's copyright and three copyrights for books. http://cocatalog.loc.gov/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?v1=4&ti=1,4&Search_Arg=Mac%20OS%20X%20Leopard&Search_Code=TALL&CNT=25&PID=wRSriYVKQl7vglCfQyV3qoEcDM4&SEQ=20081223043158&SID=3 What a waste of time this Psystar company is. Psystar also claims that Apple has code in MacOS X that prevents it from running on non-Apple computers and therefore is evil, but somehow this code isn't copy protection because Psystar would never, never circumvent copy protection and violate the DMCA act.
I did not know that a EULA is part of any business model, since anybody, including a 10-year-old can install any software in any computer. I have not heard that 10 year olds can enter into a binding legal agreement of any sort. Besides, does clicking a mouse or tearing some plastic wrapping constitute an agreement?
First, Psystar is a company, not some ten year old. So what ten year olds can and can not do doesn't affect Apple vs. Psystar at all (although I must admit that many ten year olds have more sense than Psystar seems to have).
But the ten year old in your example bought a box with a DVD and a license allowing installation of the software on an Apple computer. The fact that he can't enter a binding legal agreement means his parents can go back to the shop with the box and DVD and ask for his money back. If he installs the software on a non-Apple computer, he is committing copyright infringement. If caught, it wouldn't be him who pay any fines, but the parents. Similar situation to what happens if a ten year old is caught scratching their neighbours car.
Clicking a mouse or tearing some plastic wrapping doesn't constitute an agreement. The manufacturer puts these things just in your way to make sure you take notice of a license that is valid anyway. And as I said, without the license you have no right to make any copies of the software at all, including making copies by installing it.
People don't care about DRM per se, they care about whether they can use what they buy any way they like.
In the case of music with DRM bought from the iTunes store: I can play it on my computer with no problems at all. I can burn it onto CDs without any problems at all. I can play it in my car (by copying it onto my iPod) without any problems at all. I can't give it away to friends to play on their computers (which would be illegal, which I might or might not care about, and I can give CDs with the music on them to friends, which is just as illegal, which again I might or might not care about), and I can't convert it to MP3 which would allow me to put it onto a cheap 4GB memory stick which can be played in many places, or onto a DVD which my DVD player can play.
Most computer users that I know would have no idea how to put _any_ music onto a memory stick or a DVD, so I don't think there is very much of a limitation at all. On the other hand, the music is easy to buy, and looking in other places is effort as well.
In the case of movie rentals, DRM might very much keep people from using a movie in the way the intend, but it's not in their way when they try to get what they paid for out of a movie (at least with the Apple store).
On the other hand, years ago I tried to buy some eBooks, which came with DRM. Paid for four books (but only a few Euros), had to download bloody Adobe eBook reader software, the software crashed during the download, and all in all I was able to read one of the four books I paid for. I don't dare thinking about what hoops I would have to jump through to make these books readable on my current computer. So in that case, DRM was most definitely in my way and kept me from giving them any more of my money for years. They now sell the same books in unprotected PDF files, which means I can read them on a Mac using Preview, and they will be usable forever.
So the summary: I am not going to boycott DRM if it is implemented well and I trust the company doing it. And if it is implemented badly, you don't need to ask me to boycott it.
It's the same in Germany.
If they can't positively identify you, you're not paying the fine.
Maybe they cannot fine you, but if you routinely lend your car to people who don't respect the traffic rules (or if you claim to do so), they can ask you to keep notes of exactly who is driving your car where and when, and you can then be fined for not keeping those notes. So if you are caught again, you either show your notebook with your name in it and get fined, or you don't and get fined.
Did you know that the USA nearly voted for German as their main language?
They didn't. They had a vote somewhere whether the text of new laws should be published in German in addition to the English language publication, but that vote failed. That is not nearly the same as having "German as their main language".
I know you're trying to be sarcastic, but you're onto something now. Since that myspace chick got sentenced for fraud or whatnot because of registering under a false name then, legally, any name you put into facebook is either your real name and thus a legal representation of yourself, or you're a criminal and ... well, if they find the papers weren't properly served because the name wasn't real then ...
Lori Drew wasn't convicted purely for using a false name. She was convicted because she used that false name to harrass someone (with great success), which wouldn't have been possible under her real name, because the harrassed girl would have known that she wasn't talking to a 16 year old boy but to her 40 year old female neighbour.
You're right when you say that suicidal people aren't entirely rational when they think suicide is their best option to get revenge on someone. However the original essay's point is that the successful conviction of Lori Drew now validates this wayward thinking. Lori Drew was punished by Megan's suicide which just reinforces the thoughts some may have that suicide is an effective method of exacting revenge.
That doesn't make sense at all. The girl who committed suicide didn't know what was actually going on. She killed herself because she was dumped by her boyfriend in a particularly nasty way - at least that's what she thought. If that had indeed been the truth, then the ex-boyfriend would have gone free, because he didn't do the things that Lori Drew was convicted for. On the other hand, had the girl known that the neighbour was behind this and the boyfriend didn't exist at all, she wouldn't have had any reason to kill herself.
Last time I read up on the subject, I found Amit Singh's article claiming that various executable files in MacOS X are encrypted and require a 64 bit code delivered by the SMC chip to decode them. Quite foolproof (little chance of things going wrong for users of Apple hardware), not very difficult to circumvent, but 100% necessary to circumvent to get full MacOS X running. It doesn't prevent copying the installer DVD with the encrypted executables, it doesn't prevent installing MacOS X with the encrypted executables, but it prevents the _real_ code from every being available to your computer.
Amazon.com tracks what you search for and buy, and uses it to decide what ads to display. I like it, even though it makes me nervous to have them know too much about me. Amazon also gives you the option to say "I'm not really interested in that", so they can remove it from your list of interests.
Three years ago, my daughter developed an interest in some stuff, and I bought her five related items for Christmas from Amazon. Enough to last her a lifetime. I will never, ever buy that kind of item again. But Amazon hasn't forgotten. Not in three years. Totally gets on your nerves.
In the mid 1990s 'disk doubler' programs were popular, compressing data on the fly as it was saved to disk. After a few years, however, disk sizes increased sharply and the relationship between price and disk size is much steeper than linear (a 1Gibyte disk does not cost twice as much as a 500Gibyte disk). So hardly anyone bothers with dynamic compression any more. It is much easier to spend $40 more and get a drive that's twice as big.
What's really stopping on disk compression is the fact that the big files on a consumer's hard drive are already heavily compressed. Tons of h.264, divx, mpeg, jpeg, mp3, AAC and so on that can't be compressed any more. In my home directory, about four percent of all storage is used for files that are not music, videos or photos and might be compressible.
A 500 GB hard drive that fits into a MacBook can be had for less than £100. For me, the most important thing is storage capacity. If copying takes time, there is a cheap workaround: Waiting. If copying takes space that isn't there, there is no workaround.
So for me, SSD would have to offer about 500 GB at not more than maybe £160-£170 today to be anywhere near competitive. I don't think it will be competitive in 2009.
Ok, enough with the data recovery stuff. Can someone please explain to me why the victim was not allowed to testify? I tried to understand but it really is beyond me. Maybe someone can help out with a simple car analogy etc.
The woman was interviewed, the interview recorded on DVD, and the DVD was lost. The vague recollection of a policeman who was present was that she had said in the interview that she wasn't forced. Later she said that she was forced. Now this looks like there is conflicting evidence, and the police conveniently lost the evidence that was speaking _for_ the accused. If the vague recollection of the policeman was right, and if she then was allowed to testify again, there would have been two conflicting testimonies. One that says the accused was innocent, testimony conveniently lost and not shown to the jury, and one that says he is guilty, testimony proudly presented to the jury. I can see how the judge wouldn't see that as a fair trial.
The university may or may not have certain rights. Whether you agree or not doesn't matter, they have whatever rights they have and they don't have whatever rights they don't have. There is no way they can force you to sign over any rights. Either they have these rights, then they don't need you to sign them over. Or they don't have the rights, then you are under no obligation to sign them over. (BTW I was told that in US law, you can't sign over copyrights that don't exist yet. Like the copyright for a book that you are going to write, or the copyright that you are going to develop. For the simple reason that the copyright doesn't exist. The signing over must happen when the copyright actually exists).
(mount soapbox) Having every little thing reviewed is a necessity, not a problem. Expert and lead programmers need to set the example by getting reviews. Always. The tiniest change has the potential for causing chaos. Teaching by example is just as important as producing. (dismount soapbox)
I once spent one full week debugging to find a bug when someone made a code change that was unnecessary, trivial, not reviewed, and wrong. (Someone thought that if (! p) looked better than if (p != NULL). Which one looks better is debatable, but one is the opposite of the other).
You just hit the nail on the head. What if Lori Drew was the guy she pretended to be. Would that make it better? Would he be on trial? Lets think this through. This girl thought she was talking to a boy (mistake #1) and believed what this internet person said (mistake #2) then acted on that information (mistake #3) to her own detriment. Three strikes and you're out as they say.
The definition of "fraud" is roughly to make someone else believe something that isn't true, which then causes that person to do something that is to your advantage, or their disadvantage, which they otherwise wouldn't have done. Clearly this is fraud: Lori Drew made the girl wrongly believe that a young boy who she loved suddenly turned against her, hated her, and felt the world would be a better place without her. If that boy had been real, and suddenly turned against her, and so on, there would have been no fraud.
Assume there are two people asking people for money. One says truthfully that he is collecting money for a children's home. I give him £100. The other also claims he is collecting money for a children's home, but he is lying, he is spending the money on expensive cars for himself. I also give him £100. In both cases I am left with £100 left in my pocket. But one is fraud and punished, the other isn't.
The fact that Greenpeace comes down on Apple is a good reason for me to consider buying a new Macbook.
Don't do that! Greenpeace says the percentage of recycled plastic in the weight of the MacBook is too low!
Buy a used Intel Mac Mini, download the iPhone development tools, and convert your software to Objective-C with UIKit. Once its done, for $99 you get access to the most professional and most profitable shop for mobile phone software - the iTunes App Store. Do a search about what has been reported about revenues. You set the price that the end user pays, and you get to keep 70 percent of that. In the last quarter, Apple was the third largest mobile phone manufacturer by revenue, and all of that revenue is iPhone. On top of that you can sell to iPod Touch users, and there are a few million of those around. And that is a market full of people who will actually _look_ at the iTunes App Store, so your application will be seen, and who are used to paying out actual cash for things.
So the guy drops his MacBook Pro into water, gets told that it won't be replaced under warranty, complains to the email address of Apple's CEO, and gets a reply "Well, that's what happens when you drop your computer into water. It is a pro computer, it doesn't like water. Looks like you are just looking for someone else than yourself to get mad at".
I would rate that +1 (humor), +1 (insightful).
If you look at the court ruling (go to www.groklaw.net), here is a direct quote from the ruling:
As stated, Psystar asserted three federal claims: a tying claim under Section 1 of the Sherman Act, a monopoly-maintenance claim under Section 2 of the Sherman act, and an exclusive-dealing claim under Section 3 of the Clayton Act.2 Each of these claims requires plaintiff to establish market power in a "relevant market."
Actually, I meant "assessed", as I meant that the judge, having ruled in Apple's favour, would assess damages (if Apple counter-sued, which I expect they did), and that the judge would also make a costs ruling in Apple's favour. I'm not sure what you mean by "adjusted", is this the term more commonly used in US jurisdictions? Or are we thinking about different kinds of costs and damages?
I think this law case is running slightly different than you think. What happened is that Apple sued Psystar for copyright infringement and all kind of evil things; Psystar then replied by countersuing Apple for being an evil monopoly. Psystar's countersuit has been dismissed (Psystar has a chance to amend its claims and try again, but I don't think there is much hope for them), which means we are now left with Apple suing Psystar. Psystar and Apple will both carry their own cost for bringing this bit of light entertainment to us :-)
I can't understand why Apple don't describe the OSX retail boxes as "Upgrades" though - since you require a Mac and all Macs ship with Mac OS it amounts to the same thing, and I really can't see a court overturning the practice of selling "upgrade" products.
I wouldn't mind at all if they printed something like that onto the package. For the license terms, it makes very little difference. The license is a piece of printed paper, and you follow it, or you don't. Whether it says "install only on Apple-labeled computers" or "install only on computers with a valid MacOS X license", that doesn't make much difference. Either terms are equally enforceable (or unenforceable if you believe Psystar). It might make a psychological difference, but not a legal one.
If someone at Apple went mad and changed the license terms to "install only on Apple-labeled computers, or computers in a case with at least twelve really annoying flashing LED lights in at least three different colours", then these terms would be just as valid, even though we all (and the judge) would agree that the person setting these terms was a complete idiot.
Where are the "I don't believe in IP" people?
Apple makes the RIAA look friendly. At least the RIAA doesn't tell you what kind of stereo you have to play your music on.
Way off the mark. What annoys people about the RIAA is: A lawsuit tactics that forces completely innocent people to hand over extortion money (obviously some very guilty people are handing over extortion money as well), damage claims that are out of this world (like $9000 for copying a single song that can be bought for 99 cents), and the feeling that if these guys were not living back in the stone ages, then they could have worked out a system that gives us lots of cheap music, and them lots of profits, because the technology to do that is there.
What Apple does is more like if allofmp3.com opened freshly in the USA, offered lots of music for cheap prices without paying anyone for the rights, and told the RIAA to f*** off. And when the RIAA sues them, they would claim that the RIAA has a monopoly on all the music and therefore no rights to prevent anyone else from selling it.
Instead of taking the case of a drill manufacturer, let's take the case of Apple vs. Psystar. Psystar claimed in its counterclaims that Apple has monopolies in two markets: The market of the MacOS X operating system software, and the market of computers capable of running MacOS X. The second market, it claimed, was kept an Apple monopoly because of Apple's license that only allows you to install MacOS X on an Apple labeled computer. Clearly if such a license term was not valid then Apple would not have a monopoly in the market of MacOS X compatible computers (Dell, HP, Acer and so on would have been selling MacOS X compatible computers for ages, just nobody took much notice of it). So by its own counterclaims, Psystar admits that Apple's EULA is valid.
That company lawyer is exactly right: The time to boot is not work time, and should not be paid for. On the other hand, you shouldn't do anything you are not paid for, so you shouldn't boot. Solution: The employer has to make sure that everything is in place for you to start work when you arrive at work. They can either hire a small army of "booters" who walk around from 8 to 9 to make sure that all the machines are booted, or you arrive at work and wait (fully paid) until your machine is ready. Which could take the whole shift.