What Is the Issue in the Psystar Case?
Linked by Nescio on Mon 9th Mar 2009 08:05 UTC
Apple Numerous irrelevant issues and feelings about them are ventilated in comments on the case. However, there are only two important issues. One is what the law is, the other is what we think the law should be.
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NathanHill
Member since:
2006-10-06

This is a great reply, because it is what this analysis (intentionally or unintentionally) leaves out.

I think this case would be different if it was just a guy going and buying a copy of Mac OS X and installing it on his Dell. But it's not. It's on a whole different level.

Psystar is buying copies of Mac OS X and reselling them. (According to copyright law, this is okay.) Psystar is preinstalling Leopard on the machines. (Uh oh - this means there was an EULA.) Psystar is modifying parts of Leopard to get it to load. (Hacking the system, changing the system to point to Psystar servers, etc... Uh oh.) I just don't see how Psystar wins at all.

Sure, if they had just bought copies of Leopard and sent you a Leopard-compatible machine so you can do the work yourself - this might not be an issue. But that is not what is going on here.

Guys, nerds, OSSers - Apple is not trying to shut down people from going and installing Leopard on their netbook or whatever. That is not what is at issue here.

Psystar is going down.

Reply Parent Score: 1

Soulbender Member since:
2005-08-18

Psystar is modifying parts of Leopard to get it to load. (Hacking the system, changing the system to point to Psystar servers, etc... Uh oh.)


Uh oh? That's only a problem if the EULA is actually enforcable. Modifying something and reselling it is not a copyright violation, as long as it's not a copy that you're reselling. Same way I can buy a book, change some text and then sell it to someone else. I can, of course, not pretend that the changes I made are in the original or that I'm the original author but that's a different story.
For simplicities sake I'm ignoring DMCA since it has no effect in most of the world.

Reply Parent Score: 2

rhavyn Member since:
2005-07-06

"Psystar is modifying parts of Leopard to get it to load. (Hacking the system, changing the system to point to Psystar servers, etc... Uh oh.)


Uh oh? That's only a problem if the EULA is actually enforcable. Modifying something and reselling it is not a copyright violation, as long as it's not a copy that you're reselling. Same way I can buy a book, change some text and then sell it to someone else. I can, of course, not pretend that the changes I made are in the original or that I'm the original author but that's a different story.
For simplicities sake I'm ignoring DMCA since it has no effect in most of the world. "

So lets get it straight.

1. You have no idea what is actually written on the boxes of Apple's software.

2. You have an extremely poor grasp of copyright law (fyi, modifying a book and then selling it is copyright infringement, regardless of whether you pretend the changes are in the original or not).

3. You have decided to ignore a major law in the jurisdiction in which the lawsuit in question is happening because it completely destroys your arguments.

So the only real question is, why is someone with such a poor grasp of the facts of the case and the relevant laws in question spending so much time commenting on it?

Reply Parent Score: 0

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