🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <10288@chaph.usc.edu>, ajayshah@aludra.usc.edu (Ajay Shah) writes:
> In article <2892.267decad@mccall.com> tp@mccall.com writes:
>>In article <7324@gollum.twg.com>, david@twg.com (David S. Herron) writes:
>>> In article <JIM.90Jun14120824@baroque.Stanford.EDU> jim@baroque.Stanford.EDU (James Helman) writes:
>>> [EEC talking about getting tightening up copyright to disallow
>>>  disassembling code ..]
>>>>DEC, IBM and Apple are lobbying for it.
>>> ...
>>Actually, DEC disallows it in their Standard Terms and Conditions already.
>
> I'm new to this newsgroup, but this posting really left me
> chilled.  DEC comes across as a real Great Satan!
> 
> This is what computing was supposed to be in _1984_.  Thank god 
> for the Free World, defined as the world minus these nazi
> sentiments.
> 
> But really; are these guys stupid or something?  Apple couldn't
> have been anything today without support from a million hackers:
> setting up such a public image is commercial suicide to Apple.
> Ditto with DEC and IBM.

Nah, the neat thing about these kinds of agreements, is that you can choose
when to enforce them and when not to. If that provision were ironclad, and
DEC were serious about pursuing all such cases, half or more of the third
party vendors in the DEC marketplace wouldn't exist. They just put it in
there in case they need it. Note also, as someone pointed out to me in
mail, that that clause may or may not hold up in court. But who wants to
violate it to find out? DEC has lots of lawyers.

Speaking of Apple, don't forget the famous "look and feel" lawsuit! And I
don't think anyone has ever accused IBM of being sloppy with their patents.
Remember that they hauled Phoenix into court over their clone BIOS.
-- 
Terry Poot <tp@mccall.com>                The McCall Pattern Company
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