Submitted by There are several options out there if you wan to run Mac OS X on your non-Apple labelled computer, but one of them appears to be in serious trouble. It has been uncovered that the EFI-X module is nothing more than a USB stick with a DRM chip, with code from the hackintosh community on it – without attribution. On top of that, its firmware update utility uses LGPL code – again, without attribution.
Supposedly, the EFI-X module was a specialised piece of hardware, with a processor and lots of RAM to provide a fast and efficient EFI solution for normal personal computers. You plugged the module straight onto one of your motherboard’s USB connectors, set your BIOS to boot to it, and be on your merry way. An EFI-X module set you back 280 USD.
Back when the device was first introduced, it received positive responses from the media as being the easiest solution for those of us who want to exercise their rights and run Mac OS X on non-Apple labelled computers. Contrary to the software-based solution of the Chameleon bootloader and boot-132, EFI-X required little to no manual labour.
However, the modules began to show problems all over the web. Firmware updates from ASEM, the parent company, usually only introduced new problems instead of fixing them, and the hardware itself began to fail for a lot of people too. Complaints from customers were removed from the forums by ASEM moderators.
That was not the biggest issue. Members from within the OSX86 community – from experience, a very friendly, active, and helpful bunch – started to realise that the EFI-X module seemed a whole lot like a basic USB stick with a Chameleon/Boot-132 bootloader, and some DRM to conceal it all. Suspicions grew stronger as the EFI-X module had the exact same problems and compatibility charts as the software-based solutions. On top of that, issues fixed within the OSX86 community were fixed on the EFI-X modules shortly after. ASEM denied all of it.
Within the community, a user by the name of AsereBLN started the frustrating task of taking a module apart, to see what’s really inside of one. ASEM didn’t make it easy for him: the outer casing is easily removed, but the PCB is covered in a thick layer of black epoxy to conceal the chips inside. And as it turns out, it’s nothing special: a USB stick, nothing more. These would cost no more than 10 USD to produce at volumes of 1000.
That’s not all. After analysing the syslogs and kextstat outputs from Mac OS X, AsereBLN found out that the EFI-X module uses kexts taken straight from the hackintosh community, without attribution. The kexts have been patched to conceal their origins.
AsereBLN’s tinkering did not go unnoticed by ASEM. They sent him a cease-and-desist letter, and together with his lawyer, he figured out a solution. “Together with my lawyer we have worked out a acceptable solution,” AsereBLN writes on his blog, “Unfortunately this solution demands that I never again can say anything negative about EFI-X or ASEM. I’m also demanded to remove all posts and articles about ASEM and EFI-X in my Blog, in different forums and even in Google.” He further explains that he is sorry for complying in this manner, but that he is only an individual and doesn’t have the means to take all this to court.
To make matters worse, after analysing the 32bit Windows driver which aids in updating the EFI-X module, it was revealed that it contains code released under the LGPL, namely from libusb-win32. However, the EFI-X mdule does not come with the source code, a copy of the LGPL, or a description of the modifications. All references to libusb have been replaced with EFI-X.
The final nail in the coffin which proves that the EFI-X is nothing more than an elaborate scam is that despite promises to the contrary, the original EFI-X module, version 1.0, will not be able to run Snow Leopard. For that, you’ll have to buy the upcoming EFI-X module version 1.1, for yet another 280 USD.
All this is of course very sad for those that spent money on the EFI-X module, but nevertheless it’s good that all this is now out and in the open. Let’s hope ASEM gets a thorough beating about all this, so that unsuspecting customers are no longer scammed. It also confirms that the best way to run Mac OS X on a non-Apple labelled computer is to make use of the excellent code put out by the hackintosh community.
How can someone steal your code, and threaten to sue you at the same time? Ignoring the obvious moral issues, is this even legal?
I’ve heard a similar situation in another open-source project (unfortunately I cannot remember the name). They could not prove the ownership their code for several years.
I still do not understand it at all.
It’s money vs. individual… It does not matter who is right in american law. You set the amount in dispute which “kills” the other party if their finacial background is weak.
this is unfortunately true not only in USA.
besides you do not always have the spare time for a trial in your life (which is a lot more than a few hours)
Well, in my country (Austria), the looser has to pay the case costs of the winning party.
And with a license violation in place, I doubt there would have been a chanve for ASEM to win this.
On the other Hand, ASEM probably payed the copyright holders enough to make a lawsuit go away.
Ummm, no, they clearly indicate its their OWN code (a lie).
Paying money to the Copyright holders is not what they want, they want re-released code and attribution.
Where in the article or website does ASEM do that, please refer me?
That is true in the US as well. However, in the US at least the lawyers still need to be paid first before they will take the case. Basically when the losing party has to pay for legal costs, it is more of a reimbursement to the winner. The money and time are already spent, so without having the money up front to pay for the lawyers, they will not touch the case unless it is a sure victory.
How is that true in the US? I was under the impression it’d have to explicitly be part of the judgment for that to happen, or you have to separately sue for court costs. As an example, the RIAA lawsuits that were dropped when they realized they had the wrong person or were going to lose typically left the loser footing the legal bill of defending themselves up to that point.
It has to be a part of the suit, which any lawyer usually makes sure is in the case. Of course the RIAA did not have it put in the suit, and the lawyer for the person was not smart enough to have it put in apparently. Any lawsuits I have seen that were successful, the loser ended up paying the legal costs. You are correct that it is not automatic, and the party must ask for the coverage of legal costs.
The difference is that in Germany, Austria and other countries this is part of the Law, not an action a litigant may add as part of their counter claim.
This cuts down on Prosecutions being taken forth knowing that if they lose the Government [City, County, State, etc.] will be obligated to pay out for the costs of the trial.
In the US, when a Defense attorney proclaims they will counter sue the Judicial system often works in tandem to make sure they don’t lose the case. This is quite common in District Courts.
Got it. Thanks for the explanation.
May Civil Suite lawyers work on contingency – i.e. they don’t get paid unless they win, and then it’s usually a percentage of what is awarded (likely a percentage of what is actually collected since may awards are not collected due to bankruptcy, appeals, refusal to pay, etc). Sadly, just b/c you win the judgement doesn’t mean you actually get the money awarded.
Also, it is not necessarily true that court costs, attorney costs, etc. get covered by the loser – only if you ask for them in the lawsuit or file a separate lawsuit for them and win on that point as well.
I think in every country the looser pays. But thats not whats it about. The party with the money stretches the law suite so long that the little guy goes bankrupt before the end of it (where it is determined who is right and who is wrong) because of the tremendous costs of good lawyers. (Btw. I’m from Austria, too.)
This happened in Germany. I, too, wonder how they could send a cease & desist, since he only poked around in the hardware he bought.
So, the guys who sell a product helping you break the terms of a license break the terms of a license themselves. Now that’s a shocker.
Maybe that applies to some less fortunate folks out there, lets call them US citizens. Installing OSX on other kit is not a violation of terms elsewhere, so I don’t view this as an issue. Installing OSX is perfectly legal, maybe not for you.
Ok so maybe you do not understand that the license for using Mac OS X says that you cannot install Mac OS X on a non Apple computer. I find it immensely ironic, and humorous that a device that allows people to install Mac OS X on non Apple hardware is in fact stolen technology. Did you really think that people who are purposely trying to break Mac OS X EULA and circumvent the fail safes (EFI – which is really the only reason Apple uses it rather than BIOS imho) would in any way be honorable or honest? I also find it interesting that you (especially you Mr. Holwerda) are so willing to disrespect Apple’s EULA and at the same time expect LGPL to be adhered to. As if LGPL and other FOSS licenses should have any more merit – legally or ethically, than the Mac OS X EULA. You people are totally crazy. If the license says only install on Apple hardware then that is valid, and should be adhered to. Likewise if LGPL says you must include a copy of it, the source, and the modifications made then that is also valid and should be obeyed as well. Go buy a real Mac for chrissakes!
EULAs try to impose conditions post-sale, they’re not legally binding in most places.
For one that is absolutely not true – there are few, if any, jurisdictions in which software license agreements are explicitly non-binding.
And for two – the exact same can be argued about open source licenses. After all, I can download, compile, incorporate into my project and even modify open source code without ever explicitly agreeing to anything. At least with software license agreements there usually is an unskippable step in the software installer on which the text of the agreement is presented to you and you have to select “I Agree” in order to continue. With source code licenses there isn’t even that. By your logic they should be even more insubstantial and nonbinding.
Exactly so. An open source license such as the GPL gives you permission to do that. Absent being granted such permission, these acts would be illegal for ANY software (EULA or not).
One is not required to agree to the GPL license because it doesn’t prevent you from doing anything.
Copyright law is the legally binding thing that prevents you from doing anything with software that isn’t yours (i.e. software that you did not write yourself). That is what stops you from doing things such as “download, compile, incorporate into my project and even modify open source code”.
The GPL merely gives you permission (which you wouldn’t normally have) to do SOME things (but not other things) with software that isn’t yours (i.e. software that you did not write yourself).
You don’t need to agree to anything at all in order to be given a permission.
Edited 2009-09-21 11:28 UTC
You are right but you are nitpicking on semantics. At any rate, this thing you said:
applies equally to source code and software licenses. Copyright law is what gives the holder the legal right to dictate the terms under which you can use their software.
Yes.
In the context of what we were discussing, so what?
Copyright law is the thing that forbids. Licenses give (some) permissions that over-ride copyright law restrictions.
The GPL gives some permissions that copyright law withholds by default (absent such permission). That is all that it does. Therefore one does not need to agree to it.
EULAS also typically give some permissions that copyright law withholds by default (absent such permission), but generally they will also attempt to impose restrictions which copyright law does not impose.
As examples, one such restriction might be to try to prevent re-sale, or to try to prevent disassembly of the binary code, or to try to restrict the type of mahines on which the software may be used (such as the case with the Apple EULA).
In order to be bound by such restrictions (that are not part of copyright law), you must agree to be bound by them. Hence the business of having to “agree” to a EULA. This is not the case with the GPL.
Edited 2009-09-21 12:01 UTC
The GPL does impose restrictions, tho. And it is a legally binding agreement. It is the license for the code (/application) that you’re trying to use, which you implicitly accept by using the code (or application). If your analysis where correct, then companies could take GPL code, close it up, modify it, and charge for binaries built with it.
No, it does not impose restrictions, and it is not an agreement.
Any restrictions on copying and re-distribution of code are imposed by copyright law.
One cannot have an “agreement” where only one party has said anything. An agreement requires a confirming act by all parties involved.
Not at all. Look up the definition of “license”.
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&source=hp&q=define%3A+lic…
Essentially, a license is: “a legal document giving official permission to do something”.
You don’t have to “accept” anything. Either you have a license or you don’t. Either you have permission, or you don’t.
A EULA is NOT just a license, it is a license and agreement. That is why you have to agree to it.
http://www.google.com.au/search?hl=en&q=define%3A+eula&meta=
A software license agreement is a contract between a producer and a user of computer software that is included with software
No, they couldn’t. Doing such a thing is forbidden by copyright law. It is forbidden regardles if you include the characters “GPL” or not. If a company did such a thing, it is clearly breaking the law.
If what you want to do is this: “take code, close it up, modify it, and charge for binaries built with it”, then by law you need permission from the author of the code.
One way to get such permission is to BE the author of the code, i.e. to write one’s own code. OK, no problem there. Another way to get such permission is to PAY the author of the code for such permission. Normal practice, no problem there.
In some rare instances the author of the code gives such permissions out for free. The GPL is NOT such an instance.
In order to “take code, close it up, modify it, and charge for binaries built with it” for GPL code, one has to obtain permission from the author in the normal way … i.e. PAY the author of the code for such permission.
Edited 2009-09-22 00:11 UTC
FOSS licenses are based on copywrite. They are made clearly available previous to sale. They are permissive in nature; you may have permission to do a bunch of stuff provided you follow these very few rules insuring that other people continue to have permission to do a bunch of stuff also.
EULA are presented after sale as restrictive agreements (you can’t do this, this, this, this, this, this or this.. the company retains the right to enter your computer at any time and to this, this, this, this, this, or this..) and as far as I’m aware, are separate from the copyright which says one can’t duplicate the software for redistribution or resale.
Copyright is respected and enforced in most places, post sale limitations are not.
Someone with more legal training could probably correct me but based on my understanding, your confusing two separate controls.
Very few rules? Grin.
You can’t do this, this, this, this, this, this or this.. Sounds awfully like some open…. no, free software licenses.
Which only affects developers when they copy, modify and especially distribute the software. No end user has to agree to an EULA (End User License Agreement) because there are no restrictions on use.
It depends what is in them. A lot of EULAs contain restrictions and agreements that try to get around pre-existing law or are just simply illogical and unenforceable.
Open source (free) licenses are not contracts or EULAs and users don’t need to agree to them. They only come into play when copying or modifying and especially distributing.
Except the conditions are present before the sale – and you make the purchase with the conditions present. Even if presented after the sale you have a choice of returning the product for a refund if you don’t like the conditions. Believing it is your right to use the product however you please if you’ve bought it is believing that your rights override the rights of the companies and individuals who invested their time and money into developing the product. It’s a total lack or respect for them. Unfortunately it’s consistent with the world today – everyone is interested only in their rights – without accepting that respect and responsibility go along with them. It’s the three R’s, not just the one we like…
The manufacturer of a product has *no* right to dictate to his customer how he uses it. It is as simple as this: Once you sell something, you loose the right to excercise power on it. SOLD=SOLD.
The argument of no respect for the “companies and individuals” is nonsense, they have been paid for the time and money they invested. That is actually what copyright tries to achieve.
Your thinking is a little bit too US-centric I think.
In my country it is VERY doubtful if an EULA is a contract.
A contract has to be agreed on, before a deal is done.
Later one-sided changes to a contract only are lawful, if the either the not-changing party benifits from this change, or if a change of laws demands this change.
What is the agreed on contract when I go to the shop, and buy a OS-X CD?
Well, I agree that may use the OS-X CD as Software CDs usually are expected to be used: Install it, and use it, on one computer.
Imagine, I bought a copy of OS-X at the apple store, and I got a computer from store XYZ without any operating system pre-installed. I got this computer because it was cheaper but equally powerful to the computer sold by the apple store. My reasoning was: I buy the software I want from store A and the Hardware from Store B, because that is cheaper.
After doing my purchases, I install OS-X on the computer, and find out that I am supposedly not allowed to install OS-X on this computer. By revealing this unexpected limitation so late in the game, I have the right to give back the OS-X CD. But what about the computer I bought? According to Apple I would have to give it back (and I would even get my money back), and buy a computer from Apple. But I do not get my money back from the store I bought the hardware from, as it is a perfectly working computer.
This late surprise “contract” effectively would cost me money, therefore it is likely not enforceable.
It does say on the box that Mac OS X is to be installed on an Apple computer.
Wow, I just got this “mail order kit to disassemble fraterf93”, it specifically says on the box:
To be applied to OSAlert member fraterf93 only. Details inside.
So, where do I come and apply this in the proper method? Come on, I can only do what it tells me on the outside of the box.
I’m waiting with bated breath for your response.
I don’t know how things are “in your country”, but in general in the law around the world that is not true. In
most jurisdictions there is the legal concept of implicit agreement or implicit contract. If there wasn’t, as I said in my comment above, things like software licenses would be completely void.
Even if we overlook the fact that you are not buying a CD but rather a license to use the software, and the CD is just a convenient medium thrown in the package, there is no inherent “[way software] usually [is] expected to be used”. A good example for that is a volume license, say a “family pack”, with which you also receive one CD, but you are given the permission to install the software and use it on up to a certain number of machines. And the thing that makes a “family pack” a “family pack” is the exact same software license, as detailed in the respective license agreement, that you say is bunk.
IANAL of course, and I’m also from Australia rather than the US where all these legal games tend to be played, but given what scraps I’ve picked up over the years, I see it this way (be warned, it’s late and I’m trying to force my brain to express concepts it doesn’t fully understand!):
Whether it’s a cut-and-dried contract or not seems to depend not only on the wording used, but on the type of sale. If someone (legally) buys a product, sold with the intention of people using it, there’s somewhat of a presumption that the person should be able to use it. The license would just be codifying and refining that presumption in terms of copyright law.
Most commercial EULAs (or whatever they are called for a given product) include a severability clause. Why? Because it’s possible for a court (or government agency in some cases) to rule that a given provision in a license is unfair or unenforceable, and software developers and users still want the license to apply otherwise. (I’m not sure if this applies to Apple license but I’d expect so)
It’s entirely possible that at some point it may be ruled that the restriction in the OSX license against running the software on non-Apple PCs is in conflict with the implied terms of sale of the product originally, or that it’s unfair, or that it’s illegal. In those cases they may be overridden. The rest of the license stands to continue to allow use. On the other hand, it may be found perfectly fair and legit. That’s for lawyers to fight out, we will probably never have a say in that one.
Interestingly – the GPL doesn’t have a severability clause – the opposite. It says, essentially, that if anything’s not able to be adhered to, then there is no license! (or rather, strictly speaking, there’s no right to distribute.) Since most GPL software is distributed (or at least available somewhere) for free or near-zero cost, and is generally freely useable, then the sale type issue may not be as important.
Anyway – I hope that made sense somehow
I’m off to bed!
If implicit contracts could be created by any company, I’d be rich. The paper and whatever put in the box is just that, a paper. It doesn’t matter what it says nor did you sign it anywhere. License pop-ups can be ignored as unwanted application features or bugs no matter what they say. I recomend complaining to the manufacturer anyway. This is a real world folks, magic is not supposed to work here! Wake up!
So you are clicking “Don’t agree” in the License agreement page of every major software distributed (including the GPL). If you are agreeing, you are agreeing after purchase but if you don’t agree to the terms Apple doesn’t let you install the software and you have every right to return the software where you got it from.
Would you rather Apple shove the contract in your face every time you go to the Apple store to purchase OSX? Negating the validity of the OSX EULA is basically negating the validity of the gpl. The GPL does almost exactly what Apple’s or any other major software developers terms and conditions do. In-fact the gpl isn’t even shown half the time when you install software subject to it. Its included with the application you download but its something you agree to without even looking at the license and you have very little choice but to agree to the license. Now the gpl is more of a distribution license than a usage license as I don’t think the gpl really cares what you do with the software as long as you are not making changes to the code and distributing without the license, but the EULA (or at least Apple’s) is still the same they are ensuring that the software only gets run within the scope of criteria they set.
BTW, Your reasoning is flawed. Appel si not forced to let you install their software on whatever hardware you want. You have plenty of choices, ree or otherwise to run on your hardware. Apple is not obligated to cater to you since you are not their customer, and thus are not part of their ecosystem. again this is also why Psystar’s claims are flawed as well. Apple is under no obligation to sell their software to OEM’s, there are plenty of choices out there in the market Appel chooses to differentiate itself form the rest of the market by marrying their software to their hardware. Just like a game console differentiates itself from a PC. By marrying the hardware to the software you get added benefits such as more consistency, known hardware configuration and ease of use.
You as techno geek can go do whatever you want with your personal copy of OSx. Apple isn’t going to care. You as an Xbox user can hack your console any which way you want, I doubt MS is going to care. Its when you start selling pre-hacked xboxes where the issue arises.
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Bullshit. When you bought the computer, you *KNEW* it didn’t come with a copy of OS-X.
When you bought the copy of OS-X, you *KNEW* you didn’t have the right to install on the above mentioned-non Apple hardware.
It wasn’t like it wasn’t widely known that Apple has stated that installing their OS on non-apple hardware is a NO-NO.
So where does that leave you?
Looking like an utter and complete jackass.
Please quit that nonsense. FOSS licenses have nothing to do with end user licenses. The GPL and BSD licenses are distribution licenses, whereas Apple’s or Microsoft’s EULAs are end user licenses. While former grant additional rights on top of normal copyright law, the latter place additional restrictions.
This is a crucial difference. In fact, the GPL has been held up consistently in court a number of times, whereas EULAs have often been challenged successfully.
BULLSHIT! Both give you additional right and both place additional restrictions. GPL, for example, gives you the additional right to freely acquire and modify the source code, but places the additional restriction that you have to distribute any code that you add under the same license. The same for software licenses, they give you the additional right to use the piece of software, but add the additional restriction to do so, for example, on only one, and in the case of Apple – Apple branded, machine.
You misunderstand utterly.
It is NOT the GPL that prevents you from being able to distribute code that is not yours (i.e. code that you did not write). It is copyright law that prevents you from being able to do that. Read the law, it is perfectly plain. It says that in order to distribute code that is not yours (i.e. code that you did not write), you are required under the law to obtain permission to do so from the person whose code it actually is (i.e. the person who did write the code, or the entity that that person sold rights to).
OK, with me so far?
Now, the GPL extends to you some permissions, some of which are unconditional, and one of which is conditional. In order to get the permissions granted, you must follow the conditions that apply … otherwise you are not given the permission.
Unconditional grants given to you by the GPL include the rights to run the code, to copy the code as many times as you like, to run it on as many machines as you like, to study the code, and to modify it as you please for your own use.
However, when it comes to redistribution of the code you received, the GPL grants that permission also but with one condition: you must pass on the code (and any modifications you made to it, if that is what you are passing on) under the same conditions (i.e. the same license) under which you received it.
That is NOT a restriction imposed by the GPL … that is merely a condition on the permissions given to you by the GPl (which conditionally over-rides the copyright law restrictions).
Edited 2009-09-21 12:27 UTC
Once again, you are nitpicking on semantics – restriction, “conditional permission” – same difference.
And by the way, the GPL is the absolutely worst license one can pick when arguing against the equivalence, or even outright equality, of source code and software licenses (or fairness thereof). Because the GPL, unlike software licenses (baring some legally contested clauses, present in some past licenses), the GPL takes away from the offeree (the one who accepts the license terms) ownership. The particular clause we both mentioned says that changes I have made, and the copyright to which the law exclusively grants me, have to be released under the same license regardless of my wishes. That is in effect taking my exclusive ownership away from me.
Before people get their tighty-whities in a bunch, I want to stress I’m not arguing against the GPL. I’m not particularly a fan of it, because I think that the ideological part of it often spills into the software written under it, making it more ideologically driven than technologically driven, a good example of which, in my opinion, is GCC. However, I do understand that for many people the ideology behind it is important and as result I fully support its existence, its use in open source projects, and its legal defense. I’m merely trying to illustrate that this distinction – FOSS code licenses good, SLAs, and Apple’s in particular, bad – is very much arbitrary and a matter of point of view.
That’s not entirely true – I believe that you’re perfectly free to release your changes, as *just* your changes (eg, patches) under whatever license you wish. It is only when you give out the intrinsically-linked combination (either binary or source) of your changes and the original code, that the GPL is forced onto your code.
The same thing applies to books – you could write something describing how a book’s plot should have been, in your opinion, and do whatever you want with it. If you actually edit that book and change it to be the way you think it should have been, however, you can’t publish it without the permission of the copyright holder (within the copyright period, and subject to a few other conditions)
The GPL doesn’t exist to make you or me any more special than the rest are. It’s about community.
And how can GPL take away your “exclusive ownership” to someone else’s code? AFAIK the GPL doesn’t forbid the real owner of the code to release software based on the same code under another, ‘more restrictive’, license. Meaning that you could just pay him to get a permission to release your version of the code using some other license.
Edited 2009-09-21 15:14 UTC
No, it is not. Not a bit.
The GPL says this: “I, the author of this code, give you the recipient unconditional permissions to run, study, copy and modify the code for your own use. I also give you permission to redistribute this code and any changes you make to it as long as you redistribute it with the same permissions as I give to you now”.
Almost all software licenses do that. It isn’t your code, you don’t own it just because you are in possession of a copy of it.
Well, not exactly. The GPL license says you are given the nominated permissions for the licensed code if you stick to one condition. If you need to go outside those conditions, the GPL license does not apply. In that case you are required (by copyright law) to get permission from the author of the code to do what you want to do, which would normally involve buying a commercial license for the code from the author. This is exactly the same as what is required of other code, BTW. That is copyright law.
Sorry, but no. Again, copyright law is very clear on this. If you modify an existing work, then the result (which includes the original work plus your changes) is called a “derivative work”. Under copyright law, only a certain amount of the derivative work is yours, not the whole lot. You are not the exclusive owner of anything. Once again, under copyright law, you must come to an agreement with the original author before you can get permission to distribute your derivative work.
This applies just the same to closed source as it does to GPL code, BTW.
There are no freedoms which proprietary code gives you which FOSS codes denies you.
Apart from the permission to run one copy of the code on one machine, there are normally no other rights given to you for proprietary code which are given to you with FOSS code.
It is perfectly black and white. FOSS licenses are unequivocably far better for you than any proprietary EULA.
Since FOSS licenses are not EULAs (End User License Agreements) and are not for an end user to see then you’re tapping away on your keyboard for nothing I’m afraid.
Your ignorance is showing. In the absence of a license, copyright law gives no rights whatsoever to do anything at all with the copyrighted work beyond the rather nebulous, and very limited, concept of “Fair Use”. And if the source code itself is not distributed, I’m not even sure that Fair Use has any meaningful application.
Copyleft licenses only grant rights. They just may not be all the rights which you might greedily want.
On the other hand, many EULAs try to restrict rights that the purchaser would otherwise have. And in my ethical opinion, still has, despite the invalid clauses of any click-through EULA.
Edited 2009-09-21 19:56 UTC
There is a difference btw FOSS licenses and EULAs. EULAs imposes their restrictions at the point of usage and interfere with an individuals fair use rights. FOSS licenses imposes their restrictions at the point of (re)distribution and do not interfere with fair use rights.
Thinking that EULAS and FOSS licenses are equal shows you dont really understand what FOSS licenses are all about about.To start with, EULAs forces you to be the end user and FOSS licenses protects your right to redistribute the works(under the terms of the license)
A FOSS user could ethically feel justified in ignoring EULAs but not justified in ignoring FOSS licenses because nobody should tell you how to use a product in your own private space after you bought it …giving it or sell it to others falls outside the boundary of fair terms of the license should be applied then
Fair use? Are you kidding me? So with your view on fair use is that a user has the right to do what he or she wants with anything and no one can say anything about it. EULA is a LEGAL agreement. IF YOU DON’T AGREE WITH THE EULA YOU SHOULD NOT BUY THE PRODUCT! SO WHY IN HELL ARE YOU BUYING A PRODUCT WHEN YOU ARE NOT AGREEING WITH THE EULA?
There is no need to write in write in capital letters ..when was the last time you bought a product and was presented with an EULA when you were buying it? all EULAs are presented after a product is bought and at the point of installation or at first run ..waaaaaayyy after you buy the product
fair use actually says “you can do whatever the heck you want with something you bought as long as you use it in private” ..what do you think fair use mean?
That is simply not what Fair Use states — at least if you’re talking about Fair Use in regards to copyright. The tests for Fair Use incorporate several standards, including how much of a work you’ve reproduced, the nature of the work you’re reproducing, and your use of the reproduced work. And it is anything other than cut-and-dry, with the relative importance of each test being entirely up to the reasonable judgment of whoever evaluates the claim. Bear also in mind that the DMCA’s proscription of circumventing a technological safeguard against reproduction is basically an end-run around Fair Use — in that it means that it’s criminal to free up a copyrighted work, even if it’s for a Fair Use. I mention this because, if Apple could claim some part of the installation procedure was a technological measure to prevent reproduction, then whether or not installing OS X on non-apple hardware in violation of their EULA is a non-issue, because even if that aspect of the EULA was ruled to be unenforcable, it’d still be criminal to circumvent the anti-copying measure to do it.
At Least In The US, and I Am Not a Lawyer.
And pay double only for the pleasure to install it on a real Mac.
There are other reasons to use EFI than just trying to make it harder to copy the OS…
For one thing, Intel have been pushing EFI for years, but virtually no motherboards support it because MS don’t support it.
The BIOS is pretty old and crufty, replacing it with more modern firmware is actually a very good thing…
Apple are not constrained by what MS choose to support, and don’t like legacy cruft (they were one of if not the first to do away with serial, parallel, floppies etc), it makes perfect sense that they would use EFI.
Of what terms? The only terms that can be violated are the terms of the license you’re given, as detailed in the respective software license agreement. And among Mac OS X’s terms there is one explicitly stating that the license allows you to install the software only on Apple hardware. Unless you can give a particular reason, say a law explicitly invalidating that term, why this does not apply to you, “more fortunate” folks, your argument is bunk.
Let’s be realistic, though – neither my nor, more importantly, Apple’s disapproval can stop you, as an individual, from using OSX86 folks’ bag of tricks to install Mac OS X on your generic hardware. Bending over backwards to prove that it’s all legal and fine and dandy is entirely pointless. It’s just like trying to argue that downloading stuff from P2P networks is legally or morally right. And at the end of the day all of us have downloaded one thing or another from P2P, but the honest of us do so fully realizing that they are breaking the rules and in most cases breaking the law.
Incidentally, the OSX license is only presented to you after you have purchased the software and may not be binding at all, depending where you live, which would thus default back to copyright laws which place no restriction on how you can personally use a copyrighted work that you have acquired legally.
The LGPL on the other hand, does not attempt to impose additional restrictions other than those already imposed by copyright law, but what it does do is grant additional rights that you wouldn’t have had under plain copyright. You are free to reject the terms of the LGPL and continue using the software, however by rejecting the LGPL you have rejected the right to redistribute copies of the code and doing so would become a copyright infringement.
As far as morals go, i think that having legally acquired something, i should be free to use or modify it in any way i see fit. So if i purchase a copy of OSX, i should be able to try and install it on anything i choose. I don’t expect Apple to support me doing this, or do anything to help me, but i don’t like the idea of anything done specifically to prevent me (ie actions designed to prevent install on other hardware but which serve no benefit to their intended target audience… requiring efi instead of a kludgy old bios and simply not shipping with drivers for non apple hardware are one thing, but extra code that explicitly checks for non apple hardware and refuses to run are another).
“Unless you can give a particular reason, say a law explicitly invalidating that term, why this does not apply to you, “more fortunate” folks, your argument is bunk.”
Spot on dude, spot on. Yes, that, as a matter of fact, and a matter of law to be precise, is what sets better places in the wolrd apart from the US of A. The law says so. Only because someone puts crap into their EULA does not mean it has any merit, weight or validity whatsoever. Awesome stuff, isn’t it?
So this being the way it is, what I said is not bunk. The US is not the world, and the world doesn’t care about what the US does. So yes, installing OSX on any hardware is perfectly legal, even though it might not be for YOU. Btw, this does not only apply to EULA, but all sorts of T+Cs. Only because someone stuffs a clause in there doesn’t mean it is valid/can be enforced. Just sign it and then ignore it. That is also what MS had to learn the hard way when they tried to pull their bull off saying you cannot resell OEM versions – guess what – you can, no matter what it says in the copy/paste bullshit US EULA for Europe. The power and reach of the US legal system ends at the US border, didn’t you know? Now you know.
There is the misconception that anyone who steals from the rich will give to the poor. Most of the time it is Steal from the Rich and steal from the poor until you are rich.
A Problem within the Open Source Community is a general disregards to other licenses, open closed etc…
The Open Source Community should really be the biggest voice against software piracy. Because if people respect other licenses they will also respect theirs.
Where on earth did you get this nonsense from?
The open source community writes its own code. By definition. If the open source community didn’t write it, then the code is not open source.
Der.
This article about the EFI-X module is a case of a company stealing open source code, written by the open source community.
It isn’t a case of the open source community stealing the code of the EFI-X module at all.
How did you get that so very much backwards?
PS: The Open Source community is indeed very much against software piracy. As a software author, who would advocate that one’s wishes for one’s software should be wilfully disobeyed?
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html#Piracy
Edited 2009-09-21 12:50 UTC
“PS: The Open Source community is indeed very much against software piracy.”
absolutely. I tell people: don’t dload and hack photoshop. Just use gimp.
What kind of garbage is this. The open source community exists because of the regards they have for others license. They refuse to be bound by proprietary license so they write their own code and give it away. instead of blatantly using proprietary code and disregarding the license. What kind of buffoonish statement is that. my goodness
The OSS community tends to respect software licenses much more than others. They may not agree with a license but they will respect it with the same fervor that they adhear to there own preferred open licenses with. Copyright infringement and the rare cases of true piracy (resale of stolen software) is deeply frowned upon regardless of what license it happens to be under. This contrary to the public misconception promoted by marketing spin from various closed software development companies.
You’ll also find a much higher respect for software licenses, personal privacy and security among true members of the hacker community. Those that violate licenses and people are very deeply frowned upon and considered degenerates not considered part of the hacking community. This contrary to the publicly misconception promoted by mass media.
I include both communities here. The second does not necessarily required interest in security, software or technology at all but within that cross-section, it tends to include much of the FOSS community in a very natural way. In both cases, your demonstrated understanding would be wrong.
You should maybe understand the people in a given community before slamming it blindly.
I find this rather ironic; the rabid Apple hating fanboys who jumped around like cheerleaders high on caffeine and chocolate thinking they’re ‘sticking it to the man’ by supporting these group of scam-artists. Well, why are you guys surprised that these people turned out to be scam artists? these people who did this are the same sort of people who are tied up with the likes of Pystar, people so dishonest I’d sooner wish to ask for advice from my local second hand car dealer.
As for the person whining in the message above this post – Apple couldn’t care less if you were, by yourself, installing it on a computer in the privacy of your own home; two companies had commercialised it on a large scale which put it beyond just a mere hobby or a group of people interested in tinkering; just as Microsoft is willing to allow things to slide when it comes to the end user installing a copy of Office on more than the number of licensed computers.
All this time spent getting it to work would be alot better spent, quite frankly, on contributing to GNOME to improve something that is free as in speech and beer; something that isn’t beholden to a large corporation but to the aspirations of its user base. Image the time spent was focused on meeting the goals of GNOME 3.0 – imagine what could be accomplished.
Kind of reminds me of the billions wasted propping up the dying US car industry instead of investing in the new emerging energy efficient green car companies of silicon valley. Things never change unfortunately.
Edited 2009-09-21 10:12 UTC
But this isn’t how the community works. People are scratching an itch. A hackintosh hacker would make a lousy and resentful Gnome developer.
FOSS developers’ time is not like federal spending, more like personal spending. I can money/time on whatever car/project I like.
Outside of Soviet Russia, there can never be a FOSS Czar to decide on behalf of the community what their time will be spent on.
Please **note** that jailbreaking an Iphone is also violating Apple’s EULA.
This is why I go to great lengths to advise my users and customers never to purchase any Apple products and to stay clear of them because they are one of the most draconian companies that exist in the IT world. They are WORSE than Microsoft in many many ways. I just advise people to stay away. Respect their EULAs and stay far far away from Apple. They maliciously brick phones etc. I point this out to ALL who ask “should I buy Apple this or that”. The best way to respect the minefield they call a EULA is to avoid their products.
i think you’ll find that mostly all computer like hardware / software comes with an EULA.
It’s not just apple that applies an EULA to their products.
Of course the only group that doesn’t is the OSS / GPL group.
This is quite.
Since the open source aspect has been yet again brought to the center of the discussion, I would emphasize especially the hardware-side of things.
So what is the difference between this and say a PSP? Apple doesn’t really care if you jailbreak your own iPhone. I didn’t get a call from Apple when I jailbroke my 1st gen iPhone before OS v.2 came out. What they are trying to prevent is people from pirating which happens to be a big issue, regardless of how much all the jailbreak faithful try to deny it, and distribution. Again Apple, Sony, whoever don’t care if you jailbreak your own device, its when you start distributing hacked devices to make money that you start to run into issues. As far as I know Apple has never bothered with the Hackintosh or jailbreak community other than to update their software (most times halfheartedly)to block access.
And please **note** what I said regarding the Apple EULA:
It only became an issue because two organisations of ill repute setup and commercialised what was simply a home cottage/hobby by basing their business off the work done by the OSx86 enthusiast community. Apple were quite happy to allow EULA violations slide on a small, non-commercial scale where enthusiasts were tinkering around. The issue came, as I’ve said, and repeatedly said on this forum, where it was turned into a commercial scale business venture.
Lets not try and fall into this stupid idea that equates a small home cottage/hobby to a commercial scale setup like Pystar or EFI-X. The former are innocent people tinkering around in their homes with software and hardware, the later are scum sucking roaches jumping on the coat tales of Apple because they can’t be figged creating a real legitimate business off their own intellectual property.
Edited 2009-09-21 19:10 UTC
Why is a company a scum sucking roach, but I’m not? What’s the difference? Where’s the line? It seems rather arbitrary to me. What if I help a friend set up a hackintosh? Or ten friends? At what point do I become a scum-sucking roach?
And what is so “scum sucking” about it anyway? They are paying for their copies, right? It seems like to me Apple is providing all the means to be scum-sucked. If I hand over my car keys to a random stranger and say “here, take my car”, I can’t then go to the police and claim with a straight face that my car was stolen, now, can I?
Edited 2009-09-21 19:21 UTC
You become a “scum sucking roach” when you start trying to sell these hackintoshes without contributing anything back, up to and including the real value of OSX, to the parent company from which you are lining your pockets. You become a “scum sucking roach” when you commercialise something that is not meant to be sold and the original author clearly states as much. You become a “scum sucking roach” when you take other people’s hard work (commercial or otherwise) and don;t contribute anythign back at all to the community. You become a “scum sucking roach” when you sole business is to swindle users. I can keep going.
Totally agree with you there.
Kinda like the same way that Apple wrote all of the code that went into OS X and WebKit all by their lonesome, from their boundless genius? OS 9 is what you get when Apple uses their own in-house talent: OS X is the result of Apple figuring out whose code they can re-appropriate and get away with. And notice how many patches Apple has contributed up-stream, back to the community. Why FreeBSD’s just chock-full of patches from Apple, isn’t it?
Don’t get me wrong, I know that FreeBSD and KHTML where BSD licensed, I’m not even saying that Apple was out-of-line to do what they did. What I am saying is that you shouldn’t bitch about people taking from Apple and not giving anything back.
Yup, there is irony. People claiming that the hackintosh sticks it to the man while at the same time purchasing the OS to run on it. Much like sticking it to McDonalds by buying fries instead of a happy meal; they still get the profit margin.
Apple should just stop sell OS X retail to stop this. Or switch platform again.
Here, here! Apple opened up a WHOLE can o’ worms, by going to the Intel platform! Had they simply used the Intel CPU, but otherwise made the computer NOT just a standard PC (which you can verify by inserting a Windows Vista DVD and rebooting to the DVD drive), I am sure all this “hacking” wouldn’t even be an issue.
People can say what they like about PowerPC being inferior, but life was a lot simpler for Apple before Jobs started making Apple PCs, that natively run MacOS X… AND Windows!
Apple says the same themselves (in their ad)…
“Hello, I’m a Mac.”
“And I’m a PC.”
“I’m *ALSO* a PC”
Bingo!
Doesn’t get much clearer than that. Apple now makes PC’s. The only difference is you pay Apples prices for Apple’s look and MacOS X. But it’s the exact same hardware underneath.
I just don’t jive with that, yaknow?
The problem with the powerpc was that it wasn’t advancing as fast as the x86 when it comes to power efficiency. Notebooks outsell desktops and switching to intel gave them not only cooler cpus but at a cheaper price.
But yea I agree that they should tie the hardware to the software if they really want to stop people from doing this. At the very least they could raise the price of the retail OS and then provide a rebate for those who send in proof of hardware purchase.
They also need to provide a netbook since that seems to be a pretty common use of the hackintosh.
Part of the joy of owning a Mac is that I don’t have to prove to Apple that I purchased the OS. If I install Windows I have to enter a serial number and the computer has to connected to the internet which is a pain sometimes. I have spent hours looking for the correct MS serial number for a particular OS. With my macs I just pop in a DVD and load the OS. I like it that way and I don’t want to change that just because some jerk thinks that because apple sells their OS for a inexpensive price it gives them the right to sell their own brand of OSX computer. If you want a Mac, buy a Mac. If you don’t want a Mac buy something else. Use Linux and make it better, just don’t make OSX worse for people who bought Macs.
The iPhone is a lovely little brick until you prove that your a loyal Windows or osX consumer by activating the stand alone device with a valid iTunes install. Tell me again about that not proving anything to Apple before being able to make use of your owned product…
Hey. In Cupertino… the iPhone owns YOU.
Sorry…
hehe.. that was good..
I have a Mac with OSX. I do not own an iPhone. Do you have problems with your Android Phone? Oh wait you didn’t mention an Android Phone. That was my bad.
You mean better spent on etoile/gnustep something which is actually like osx. Gnome is great and I use it daily but for a person trying to get a mac-like system Gnome is a really dumb choice to contribute to.
The EULA, End User License Agreement, is not valid in Germany if not presented pre-sale. This means, if i were to buy any kind of software, which has no notice of restrictions on the box or being told by the salesman, i cannot be restricted to certain things after. Thats (still) one nice thing about germany … There are a lot bad things on the way now …
The worst thing ever: Software patents … I actually am a Softwaredeveloper and by the time software patents will be introduced its time to hang myself.. But thats offtopic
For distribution of GPLed software, most of the time there is a link/label near the download button, which tells you it is released under GPL/LGPL. Which makes you being able to view the license, so you have been noticed about the license. Moreover there will be a license in the package for you to easily find. Guess which file it is? No it^A's not INSTALL, nor is it README.. yes it^A's the LICENSE file ;P
If you do not comply to the license you can easily delete the software and since you did not pay anything youre not at a disadvantage. This ist not working with the EULA, since for seeing this, you will have to install the package. This is only possible with opening the box and removing the foil wrapping. As soon as you removed the foil wrapping you are not allowed to return the software (it will work with reasoning anyway), since you could have made yourself copies of it (This will be strictly handled with music/video, but will not be that strict with software inofficially). Thist officially brings you in a situation of disadvantage, which you could not see into before, therefor the EULA is not valid in Germany. Another thing would be the EULA being readable or noticed by standing out of the rest of the box layout. Which than would make it reasonable to ask a salesman about it. But this would be ruled different by different courts.
So long
micro
“for those of us who want to exercise their rights and run Mac OS X on non-Apple labelled computers.”
What the f***ing hell are you talking about?
You have no right to do that and Apple does not support it. Can’t you damn trouble makers just accept that Apple does not want you to hack and do this. If you are unhappy with Windows, go and wank over Linux instead. Keeping this hacking up will only make Apple have to take stronger actions against this in the future, destroying for us all. If you have no money to buy a Mac, Don’t buy one! Download Linux, ITS FREE!!! Apple may have to resort to copy protection n OSX to deal with this. Or ordering special CPUs from Intel or even stop sell OS X retail so you have to really prove that you own a Mac in order to buy OS X. And I for my part really hope that Apple takes strong strong actions against this. If Apple does not want you to do this, DONT F***ING DO IT? What’s your problem? Apple made the product, I think they have some say in this matter. And if you like Apple you should respect that. If this gets more wide spread it will hurt Apple and maybe your beloved OSX will go down the drain as a result.
If you don’t like Windows and are to damn cheap to buy a Mac, download LINUX! Apple is fighting retarded Psystar that only want to make money on Apples success. Why don’t they sell Windows PCs? Ohhh I’m sorry. Is that not a good enough business for ya? Anyway. If Apple for some unknown reason loses this Battle, you WILL see them take stronger actions against this. Copyprotection, Special CPUs, Stop selling retail OS X etc. And then you can thank yourself that you made Apple do all these things because you were too cheap to buy a Mac.
I’m talking about a contract that the buyer (me) and the seller (shop owner) went into when I bught my copy of Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard – also known as a sales contract. This contract gives me the right to use the purchased software in any way I deem fit, as long as I do not violate copyright law. By installing the software on a non-Apple labelled computer I am not breaching copyright. In fact, it’s a right that I have because a) I entered a sales contract, and b) because it is granted to me by copyright law.
Unless the reseller starts showing me the EULA as PART of the sales agreement, the EULA can “f–k right off”, to keep it at a level of discourse you can understand.
You are thinking of buying software to be somehow equal to buying hardware, which borders on sophistry. When you are buying software, you are not buying jack shit. You are transferring some money to the reseller, but you don’t own the product you bought in a way you would own, say, a wrench you buy in hardware store. You are just licensing the software under whatever terms the whims of the license provider dictate.
Why not just use a warez version of the OS and give up the pretense of being legit in the first place?
I find it amazing how incompetent Apple are with limiting the OS to genuine macs. How hard can it be to solder a chip on the motherboard that the OS will authenticate against? Can’t they ask Intel to brand the CPU microcode?
The is the most common misunderstanding about buying software. People have been indoctrinated to believe it but it ain’t true. Look in the laws, you will not find any article that states software is sold in a different way than books or televisions.
Still not convinced? The law defines what a sales is. I’m living in the Netherlands, our law defines a sale as:
“Koop is de overeenkomst waarbij de een zich verbindt een zaak te geven en de ander om daarvoor een prijs in geld te betalen.”
Freely translated:
“Sale is the agreement whereby one commits itself to give a good and the other to pay a price in money for it.”
Translation of laws is difficult. The limitation of this translation is that I translate “zaak” with “good”, while “good” is actualy the translation for “goed”. They mean different things in Dutch law, but luckily it is not relevant for this discussion.
As you can see the purchase of a copy of a computer program perfectly matches this definition, therefore, by law, software is sold, not licensed! Other countries have their own definitions of a sale, but none will exclude software.
Now, copyright law. Copyright law deals with copies, and by copying you create new copies. Copies can be sold. Conclusion again. Software is sold, not licensed.
By the way, it is legally not impossible to license a copy. That requires a special agreement that does not match the definition in a law what a sale is. Sounds extremely logical: If you pay in a shop for something that does not become your property, it sounds reasonable that you make a special agreement about it.
Now you can also understand why EULA’s do not hold in most countries. If you own a television nobody except you has any right to tell what you do with it. The TV is your property. Once you sold a copy of a computer program, copyright law may prevent you from copying it, but as long as you will not violate copyright, nobody has a right to tell you what to do with the copy. The copy is your property.
This logic appears to be even valid for the U.S., where many people claim EULA’s to be valid. However, it seems that in .us “sales agreement” needs to be more explicit rather than implicit for the logic to hold, it seems one can implicitely license software there, where in European countries one can be rather sure that any program you buy is a “sales agreement” unless agreed otherwise.
Edited 2009-09-21 22:40 UTC
@dmantione
Can you clarify what you mean?
Does most software sold in the Netherlands come with a click-thru license?
Can you buy a single copy of Windows and load it on hundreds of PCs?
If you buy a book do you have the right to turn it into a blockbuster movie… as long as you don’t actually copy it?
I am having a little trouble believing that the laws in the Netherlands, Austria, Germany etc seem to have such low regard for the concept of intellectual property.
As a lot of of software is written outside the Netherlands and imported, a lot of software comes with click-tru license. They can usually be safely ignored.
No, the copyright law will prevent you. Copyright law gives you permission to do the copying you absolutely need to do to use the copy of a program in a normal way. Installing is required to use a copy of a program in a normal way.
To install on hundreds of PC’s you need a copyright license (not an EULA).
By the way, Microsoft is very well aware of the laws of the Netherlands. They still try to do something that looks like an EULA, but present it more like “terms of use” and describe the behaviour of Windows, for example that it will phone home for activation. It is written in Dutch language refers specifically to concepts in the Dutch law. As it doesn’t try to forbid typical things like reverse engineering, it isn’t immedeately illegal. It would be much more difficult to fight Microsoft EULA’s than usual EULA’s.
A blockbuster movie based on a book, is not an independend work. It is a multiplication of the story in the book. A story itself is already copyrightable, so this would again be prevented by copyright law.
These countries have a high regard for intellectual property, but have a high regard for consumer rights too. Trying to force a consumer to agree to something after he already spent his money sounds unfair, and the law is in line with that.
Except that the EULA does in-fact show up when you first try to install the software asking you to agree or disagree with the license, at that point you have the option not to agree to the terms of the license and promptly return it where you got it from. Any retailer that says otherwise are the ones that need to get sued.
Just to repeat what’s been said elsewhere: that interpretation varies by country. I am very confident that, at least in the States, EULA’s are definitely binding legal agreements. Especially since you (probably) do have the remedy of just returning the software if you don’t like the EULA.
That really shows how much Linux sucks. Apple could probably charge $300 for a version of OSX that can be installed on any computer and people would buy it even though Linux is free.
The people behind Linux really need to rethink Stallman’s ideology which declares proprietary software to be a sin. Stallman is on research tenure which means he doesn’t have to worry about where his next paycheck is going to come. Too much of the software world has been corrupted by the views of a hippie who doesn’t have to work for a living.
Build a platform that allows independent developers to profit from their work and watch the applications come in. A recent example of this is the iPhone which already has a better game selection than Linux.
even if linux had a less restrictive license, the linux based OS would still be a collection of different parts cobbled together, not a platform, and it wouldn’t have the sense of style and elegance that Apple has.
It isn’t just the license itself, it’s the ideology behind design decisions that discourage proprietary drivers and applications.
You’re right that Linux it isn’t a platform which is why they need something like the app store to bring in commercial developers. You could hide a lot of the distro compatibility problems through abstraction. Basically create a universal sandbox for commercial developers to work in.
People turn on a computer to run applications, not dink with a rotating desktop. The open source world hasn’t been able to match the level of production in the commercial software world so it is time to rethink the anti-proprietary attitude.
Or accept that Linux will hover around 1% for another decade and end the evangelical drive to convert Windows and OSX users.
I’ve said it before: don’t transfer the views of a small sub-set of a group to the entirety of a group. I know plenty of Linux users who do not hate proprietary software — and a few who produce it. Hell, I produce proprietary software that runs on RHEL4 and RHEL5.
You do have something of a point, tho, at least in that, if the set of Linux-kernel-using distros and projects want to develop a vibrant commercial ecossystem (which they’ll need to do to really become a home desktop OS), they’ll need to commit to some long-term-stable and common high-level APIs. In particular, having a universal high-level windowing API, a universal multichannel software-mixed sound API and a universal, stable driver API would all be good things. Not to mention a stable X server.
Hang on a sec…. Stallman may be an ideological zealot, and his personal hygiene may leave something to be desired, but he is most definitely NOT on research tenure.
He essentially lives like a pauper. His position as grand high poobah of the FSF is entirely unsalaried. He makes a few bucks on public speaking and advisory roles, but my nephew working at Burger King probably brings in more cash each year than Stallman.
He did (previously) have free office space at the MIT AI Lab, but moved on from there several years ago.
If you’re going to knock Stallman, there are countless good reasons to do so, but implying he is a well-moneyed fat cat who doesn’t have to worry about his next paycheque isn’t one of them.
I never said he was a fat cat. I just said that he doesn’t have to worry about his next paycheck.
Are you going to tell me that he would be unable to teach at MIT if he couldn’t collect checks giving public appearances?
He’ll never have to make a living by producing software. He can go back to MIT or continue making money by selling his own carefully crafted definition of “Freedom” instead of actually creating useful software.
Most of the people who buy into GPL ideology don’t produce software. The most vocal GPL advocates don’t produce software either. The same goes for FSF board members.
The GPL movement is mostly made up of non-programmers who follow around a collectivist who doesn’t produce software anymore and just scolds those who violate his software sins (that he defined).
>
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Who gives a damn about fraking games? I don’t want an iphone, because I don’t like the kind of people it attracts, like yourself.
I find it laughable that so many here are shocked that the hackintosh code would be used without attributions. Do you see Psystar doing so or the group in Germany? Such naivet~A(c) is astounding.
So let me get this straight. The tools that are used to run OS X on any PC are GPL, the tools also (arguably of course) allow one to break the EULA for OS X. Now people are throwing a fit because a group of people are not ‘honoring’ the licensing terms of the tools which allow you to break the EULA of OS X ?
Also if these tools are GPL, all this company really needs to do is make the source code available and they would be compliant wouldn’t they?
The problem with that is that the company would then have to admit that they were basically swindling users by selling them a USB stick with the same software they could already download for free for $230. I doubt that they are going to want to do that.
However it does at credence to the saying “There is a sucker born every minute”. I kind of feel sorry for those who bought into hype.
Another thing that makes me wonder… I see a lot of people post on these forums that EULAs are not legally binding.
Isn’t the GPL a form of an EULA? Its basically the same thing. You didn’t sign anything, like an EULA, its just a file sitting there with the terms that you may or may not read depending.
So if an EULA is not legally binding, what makes the GPL legally binding? Why would the GPL be binding, but an EULA be worthless to an end user?
Honest questions here. Dickheads need not reply
The difference, as mentioned previously, is that the GPL isn’t restricting your rights. A EULA tells you what you can and can’t do with the software you just purchased. On the other hand, the GPL tells you you can do anything you want with what you have (purchased or downloaded) EXCEPT restrict the rights of others to whom you give or sell the software.
A EULA could tell you “you can’t use this software on days of the week that end in a ‘y'”. What are you supposed to do if you don’t agree with this – take the software back? Good luck getting your money back from Best Buy.
However, having said that, if I were selling “Free-as-in-Freedom” software, I would make sure that the person has agreed to the license before purchasing the software. With “Free-as-in-Beer” software, I do not think that is necessary, since the user has not paid for the software, and thus can’t claim to be damaged by being denied the “right” to take away the rights of others.
OK I’ll bite, although I’m not entirely sure your question is honest and not just a troll.
1st:
An EULA is an End User Licence Agreement. It (tries) to restrict how you use the software. The GPL does say nothing about the usage of the software. It is only concerned with copying/distribution. Copyright law as it is intended was only ever about copying/distribution. Software manufacturers “found” a way of sneaking in usage restriction into the whole thing by arguing that you copy/distribute when you install on your computer. Nobody would think that you’re licensing a book when you buy it, you buy a copy of the book. Similarly with software you buy a copy of the software. The reason that software manufacturers say you’re licensing is because you need to copy the software to your computer, and once you do that they make you agree to the EULA. However in a number of jurisdictions the validity of EULAs is at least questionable. In these countries (e.g. Germany), the argument is, that software installation on one computer constitutes usage, not copying/distribution. The reasonable expectation about buying a copy of software is that you can install it in order to use it, thus a requirement to agree to a license once you try to install is “surprising” and void, because it puts restrictions on your purchase after the sale. Now to come back why the GPL is different, it does not govern how you use the copy of GPL software you acquired. You can do whatever you please, however once you copy and/or modify and then distribute it the “restrictions” come into place (i.e. you need to also make your modifications available in source form). However when you acquire a copy of software (open source or proprietary), it is not a reasonable expectation that you can freely distribute and copy it multiple times. This is governed by copyright law. Thus the restrictions of the GPL are not a post sale restriction on your purchase of the copy.
Jochen
Not exactly. The GPL is an “EUL”. It is a license and only a license. It is a legal document that gives the recipient a legal right to do some things with the code that are otherwise disallowed via copyright law.
That is it. You don’t have to “agree” with it. You are given permissions to do some things. Either do them or don’t, it is up to you, you have got permission via the GPL.
You have to “click to agree” with a EULA. If you don’t agree, you are not given the license to run the code.
You don’t have to read it. With the GPL license, you have it regardless, no matter what you do or think about it, the permissions that the GPL EUL grants are granted to you regardless.
The GPL isn’t legally binding because it doesn’t bind you to anything.
The GPL just grants you some permissions regarding the covered code that copyright law would normally forbid you to have. There are still some things regarding the code that the GPL does not grant you permissions to do.
It is copyright law that binds you.
PS: With a EULA, if you agree to it (click on it), then the software vendor’s claim is that you have agreed to be bound by additional conditions that are NOT required by copyright law. It would be those additional conditions (in EULAs only) which are subject to question if you are really legally bound to them or not.
Edited 2009-09-22 03:11 UTC
For people who may still be confused (because this is a subject that has a lot of misinformation spread about it), perhaps it will help to think about the concept of “disagreeing with the GPL”.
OK, the GPL is a license. A license is a legal document granting one permissions to do some things named on the license that one wouldn’t be allowed to do if one didn’t possess said license.
OK, so the GPL is a license to do the following things with the covered code:
(1) copy the code on to as many of one’s own machines as one wishes,
(2) run the code on as many of one’s own machines as one wishes,
(3) study the source code,
(4) modify the source code for use on as many of one’s own machines as one wishes, and
(5) give the code out again (or sell it) to other recipients (either with or without one’s own modifications) provided one gives the forward recipient the exact same permissions as listed here.
OK … let’s imagine for a moment that it was possible to “not accept” the GPL. Pretend to yourself for a moment that you “don’t agree with it”.
OK then, in that case, you may NOT do any of the above things, because copyright law forbids it.
Edited 2009-09-22 03:56 UTC
As you are so eager to educate us about GPL, please mention also the requirements of GPL regarding those permissions mentioned in the license. Because, you know, those are the real gist of GPL.
The GPL cannot impose a “requirement” on anyone, because the GPL is not law, and it is not a contract. It is a license. It gives you permissions, some permissions it gives you unconditionally, and one permission it gives you only if you meet certain conditions. If you don’t meet the conditions, the only “penalty” is that you don’t get that last permission.
I listed the permissions given by the GPL in my last post, the one to which you replied. Of the five permissions you get, the first four are given to you unconditionally, and the last one is given to you if you meet the condition, which I also stated.
Here it is again, in summary:
For those of you who suffer unfrotunate reading comprehension problems, the “condition” is the phrase that comes after the word “provided” above.
Edited 2009-09-22 05:30 UTC
It is quite important to understand this.
The EULA is a secondary contract that you enter into by click through in order to use software that you have bought and own a retail copy of.
Conditions in this secondary contract may be binding and enforceable, or may not be. It depends on two things, the state of the law regarding what clauses in contracts may be entered into in your jurisdiction, and the state of the law regarding entry into contracts.
To explain this a little further, on the question of which clauses may be entered into, in almost all jurisdictions there are things you cannot agree to do in a contract. You cannot, for instance, sell yourself into slavery. You very often cannot renounce your rights under consumer protection law. You cannot bind yourself to doing something criminal. Clauses which are anti competitive will not be enforceable. And so on.
When it comes to contract law, most jurisdictions have rules about how contracts may be entered into. They must be freely entered into, for instance. In Anglo Saxon jurisdictions, there must usually be a consideration. In England specifically, a contract cannot change the terms of a previous transaction without a consideration, and perhaps not even then. A clause in a contract must also be known, presented, and in the contract at the time it was entered into.
If we look at the EULA of OSX with this in mind, we see that it depends on the clause, and it depends on the jurisdiction.
Take the jurisdiction first, and contract law in it. In the UK it is doubtful that the EULA itself is going to be binding if it changes the terms of a previously completed retail purchase transaction. That would apply to any clauses whatever in the EULA, and could have the effect of invalidating it as a whole. This is a problem with the way in which EULAs are entered into, they are entered into without consideration and subsequent to a complete transaction. This is not a problem with any specific clause, but with the thing itself.
There are also problems with the specific clause restraining installation, and these would remain even if the general validity of EULAs under UK law of contract were to be upheld. Now, as to the clause, even should the process of acceptance of it be held valid, the problem with it is, its a post-sales restriction on use (these are anti-competitive). It results from a disparity in power between user and supplier (consumer protection). It tries to enforce lnked sales (generally frowned on as anti competitive).
So you see that in order for the Apple EULA to be upheld in the UK, we have to get two things ruled, the first being the general validity of contracts entered into in this way, the second, the specific clause restraining use. They are different questions and will be answered independently.
Now we come to the GPL. The GPL is not a contract or a EULA. The GPL is a permission granted under copyright law, and applies with or without the agreement of the user. Under copyright law, you may not make copies without the permission of the copyright holder, who may impose conditions for that permission. Like, you may only make one copy, or two, or three. Like, you may or may not make derivative works from this material. Like, if you do make derivative works, you have to place them in the public domain or license them under the GPL.
All these sorts of conditions apply without anyone having to agree to anything. They are not EULAs, they are simply permissions granted.
Now some intellectually forsaken people try to use this to argue, about the US, that installation and use is a violation of copyright because it involves making copies, and so requires permission, and this permission is given in the EULA subject to conditions, and thus it is a violation of copyright to install and OSX in contravention of the EULA.
The difficulty is that this runs onto the rocks of US copyright law. It did use to be true that you had no right to make the copies which you make when you install or use software. Amazing, but the law had been written at a time when this was not an issue, and when the standard law of copyright was extended to computer software, it had this effect. Consequently, the law was changed, and Title 17 S117 was amended in the early years of this century to take away the need for permission of a copyright holder for any copies made that were essential to use.
So, it is true that when you install and use, you are making copies, but under US law at least, you acquired the right to do that when you bought your retail copy.
Intellectually desperate people have also argued that you did not buy your retail copy, you just bought the media and acquired the right to enter into a license. This runs onto the rocks of Softman and also Vernor, where it is clearly ruled that when you buy a retail copy, you become the owner, because it is a purchase and not a licensing transaction. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck…. calling it a goose does not make it one. The law is not totally stupid.
I hope this makes it clear that whether Apple wins or loses on the EULA case will depend on whether the EULA type of contract is valid in a given jurisdiction, also on whether the restraint clause is valid in that jurisdiction, and will in any case have no effect whatever on the GPL, which is valid or not in respect of copyright law in that jurisdiction, not contract or consumer protection law.
The implications of some of these things are not at all obvious and not what you might think.
Q If its a license and not a sale, does that mean the conditions are enforceable?
A Be careful what you wish for! Yes, maybe it does, in which case Apple is in deeper trouble from consumer protection. The clauses would have to be presented in plain English at the time of purchase and assented to then, and could not violate consumer protection law, and could not result from any disparity in bargaining power between seller and buyer…. It would not be the good news you might expect!
Q If its a purchase not a license, how does this affect resale?
A Very strangely, perhaps. In Vernor vs Autocad, which AFAIK is under appeal as we speak, it was ruled that upgrades permit the buyer to sell his old versions of software. If this holds it would destroy the current convention on upgrades, that you upgrade the copy you have bought, and so cannot sell it.
Q If the machine used can be restricted, what else can be?
A Good question. The restriction of the machine is completely arbitrary, there is nothing in the law that makes this kind of copying and use different from any other. The law does not mention hardware. So the principle that is at issue is quite general. It could cover almost any circumstance of use. If you are able to restrict what machine a buyer installs his software on, solely by where he buys that machine, you are probably able also to restrict other characteristics of that machine, including what other software is installed on it, now or later. Maybe you can restrict how he uses ‘your’ software? Can he, for instance, restrict you from using it to compose works in support of particular religious or political movements? Or in way of trade? Or on a machine which has competitive packages installed? Or on a machine which has file conversion utilities installed?
Maybe so. Again, be careful what you wish for. Could MS for instance have a clause which forbad dual booting with OSX? Maybe…
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Once you get into allowing companies to restrict what people do with stuff they have bought, life gets very complicated indeed, and the consequences are not always what you expected or wanted when you started down that path. Who would have expected that the consequence of Apple’s starting up an app store for the iPhone would be that it would end up forbidding people to use some software on the grounds that they might use it, perfectly legally, to download the perfectly legal Kama Sutra? Or that they would end up banning the very useful and perfectly legal Google Voice from ‘their’ phone?
Someone should contact GNU Foundation because they can sue Asem for breaking the LGPL.
The whole story is on http://www.tomshardware.com/news/asem-efix-mac-chameleon,8617.html