gillies@uiucdcsp.cs.uiuc.edu (03/24/88)
Apple can copyright the ART on the macintosh. You see, modern companies hire professional graphic artists to draw the icons (trash can, icons, window displays). The work these artists do can be copyrighted (it's like a type of painting). This they can sue for. There was a big discussion in comp.sys.mac about this. Basically, Apple did invent most of the features of the macintosh that allow the use of a 1-button mouse (e.g. pull-down menues, mouse-downing an object to grab hold of it, some others). I'm not sure, but I believe Apple may have invented the infinite desktop (no side boundaries except at the top). Maybe they can sue over these concepts. I know Xerox had to be careful with Viewpoint *not *to *copy pull-down menues explicitly.