rms@WHEATIES.AI.MIT.EDU (Richard Stallman) (03/29/89)
Several people have asked me what Apple is doing that endangers the GNU project and free software in general. I think there may be enough people who don't know the answer that it is worth telling all of you. Software companies typically hoard software they write. I disapprove of this, but once I write a GNU replacement, they don't hurt me (or GNU users) any more. Apple, Lotus and a few others have gone beyond hoarding software; they are suing companies for independent development of compatible replacement programs--the same sort of thing that I am doing in GNU. If they win these suits, they will be able to crush free replacements along with proprietary replacements. And if this becomes accepted practice, most other companies will doubtless join in, even though they are not now among those trying to establish the new monopolies. Then free software would be limited to things that software did before 1980, for around 70 more years: till long after I am dead. I could continue writing free software for the rest of the world, but Americans would not get the benefit of it. This is why I consider it so important to fight Apple in whatever way I can--such as, by not supporting A/UX. Therefore, instead of helping A/UX users by working on supporting A/UX, I choose to help some other users by working on something else. Supporting a system takes more work than you might think.
shap@polya.Stanford.EDU (Jonathan S. Shapiro) (04/03/89)
I own a Mac II (purchased before the lawsuit nonsense) and I will never willingly buy another apple product. The reasons are that Apple is acting in a fashion I believe is improper in these lawsuits, and that apple's pricing and upgrade policies when coupled with their support policies are hurting the individual users. The Mac-II to Mac-IIx upgrade gives me nothing I want, but wait and see how quickly they obsolete the Mac II. Fundamentally, the issue is this: what should, in principle, "intellectual property" mean. I support Richard's view that Apple's approach to this question is both wrong and bad. If Apple manages to win these cases, they will establish legal precedents that will hurt all software developers in the intermediate and long term. The current state of affairs is that I can be sued for independently developing a piece of software, and the de facto burden of proof falls on the plaintiff. I cannot afford to defend a case against bastards like Apple, even if I am in the right. This is great for the short term - the company and its stockholders that win by default are delighted. In the long term it is very bad. It creates an environment in which *everything* must be done in a clean room atmosphere. If I wish to have a defendable case under the current law, not only can't I use your code, I can't talk to your employees - even if they are best friends or family, because this would violate the clean room, and I need to prove beyond a doubt to the jury that I had no inside knowledge. Further, I need to preprocess everything that goes into the clean room, having it looked at by a team of lawyers and engineers that are not involved in the actual development. This easily multiplies the cost of software development by a factor of 10. Worse, I can't afford to defend, and a company like Apple can engage in nuisance lawsuits that appear legitemate enough that I can't turn the tables. To fix this, we would have to make it be the case that if A sues B, and A proves to be wrong, A must pay all of the costs and lost income incurred by B plus a hefty penalty, say 200%. At the moment, if I sue and I lose, all I have lost are the legal fees, which is not even a drop in the bucket. Apple is creating legal precedents that will hurt us all. *That* is why they should be boycotted. The issues pertinent to FSF are strictly incidental. Of course, the sweet irony of the whole situatio is that ultimately these increased costs will mean that Apple goes out of business. It isn't big enough to survive an increase of a factor of 10 in the cost of software production. Jon Shapiro These opinions are my own, and certainly not those of my employer!