jet@karazm.math.uh.edu ("J. Eric Townsend") (12/29/90)
w/o permission, from Dec 24/31 Infoworld, p 5. Typos mine. "Class Action Filed Against Ashton-Tate Still Reeling From Loss to Fox, Officials Say Charges Without Merit By Mark Brownstein Beleaguered Ashton-Tate Corp. suffered another blow last week when a group of Dbase owners filed a class-action suit against the corporation and certain corporate executives, alleging fraudulent copyright and restrictive licensing. This latest action followed a mid-December ruling by a federal court judge that invalidated Ashton-Tate's copyrights on Dbase II and III and dismissed its suit against Fox Software Inc. (See "Developers Cheer Fox Win in Ashton-Tate Suit," Dec 17, Page 1.) The class-action complaint was filed by a Pennsylvania partnership called rudolph-Peletz, acting on behalf of all Dbase II and III users. The 25-page complaint specifies eight causes of action against Ashton-Tate. The suit asks for unspecified real and punitive damanges based on the contention that Ashton-Tate knowingly profited from sales of a product that it did not legally own the copyright to. "It's interesting, but it's going to be a tough sell," said James Pooley, an attorney with Graham & James, in Palo Alto, California. "I don't think that anyone would dispute that Ashton-Tate believed it had a valid copyright." The suit is asking the courts to force Ashton-Tate to return all the moneies it made on the basis of Dbase II and III being copyrighted property. In addition, the suit asks for an order that would stop Ashton-Tate from advertising that it has a copyright on the program. Calling the charges "completely without merit," Ashton-Tate said that it "will defend vigorously against them." In addition, Ashton-Tate returned to court last week to file a motion before federal Judge Terry Hatter, asking him to reconsider his December 11 ruling. Stunned by Judge Hatter's decision, Ashton-Tate said it was "a clear error of judgment on both the facts and the law" in a statement the company recently released. Ashton-Tate also reaffirmed its plans to file an immediate appeal if the judge declines the motion. The company has 30 days following the judge's order to file an appeal." -- J. Eric Townsend Internet: jet@uh.edu Bitnet: jet@UHOU Systems Mangler - UH Dept. of Mathematics - (713) 749-2120 "If you are the system administrator and this is the first time you are logging into your system, use the login name root." -- IBM RS/6000 docs