Re: Apple II Reference Manual ("Red Book")

[fadden@netcom.com (Andy McFadden)]

In article <8dfbam$e1d$1@merope.saaf.se>,
Paul Schlyter <pausch@saafNOSPAM.se> wrote:
>OK -- let's for the sake of the discussion imagine that someone
>posted cans of that "Red Book" without having obtained the proper
>permission.  Next, assume Apple hears about this, and doesn't like
>it.  Do you think Apple would sue?  I think that would be very
>unlikely.  What would Apple gain from such an action?  Very little,
>since the copyrighted work no longer has any commercial value.  What
>would they lose?  They'd gather a lot of bad-will, and could easily
>lose a lot of customers.

This gets into some rather speculative ethical issues.  Like, if I shoot
somebody unpopular, and nobody wants to prosecute me, is what I did
wrong?  I think you'll run into trouble if you start evaluating actions
based primarily on whether or not you'll be prosecuted.

OTOH, I believe you're correct that Apple has no interest in the material
itself.  A re-issue would have little value.

>There's an interesting story about something similar.  You know what
[...]
>A few months later, PKware reappeared with the ZIP archive format,
>plus the programs PKZIP/PKUNZIP.  The customers strongly disliked
>ARC's action, and abandoned ARC files as soon as ZIP files became
>available.  Nowadays everyone use ZIP files (PKware released that
>archive file format into the public domain btw), and few people have
>heard about ARC files.  Even though SEA won the case, they lost the
>market.

Might also have had something to do with ARC using LZW and PKZIP using LZH.
I believe most people are blissfully unaware of a conflict between SEA
and PKWare, just as they're unaware of why NuArc turned into NuLib, and
AutoArc turned into AutoArk (bunch of litigous bastards over at SEA).
SEA simply failed to produce a superior product.

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