CherryOS On Hold

aberkvam writes "MacWorld is reporting that CherryOS is "On Hold - until further notice." Does this mean that they are going to confirm that they used PearPC's code or is this just a delaying tactic due to the potentially pending lawsuit? Slashdot has covered this saga before."

Good!

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm glad I donated my $5 to PearPC. It's about all I can really afford, and I only use Apple's anyways, but people who put all that effort into source-code like PearPC (which is amazing, by the way), deserve some help when theiving bastards like CherryOS come along. Viva la Open Source!

Re:Big surprise... feh

[Bastian]

Also interesting that they refused to make any sort of comment in the MacWorld article. I don't know the legal system well, but could this be a sign that they know they're in so deep that there's hardly a think they could say that couldn't be used against them in court?

In the page source....

[Flaming_cows]

There is a date in the page source (which doesn't conform to the stated HTML 4.01 Transitional doctype along with other random attributes given to various elements, by the way):

<st1:date Month="11" Day="25" Year="2004">

I wonder what it's there for, as it is nowhere near accurate.

Re:Of course its on hold!

[iCEBaLM]

This is actually quite true. There are non-public and unreleased patches for pearpc which include features for sound, etc. They are unreleased because of the potential for CherryOS to steal them and will continue to be private until such time as the CherryOS threat is negated.

Legitimate question: what's the opposing argument?

[Dejohn]

There are two sides to every story. It's clear that the Slashdot crows believes the publisher of CherryOS should burn in hell, but what is his story/argument? Surely he didn't think that he could get away with a clear violation of the GPL, claim all ownership and intellectual property of CherryOS, sell it, make millions, and not get anyone suspicious. Is he thinking that he's doing an allowable fork and then selling some slightly modified version with support or something?

Re:Various conspiracy theories...

[plimsoll]

| Investors pulled out when they realised that
| Cherry is a really pathetic name - and I'm pretty
| sure it's already trademarked for some other
| computer equiptment [sic]

Yeah, no kidding. Smells like another Phoenix/Firebird/Firefox to me. For instance:

Cherry Corporation [cherrycorp.com]

Point-of-Sale, Automotive

Cherry Semiconductor [cherry-semi.com]

Discrete IC's (now owned by ON Semiconductor [onsemi.com])

Maybe they are getting out of the whole crowded fruit-based naming convention, and thus, avoid the obligatory Pac-Man jokes that plague these stories each time they're reported here.

what it might be...

[rogabean]

1. They realize now they are not going to get away with it.
or
2. They still think they can, but they need more time to hide code. Obviously they didn't do a good enough job. LOL
or
3. Lawyers scared them.

Then again I don't know. I've refocused myself on PearPC and helping with it. I could care less anymore what these monkeys do anymore. Let the lawyers sort this one out.

Source Date

[UrlFlynn]

Interesting that the date on the page source is from 11/25/04... Have they been contemplating this for 4 months?

Re:Wait for it...

[M.C. Hampster]

They are not merely making a copy. They are claiming it as their own creation. Surely you can see the difference.

There is a difference, but it doesn't mean what they are doing is theft, or that it is anymore theft than making copies of content/software you don't own.

When one makes the statement that people who copy movies/music/software aren't "stealing" because they are making a copy of existing code and the original content authors are not out anything (because they still have their original copy), they are making the distinction that it only becomes theft if you remove the original from the hands of the owner. In this case, the PearPC guys still have all of their own original code. They aren't "out" anything except possibly for the credit of their original work. How are they "losing" out on anything by the CherryOS guys copying their code? If you say they are out potential revenues from selling their code, then you are acknowledging that the ??AA has a point, aren't you?

In both cases, people are releasing their intellectual property to the world under certain conditions. In one case, they say you can use the property however you want, you just can't give copies of it to other people. In the other, they say you can use the property however you want, and you can give it to other people, but only if you also do it in it's original form (source code). Both parties have the right to put whatever conditions they wish on redistribution, no?

Re:Deserve

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, both cases are copyright infringement, but I guess "it's worse" when you take code, repackage it, call it your own, deny you stole it, and try to sell it.

Yes, it's worse. No, it's not theft. No matter how bad an infringement is, it's never theft. An infringement can cause more harm than a simple theft might, but it still wouldn't be theft. That's because they are fundamentally different things.

People don't say that it isn't theft because they want to make it seem like less of a crime. People say that it isn't theft because it isn't.

If I walk into a shop and take a CD that doesn't belong to me, costing the record company maybe $5, then that is theft. If I rip it and distribute it on the Internet to hundreds of thousands of people, costing the record company a million or more, that is not theft, that is still copyright infringement.

"Theft" isn't a synonym for "really bad copyright infringement".

Re:Deserve

[chronicon]

This can't go untreated, or the GPL will lose it's merit IMHO.

What??

While I agree that those that infringe on the GPL should be pursued and prosecuted, I don't agree that "untreated" actions have any bearing on the validity of the GPL as a software copyright license.

From my vantage, there are two avenues for pursuing violators--one equals cash (as in lawyers), the other (in this case) equals exposing the truth (as you have indicated). As the article states numerous bloggers and others have pointed out that CherryOS is a blatant rip-off of the PearPC project. If the distributor had abided by the license (GPL) they could have packaged it under any name they wanted (barring trademark infringement) and sold it for whatever they wanted to... (providing they supply you the binary + the SOURCE code).

(If I may be redundant), as it is, they tried to sneak it under the GPL radar and market it as their own devise (device?), which is clearly and blatantly wrong, not to mention illegal.

However, and to the point: NOT challenging them in either of the two manners I have suggested does NOT in any way invalidate the legal strength of the GPL as a software license.

I totally reject the claim that the GPL has not been tested in court. As Eben Moglen says [gnu.org], it hasn't been 'tested' in court because the defendants have always known that they would lose.

To those who like to say there has never been a court test of the GPL, I have one simple thing to say: Don't blame me. I was perfectly happy to roll any time. It was the defendants who didn't want to do it. And when for ten solid years, people have turned down an opportunity to make a legal argument, guess what? It isn't any good.

The GPL has succeeded for the last decade... because it worked, not because it failed or was in doubt.

I agree with part of your statement. CherryOS was exposed by 'countless websites' and this had the appropriate effect. Nevertheless, the GPL is a solid license whether anyone sits on their butts (regarding infringement) or not.