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One doesn't have to start with a lawsuit. One starts with a nice polite letter, on actual paper, to Apple's legal department reminding them of their LGPL obliga
by mechanical_fish 16y ago
One doesn't have to start with a lawsuit. One starts with a nice polite letter, on actual paper, to Apple's legal department reminding them of their LGPL obligations and pointing out that they're past deadline and perhaps they should poke the relevant engineering team?
Then if that gets no satisfaction you have your lawyer send the same letter. Then a nastier letter. Only then do you begin to think about preparing a lawsuit, which is expensive and probably overkill.
What you don't do is put up a passive-aggressive blog post. This post doesn't even tell us how many letters have been sent, or by whom, or to whom, or when. Have we even asked the support folks or the engineers, let alone Apple legal?
I can barely find the stomach to blame Apple's engineering team for prioritizing strict and timely license compliance somewhere below: Making their boss Steve Jobs happy, releasing features that paying customers care about, and sleeping. Fortunately, it is not my job to blame them. It is the job of Apple's legal department to blame them. Has anyone asked Apple's legal department?
- gatlin 16y ago"I can barely find the stomach to blame Apple's engineering team for prioritizing strict and timely license compliance somewhere below: Making their boss Steve Jobs happy, releasing features that paying customers care about, and sleeping." Sleep is an important function the brain and body must perform to survive; I would never advocate sleep deprivation. However, no, Mr Jobs and everyone else can wait as there is a legally binding license governing the release of the code. This is a rare completely black and white issue. The binary is released without the source -> license violation.
- kalleboo 16y agoIf they don't want to spend their time complying with the software license, then they're free to not use open source licensed code in their products. Microsoft do just that, and they never have to worry about compliance issues. I don't think Apple would appreciate it if I downloaded iWork and instead of paying them said "Promoting strict and timely license compliance falls somewhere below sleeping".
- mechanical_fish 16y agoIt is true: Apple will not appreciate it at all if you pirate iWork. But will they sue you? Does anyone have a news story about Apple suing the (many, many) Apple software pirates? So far as I've heard, they don't even send very many nasty letters. Presumably not because they don't believe in paying for software, but because it's strategically unwise. Anyway, if Apple fails to respond in timely fashion to a series of inquiries they can, indeed, eventually be sued, and maybe that will even be the best move. Perhaps a suit against Google will proceed at the same time: http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/03/25/google.not.sharing.android.3.source.to.public.yet/ http://www.electronista.com/articles/11/03/25/google.not.sha... Though in that case, as well, I doubt it will come to that. (One of the many virtues of starting your own business is that you soon learn all about the practical limitations of contract law. People violate the letter of your contracts all the time. What are you going to do about it? The law is a relatively blunt instrument; it is expensive and difficult to bring it into play, often more difficult than your unpaid invoice is worth.)
- jrockway 16y agoPerhaps a suit against Google will proceed at the same time Indeed. It seems like applications that have code from non-Google employees have changed, as well as the Linux kernel itself.