13 ms·

Nobody except Apple sued another company claiming ownership of the GUI That's disingenuous. Apple v. Microsoft stemmed from their existing licensing agreement.

Nobody except Apple sued another company claiming ownership of the GUI That's disingenuous. Apple v. Microsoft stemmed from their existing licensing agreement. It also didn't claim "ownership of the GUI", but tried to assert copyright over the "look and feel" of the Macintosh UI specifically.

pconf 15y ago
Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found, those are the facts.
- greyish_water 15y ago
  Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. I'm not going to engage you on this, because I don't know what it has to do with anything I wrote. You seem to have just jumped on the idea that I'm trying to have some kind of stupid fanboy argument with you. I wasn't. I was trying to point out that your description omitted a relevant fact: saying "Nobody but Apple sued another company..." has a different interpretation when the actual basis of the suit is considered. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial... The existing licensing agreement was why they sued in the first place and one of the main reasons the courts cited in the rulings. It can't possibly be immaterial: it's central to their case! You make it sound like they just came out of nowhere and claimed to own all GUIs or something, but the actual case revolved around the existing licensing agreement and the (then untested) claim that "look and feel" as a whole was subject to copyright. *...as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found..." That's not what the court found, though! Yes, Apple lost the case (rightly), but it was on the basis that most of what they claimed was subject to the prior licensing agreement and that the broader "look and feel" wasn't copyright-able at all, by anybody. Not even Xerox.

pconf 15y ago

Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found, those are the facts.

greyish_water 15y ago
Apple's claims of "look and feel" were absurd on their face as anyone comparing Windows 3 and MacOS can plainly see. I'm not going to engage you on this, because I don't know what it has to do with anything I wrote. You seem to have just jumped on the idea that I'm trying to have some kind of stupid fanboy argument with you. I wasn't. I was trying to point out that your description omitted a relevant fact: saying "Nobody but Apple sued another company..." has a different interpretation when the actual basis of the suit is considered. Any an all existing licensing agreement were immaterial... The existing licensing agreement was why they sued in the first place and one of the main reasons the courts cited in the rulings. It can't possibly be immaterial: it's central to their case! You make it sound like they just came out of nowhere and claimed to own all GUIs or something, but the actual case revolved around the existing licensing agreement and the (then untested) claim that "look and feel" as a whole was subject to copyright. *...as the technology wasn't owned by Apple in the first place. That's what the courts found..." That's not what the court found, though! Yes, Apple lost the case (rightly), but it was on the basis that most of what they claimed was subject to the prior licensing agreement and that the broader "look and feel" wasn't copyright-able at all, by anybody. Not even Xerox.