San Francisco (CA) – It can’t get much more David vs. Goliath than that: A small computer maker said it will be filing suit against Apple, alleging that the company is engaging in anticompetitive tactics by tying its Mac OS X operating system to its own computers.
Psystar’s move is a response to Apple’s July 3 complaint that Psystar's Open Computer desktop and server products violate Apple copyrights and trademarks. While Psystar denied these claims, Apple is right, at least on paper.
Apple’s software license agreement for Mac OS X states that the software can only be installed on “Apple-labeled” computers and users “agree not to install, use or run the Apple Software on any non-Apple-labeled computer, or to enable others to do so.” Apple also states that only open-sourced components can be modified and users “may not rent, lease, lend, redistribute or sublicense the Apple Software.”
According to this license agreement, Psystar indeed violates several key terms simply by installing Mac OS X on non-Apple systems, redistributing the software without the necessary license and by modifying Mac OS X in a way that an auto-update feature can actually update an existing Mac OS X version installed on its Open Computer systems to a newer version.
Psystar believes these constraints are unfair and told press that it will “soon” file a legal complaint against Apple. "Our goal is to provide an alternative," Rudolfo Pedraza, co-founder of the company said. But it is clear that the firm’s claims rest on the hope that a court will also consider Apple’s practices as unfair and anti-competitive – and that has not happened in Apple’s history yet. And it is rather unlikely that Apple will give in this time and open the floodgates to Mac Cloning and give up the high margins it can achieve with its computers today.
Psystar may be right on a pure emotional and subjective level, but we have our doubts if a small company such as Psystar can succeed against a $160 billion company that makes a billion dollars of profit every quarter. It simply may not have the resources for a lengthy fight against Apple.
Psystar’s move is a response to Apple’s July 3 complaint that Psystar's Open Computer desktop and server products violate Apple copyrights and trademarks. While Psystar denied these claims, Apple is right, at least on paper.
Apple’s software license agreement for Mac OS X states that the software can only be installed on “Apple-labeled” computers and users “agree not to install, use or run the Apple Software on any non-Apple-labeled computer, or to enable others to do so.” Apple also states that only open-sourced components can be modified and users “may not rent, lease, lend, redistribute or sublicense the Apple Software.”
According to this license agreement, Psystar indeed violates several key terms simply by installing Mac OS X on non-Apple systems, redistributing the software without the necessary license and by modifying Mac OS X in a way that an auto-update feature can actually update an existing Mac OS X version installed on its Open Computer systems to a newer version.
Psystar believes these constraints are unfair and told press that it will “soon” file a legal complaint against Apple. "Our goal is to provide an alternative," Rudolfo Pedraza, co-founder of the company said. But it is clear that the firm’s claims rest on the hope that a court will also consider Apple’s practices as unfair and anti-competitive – and that has not happened in Apple’s history yet. And it is rather unlikely that Apple will give in this time and open the floodgates to Mac Cloning and give up the high margins it can achieve with its computers today.
Psystar may be right on a pure emotional and subjective level, but we have our doubts if a small company such as Psystar can succeed against a $160 billion company that makes a billion dollars of profit every quarter. It simply may not have the resources for a lengthy fight against Apple.