November 17th, 2009
Well it’s been a while since I updated this blog, which isn’t good going actually, since it’s only been online for a month…
Anyway, there’s been a bit of a blow in the Apple vs. Psystar case, which could spell bad news to those who want OS X on the PC. It seems the judge sided with Apple and ruled that software is licensed, not sold. I can see how this works with all the open-source licenses out there, because if it was ruled that software is sold, like a book, it could potentially invalidate every single Free and Open Source Software license in existence.
It’s still a shame that the court ruled this way, I was getting used to the idea of running OS X. Ah well, time to start supporting Haiku…
Posted in Haiku, Mac OS X | No Comments »
October 13th, 2009
Yesterday, OSNews announced that there was increased action between Apple and Psystar for a quick and easy out-of-court settlement. This particular case has become very much more interesting, as Psystar are taking the stance that Vernor took in the Vernor vs. Autodesk case two weeks back, in which Vernor undeniably won.
What makes the Apple vs. Psystar case so important in the history of computing, is the fact that if Apple were to actually lose the case (which is highly probable), the whole OS market, as well as Apple’s profit margins, could be in for a shock. Microsoft should actually be getting worried, because if there’s suddenly a flurry of completely legal copies of OS X on the PC marketplace, how many people would be interested in booting Mac instead of Windows? For a lot of people, Macs are very pricey pieces of hardware, and in my opinion, rather crap for the money you pay for them. The only reason i don’t use Mac is because of the price on the hardware. I’d love to boot Mac OS X on a PC though, and although there is EULA-breaching software out there, many people can’t be bothered to go though that process, or don’t have the tecnological knowhow to anyway. I’m in the cant-be-bothered catergory.
If Mac OS X was to lose it’s shackles of the Apple hardware, i can many PC’s around the world becoming “Macs”. I could see Mac OS X becoming a very real competitor to Windows if it did hit the market freely, and this could potentially steal a significant part of Microsoft’s marketshare in the PC OS market. Many Free Open Source projects havn’t quite made it out of the primaeval soup of code and actually dent Microsoft’s market share yet, but could Mac OS X do it? I expect there is plenty of people queuing up just waiting for the avaliability of Mac on the PC platform, so they’ll definately be demand for it if Apple do lose the case.
If Psystar won this case, it could spell distaster to Apple, as their whole market is really on their hardware. If they are legally obliged to offer people copies for PC’s they’d no longer have that market, which could potentially be disasterous for the company. I don’t think Apple will be going anywhere any time soon, but i can see them phasing out Macs if Psystar win this case.
It will be interesting to see what happens here, but i can safely say i’ll be in the queue for Snow Leopard at PC World if Psystar win though.
Posted in Mac OS X, Windows | No Comments »
October 13th, 2009
Yet Another Wordpress Blog.
Welcome to Joshua Rice’s new tech blog. Here i will discuss new pieces of news from all sorts of open-source projects, and maybe my own opinions on some tech news stories… Keep your eye on this blog, because it could be updated at any point in time. Hopefully it will be filled full of cool little techy snippets, and all sorts of other bits for you to digest.
Anyway, onwards and upwards.
Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »