According to AppleInsider, the Mac clone maker Psystar filed Chapter 11 in Florida last week, which will likely delay its court battle with Apple. Psystar entered the news-stream when it began selling Intel-based computers with Mac OS X pre-installed, which according to Apple is an infringement of the OS X End User Agreement (EUA) which forbids the installation of the software on non-Apple hardware. Not only that, but Psystar had to “hack” the Mac OS in order to get it to run on the hardware, which further complicated the copyright infringement claims. Apple responded by taking Psystar to court last July.
Normally, that would be the end of the story. The twist was that Psystar counter-sued Apple claiming that the computer maker was violating anti-trust laws. This move generated a lot of attention due mainly to the fact that if Psystar somehow won the case, it would drastically affect the way computer OSes, particularly OS X, would be sold and distributed.
Another factor in the story was the fact that Psystar, a relatively small company, was able to sustain a long and costly legal battle, generating speculation that an outside benefactor was funding Psystar’s legal actions. Psystar has also drawn out the proceedings by failing to provide Apple with paperwork and a contact within the company to work through legal details.
It would seem with Psystar’s bankruptcy filing that its resources have finally begun to dry up, but they have not given up yet. In the court documents filed only a week ago, Psystar maintained that it “[…] plans on emerging from this Chapter 11 with a strong and effective plan to make an increasingly higher profit and still provide the consumer with the product that they have grown to enjoy and trust.”
Good luck with that.
Personally, even though I am in favor of Open Source development, and even have an interest in the “Hackintosh” community, I’m really not in favor of Psystar’s end run around Apple’s licensing. I also fear that were they to continue to sell their OS X based products, people attempting to save money (something I also support), might find themselves with an unsupported system that is more PC-like than the reliable Mac experience, and support, of which most of us are accustomed.
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