CNETNate writes "As the reviews of the Palm Pre start to roll in, DVD Jon expands on previous coverage of the Pre showing up in iTunes as some sort of an iPod, by publishing the offending code Palm has used to enabled the feature. As suspected, in regular USB mode, the phone addresses itself as a standard peripheral. But in 'Media Sync' mode, it claims to be an iPod ... from a vendor known as Apple."
I can't imagine a major competitor to the Apple iPhone will be allowed to do this without a lawsuit smacking them in the face. Then again, perhaps Palm wants a lawsuit to bring additional media attention to their device.
Seems like a risky move by Palm, their entire future most likely rests on this device. Without it succeeding the risk of Palm going under are pretty high. Might as well shoot for the fences I guess.
I very much doubt this was orchestrated in order to gain publicity. Never ascribe to malice what can be adequately explained by a rogue engineer who wanted his phone to work with iTunes.
It's unlikely that this was the work of a 'rogue engineer.' Palm's Pre team is run by a former Apple VP who hired away Apple iPod team employees to join his new Palm Pre team. There's almost no chance that this wasn't intentional and by design, using inside information that the former Apple employees had. Apple, being famously litigious, will almost certainly try to build a case. On what basis is unclear—perhaps non-compete violations, perhaps trade secrets.
From the sounds of it, this hack isn't based off any information that can't be had with trivial USB sniffing. As others have put it, this is no more complex than changing the useragent string for your web browser.
Why would Apple sue over this? On what grounds? There's no copy protection being circumvented, no cryptography being broken, it's a plaintext response. Also remember when that when Apple suggested legal trouble [boingboing.net] for Palm, Palm suggested that they wouldn't hesitate to strike back [boingboing.net] with their own patent portfolio. I can't see either party taking anything to court.
I *LIKE* the BB/Treo keyboard styles, so landscape style keyboards kind of ruin the experience for me. After playing with a G1 last night, I'm not convinced. I think it's come down to a WinMo treo, BB 8900, or the Pre if I like how it feels.
I've been a Verizon customer for 12 years. I love my service - I'm loath to leave, but Verizon has been on the shit-end of the smartphone arena for too long.
What I *REALLY* want, is the old style Palm Visors with graffiti area to come back and just get rid of all the buttons. I was so much better at graffiti than typing, and we could have MASSIVE screens in the same form factor. I *LOVED* my Kyocera 6035.
Apple could sue, and Palm could counter-sue with antitrust claims. After all, Apple does control most of the music market via iTunes.
I vaguely recall a lawsuit where Apple was sued for limiting the iPod to only iTunes (Apple won), but I don't think anybody has challenged the reverse (using something else with iTunes) in court.
Apple isn't doing anything (illegal or otherwise) to interfere or prevent other online music stores from operating. iTunes popularity is due to brand loyalty, mind share, convenience, and being first.
In order to gain a successful antitrust verdict you need to be something of a monopoly (which iTunes and more generally Apple clearly isn't)
What makes you say that? A quick google search shows most sites estimate iTunes market share as between 50% and 70% of the legal downloads market. That's comfortably enough for most regulators to consider it a monopoly.
Of course being a monopoly isn't illegal. It only becomes a problem when you try to use your monopoly in one area to create or expand a monopoly in another. Say like taking a monopoly in digital music sales and using it to help a monopoly in digital music players? Maybe or maybe not. Still, I'd be hesitant to describe Apple's digital music business as something other than a monopoly.
With the removal of DRM, there's no issue of monopoly whatsoever. 70% of the market is not 100% of the market; a clever player who can work a deal could get in and take over a big chunk of that.
The only issue before was the fact that anything you bought on the ITMS would only work on the iPod. While that sort of software-hardware vendor lock-in still does not constitute a monopoly--there are other stores that work with other devices--the removal of DRM means that you can buy from ITMS and play your files on anything. You might just have to take an extra step of importing your music into a different piece of software.
If anyone were to take that to court and claim that this requirement constituted a monopoly, the judge would try to say, between fits of laughter, "Buy your music from a different store and use that store's music management software. Now GTF out of my courtroom!"
Silly Apple, if it only identifies its devices via a USB identifier, but interacts with them in standard, easily emulated ways, all the while going for the exclusivity angle.
Silly Palm, for thinking Apple will take this lying down. But kudos for the balls to do it anyway.
Silly Apple, if it only identifies its devices via a USB identifier, but interacts with them in standard, easily emulated ways, all the while going for the exclusivity angle.
If it's only identifying devices in a standard, easily enumerated way - then they obviously are not going for the exclusivity angle. That part is your assertion but actual technical details seem to prove your assertion wrong.
Silly Palm, for thinking Apple will take this lying down.
I honestly don't think Apple will care much. It leads to more people buying things from iTunes after all and cements the dominance of iTunes for managing media. Perhaps they even did this in conjuction with Palm... if you think about it they would have been smart to do so.
But kudos for the balls to do it anyway.
Can't argue with that. Palm is an amazing company to come back the way they have, makes me think of the Palm of old...
1) This is impossible for Apple to block. If according to USB it's an iPod, how can Apple distinguish? They can try to see if any little details are missing, but in the end any probing they do can easily be met by Palm.
Nor is it even unsafe, because the code to support older iPods is pretty stable and will not change over time - the older iPods will always be supported.
2) I'm pretty sure Apple sill not sue. What legality is there around USB identifiers? Nothing. The only hook there is the Apple string in the ID, but I don't think it's enough to put a case around. Why bother with the expense of a suit.
It's a clever idea from Palm and I applaud them for it.
Well, if you read the article you would see that "the root USB node (IOUSBDevice) still identifies the device as a Palm Pre", therefore it appears that there are checks that could be put into the next version of iTunes to block this. If Apple were a bit smarter, they would make iTunes available for 50 quid for non-iPod devices.
Nor is it even unsafe, because the code to support older iPods is pretty stable and will not change over time - the older iPods will always be supported.
But iPods can get firmware updates.
The older iPods will always be supported. But do you know what happens if you plug in a first generation iPod right now and don't permit iTunes to update its firmware?
All Apple has to do is put out firmware updates for all the legacy iPods (which they really have done in the past) and require those upgrades for iTunes to continue working. Apple can block this if they want to.
Which is kinda stupid on Palm's part, IMO.
You can use iTunes with other MP3 players -- I have several that still work with it. If iTunes sees a driver for your music player, it'll work with it. Palm could have done whatever they wanted and distributed a driver for their device, or they could have emulated a non-Apple device for which iTunes already had a driver (eg. Diamond Rio), which Apple doesn't have the freedom to require firmware updates for. I can understand why they didn't do the former -- they want users to be able to just plug in the devices and have them work, rather than installing device drivers. But I think it was unnecessarily risky to spoof an Apple device.
1) This is impossible for Apple to block. If according to USB it's an iPod, how can Apple distinguish?
You didn't read all the links in the article.
It's not the case that it's an iPod according to USB. That's not what Palm did.
It's a USB device with an array of sub-devices. The mass storage portion claims to be an iPod mass storage device... but if you look at the whole tree, you can see that it's connected via a Palm device.
The Pre does not pretend to be an iPod instead of a Pre. It pretends to be a Pre with an iPod inside it. Even easier for Apple to block than I had thought, if they care at all.
But Palm wont be able to certify their device as USB unless the hack is an aftermarket hack.
Why not? When you hit "Mount as Storage", the device acts as a bog standard USB mass storage device.
When you hit media sync, it acts totally differently. But why should a special mode of using USB stop certification when it does offer a standard mode...
Offering different options when plugging into USB is sheer genius.
But since this isn't a USB device, or being marked as one, they neither need a logo or a license. This is just a hack to make it seem like one and there is nothing illegal in that.
Chamberlain v. Skylink, 381 F.3d 1178 (Fed. Cir. 2004), and Lexmark v. Static Control Components, 387 F.3d 522 (6th Cir. 2004), were decided in 1994 after the DMCA was passed, both times in the cloner's favor.
This computer is claiming to be an Apple Computer. Apple sued. Apple won.
Citation needed. This device is claiming to be a Sega Genesis game cartridge (Sega v. Accolade), a Chamberlain LiftMaster garage door opener (Chamberlain v. Skylink), or a Lexmark toner cartridge (Lexmark v. Static Control Components). Sega, Chamberlain, and Lexmark sued. Sega, Chamberlain, and Lexmark lost.
There was an earlier case involving game carts and embedded trademarked identifiers where it was ruled that another company was allowed to use a particular trademark embedded in ROM because it was required to enable the full functionality of the game machine. So using your trademarked name as a "magic number" will not prevent others from connecting to your device or software legally. Once you use the trademark for a purpose other than identifying your business or product, it may become fair game in that other context.
If they were misrepresenting themselves to USERS as an Apple device in order to make sales (like the famous "Rollex Watch"), then they'd be in big trouble, but if all they're doing is misrepresenting themselves to the machine in order to get around some technical limitations of the software, then they should be fine.
They are pretending to be an Apple device. I don't think that's legal.
What's the charge? "Impersonating an Apple Device"? What law is that exactly...
As I noted, the only hook is that the USB id has the word Apple which could be a trademark violation... but all the car adaptors looking for iPods have the word "Apple" embedded in order to look for said iPods. There's a strong case to be made that the string is there for the purpose of interoperability.
I don't even think it's grey enough an area to be worth a lawsuit. Did you hear of a suit filed today? Apple has known exactly how this mimicing would work for a few weeks now, you would have heard something either before or around launch.
Sega v. Accolade protects trademark infringement that is necessary for the purpose of interoperability:
Because the TMSS has the effect of regulating access to the Genesis III console, and because there is no indication in the record of any public or industry awareness of any feasible alternate method of gaining access to the Genesis III, we hold that Sega is primarily responsible for any resultant confusion.
Next time you connect your Pre to iTunes, well, iTunes attempts to install iPod software on a Pre and I have no idea how happy the Pre will be with that:-(
Well, the Pre will just respond with 'sure, upload the new firmware!' and pipe it over to the Pre equivalent of/dev/null. Then it will respond with the 'upgrade worked! Thanks alot!' code.
Or, worst comes to worst, a simple update to the Pre allows it to emulate the new and improved firmware version.
*If* this is the only way to get data from iTunes, then spoofing the model and vendor should be like the Game Boy requesting an image of the Nintendo logo at bootup. There was a court ruling back in the 90s (Sega vs Galoob, I think) that said the image was treated as a password to go through the BIOS bootup, therefore, anybody could put it in their games. This is probably a completely different ball game, though.
Pre: "Knock knock"
Windows: "Whoâ(TM)s there?"
Pre: "iPod."
Windows: "Cool, come in. Hey iTunes, Iâ(TM)ve got an iPod for you."
iTunes: "You donâ(TM)t look like an iPod but if Windows says you are, thatâ(TM)s good enough for me. Smoke some of this music."
Pre: "Kickass."
How is this any different than Opera/Firefox/whatever changing the User-Agent string?
Neither looks like anything complicated nor like anything illegal.
Back on topic, John Gruber has covered this pretty well here [daringfireball.net] and here. [daringfireball.net]
"But is it illegal? And would it be illegal for Apple to take countermeasures against it? My guess is "no" to both questions... I don't think WebOS's media sync is a mistake on Palm's part because it is wrong, I think it's a mistake because it is risky and unnecessary."
Well, there is a standard for media syncing [wikipedia.org], but it's developed by Microsoft and apparently not followed. Especially by Microsoft with their Zune, as they decided to ignore the standards they had created and sold to third-party developers in favor of something that only works with their software.
Mass storage mode still seems to work better. Again, Microsoft will allow watching a video on the Xbox 360 from a mass storage device but not a MTP device.
I've never seen the rules one should follow when releasing a device that might end up in millions of hands, but I'm sure they include the following:
1) Don't use an unstable hack to enable a feature that a very large percentage of potential users will be counting on.
2) Don't base a feature on a cat-and-mouse game. Especially with the likes of Apple, who are really good at that particular game.
3) Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup. Jobs was bragging about patents in the iPhone announcement keynote, for Christ sake.
I think Palm is counting on them yelling than then Palm will lean on them with their patents.
Remember Palm defined this space long before Apple did and from a few quotes from palm recently they are going to use that as leverage.
Quote from Palm CEO:
"The whole area of patents is elaborate; a lot of issues there, and a very complex area. One of the things we've done over 15 years is build a very extensive patent portfolio in the mobile computing space, one of the highest-rated patent portfolios in this space, which contains more than 1,500 patents. And the reason you do that is to have a defensive position in the marketplace. It's kind of like two little porcupines going around, and you don't want to touch each other because you might get stung. You peacefully coexist and everything's OK and we keep working together."
You really think that there isn't a SINGLE Apple employee who couldn't get hold of a Pre if they wanted to, or that they don't already have one? Even in their hardware, PR, developer etc. departments? And that "revelation" was basically revealed by plugging the device in and looking at the usbid... lsusb would have done it in a single command and there are even prettier interfaces for Windows for free.
Obscurity is a waste of time when you're hoping the *designers* of a system don't realise how you've worked around it - it's like "telling" the DVD forum about the CSS hack - they already know *how* you circumvent it, but they may not know the exact method by which you discovered it (that's the bit that *doesn't* matter). The designers of any such system already know, or it would take seconds to make 10 guesses at how, and it would take minutes to actually discover how even without basic knowledge - you just run it through a debug version of iTunes and see what happens.
Don't be silly. It's like saying Microsoft don't know how people are installing pirate copies of Windows, or upping the TCP connection limit, or Nintendo not knowing how the Wii hacks work. It takes *seconds* for them to work it out once it's been revealed, even if they would never have thought of it. They DESIGNED the system, after all.
P.S. If Palm had just gone to Apple and said "we want to make the Palm Pre sync with iTunes", would Apple have been reasonable about it? I saw a comment on Slashdot mentioning that there are non-Apple devices that sync with iTunes, implying that Apple can be reasonable.
That ability is left-over from the SoundJam days, which is why the list is so antiquated. I'm also pretty sure that whatever sync code there is for 3rd party devices was written by Apple, not the device manufacturer.
Personally, I think this is one of those, "Easier to ask forgiveness than permission" things. Assuming that Apple will sue Palm, this is just another thing that Apple can add to the list and will be worked out in whatever settlement Apple and Palm come to.
How Long Before Apple Files a Lawsuit? (Score:4, Insightful)
Seems like a risky move by Palm, their entire future most likely rests on this device. Without it succeeding the risk of Palm going under are pretty high. Might as well shoot for the fences I guess.
Re:How Long Before Apple Files a Lawsuit? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:How Long Before Apple Files a Lawsuit? (Score:5, Informative)
It's unlikely that this was the work of a 'rogue engineer.' Palm's Pre team is run by a former Apple VP who hired away Apple iPod team employees to join his new Palm Pre team. There's almost no chance that this wasn't intentional and by design, using inside information that the former Apple employees had. Apple, being famously litigious, will almost certainly try to build a case. On what basis is unclear—perhaps non-compete violations, perhaps trade secrets.
Here's John Gruber's take on the Pre's MediaSync [daringfireball.net].
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Re:How Long Before Apple Files a Lawsuit? (Score:4, Insightful)
From the sounds of it, this hack isn't based off any information that can't be had with trivial USB sniffing. As others have put it, this is no more complex than changing the useragent string for your web browser.
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Re:How Long Before Apple Files a Lawsuit? (Score:5, Informative)
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Umm... why the fuss? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Umm... why the fuss? (Score:4, Interesting)
My needs:
Tethering, Music (ghetto iPod), Skye (maybe), custom app development.
AT&T:
Blackberry Curve 8900 - no touchscreen, QWERTY keyboard, SD card
iPhone - Touchscreen, no QWERTY keyboard
Verizon:
Palm Centro - WinMo (ick) - QWERTY, SD card, Touchscreen
Blackberry Storm - no QWERTY, no touchscreen, SD card
TMo
Blackberry Curve 8900
Android G1 -> qwerty keyboard, touchscreen, sd card
Sidekick XL
Sprint:
Palm Treo 800/750: qwerty, touchscreen, sd card
Palm Pre : Touchscreen, qwerty, sd card?
I *LIKE* the BB/Treo keyboard styles, so landscape style keyboards kind of ruin the experience for me. After playing with a G1 last night, I'm not convinced. I think it's come down to a WinMo treo, BB 8900, or the Pre if I like how it feels.
I've been a Verizon customer for 12 years. I love my service - I'm loath to leave, but Verizon has been on the shit-end of the smartphone arena for too long.
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Re:Umm... why the fuss? (Score:4, Insightful)
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Antitrust? (Score:5, Interesting)
Apple could sue, and Palm could counter-sue with antitrust claims. After all, Apple does control most of the music market via iTunes.
I vaguely recall a lawsuit where Apple was sued for limiting the iPod to only iTunes (Apple won), but I don't think anybody has challenged the reverse (using something else with iTunes) in court.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Antitrust? (Score:5, Insightful)
What makes you say that? A quick google search shows most sites estimate iTunes market share as between 50% and 70% of the legal downloads market. That's comfortably enough for most regulators to consider it a monopoly.
Of course being a monopoly isn't illegal. It only becomes a problem when you try to use your monopoly in one area to create or expand a monopoly in another. Say like taking a monopoly in digital music sales and using it to help a monopoly in digital music players? Maybe or maybe not. Still, I'd be hesitant to describe Apple's digital music business as something other than a monopoly.
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Re:Antitrust? (Score:5, Informative)
The only issue before was the fact that anything you bought on the ITMS would only work on the iPod. While that sort of software-hardware vendor lock-in still does not constitute a monopoly--there are other stores that work with other devices--the removal of DRM means that you can buy from ITMS and play your files on anything. You might just have to take an extra step of importing your music into a different piece of software.
If anyone were to take that to court and claim that this requirement constituted a monopoly, the judge would try to say, between fits of laughter, "Buy your music from a different store and use that store's music management software. Now GTF out of my courtroom!"
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Silly Apple, silly Palm (Score:5, Interesting)
Silly Apple, if it only identifies its devices via a USB identifier, but interacts with them in standard, easily emulated ways, all the while going for the exclusivity angle.
Silly Palm, for thinking Apple will take this lying down. But kudos for the balls to do it anyway.
Why is either silly (Score:5, Insightful)
Silly Apple, if it only identifies its devices via a USB identifier, but interacts with them in standard, easily emulated ways, all the while going for the exclusivity angle.
If it's only identifying devices in a standard, easily enumerated way - then they obviously are not going for the exclusivity angle. That part is your assertion but actual technical details seem to prove your assertion wrong.
Silly Palm, for thinking Apple will take this lying down.
I honestly don't think Apple will care much. It leads to more people buying things from iTunes after all and cements the dominance of iTunes for managing media. Perhaps they even did this in conjuction with Palm... if you think about it they would have been smart to do so.
But kudos for the balls to do it anyway.
Can't argue with that. Palm is an amazing company to come back the way they have, makes me think of the Palm of old...
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Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Interesting)
Two points:
1) This is impossible for Apple to block. If according to USB it's an iPod, how can Apple distinguish? They can try to see if any little details are missing, but in the end any probing they do can easily be met by Palm.
Nor is it even unsafe, because the code to support older iPods is pretty stable and will not change over time - the older iPods will always be supported.
2) I'm pretty sure Apple sill not sue. What legality is there around USB identifiers? Nothing. The only hook there is the Apple string in the ID, but I don't think it's enough to put a case around. Why bother with the expense of a suit.
It's a clever idea from Palm and I applaud them for it.
Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:4, Informative)
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Informative)
But iPods can get firmware updates.
The older iPods will always be supported. But do you know what happens if you plug in a first generation iPod right now and don't permit iTunes to update its firmware?
All Apple has to do is put out firmware updates for all the legacy iPods (which they really have done in the past) and require those upgrades for iTunes to continue working. Apple can block this if they want to.
Which is kinda stupid on Palm's part, IMO.
You can use iTunes with other MP3 players -- I have several that still work with it. If iTunes sees a driver for your music player, it'll work with it. Palm could have done whatever they wanted and distributed a driver for their device, or they could have emulated a non-Apple device for which iTunes already had a driver (eg. Diamond Rio), which Apple doesn't have the freedom to require firmware updates for. I can understand why they didn't do the former -- they want users to be able to just plug in the devices and have them work, rather than installing device drivers. But I think it was unnecessarily risky to spoof an Apple device.
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Informative)
You didn't read all the links in the article.
It's not the case that it's an iPod according to USB. That's not what Palm did.
It's a USB device with an array of sub-devices. The mass storage portion claims to be an iPod mass storage device... but if you look at the whole tree, you can see that it's connected via a Palm device.
The Pre does not pretend to be an iPod instead of a Pre. It pretends to be a Pre with an iPod inside it. Even easier for Apple to block than I had thought, if they care at all.
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Aha, one mode (Score:5, Insightful)
But Palm wont be able to certify their device as USB unless the hack is an aftermarket hack.
Why not? When you hit "Mount as Storage", the device acts as a bog standard USB mass storage device.
When you hit media sync, it acts totally differently. But why should a special mode of using USB stop certification when it does offer a standard mode...
Offering different options when plugging into USB is sheer genius.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Informative)
They are pretending to be an Apple device. I don't think that's legal.
This computer is claiming to be an IBM PC. IBM sued. IBM lost.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
They are pretending to be an Apple device. I don't think that's legal.
This computer is claiming to be an IBM PC. IBM sued. IBM lost.
The DMCA didn't exist then, and syncing a Pre with iTunes can be seen as breaking a functional copyright enforcement device.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
The DMCA has exceptions for interoperability.
Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:4, Informative)
The DMCA didn't exist then
Chamberlain v. Skylink, 381 F.3d 1178 (Fed. Cir. 2004), and Lexmark v. Static Control Components, 387 F.3d 522 (6th Cir. 2004), were decided in 1994 after the DMCA was passed, both times in the cloner's favor.
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Sega, Chamberlain, and Lexmark (Score:4, Informative)
This computer is claiming to be an Apple Computer. Apple sued. Apple won.
Citation needed. This device is claiming to be a Sega Genesis game cartridge (Sega v. Accolade), a Chamberlain LiftMaster garage door opener (Chamberlain v. Skylink), or a Lexmark toner cartridge (Lexmark v. Static Control Components). Sega, Chamberlain, and Lexmark sued. Sega, Chamberlain, and Lexmark lost.
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple v. Franklin (1983) [wikipedia.org]
Palm didn't copy Apple's code in this instance. You're comparing oranges and fish.
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Insightful)
There was an earlier case involving game carts and embedded trademarked identifiers where it was ruled that another company was allowed to use a particular trademark embedded in ROM because it was required to enable the full functionality of the game machine. So using your trademarked name as a "magic number" will not prevent others from connecting to your device or software legally. Once you use the trademark for a purpose other than identifying your business or product, it may become fair game in that other context.
If they were misrepresenting themselves to USERS as an Apple device in order to make sales (like the famous "Rollex Watch"), then they'd be in big trouble, but if all they're doing is misrepresenting themselves to the machine in order to get around some technical limitations of the software, then they should be fine.
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Apple is not a Police Officer (Score:4, Insightful)
They are pretending to be an Apple device. I don't think that's legal.
What's the charge? "Impersonating an Apple Device"? What law is that exactly...
As I noted, the only hook is that the USB id has the word Apple which could be a trademark violation... but all the car adaptors looking for iPods have the word "Apple" embedded in order to look for said iPods. There's a strong case to be made that the string is there for the purpose of interoperability.
I don't even think it's grey enough an area to be worth a lawsuit. Did you hear of a suit filed today? Apple has known exactly how this mimicing would work for a few weeks now, you would have heard something either before or around launch.
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Re:Apple is not a Police Officer (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Apple is not a Police Officer (Score:5, Funny)
What's the charge? "Impersonating an Apple Device"? What law is that exactly...
If there were a law, these people [engadget.com] would have been arrested.
On second thought, maybe we do need such a law... :^)
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Interesting)
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Re:Apple cannot block and it's not illegal (Score:5, Informative)
Because the TMSS has the effect of regulating access to the Genesis III console, and because there is no indication in the record of any public or industry awareness of any feasible alternate method of gaining access to the Genesis III, we hold that Sega is primarily responsible for any resultant confusion.
http://digital-law-online.info/cases/24PQ2D1561.htm [digital-law-online.info]
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Well, the Pre will just respond with 'sure, upload the new firmware!' and pipe it over to the Pre equivalent of /dev/null. Then it will respond with the 'upgrade worked! Thanks alot!' code.
Or, worst comes to worst, a simple update to the Pre allows it to emulate the new and improved firmware version.
Passwords aren't copyrighted (Score:5, Informative)
*If* this is the only way to get data from iTunes, then spoofing the model and vendor should be like the Game Boy requesting an image of the Nintendo logo at bootup. There was a court ruling back in the 90s (Sega vs Galoob, I think) that said the image was treated as a password to go through the BIOS bootup, therefore, anybody could put it in their games. This is probably a completely different ball game, though.
I see no code here. (Score:4, Insightful)
Dumping the USB registers: cool.
Commentator confusing USB registers with code: not cool.
Mod DVD Jon +1
Mod Slashdot -1
Re:DMCA ??? (Score:5, Funny)
Pre: "Knock knock"
Windows: "Whoâ(TM)s there?"
Pre: "iPod."
Windows: "Cool, come in. Hey iTunes, Iâ(TM)ve got an iPod for you."
iTunes: "You donâ(TM)t look like an iPod but if Windows says you are, thatâ(TM)s good enough for me. Smoke some of this music."
Pre: "Kickass."
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Ugh, the text encoding in Windows is terrible.
I would like to know just one thing (Score:5, Insightful)
Neither looks like anything complicated nor like anything illegal.
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Re:DMCA ??? (Score:5, Funny)
Reader: Knock, knock
Slashdot: Who's there?
Reader: Unicode.
Slashdot: Fuck off.
Back on topic, John Gruber has covered this pretty well here [daringfireball.net] and here. [daringfireball.net]
"But is it illegal? And would it be illegal for Apple to take countermeasures against it? My guess is "no" to both questions... I don't think WebOS's media sync is a mistake on Palm's part because it is wrong, I think it's a mistake because it is risky and unnecessary."
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Re:DMCA ??? (Score:4, Informative)
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MTP (Score:5, Informative)
Mass storage mode still seems to work better. Again, Microsoft will allow watching a video on the Xbox 360 from a mass storage device but not a MTP device.
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Re:Poor Open Source (Score:5, Insightful)
1) Don't use an unstable hack to enable a feature that a very large percentage of potential users will be counting on.
2) Don't base a feature on a cat-and-mouse game. Especially with the likes of Apple, who are really good at that particular game.
3) Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup. Jobs was bragging about patents in the iPhone announcement keynote, for Christ sake.
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Re:Poor Open Source (Score:5, Informative)
I think Palm is counting on them yelling than then Palm will lean on them with their patents.
Remember Palm defined this space long before Apple did and from a few quotes from palm recently they are going to use that as leverage.
Quote from Palm CEO:
"The whole area of patents is elaborate; a lot of issues there, and a very complex area. One of the things we've done over 15 years is build a very extensive patent portfolio in the mobile computing space, one of the highest-rated patent portfolios in this space, which contains more than 1,500 patents. And the reason you do that is to have a defensive position in the marketplace. It's kind of like two little porcupines going around, and you don't want to touch each other because you might get stung. You peacefully coexist and everything's OK and we keep working together."
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Whereas the current generation of iPods is usable with open source software? Gimmie a break dude.
Hell no it's not, but my 4G Photo worked just fine. Since I replaced it with an 80GB model, I've been cursing the purchase ever since.
Re:Good or Bad? (Score:4, Insightful)
You really think that there isn't a SINGLE Apple employee who couldn't get hold of a Pre if they wanted to, or that they don't already have one? Even in their hardware, PR, developer etc. departments? And that "revelation" was basically revealed by plugging the device in and looking at the usbid... lsusb would have done it in a single command and there are even prettier interfaces for Windows for free.
Obscurity is a waste of time when you're hoping the *designers* of a system don't realise how you've worked around it - it's like "telling" the DVD forum about the CSS hack - they already know *how* you circumvent it, but they may not know the exact method by which you discovered it (that's the bit that *doesn't* matter). The designers of any such system already know, or it would take seconds to make 10 guesses at how, and it would take minutes to actually discover how even without basic knowledge - you just run it through a debug version of iTunes and see what happens.
Don't be silly. It's like saying Microsoft don't know how people are installing pirate copies of Windows, or upping the TCP connection limit, or Nintendo not knowing how the Wii hacks work. It takes *seconds* for them to work it out once it's been revealed, even if they would never have thought of it. They DESIGNED the system, after all.
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Re:Quoth DVD Jon... (Score:4, Insightful)
P.S. If Palm had just gone to Apple and said "we want to make the Palm Pre sync with iTunes", would Apple have been reasonable about it? I saw a comment on Slashdot mentioning that there are non-Apple devices that sync with iTunes, implying that Apple can be reasonable.
That ability is left-over from the SoundJam days, which is why the list is so antiquated. I'm also pretty sure that whatever sync code there is for 3rd party devices was written by Apple, not the device manufacturer.
Personally, I think this is one of those, "Easier to ask forgiveness than permission" things. Assuming that Apple will sue Palm, this is just another thing that Apple can add to the list and will be worked out in whatever settlement Apple and Palm come to.
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