Talk:Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp.

I think that the Windows Taskbar was actually based/ripped off from the NextStep Dock, and as we all know NextStep became "as one" with Apple and OS X inherited the Dock.

If I remember the story correctly, the 'technicality' was that the Xerox people didn't get it properly copyrighted before showing it to Apple. As the article stands, it leaves an aching feeling for what that technicality was, so can anyone modify the article and say for sure? --Calamari 03:25, 7 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

You can read some history of Apple, Xerox, and Microsoft here. Apple paid a lot of money to see (a small subset of) Xerox's development. There is no technicality here. It was a simple quid pro quo.BU

Apple. v. Microsoft Corp. is the most complicated software copyright lawsuit to date"==

the most complicated... what about SCO v. IBM Linux lawsuit???

In spite of much public armwaving and bellicosity on SCO's part, in reality that suit is not nearly as complex on technical matters since SCO has been able to provide the court with practically zero proof of their claims, even prompting the Judge at one point to comment on SCO's "astonishing lack of evidence."

Mac OS dock is derived from the NeXTSTEP dock. But NeXT, Inc. was purchased by Apple (long before OS X) in 1996.

This section included the statement:

many features of the Macintosh and Windows GUIs have been incorporated into the windowing environments of unrelated third-parties, such as OpenWindows, X11, and Solaris.

I removed the "such as..." clause since there are no examples given of borrowing by any of these. None of them seems to be candidates for this claim in any event: OpenWindows used the OPEN LOOK L&F, co-developed by AT&T, Sun and Xerox, which predates the lawsuit. X11 does not have a specific L&F; rather, it's the underlying foundation for many different GUIs. Solaris' GUI environment is not unique to Solaris -- it's either CDE or GNOME, so unless there's some Solaris-specific modification to either of those that is in question, it would be more appropriate to call out which one has the borrowed elements, and what those elements are.

The underlying point is that any statement of borrowing needs to be backed by an example of which elements were borrowed, rather than just making an unsubstantiated blanket statement.--NapoliRoma 19:37, 10 February 2007 (UTC)Reply

I'm inclined to remove the entire section. It seems to debate with itself whether Apple borrowed the Dock idea starting with NeXTSTEP. I've added the fact that Apple bought NeXT, so there is no question of borrowing there. Even if the section did make a point it would be tangential to the article, which is about the lawsuit, not whether Apple ever copied anything. Any objectins?--agr 03:38, 8 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

The lawsuit concerns supposed copying of GUIs that goes on in the computer industry. The section basically gives context as well as some idea of the long term repurcussions, suggesting that despite Apple's protestations, it's always been the case that GUI work has been built upon by others, with even modern-day Apple borrowing features that are traceable all the way back to Windows 1.0 (the Dock.)

As such, I see it as relevant and useful. It might be better reworded, but even in its present form the article is better for its inclusion. --Squiggleslash 13:16, 8 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

Should the page be moved to reflect Apple Computer, Inc.'s name change to Apple, Inc. ? Dravick 15:21, 26 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

Only if the associated court case is similarly renamed, which I doubt will happen in a million years. Squiggleslash 15:23, 26 March 2007 (UTC) Wikipediea is coolsReply

I know this is old, but I agree with Squiggleslash. The title of the article is not to identify the companies involved, but is the name of the court case: [1] Metromoxie (talk) 01:37, 27 September 2009 (UTC)Reply

Someone tell me if I am suffering from False Memory Syndrome... Did not Microsoft (presumably at the behest of Apple's lawyers) put rather absurd notices in the press asking users of Windows to refrain from moving or resizing windows until the suit was settled?Moletrouser (talk) 09:02, 10 October 2009 (UTC)Reply

The PARC_(Company) article says:

The lawsuit was dismissed because the presiding judge ruled "that Xerox's complaints were inappropriate for a variety of legal reasons," although apocryphal revisionist history insists that Xerox simply waited too long to file suit, and the statute of limitations had expired. This was not actually true; the dismissal of Xerox' legal complaint was not based simply on late filings, but rather a lack of legal merit to Xerox' case as it was presented.[3]

Therefore the PARC_(Company) article is saying that this article is part of the "revisionist history". I don't know which article is correct, but it would be nice if they were consistent.

Hlovatt (talk) 07:48, 26 May 2010 (UTC)Reply

The quoted section below was removed from the end of the "Impact" section of the article. If one reads the article, expressions (like the Aqua GUI components) are covered under copyright and do get protection, so this is not an example of what's claimed in the removed quote.

"In recent years, Apple has resumed threats of litigation in this area. Before the release of the Aqua GUI for Mac OS X, Apple threatened litigation against a Windows skin named WinAqua which was meant to emulate Apple's GUI based on a Mac OS X beta release.^[1] Similarly, Stardock released a desktop enhancement program for customizing the theme in Windows, named DesktopX, which had a theme that was similar to Aqua. Apple, however, demanded the company remove "anything that even remotely looks like Aqua."^[2]" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.214.40.164 (talk) 18:39, 20 February 2011 (UTC)Reply

Though interesting, the quoted section below was removed from the last paragraph of the Background section. That the stock was "purchased as an investment and then later sold" has no relevancy. Certainly it doesn't improve on the "legendariness" of the story. Also the "story" referred to in the quote is not relevant, though still interesting. Should be good here in the discussion tab. There's already a link here in the discussion to a much fuller treatment of the Mac GUI thing, but for anyone interested in these details I'm linking it again here for reference: http://www.mackido.com/Interface/ui_history.html.

"(the story that Apple had given Xerox Board members stock in exchange for access to the research performed at PARC is a legend because the truth is that Xerox did, at one time, own stocks in Apple but they were purchased as an investment and sold later);^[1]" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.214.40.164 (talk) 18:55, 20 February 2011 (UTC)Reply

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