Amiga technology and patents ownership ?

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motorollin wrote:

Senex wrote:
AROS devs don't want the sources

Why not?

--
moto

Because 68k asm source code for a 15 years old operating system is very close to useless. TECHNOLOGY HAS MOVED ON! :-D

Even Hyperion have stated that little of the origianl source code was used, do you really think it would have taken 4 years JUST to port an OS from one machine to the next with the full source code?

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amiga1084 wrote:
Hello All,

I still believe the rumor that Bill Gates/MicroShaft scared
Gateway to stop making,marking new Amiga.Why would you buy
the rights if all you want are the patents.

It was a complete package, they bought it play around with it for a bit... got bored/sacred (whichever) and sold the trademark to a bunch of idiots.

They held the IP/Patents, 'cos patents are always good to have. But they have all expired now, Amiga is nothing but a valueless trademark now.

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uncharted wrote:

bloodline wrote:

Because 68k asm source code for a 15 years old operating system is very close to useless. TECHNOLOGY HAS MOVED ON! :-D

So what about an OS that tries to be a carbon copy of 15 year old operating system?

Fine, if you don't plan to sell it ;-)

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xeron wrote:

Even Hyperion have stated that little of the origianl source code was used, do you really think it would have taken 4 years JUST to port an OS from one machine to the next with the full source code?

Actually, a lot of OS4 is based on the AmigaOS source code. Obviously it has a lot of changes, since OS4 is a massive upgrade to pretty much every area of AmigaOS. Exec was written entirely from scratch, and DOS has been heavily rewritten, but the changelogs for nearly all components go back to 3.x.

When pressed Ben Hermans said that the only thing he could remember being used from original AmigaOS source code was some binary tree algorithms...

Anyway as a coder yourself you know that very little of AmigaOS 3.x code is in AOS4.0.

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snowman040 wrote:
First I'd like to thank you all for answering, seems like Amiga story is very complicated

What I really wanted to know is if some company X (for example) would like to buy all Amiga IP, brand name, patents, etc, etc... how complicated it would be, and how much money it would take ? (feel free to guess)

From what I learned so far:

- Brand name and patents are held by Gateway

No, the IP and Patents are held by Gateway, but the patents will have expired by now so are valueless. The IP is 20 years old too, so isn't of much value... Denises Minimig IP has MUCH more value!

- Amiga Inc, Amino or whoever licenced brand name and .... ?

No, Amino bought the trademarks/Brand (Amiga) and obtained a licence to use the IP and patents.

- Hyperion licenced Amiga OS rights (or is just developing OS4  for Amiga inc.?)

Hyperion apperantly bought a licence to develop a PowerPC version of AmigaOS called Amiga Os 4.x

and it looks like 1000 lawyers can't deal with this mess ...

I'm not a lawyer :-D

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xeron wrote:

Anyway as a coder yourself you know that very little of AmigaOS 3.x code is in AOS4.0.

This is a hilarious statement.

Maybe it is, but it doesn't detract from the fact that 15year old source code is of no value just about everybody.

Anyway, the lack of a comprehensive response doens't imply that I concede your point, merely that I cannot go into specifics because of the NDA I hold with Hyperion. Damn it.

Use hypothetical examples then...

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xeron wrote:

bloodline wrote:
Use hypothetical examples then...

Well.. hmmm... OK. You are porting operating system A to hardware B. Lets say you have component X's source code. It is written in C. With a bit of tweaking it compiles under GCC for hardware B. Is it better to rewrite component X from scratch, or use the existing source code? This will depend on the state of component X's code of course, but when there are hundreds of components in operating system A a fair amount of them will probably be worth developing using the original source as a base.

Also, I can think of at least one OS component in OS4 that was almost entirely assembler. It was translated function by function into C to ensure maximum compatability, with builds tested on AmigaOS3.x to ensure nothing broke as the functions were translated (the C functions even had to work with the other functions still being assembled from the original source). When it was fully C, it was tweaked to compile with GCC, and then finally compiled for OS4 and PPC. This was done because the component in question was quite complex and it was desirable to go for maximum compatability with this particular component. Although there is now none of the original source involved in that component, I still consider it based on OS3.x code. (note: if you are thinking of a particular component, you are probably wrong, but i can't tell you which one it is anyway).

Ok, our definitions are a little different, I understand what you mean.

I know which part you are referring to though, and I'm not thinking of the obvious ;-)

Anyway, at the end of the day, only the OS4 core devs know exactly how much OS3.x code is used, and i'm not one of those, so even without NDA I couldn't give you an exact figure, but from the information I DO have I can see that having the code has been very useful indeed.

I would put it to you though, that other than the private functions (and the extra comptiblity that that might provide for naughty programs)... it has not sped up or in any way eased the the AOS4 process!

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xeron wrote:

I would put it to you though, that other than the private functions (and the extra comptiblity that that might provide for naughty programs)... it has not sped up or in any way eased the the AOS4 process!

and I couldn't disagree more wholeheartedly if I tried.

Go on! Try!

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snowman040 wrote:
bloodline, if you're not a lawyer - you should be  :-D

I wouldn't mind earning a lawyer salery!

Ok so, in order to get Amiga name (trademarks / brand) and to start developing new Amiga OS/Hardware, company X should:

- buy Amiga name from Amino, or buy Amino?

If you want to call it an Amiga, yes.

- licence or buy IP and patents from Gateway

No, you don't need the IP since it can't be used anymore, there are no chip factories that could build Amiga chips... but you could reimplement the chips using modern technology as Dennis has done (See this thread: http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=19361)

Since Dennis designed the Amiga compatible chips all by himself, he owns the IP to them.

What ammount of money can be involved here ? 50-100mil$,... less? more ? Are there any informations related to Amiga Inc. / Amino stock value ?

At a real push the owerns of the Amiga trademarks could probably demand about $5 Million... but the brand isn't worth that much anymore. Amiga Inc. the company has no value.

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snowman040 wrote:
@bloodline

And what about OS rights ? How expensive would it be to buy AmigaOS classic and patents so company X could continue development? (Similar to what Hyperion did, but in more "we own this" type).

Who knows who owns the OS rights... Amiga Inc. suggest that they do, and no one has challenged them. They have proven their unwillingness to disscuss any terms on this matter.

Hyperion IMHO own the rights to the parts of AOS4 they have written, which despite Xerons protestations, I think is a sustantial amount!

Well... if you own the rights to the Amiga brand, you can take an opensource Amiga OS compatible clone, and call it Amiga OS. I would suggest that one should take an exising *nix and then host the opensource amiga OS compatible clone on that, in a similar way to what Apple have done wither thier OS.

And bloodline, could you explain more your opinion that Amiga brand isn't worth that much ? Do you think that some serious investment in Amiga has no sense ?

The probem is that the current owners have killed the Brand image, in order to maintain a brands value you MUST keep it rellevant to the young people. No mass market under 25 will have any nostalgia for the brand, and it's been 10 (more like 13) years since Amiga meant anything other than "that old games machine, that I might still have in the attic".

If you wanted to use the Amiga brand now, you would have to build an image from scratch! It would be a new brand.

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snowman040 wrote:

Waccoon wrote:

Amiga is never going to stand out on the grounds of technical competence without a freakin' lot of money.

How much money is that ? 200, 500, 900mil$ ?

It needs someone with the arrogance, balls and ruthlessness of Steve Jobs (who also has experience resurrecting an ailing computer brand)... I guess it would cost however much he would charge to do the job... Though I doubt someone like that would bother with such a pathetic starting point.

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Flexinoodl wrote:
Damn it's the Steve jobs fan club
Only kidding but lets be honest here, You are talking like only Jobs could resurrect the Amiga which is cobblers.

My point was we would need some one LIKE Steve Jobs, anything less and the Amiga would not have a chance.

I asure you the Amiga brand has nothing of value over my StiffSock brand... Amiga Inc. killed off any value the Amiga still had.

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Hyperspeed wrote:
Flexinoodl I salute you!

I've just read some of the most negative tripe on this thread...

I would rather negative and find myself in a relistic situation fully aware of what needs to be done, than to live in a delutional bubble where everything is ok... The Amiga has had enough of la la land.

The Amiga brand still holds a whopping big clout - you just have to look on the TV text services/newspapers in the UK to see "Commodore is resurrected" as having some sort of editorial grandeur.

You miss the point of a Brand! It's not for the techies (the sort of people who would remember the Amiga), they would buy any machine that was good.

In order to be a sucessful brand you need to build a reputation in your chosen field. The Amiga has no reputation in any field right now, you would have to build one from scratch.

I vote Sir Alan Sugar as the saviour... he's got a billion dollars behind him and Amstrad (his Amiga-competing company) is now on the up...

He is completely the wrong type of person for the job! Amstrad computers, hahahahah... :crazy:

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Waccoon wrote:

Anyone:  Steve Jobs

He's a major A.H.  Profit or no, there's no way would I want someone like that to re-invent the Amiga, because I would probably not like it at all.

Sure he is a huge A.H. but we were talking about saving the Amiga Brand... not about making products that would appeal to the Amiga community. ;-)

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Waccoon wrote:

Bloodline:  Sure he is a huge A.H. but we were talking about saving the Amiga Brand... not about making products that would appeal to the Amiga community.

Ah, so you just want a salesman, and not engineers.  :-D

:-D

Yeah, I guess so... no one comapny could afford the same number of CPU designers as intel/AMD, or the same number of GPU designers as ATI/nVidia or the same number of chipset designers as any of the above... it just makes sense to use thier hardware and repackage it a way (a pretty aluminium case?) that makes it more attractive to the customer... a well thought out OS and a great suite of productivity/home apps as standard for a good price is the way to do it.