Amiga PCs on the way....

[Iggy]

"Our American lawyers will take action against this.

This is blatant violation of the rights Hyperion Entertainment secured in the settlement agreement with Amiga Inc., Itec and Amino."
(source)

Damned right! This is f'ing annoying. McEwen can only be trying to make a little money (and maybe confuse/trash customer's opinion of the Amiga name).

Words cannot express the sense of irritation I have over the truck driver's latest move.

Any of you that buy one of these deserves a sharp slap in the face. If the X1000 isn't an Amiga, well its nothing else. This "Amiga" is a PC.

This is as illegitimate as it gets.

[Iggy]

Get ready to be inundated with AROS users running low cost PCs thanks to the name of the website.

The Amiga name was the only thing Bill really had he could sell, so I probably shouldn't be surprised.

Even his claim to that may not be that legitimate, but what it matter? He's just going to eliminate the last shred of respect left to the community and sh*t on it.

[Iggy]

But this Barry Altman prick of a guy is just a joke and anything he sells stinks of shit.

You haven't contacted him yet. He's one serious asshole! The first line in his response to me was to ask what rock I crawled out from under. Each of you with a viewpoint ought to contact him (the e-mail address is part of the threatening letter to OSNews).

The fact that he's dumb enough to enter into a business relationship with Bill McEwen speaks volumes.

What's most offensive is he and Bill getting together to try to market something created by our community. Hey, AROS may be free, but does that mean that someone with no interest in our market other than making a profit should be allowed to take the hard work of others and slap it into some generic piece of crap and call it an Amiga?

Altman and McEwen? As far as I'm concerned, both notorious con men and serious detriment to the Amiga community

[Iggy]

BTW I did not read every post in this thread, but I will simply ask everyone PLEASE be polite to each other. Everyone has different opinions, just express them politely.

I'll try Red, but Barry Altman's a real jerk. I've already received two messages from him that reference my "balls".

He seems really fixated on testicles.

[Iggy]

Has anyone confirmed if any legal paperwork has been filed?

It's already been confirmed that Commodore USA, LLC is a legitimate Florida corporation. Confirming the Commodore B.V. and Amiga Inc. argeement may take a little longer.

But while would anyone question that part of the operation? The question is, is it are they really going to sell the product and when will they be ready to move forward?

[Iggy]

Avoiding "AOS based commuters"? Yeah, they drive poorly (hey wasn't that an old BMW that just blew by)?

Now if Amiga Inc. is allowed to sell its IP to a seller of non-AOS computers (and its beginning to look that way), we'll just have to deal with it.

[Iggy]

You forgot the other (major, important) difference, those systems run OSes the standard x86 PCs cannot.  That PPC "dongle" unfortunately can't be stuck on your Dell.

The PPC issue didn't affect Apple when it changed platforms. Neither of the makers of these PPC OS' has written off the idea of doing an X86 version.

Personally, I wouldn't buy a PC from Micheal Dell and we must have a different definition of "dongle". If you mean the PPC processor, there are dozens of PPC boards that plug into X86 PCs.

[Iggy]

Oh, no doubt there'd be a lot of work moving from a RISC PPC processor to a CISC X86 processor.
But there's nothing that one type of processor can do that can't be rewritten for another, completely different processor.
One of the real challenges presented by the move to X86 platforms would be all the additional chipsets and drivers need to support the wider variety of hardware.

[Iggy]

Thank you for these platitudes.

Actually, I'm comfortably above having to deal with polite platitudes. I've got nothing personally invested in this. I'm a MorphOS user. I don't use classic or new generation Amiga hardware.  If the MorphOS developers decided to move to X86, I'd probably follow.

But I'm not hung up on the name Amiga. Its just a name. Apparently one you can buy.

[Iggy]

Here's what I got in response to the concerns we've voiced. Some of it's a little harsh, but then so have some of our comments here.

"Here's a blast you can relay to the forum members, please quote exactly:
Commodore USA was not set up as  charity to support the development of AROS. It holds less than nothing of interest or importance to me, or 99.999999% of our intended market. It is a product that I or any other company could not use at all, as it has NO commercial value now, as is. So why are you all so concerned??  
Our support was to help the group move ahead, and be part of a niche hobby group that seemed initially to be  fun. I was wrong. Although some members expressed calm, sane, accurate and positive and open viewpoints, far too many exhibit behavior that is truly reprehensible. What is most amazing is the behavior and comments of the 'Moderators"   UNREAL!! Aros is not a commercial product; it is not even close to a beta functional OS that has any use at this point in it's development. Why some of you oppose the ONLY viable source of support is beyond me. Never has AROS received any promotion or publicity  that comes remotely close to that that was gotten since my intended involvement. Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth. Why some of you find every facet of my life of interest is really sad. Don't you have lives to live?

I'll address some comments in particular. This is business, not nursery school. You know how much was spent and paid for the Commodore and Amiga IP over the last 15 years. Do your homework…we are talking close to 100 million dollars cumulative over all these years and by all the corporate entities that played the game. Price of entry is steep, and so is execution.  Iggy has  tons of more info that for some reason he chose not to share with you all.  

As far as using abandoned artwork, no problem here. Marko Hirv cannot be reached. Period. I tried. No luck. And yes, I did email the company he is at now….again no reply. Find him…I'll deal with him, or anyone else that falls into that category. Ever hear of an Iphone, boys and girls? Guess what…Jobs used it, took it, made it his own…knowing all the time it was the IP of Cisco. Ever hear of iTV, another recent product of the Apple guys. Also, no ownership…take it …use it…and then buy it if you must. Lawyers make a ton and the company gets what it wants, and the IP holder is paid. All good, no? That's just a small example of how business is. I am not saying it is right, just giving you a lesson in reality.

Oh…..ONE MORE THING !!!! All you self righteous self appointed moral compasses out there with the huge mouths and not much else. JUST WHO LICENSED AMIGA.ORG THE AMIGA TRADEMARK PROPERTY APPEARING ON YOUR BANNER MASTHEAD???   NO ONE!!
Any comments on that flagrant violation of trademark law? I'll be most interested in a reply to that one. Very interested.

So, enjoy your little clubhouse, I wish you well, and am sorry my leap into your little pond caused such an uproar. I never knew such muddy pond could even exist.

Barry"

OK, like I said a bit harsh, but apparently heartfelt. Comments?

[Iggy]

If you are always bitching about him and his company, you were never a potential customer to begin with.

I do believe that was one of Altman's points. He really doesn't need to cater to us, we only represent a small part of the potential market.

And if he seems a little peeved, maybe he's got a right to be as he's only trying to get get his company started.

The one thing you've faulted him on (using someone else's artwork w/o permission) could be corrected if the property owner contacted him. I'm sure he'd be willing to work out a deal for the use of the image.

Guys, this isn't any different than selling motorcycles built from third party Harley parts and labeling them Indians.

Besides, if Commodore was still around, what would they be selling? Most likely PCs.

[Iggy]

The thing that annoyed me wasn't that he took an image that didn't belong to him. It was that he deliberately tried to alter it to disguise its provenance.

Not to mention his plagiarised description of the cybernet.

And whilst we're at it.

His faux legal threats to an established, respected news site - OSNews.

Oh and let us not forget - his implied threat against this site.

I don't see his mention of the unauthorized use of the term Amiga in Amiga.org's name as a threat. Only Bill McEwen could issue a threat based on that (and he's never shown any such inclination). I think the point was that his use was legitimate (and that Amiga.org was using that  trademark without authorization).

As to a faux legal threat, is Hyperion suing anyone? While OSNews can claim absense of malice if they legitimately thought this was the case, there has been no further confirmation on this point.

And you guys seem fixated on that artwork and the Pheonix manual.

[Iggy]

Which is utter balls.

That wasn't really a counter argument.

Since Amiga.org has been here for years (w/o challenge), there's no real threat.

Just a point.

[Iggy]

Clearly you didn't bother reading the response directed at you.

Your (and his) "point" is utter bunkum.

Even ignoring for the moment that Amiga.inc have stated in the past that there is no issue with AO,  Trademarks do not work that way.

Oh, you can here for an argument. Well try and actually have a point, rather than just a negative response.

As to his point, "bunkum" or not, he did pay to use Amiga and Commodore.

Do I think there's a problem with Amiga.org's use of the term Amiga? Of course not (if you'd read my response on this matter).

As to taking sides in this, I personally can't because I consider it to be a dead issue. The Amiga name was sold like the commodity it is.

Personally, as a MorphOS user, I don't currently use and do not ever expect to use anything with an Amiga label (be it an OS or a computer).
But, its interesting seeing all of you get up in arms over the matter.

[Iggy]

If a product is licensed, then money is changing hands and the lawyers are happy.

Give it a shot though. Buy some cheap chinese knock off mp3 players, brand them as ipods, call your company "apple" and start selling them.

Let me know how that works out.

I don't want to be the one to break this to you, but Apple hardware generally is made in China with cheap labor (haven't you heard about Foxconn's employee suicide problems).

And that's not really to the point. If Apple was out of business and a holding company had the brand name in its assets, I'm sure you could work out a deal to brand your products as Apples.