Workbench Disk Sets... What Would Be The Best Way To Obtain Them...

[persia]

EULAs have never been properly tested in court.  Even the US, with it's strong connection to the software manufacturers has no court cases that actually give legal standing to EULAs, only a few that comment on certain policies within EULAs.  Most other countries have less than that.

So basically, until someone can prove in court in your country that EULAs are legally enforceable, it's all in the realm of legal theory.  It gets back to that old chestnut, when I buy a copy of software am I getting the software or just a license or something in between.

[commodorejohn]

Totally agree, the old Operating systems should have been released for free years ago. But I don't see why attacking Cloanto for providing a legal route to get them makes them a bad company!

When did Cloanto start providing a legal route to get them? If there's one point that's been absolutely hammered into the ground in this thread, it's that the Amiga Forever disk images do not work on a real Amiga.

[CSixx]

If you think I'm wrong then go read the law and show me.

Not going to argue grey areas with you, I simply don't care.
I'll offer physical copies via mail for anyone who requests them, and I'll never hear a word from Cloanto or Amiga Inc. or anyone else.

[Franko]

This thread turned out to be a waste of time...

[antonvaltaz]

I wasn't being personal with you I was just telling you what I thought about that particular post you made

No, you claimed I was associated with Cloanto, and that I had specifically joined Amiga.org to defend them against you.

A point you really need to take notice of in regard to quoting posting times, it's ruddy pointless due to the simple fact of things called "Time Zones" the post you gripe about and give a time of 11:40am doesn't show up here as 11:40:am it shows up as 04:40 am. So quoting posting times is useless  it's much simpler to type the actual post number or quote the post or provide a link to the post...

Fair point, I should have used the post #, although in my defence when you actually go to create a new post on Amiga.org, the post # doesn't appear on the 'review' of recent posts.

Between your fetish for "Copying & Pasting" giving exact time of posts and stating the bloody obvious, I can only come to one conclusion... you're weird man...

Can we keep to the actual topic and stop with all the ad hominem attacks?

I still don't understand what your legal case against Cloanto consists of, when their complaint about your file hosting consists of:

(a) they claim 'Workbench' is their trademark (I understand your argument that you don't believe 'Workbench 2.04', 'Workbench 3.0' or 'Workbench 3.1' to be a trademark, but find that hard to believe - although willing to be corrected)

(b) they claim that they are one of several copyright holders for Workbench 3.1 (as co-authors)

(c) they claim that Amiga Inc are copyright holders for Workbench 3.1 (and I assume Workbench 3.0 and Workbench 2.04 as well)

Out of these, (a) would seem to be a fact, (b) would surely be very easy for them to prove. The only slightly questionable aspect is (c) - http://sites.google.com/site/freeamiga/ raises the possibility that perhaps Amiga Inc have not legitimately inherited Commodore's copyrights for Workbench, as they have been claiming all these years. But given that even the recent ruling in the US in favour of Cloanto against Amiga Inc seemed to suggest that Amiga Inc DO hold these copyrights, it seems that Cloanto are acting in good faith in requesting these copyrighted materials be taken down.

So what, exactly, are you legally accusing Cloanto of?

[Steino]

You see Cloanto's only legal claim to the term "Workbench" being used as a tradmark, was issued under the word Workbench being written entirely on it's own ie: "WORKBENCH" or being used as a graphic image of the word Workbench produced in a certain font/image style. For example think of the way McDonalds use their name to distinguish it from any other company that happens to be called McDonalds, ie: the big curved "M" the colours used the style/font used for the name McDonalds...

You are probably not very familiar with trademarks. That trademark is not for a logo, it is for the word in any shape, font, color, etc. You also cannot embed a registered trademark into a composite term, for example by adding a version number to "Workbench". "Workbench 2.04" if used for an operating system name (and not something else, like the other UK marks you found, which are not for an operating system, but for other types of software), would infringe on Cloanto's US trademark, so their claim is valid as I can see it.

but as Cloanto are in no manner whatsoever the Copyright holders of Workbench 2.04 and their trademark was not infringed upon, then as of yesterday I instructed my Solicitors to begin putting together legal proceedings against Cloanto in this matter...

You are probably not very familiar with copyrights either. They don't need to be the "holder", all they need to be is an "authorized agent".

[desiv]

(a) they claim 'Workbench' is their trademark (I understand your argument that you don't believe 'Workbench 2.04', 'Workbench 3.0' or 'Workbench 3.1' to be a trademark, but find that hard to believe - although willing to be corrected)

(b) they claim that they are one of several copyright holders for Workbench 3.1 (as co-authors)

(c) they claim that Amiga Inc are copyright holders for Workbench 3.1 (and I assume Workbench 3.0 and Workbench 2.04 as well)

First, I'd like to say that I've seen antonvaltaz on eab and such for a while.
There does seem to be a proclivity to assume that when someone disagrees with someone else here, they are part of some group/conspiracy.  Not from anyone in particular, this happens often..
Its kind of silly, distracts from the discussion and never makes the accuser look good.

OK, enough of the preaching...  ;-)

a)  I'm lost again..  Did Cloanto's complaint to Franko's hosting mention trademarks at all?  I thought that was just a side-note that was mentioned when someone came across it?  I lose track.. ;-)
b) Part of the discussion is whether or not someone who has the right to distribute also has the legal right (regardless of some comment saying they are required to) send cease and decist letters?
c) I think that's the issue, and Amiga Inc might be the ones who are expected to answer..

desiv

[Franko]

This thread turned out to be a waste of time...

[Franko]

This thread turned out to be a waste of time...

[AmigaHeretic]

+1

Totally agree, the old Operating systems should have been released for free years ago. But I don't see why attacking Cloanto for providing a legal route to get them makes them a bad company!

They ARE NOT a legal route to get them --for people with REAL hardware--

read -->http://www.amigaforever.com/kb/13-145

They have made themselves and impediment.


You have to have ROMs to have an emulated environment right?  The disk alone do you no good.  Franko has no ROMs up.  He is not providing an alternative to Cloanto's product.  The disks do nothing if you want an emulator.  You still need to pirate the ROM's  If you are going to pirate ROM's it will probably already come in a torrent called "amiga_forever_craxord-2011-torrent-blah blah".

I could definitely see Cloanto being pissed if the ROMs were being offered with the disks.  But, 1, they are not.  2, as has been stated, the ADF disks they are offering are not licensed to use on real Amiga's and some images "differ" from the REAL Commodore disks.

[psxphill]

I'm sure EU law dictates you are allowed to make a backup and use a backup of ALL software and this right supersedes all other rights a seller may impose on you.

Nope
 

Not always..
Just ask RealNetworks...
DMCA...
 
desiv

DMCA is not a copyright law, it's an anti DRM circumvention law. As there is no DRM to circumvent then DMCA is not applicable.
 

You forgot to mention that there is the HXC floppy emulator which makes it possible to boot, use, and install amiga software using adfs.

I didn't forget it. As the word "emulator" is in that sentence then I would expect that it falls within Cloanto's emulator use.
 

Not going to argue grey areas with you, I simply don't care.
I'll offer physical copies via mail for anyone who requests them, and I'll never hear a word from Cloanto or Amiga Inc. or anyone else.

I don't care what you do in real life. I don't think that Cloanto will care either as it doesn't have anything to do with emulation and Amiga Inc (or whoever turns out to own the copyright) will have better things to do. However the discussion is about the legality of offering adf's for download, not whether anything bad will happen if you do.
 

And realistically, does anyone who needs a Workbench ADF, for whatever purpose, really have that much difficulty in acquiring it for free with Google's help?

That doesn't solve Franko's problem, but it is the best way of obtaining adf's.
 
It doesn't solve the problem of people who need real disks, however that is a completely different situation with it's own pitfalls. While one would imagine that it's safe to offer the disks as they would have been licensed already, how do you make sure someone isn't upgrading their machine?
 
Providing someone with a set of workbench 3.1 disks and a kickstart rom is piracy & will steal sales from the few remaining dealers.

[Franko]

This thread turned out to be a waste of time...

[AmigaHeretic]

Wow finally someone who knows where I can legally purchase Workbench 3.1 disks, this is good news, please share this with the rest of the community for future reference...

PS: I know I can purchase 3.1 ROMS from AmigaKit but not the Workbench 3.1 disks...

Here I'll say it before someone else does for the 1000th time.

Just by Amiga Forever from Cloanto and get the ADF's for your real Amiga!

What? They are licensed for emulators only!!?!? --> http://www.amigaforever.com/kb/13-145

Oh, maybe we should have a repository when you can get original "UN-moddified" Workbench disks only (no ROM images so people still have to buy Amiga Forever for emulation purposes)  so people that need disks can find them.  

People that pull their old molded Amiga's out of their attic and try to find a Working floppy image to play around with 15 or 20 years later must think it's bat shit insane that there are a few crazy people holding on to a hundred Kilobytes of dead IP with such a death grip.

[Steino]

Workbench... Oops Blatant Trademark Infringement

Would love to drink a cup of tea with you!! Since we can't, let's continue with this distance education program....

There is no trademark infringement by simply writing "Workbench" in a signature.

But if you offer an unlicensed operating system product and stick the "Workbench" label on it, then yes, that becomes a trademark case too, for more than one reason.

[AmigaHeretic]

Would love to drink a cup of tea with you!! Since we can't, let's continue with this distance education program....

There is no trademark infringement by simply writing "Workbench" in a signature.

But if you offer an unlicensed operating system product and stick the "Workbench" label on it, then yes, that becomes a trademark case too, for more than one reason.

Does that mean Hyperion are going to get sued?  Or do they have a license from Cloanto now?

Or has Cloanto gone after their ISP just like they have gone after Franko's

[Steino]

DMCA is not a copyright law, it's an anti DRM circumvention law. As there is no DRM to circumvent then DMCA is not applicable.

The DMCA has several parts. The one that was used to take down the MediaFire files is the same one that applies to take down copyrighted videos from YouTube, etc. There is no DRM involved in this part.

The other problem that Franko has with his UK provider relates to the terms of service. He placed Amiga ROMs and disk images online for which he had no license, and the terms of service say he can't do that. It's as simple as that.

However the discussion is about the legality of offering adf's for download, not whether anything bad will happen if you do.

Yes and no. The discussion turned into Franko whining about Cloanto shutting down his sites/files. But Franko here is conveniently "forgetting" that the majority of items in the long list of files that were in the DMCA takedown request that he posted were not floppy disk images, but Amiga ROMs like this one:

http://i1188.photobucket.com/albums/z406/analogfiles/Piracy/mediafire-com-amigacollector-amiga-rom-download.png

I know what I am talking about because I have a user name on the "Commodore Scotland" site, and I saved a few pages and took screen grabs before they were taken down.

--
Franko 'n' Steino virtually drinking tea together, how does that sound? ;-)