[HECnet] TOPS-10/20 copyright status

[Johnny Billquist]

On 2014-11-15 13:38, Dave McGuire wrote:
On 11/15/2014 04:31 PM, Johnny Billquist wrote:
By the way - why do people assume that people would not want to protect
their rights?
This whole attitude scares me a little.

      In this case, it's because the rights are to a decades-old OS that is
viewed by the business world as being nothing more than a long-dead
historical curiosity.

That is a mistaken assumption. Just because most have long since
forgotten it does not mean it is dead.

    Don't take what I'm saying the wrong way.   I love those OSs too.   But
that's not the point.

Agreed.

      We know it's awesome, and we understand why, but let's put it this
way...Windows is fast disappearing, and it's not exactly TOPS-10/20
that's killing it.

Yeah. Not sure how relevant that is, though.

    It's very relevant.   TOPS-10 and TOPS-20 are great OSs, I will never
dispute that, but they are no longer commercially viable in the
mainstream.   We will never see TOPS-10 and TOPS-20 for sale to the
public in retail packages.   Further, it's highly unlikely that we'll see
it making serious inroads in data center use.

    Neither Dell, Apple, IBM, nor HP will be selling TOPS-10/TOPS-20
machines anytime soon.   That's really all it boils down to.   It *is* a
dead platform, commercially speaking.

No. You are making the wrong assumption that it has to be a generic OS for sale to the public in order for it to have any commercial value, or to be a viable product of any sort.

    It's certainly possible (IMO) that it could be brought into this era
technologically, as it has a good base to build on, but I don't know of
any companies or investors who would support such work.   I think it
should happen, but it likely will not.

    Think of it this way.   Remember "wash boards"?   I don't know if you
have a different term for them in Sweden, but they are how we washed
clothes a century ago, before automated washing machines.   It's a rough
metal plate in a wooden frame that sticks out of a bucket of soapy
water, and you rub the clothes on it to flush out the dirt.   If the wash
board is patented, and someone still owns that patent, it's very
unlikely that anyone in the business world would consider that patent to
be worth anything, for the obvious reason.

Analogies are always problematic.

Consider this - a piece of software used in embedded applications is a piece of software you will probably never hear of. Might not even be possible to buy if you tried. Does that mean it is dead, or have no value?

This is the state of TOPS-20 at the moment. It is being used as embedded software, that you'll never see, or hear of. But it's still alive.

But more broadly speaking, any kind of software have the same issue. Just because you do not see it used anywhere does not mean this is not the case. Assuming noone cares anymore just because you cannot find it used anywhere does not work. And even when noone actually do not care anymore, it is still sad when it is assumed that you can take liberties based on that assumption.

Don't get me wrong here, I'm not condemning those who want to run cool software, or play with odd technology, and feel that there is no legal way of doing that. I just dislike when people try to present it in a way that make it sound like it was actually legal/ok/right.

	Johnny