P96 Licensing Status

[supaduper]

The Amiga to some is a Business, and to most a Hobby(our friend majesta ,Vampire king) and a very select few a Goldmine

[apex]

I am maintainer and there are 2 threads on a1k.

One thread is about the P96 license status and one about the strange email mntmn got.
In the license thread you can find a emotional discussion between thorfdbg, the guy who updated P96, and many users. His intention is to get a fully legal P96 solution which include already done improvements and to do future improvements on a legal way. This discussion already started a long time ago in other threads and exploded in the thread about the strange email. He was also upset about this kind of doing business!
The thread is also emotional and after 2 days of exploding minds everyone cooled down. We know the guy behind the email, but what should I say, he is shooting in his own knees... Because now also other hardware developers reported such mails. But a dog which is barking is normally not biting...

A very good neutral summary can be found here:
http://www.amiga-news.de/de/news/AN-...-00057-DE.html

Maybe the Google translation will be better than the one from the a1k discussion. Maybe Amiga-News will offer an English translation in the next days.

I was also upset about many comments, but everyone should now cool down. In Germany we say: Nothing will be eaten so hot like cooked... This 2 threads are really not the AMIGA community!!! There are many other good and interesting projects like the grafic board from Matze and so on...
The people are helping each other to repair every Amiga, no one must day!
You have the better software projects, we the better hardware projects, but WE ARE ALL ONE COMMUNITY!

It is like a dispute with the wife, often is the sex better after a cleaning storm.

A new possibility is maybe CGFX and also AROS RTG, but such things should not discussed with the users, they just need a working solution to be happy.

I wrote this in my holiday on my iPhone, so excuse in advance for everything which will be now written to my post.

Regarding P96, there will be no news from the owners till beginning/mid of June. Then we will see...

[ptyerman]

Originally Posted by wawa

he has only been advertsed it on a1k so far i know. it was taken immediatelly. but this is an early adopters version, development batch. in case it succeeds others will follow, a bit more expensive as it seems, but im glad there is interest to contribute. lukas sounds like a pretty cool guy, and is imho another valuable member won for the community. actually i have a feeling we are growing, not shrinking, at lest here in berlin.

I actually found out about it reading the comments in Matze's card thread on amiga.org where it was mentioned.
He has it listed on his web site for pre-order at http://mntshop.bigcartel.com/product/preorder-mnt-va2000-amiga-2000-3000-graphics-card-zorro-ii-iii,
there was still some left a couple days ago but when I looked today it has sold out.

[matthey]

Originally Posted by supaduper

The Amiga to some is a Business, and to most a Hobby(our friend majesta ,Vampire king) and a very select few a Goldmine

Except nobody is getting rich. Few are even making a profit. Most are losing money if they consider their time (Majsta, kipper2k and Gunnar). The only way to make the Amiga a viable market again is cooperation, moral business practices and sacrifice to build the market which would benefit everyone. Instead, the controlling entities divide, road block, sabotage and back stab for their selfish benefits and deluded visions while some of the smaller players are sacrificing to bring the Amiga back from the brink.

[saimon69]

Originally Posted by matthey

Except nobody is getting rich. Few are even making a profit. Most are losing money if they consider their time (Majsta, kipper2k and Gunnar). The only way to make the Amiga a viable market again is cooperation, moral business practices and sacrifice to build the market which would benefit everyone. Instead, the controlling entities divide, road block, sabotage and back stab for their selfish benefits and deluded visions while some of the smaller players are sacrificing to bring the Amiga back from the brink.

Very similar to a small town dynamics, and Amiga Community has a small town mindset well ingrained without realize is holding them down (is this like a 'me too' post?)

[wXR]

Please open source (and permissively license) all the things?

[idrougge]

Originally Posted by eXeler0

Why would anyone after 20 years (but just shortly after Vampire adopts it as standard driver) suddenly anounce the plan to buy the p96 license (as opposed to any other "solution") and threaten with legal action instead of simply asking for a small license fee for this ancient piece of code? To what end..? well...

Read the mail again. Isn't that exactly what it offers?

[wawa]

a statement by the autor of the message in question has been posted here:
http://www.a1k.org/forum/showthread.php?t=55203&page=18
post#358
unfortunatelly its in german. generally it confirms the suspected origin. the other information is, that after acquiring the p96 standard the driver model is going to be "opened", the licensing model changed, however its difficult to judge how this is going to look like.

the recipient of the message however has apparently refused cooperation, upon the proposal.

[kipper2k]

Originally Posted by idrougge

Read the mail again. Isn't that exactly what it offers?

this is like "He who controls the spice controls the universe.". Now that there has been an Amiga revival as such. P96 is the key to high resolution performance and if a person can lock up the rights it can become a valuable commodity and force other developers to pay up or stop developing.

Fortunately for the community we were able to catch a sniff of the planned future, as a result we can now either persuade the opening up of p96, a low cost licensing system or a community effort to produce a new RTG to prevent a monopoly of RTG grfx. Seeing as Jens S. has now shown he sent the email to Mntmn we now know that it is him that has tried to make plans to buy out all rights for P96, why would someone want to buy out rights after all these years on on old driver, I dont think anyone is naive enough not to know the answer to that.

It is up to the community as to how you want to spend your cash and not be held hostage to only one option.

[eXeler0]

Originally Posted by idrougge

Read the mail again. Isn't that exactly what it offers?

Apart from the fact that my german is handled by Google, I was actually referring to the original copyright holders, not some genius that starts making "threats" even before he owns the technology in question.

"I'll buy the rights to jpeg technology, then you'll ALL be in deep shit, you wait and see!" ..Or something along those lines, does not impress me. Quite the contrary. It's an exercise in bullying, selfishness and stupidity combined. Don't expect me to respect such actions.



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[Zetr0]

Wow.... you go away for a couple of days.....

I doubt ever before the inequities of monopolies have ever played out to such a fashion in such a niche microcosm that we call " Amiga World "


To be honest my opinions are that of my own and since your still reading here are just some thoughts.

1) Our platform should of had a fully supported open platform for both RTG and OS by now -after all its been 16 years since OS3.9 and well over 20 years for an RTG platform - arguably one could mention AROS and I would say touché

2) Intentional or not, attempting to block a competitor using a far from clear ownership of a 20 year copyright - is both nefarious and desperate, and will land a large suit of law that only solicitors profit from.

3)In regards to RTG, I would love to see an Open Zorro system, like OpenPCI, I feel that this is a missed opportunity by our community - but no one that need continue to be missed.


All in all, I am firm believer in the; If there isn't a "thing" to do "XYZ" lets make one... admittedly getting X, Y and Z all working can be an utter fut-buggery at times -

The fact we have such a strong and talented community across multiple developments can really finally get our "Amiga World" a little more open and a lot more accessible.

[eXeler0]

Originally Posted by Zetr0

2) Intentional or not, attempting to block a competitor using a far from clear ownership of a 20 year copyright - is both nefarious and desperate, and will land a large suit of law that only solicitors profit from.

Are we few , we who think people over-estimate how much this is worth? I can easily see lawyer fees - by far - exceed the money that can be collected from the community or some loner doing some hobby project for no profit.. a nische hobby market. Don't expect Robert Kardashian - style lawyers in such a case.
And who exactly are they going to sue after untangling this legal "ball of yarn" mess?
It's not like they could target a big company to bring home some serious cash.
The lawyer you hire for this case is that guy that failed law school and can be paid in food coupons and free coffee :-)

The cost of actual legal action vs the potential pay off is probably why someone would resort to premature threats rather than going through the whole procedure of first acquiring a product with messy legal status the proceed with the law suit...

Oh well...
In a way, all this is actually somewhat amusing to witness..


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[OlafSch]

Originally Posted by eXeler0

Are we few , we who think people over-estimate how much this is worth? I can easily see lawyer fees - by far - exceed the money that can be collected from the community or some loner doing some hobby project for no profit.. a nische hobby market. Don't expect Robert Kardashian - style lawyers in such a case.
And who exactly are they going to sue after untangling this legal "ball of yarn" mess?
It's not like they could target a big company to bring home some serious cash.
The lawyer you hire for this case is that guy that failed law school and can be paid in food coupons and free coffee :-)

The cost of actual legal action vs the potential pay off is probably why someone would resort to premature threats rather than going through the whole procedure of first acquiring a product with messy legal status the proceed with the law suit...

Oh well...
In a way, all this is actually somewhat amusing to witness..


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do not underestimate how even threatening can help. Jens S. has a long history to talk down any possible hobby competition and who wants to get in legal trouble just for hobby when there is nothing to earn. Of course that does not work for Vampire or FPGA Arcade f.e. but it can work for small projects, mostly only one person behind. Do not forget, he is earning money on the small market and gets under pressure now because being both very expensive and having only uncompetitive hardware. Vampire will become available on big hardware too for sure and then (latest) most of his hardware will become obsolete.

[OlafSch]

Originally Posted by daxb

I just want to notice it again. Don`t take the stuff written on a1k.org serious because the most posts are guesswork, wrong, attacks and meanings based on prejudices. wawa and OlafSch are part of that.

<br />
<br />

now what? The person behind now officially is the suspected

[Paul_s]

Originally Posted by OlafSch

do not underestimate how even threatening can help. Jens S. has a long history to talk down any possible hobby competition and who wants to get in legal trouble just for hobby when there is nothing to earn. Of course that does not work for Vampire or FPGA Arcade f.e. but it can work for small projects, mostly only one person behind. Do not forget, he is earning money on the small market and gets under pressure now because being both very expensive and having only uncompetitive hardware. Vampire will become available on big hardware too for sure and then (latest) most of his hardware will become obsolete.

and his company is fast becoming obsolete.

[wawa]

Originally Posted by kipper2k

this is like "He who controls the spice controls the universe."

frank herbert has foreseen few developments we are currently dealing with, just to mention that the desert planet houses a worlds essential resource everybody goes battling about because imperias can decline about it. not that it was as hard to come to his conclusions equipped with some basic knowledge about the practices of history of colonialism and imperialism..

Fortunately for the community we were able to catch a sniff of the planned future,.

alas its not enough to take a sniff..

as a result we can now either persuade the opening up of p96, a low cost licensing system.

we cant persuade anybody, except he lets himself persuade or does it of his own good will.

or a community effort to produce a new RTG to prevent a monopoly .

i and few others have stressed such issues in a foresight what might happen, however what needs to happen is an action. and it means cooperation between parties of concurrent interests. such as apollo, mist, mntmn, fpga arcade. aros not to mention the least at an end.

btw thats why i was asking questions about the kickstart licensing issues. not of hostility but of concern, that some critical corner cases may block a promissing developments.

[Interceptor]

so after 9 pages of this crap, did Jens write that original 'threat message' or not?

Yes/No/We Don't know yet?

[McTrinsic]

He wrote a series of messages of which only one in the middle was posted and put out of context.

It's far more complicated than just saying "it was him".

So before any bashing make sure you understand what the complete communication was about, including the replies by the recipient.

Cheers,
McT

[dirkies]

To Jens' defense: thanks to him the Amiga market survived all those last years while 90s accelerators were resold for silly prices, his hardware has always been top notch build quality, his after sales support aswell, and frankly i do not regret buying any stuff from him. I also have no problem he makes money out of it, it's his full time job! It's not that one out of context mail suddenly makes him an enemy of Amiga. He's not perfect and neither is any of us.

[trixster]

For those of us who don't speak German, care to enlighten us with a decent translation of all the messages, in order and in context?