[OT] EULA and legality

[Richard Gaskin]

Of course the OS X EULA limits use of OS X to "Apple branded hardware", 
which is why the topic is disallowed at the Ubuntu forums because they 
run a tight ship and do not allow any discussion of "illegal activities".

I doubt anyone here in this developer forum would openly advocate 
violating Apple's EULA, and for the record I don't either.

That said, apparently a great many people run OS X in VMs on non-Apple 
systems, and even as the main OS on non-Apple systems, so while Apple's 
intent is clear it's at least physically, if not legally, possible to 
bypass it.

I observe that there are many thousands of Web pages devoted to the 
topic, and even one site that sells non-Apple-branded computers on which 
you can choose to have them install your choice of Windows, Linux, or OS X:
<http://quocomputer.com/>

Quo's been doing this since 2009, and last time I talked with the owner 
about this he says he's not received a cease-and-desist from Apple yet.

What distinguishes Quo from Psystar and other true cloners is that Quo 
doesn't *ship* computers with OS X installed.  What you buy is a 
computer with no OS, and then as a separate service you can elect to 
have them install any of the three most popular OSes you choose - even 
all three in a triple-boot configuration.

This article gives a little more background on Quo:
<http://www.tuaw.com/2010/09/10/psystar-is-dead-long-live-quo-computer/>

Whether this "service" approach will pass muster with Apple's legal team 
is beyond the scope of my knowledge.  Neither Quo nor AFAIK any of the 
hackintosh web sites have received cease-and-desist letters from Apple 
Legal, so it appears the legality of this approach may be currently 
untested.

It may be that if the clause restricting use of OS X to "Apple branded 
computers" were tested in court, it may not survive and would open the 
door to similar "services", which would explain why the multinational 
giant's vast legal resources have not been applied to such cases.  With 
OS X's mere ~10% of the desktop market there's no way anti-monopoly laws 
could come into play, but there may be an argument for restraint of 
trade.  I dunno; I'm no lawyer.

In some respects the situation is similar to the famous Nintendo game 
cartridge suits.  But it's worth noting that while the results have been 
mixed across different jurisdictions, aside from an anomalous victory 
for the Divineo Group in France the global trend has apparently favored 
Nintendo:
<http://www.pcworld.com/article/184075/nintendo_loses_major_antipiracy_lawsuit_in_france.html>

So it may also simply be that Apple Legal has bigger fish to fry, and 
just hasn't bothered sicking the dogs on the hackintosh community. Yet.

I would never advise anyone to willfully violate any EULA, but 
apparently if one chooses to do so by installing a purchased copy of OS 
X onto hardware of his own choosing and keeps a low profile about it, 
the odds of getting in the cross-hairs of Apple Legal appear slim.

--
  Richard Gaskin
  Fourth World
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