Windows 2 Apples Episode 10

Windows 2 Apples Episode 10

I know I had scheduled a review of the new iWork and iLife 08 suites but the recent debacle with the Microsoft Genuine Advantage or as most seem to prefer calling it Genuine Disadvantage gives me a chance to speculate on why Apple and Microsoft view and deal with piracy in radically different ways.

First let me state, I am not defending Microsoft or others with similar copy protection schemes but I would like to add my two cents (and with the fall of our currency this colloquialism should appropriately qualify my comments).

As a hardware designer and software developer I have been on both sides of the fence. I have two small companies that have, for the last 25 plus years, been developing hardware and software for the physiological monitoring markets.

Our markets have traditionally been small and our products priced accordingly. We were never in the $29.95 a copy market place and had to generate enough income to support our customers and fund the R&D needed to remain competitive in a niche market. Any lost sale to piracy would have been a substantial loss in revenue.

In some cases our software supported devices developed by other companies as well as our own and we were in competition with their software and other third party software developers. We have always prided ourselves on supporting our customers and distributors. This commitment to support and a superior software solution allowed us to thrive in a very competitive niche market.

From the beginning I realized we could only survive if we protected our assets and I developed several copy protections schemes most of which were dependent on hardware dongles spliced between the device and the RS-232 port of the PC. There was no need for software protection when shipped with devices we developed because that hardware was always bundled with our software. This of course is the case with Apple.

Unlike Windows, which can be installed on any Windows compliant computer, OS X is only available on computers manufactured by Apple. The Apple hardware is in fact their software protection. I have to wonder how Apple would handle things if it ever released its OS to third party hardware manufactures. I believe they tried this once and pulled the license from the manufacturer early in the game.

Would Apple continue to ship unprotected copies of their Operating System and applications if some enterprising entrepreneur developed a virtual machine product similar to bootcamp allowing OS X to be run inside existing Windows PCs?

I suspect it was Apples historic reliance on using proprietary hardware to copy protect their software that lead them to surprise and even anger some pundits and Apple fans when they released the locked iPhone. The controversy continues eat up hours of tech podcast time as the attempts of hackers to open the iPhone to cell service provider other than AT&T and to develop third party applications not sanctioned by Apple remain the focus of the geek tribes. The way Apple and AT&T react to the iPhone hacks may offer a glimpse of how Apple would treat customers if its OS were not locked down by the Apple hardware.

As I said, I am not supporting or advocating the draconian schemes of Microsoft or the recording industry but have some appreciation of the costs of piracy. Our copy protection dongle rarely caused any of our customers any grief. And over the years I received many reports from our distributors as well as calls to our own office from people wanting to know why our software, “ so kindly given to them by a friend”, could not be used with their devices supported by our software but not developed by us. The revenue generated by legitimate sales allowed us to continue to support our software long after the manufactures of the other devices dropped them like hot potatoes.

Both Apple and Linux distributions are in a unique position. With Apple, the hardware is the software “dongle” and with Linux most developers profess a non-commercial philanthropic intent.