HyperCard Mailing List

Having spent donkey's ages fa*ting around with an external USB drive getting my original HyperCard floppies read onto my Mac-Mini, a little bird pointed out to me that "Macintosh Garden" (an abandonware site) had both Hypercard and the Deprotect stack freely available for download.

Having now backed up my HC floppies onto a couple of external drives the question re the abandonware site is rather academic . . .

is "abandonware" just a sort of euphemism for 'old pirate software',
or does it mean that the software is now in the public domain? I must say I don't remember Apple releasing HC.

Hi Richmon,

Yes, in Macintosh Garden's case, it is a euphemism for "old pirate software". IIRC they did actually have some problems with copyright violations once, but this doesn't seem to matter anymore. Still, many software on that website is copyrighted and the orignial publisher still has the right to order MG to remove the files from the site and demand compensation for copyright violation.

--
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On 22 jul 2011, at 15:20, geradamas wrote:

> Having spent donkey's ages fa*ting around with an external USB drive getting my original HyperCard floppies read onto my Mac-Mini, a little bird pointed out to me that "Macintosh Garden" (an abandonware site) had both Hypercard and the Deprotect stack freely available for download.
>
> Having now backed up my HC floppies onto a couple of external drives the question re the abandonware site is rather academic . . .
>
> is "abandonware" just a sort of euphemism for 'old pirate software',
> or does it mean that the software is now in the public domain? I must say I don't remember Apple releasing HC.
>
>
>
>

>Having spent donkey's ages fa*ting around with an external USB drive
>getting my original HyperCard floppies read onto my Mac-Mini, a
>little bird pointed out to me that "Macintosh Garden" (an
>abandonware site) had both Hypercard and the Deprotect stack freely
>available for download.
>
>Having now backed up my HC floppies onto a couple of external drives
>the question re the abandonware site is rather academic . . .
>
>is "abandonware" just a sort of euphemism for 'old pirate software',
>or does it mean that the software is now in the public domain? I
>must say I don't remember Apple releasing HC.

I haven't seen the site, but I do recall similar Websites over the
years. Generally - if memory serves me right - they featured
software that was legacy grade ( not an officially recognised
category ) and/or software where the company had long since folded.

It certainly dosen't mean that the software is in the public domain -
more just that no current owner exists to complain about it.

In the case of Apple; the HyperCard application would definitely NOT
be in the public domain. On the other hand it's always been my
understanding that Apple encouraged the wide circulation of
user-created stacks. The Deprotect stack would come under this
heading.

George
--

The Deprotect stack is now here:

http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/RsHYPERCARD/files/

--- In HyperCard-Mailing-List, George Barker <lynxster@...> wrote:
>
> >Having spent donkey's ages fa*ting around with an external USB drive
> >getting my original HyperCard floppies read onto my Mac-Mini, a
> >little bird pointed out to me that "Macintosh Garden" (an
> >abandonware site) had both Hypercard and the Deprotect stack freely
> >available for download.
> >
> >Having now backed up my HC floppies onto a couple of external drives
> >the question re the abandonware site is rather academic . . .
> >
> >is "abandonware" just a sort of euphemism for 'old pirate software',
> >or does it mean that the software is now in the public domain? I
> >must say I don't remember Apple releasing HC.
>
> I haven't seen the site, but I do recall similar Websites over the
> years. Generally - if memory serves me right - they featured
> software that was legacy grade ( not an officially recognised
> category ) and/or software where the company had long since folded.
>
> It certainly dosen't mean that the software is in the public domain -
> more just that no current owner exists to complain about it.
>
> In the case of Apple; the HyperCard application would definitely NOT
> be in the public domain. On the other hand it's always been my
> understanding that Apple encouraged the wide circulation of
> user-created stacks. The Deprotect stack would come under this
> heading.
>
> George
> --
>

> no current owner exists to complain about it.

True in many cases but I suspect that most abandonware sites don't really
care if the original owner is still around. For example, Cyan (maker of Myst)
has sometimes found their older games posted on Abandonware sites, even
though Cyan is still in business.


> I don't remember Apple releasing HC

They haven't, but after all these years I doubt if Apple would object to
someone posting it, as long as the poster wasn't trying to sell it.

Jim

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On 25.07.2011, at 07:20, hcheaven@[redacted].comwrote:
>> no current owner exists to complain about it.
>
> True in many cases but I suspect that most abandonware sites don't really
> care if the original owner is still around. For example, Cyan (maker of Myst)
> has sometimes found their older games posted on Abandonware sites, even
> though Cyan is still in business.

I think the original criterion was not whether the *company* is still in business, but whether the product (or something equivalent enough) is still on sale. E.g. Myst was released for Mac OS 9, but never for Mac OS X --> Abandonware people are interested in it because retro-computing people are looking for it. (Well, RealMyst was released for PowerPC, but IIRC not for Intel, and it's sufficiently different).

>> I don't remember Apple releasing HC
>
> They haven't, but after all these years I doubt if Apple would object to
> someone posting it, as long as the poster wasn't trying to sell it.


Of course that depends on the lawyers. If Apple licensed technology for use in HyperCard, those might want to encourage new licenses by making sure those people who could make do with the old software can't use it anymore (thus creating or "restoring" a market that's large enough to serve again).

In short: Abandonware is not a legal term. It's technically illegal (or breach of contract, or patent infringement, or whatever).

Cheers,
-- Uli Kusterer
http://stacksmith.com

On 26 Jul 2011, at 12:00, Uli Kusterer wrote:

> In short: Abandonware is not a legal term. It's technically illegal (or breach of contract, or patent infringement, or whatever).

I don't see the need for "technically" in that sentence.

It is illegal.

Tony McCoy O'Grady
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
If I had stopped to listen once or twice
If I had closed my mouth and opened my eyes
If I had cooled my head and warmed my heart
I'd not be on this road tonight

> Myst was released for Mac OS 9, but never for Mac OS X

Incidentally, although it's not available for OS X, Cyan has released
iPhone versions of both Myst and Riven for about $5 each. Although personally I
imagine those games lose a lot when played on a little iPhone screen.


> Of course [Apple objecting] depends on the lawyers

Just to be clear, when I said that Apple probably wouldn't care, I just
meant that their lawyers have bigger fish to fry. But posting it certainly
would be illegal and Apple's lawyers could get involved if Apple wished.

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]