Psystar Keeps Accusing Apple of Misused Copyrights

We recently reported that a federal judge had allowed Psystar Corp. to continue its countersuit against Apple Inc., giving the Mac clone maker its first win in a seven-month-old battle with Apple. Towards the end of last week, Psystar filed an amended complaint saying Apple had misused copyrights by preventing Mac OS X from being run on third-party hardware.

The Mac cloner's complaint now stresses that there are differences between computers that are simply capable of running Mac OS X - "Mac OS Capable Computer Hardware Systems," and those built by Apple.

"The most significant competitive threat to Apple is not from a new operating system," the complaint says, "but from computer hardware systems manufacturers that may offer a competing hardware platform upon which to run the Mac OS."

Besides this new assertion, Psystar maintains all its earlier claims, one of which is that Apple has (allegedly) intentionally embedded code in Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) that can initiate kernel panics or infinite loops when non-Apple hardware is detected. Psystar believes that such practices are anti-competitive because they reduce the functionality of non-Apple machines to near-zero.

Since intellectual property copyrights covering the Mac OS do not cover these hardware restrictions, Psystar says, this practice is a misuse of copyright through the End User License Agreement, which grants users permission to use Mac OS X only on Apple hardware. The Florida-based cloner asks that Apple's copyrights be found unenforceable until Apple stops misusing them through its EULA.

Psystar also accuses Apple of attempting to "obtain, maintain, and/or enjoy rights not granted by the Copyright Act," through its allegations that Psystar violates the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). Lastly, the clone manufacturer “seeks injunctions 'as is necessary' to prohibit Apple's copyright misuse (under the license and through misapplying the DMCA) as well as any additional relief the court finds appropriate. Otherwise, the plaintiff says, Apple will prevent anyone from offering real competition that uses Mac OS X,” according to an AppleInsider report.

"Apple brought the foregoing DMCA claim in an attempt to chill innovation whereby third-parties such as Psystar would not engage in legal and legitimate development of products that compete with Apple-labeled computer hardware systems," Psystar concludes.

Starting today, Apple has just over two weeks to answer to Psystar's allegations.