I have no concrete evidence that there is a lawsuit taking place, all I know is that about 18 months ago, Hyperion Entertainment were seeking legal advice regarding the use of the Amiga name, which I believed was going to lead to a lawsuit.
Now whether this has happened or not, cannot say, I apologise to everyone if I have inadvertantly mislead anyone here. I do not know whether indeed a lawsuit has been filed.
Amiga Inc. licensed the brand name Amiga to C=USA.
IANAL, but...
If it was NOT written in the contract between the two parties then Amiga Inc. can be held accountable for branding abuses that follow as a consequence of this omission. C=USA could then turn around and sue Amiga Inc. for presenting a legal agreement in which they were not in a legal position to present and pursue compensation through the courts for damages.
If it WAS written in the contract between the two parties, then C=USA is in breach of contract and Amiga Inc. can revoke the license granted to C=USA with zero compensation.
C=USA have clearly the breached the contract, but how was the contract drawn up? And why have Amiga Inc. not revoked C=USA's license?
If Hyperion are to stand any chance of owning the brand 'Amiga' - the first question I would pose to the court is - how could Amiga Inc. (a technology company with all its history) be so naive to think that C=USA would NOT want to produce a computer product when the brand Commodore itself (of USA) has a long history as a computer manufacturer?
EDIT: So I can gather from what I haven't learnt Ben Hermans is himself a qualified lawyer. A great position to be in all things considered, he will know with some certainty his legal position on this matter which will no doubt work in Hyperion's/his favour either way.
Edited by djrikki on 2011/11/1 15:17:58 Edited by djrikki on 2011/11/1 15:19:51
I'm not sure what you're getting at here. The 2nd article linked to, misses the point entirely.
The comment from Hyperionmp must be examined in context of which it was offered. It was made in response and TO the OP in the thread who quoted:
"Commodore USA to relaunch Amiga brand with series of AROS desktops"
Considering that the result of this was CUSA's withdrawal of this claim, it should be obvious that this was about an operating sytem considered for use with the newly branded Amigas and not about the brand "Amiga" per se.
This occurred approximately 2 months after the above referenced statement from Hyperionmp. Whether you see a connection to that or not...I'll let you decide.
Snuffy wrote: Hi L8Knight, > Amiga site says: you manage your systems with our powerful hardware/software M2M communications solution... I have the impression the device has nothing to do with Amiga OS, yes?
Grand Blanc, imagen that! Detroit and Mt. Clemens area here... You, me, Paul Zager and Ken Lester Jr. are the only Amigans existing in the whole state, I'm aware of. Not sure about Ken anymore?
Hey Snuffy!
Yikes... We really need to start getting some recruits, huh? Still have friends that own Amigas but sadly never have time to turn them on. I'm hoping I'll get an X1000 and start to bring them back into the fold. Good to hear that I'm not /the/ only Amiga fan still around these parts! :)
Though I agree with the general sentiment that this is not an "Amiga" tablet, last I hear Amiga Inc. is still licensing the name/trademarks to Hyperion to continue Amiga OS4 development. So until Hyperion truly owns the Amiga IP, I think Amiga Inc at least deserve a mention for their new products. (If Amiga Inc were to go bust, I fear what would happen to all the progress that has happened recently...)
As part of the settlement that ended Amiga Inc's lawsuit, Hyperion was:
Quote:
... granted an exclusive, perpetual, worldwide right to AmigaOS 3.1 in order to use, develop, modify, commercialize, distribute and market AmigaOS 4.x (and subsequent versions of AmigaOS including without limitation AmigaOS 5) in any form, on any medium and for any current or future hardware platform under the exclusive trademark “AmigaOS” (Amiga operating system) and using other associated trademarks (such as the “BoingBall” logo).
Hmmm....ok. I guess I missed that part. So Hyperion can make AmigaOS 5 (or later) ? For some reason I was under the impression that their license was limited to OS4. Good news!! Thanks for pointing that out. I'm still hopeful that maybe someday all "Amiga" companies will play together again.
Well while announced laptop is somehow similar to other Amiga rebadgings, difference is that Sinclair UK (new name for CUSA) and NoCoin (iCoin) really use existing products that are rebranded with nothing added or invested R&D.
With the (Lime?) nettop is one of very few PPC based nettops, that has an OS (AmigaOS) ported to it. Its no different then AmigaOS 4 for e.g. Pegasos II, Classics with PPC, SAMs or MOS for MacsPPC. Its the AmigaOS that has been ported to certain hardware of any PPC manufacturer and that is the work and added value, while so far, mentioned licencees of AmigaInc don`t hold much innovation, just the exploit side.
Hmmm....ok. I guess I missed that part. So Hyperion can make AmigaOS 5 (or later) ? For some reason I was under the impression that their license was limited to OS4. Good news!! Thanks for pointing that out. I'm still hopeful that maybe someday all "Amiga" companies will play together again.
AmigaOS 4 and all further releases, so AmigaOS 5 by Amiga Inc is dead. Or far better, there is a way that in process AmigaOS 4 can grow maybe to something similar with much more of original Amiga spirit.
Amiga companies are down to Hyperion and their hardware partners, MOS developers, AROS developers, Natami developers and few small software companies. Amiga Inc just isn`t there anymore, especialy after court case with Hyperion. Only thing left for Amiga Inc is to sell Amiga (but not AmigaOne, and AmigaOS) name to whoever wants it and that is exactly what we are witnessing. So expect more of "Amiga" phones, tablets, TVs ...