Commodore USA acquires rights to Amiga name

It must be a bad joke. I think it looks like hoax. But how much this will confuse people and hurt Amiga platform. I'm thinking to give up. It's 2010 already guys.

@Troels Quote:
Unless BigBen actually created "Commodore"USA, I'd be inclined to treat him along the lines of other (far bigger) Amiga personalities - who were seemingly brought-in to add legitimacy to past incarnations of Amiga Inc, and who were conned as much as the rest of us. People like Jamie Krueger (of BITbyBIT Software fame), and Dave Haynie.

Makes you wonder if Amiga Inc. did this just to hurt Hyperion, A-Cube and A-EON's efforts.

I also imagine the Amiga "purists" will be up in arms against them like they are with everything else that isn't the direct spawn of the old Commodore.

@ssolie

Don't underestimate all that UAE-jockeys from Amiga.org/EAB et al. who will happily buy an "Amiga" to play with their OS1.x - OS3.x stuff. Play a littlebit with AROS. And using Windows the rest of the time. Sadly *that* market might be bigger than any AmigaOS4.x (or MorphOS2.x respectivly) market.

@All

Well, no matter what happens around this Commodore-thing, it's for me a name that died in 1994 when the original Commodore went bankrupt. They had the chance with the original Amiga, and couldn't do it anymore...

AROS might seem like an interesting direction for x86-systems, but doesn't provide anything new or special like the native AmigaOS4 systems designed to run on PPC-systems only, at least for now on..

Therefore, i want the real thing and not an Amiga-clone running clone-OSes. AmigaOne X1000 and SAM460ex are
REAL Amiga-systems running the native AmigaOS4, just like
PPC-hardwares are real running MorphOS...

I'm still saving my money for the AmigaOne X1000, and i am not even sorry that i am saving for it. I'm proud of it and this will be the thing allowing me to come home again, to the Amiga community where i belong.

Also, this link should strenghten the belief that this is clearly a violation to the settlement, according to Hyperion themselves. If there are real Amiga-companies i entrust,
then that are Hyperion Entertainment, ACube and A-Eon..

Check the link here: Amiga Inc violate the settlement again..

"In 30 September 2009, Hyperion Entertainment and Amiga, Inc reached settlement agreement where Hyperion is 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 AmigaOS 5 without limitation).[12] Hyperion has assured the Amiga community that it will continue the development and the distribution of AmigaOS 4.x (and beyond), as it has done since November 2001".[13]

If you remember how AROS is developed, it should be mentioned that AROS is built around the Open Source-codes of AmigaOS 3.1. Hyperion Entertainment therefore owns not only everything related to the main AmigaOS and its' source codes, but also the Boing Ball logo and the AmigaOne brand. This is clearly a violation against the settlement Hyperion Entertainment won..

@Helgis

"If you remember how AROS is developed, it should be mentioned that AROS is built around the Open Source-codes of AmigaOS 3.1."

This makes no sense at all, what are you trying to say?

@Helgis
AROS is not build on any AmigaOS code (or so they say;) it is an opensource version of AmigaOS3.1 build from scratch.

Ontopic:
I think Hyperion will stop this madness in a hurry.

It's not like people didn't think of the possibility of Amiga Inc using AROS in place of OS5, so I'm pretty certain Hyperion have taken the necessary steps to prevent that from happening.

Besides, if Hyperion are upset about this. Why not try to enter negotiations about a sub-license of the "amiga" trademark for OS4 compatible computers? (Or directly between acube/a-eon and C=USA)

@orgin

Meaning that Hyperion Entertainment OWN the source codes to everything related to AmigaOS, including AmigaOS 3.1, 4 and beyond.

If Amiga Inc simply asked Hyperion for a license to use AROS in Commodore USAs' line of Amiga-branded PCs, then that would have been better. Since they didn't ask Hyperion, they violated the settlement Hyperion won..

Fairly easy to understand if one reads twice..

@Troels and all

It can be misunderstanding however, but it's clear that this is a violation to the settlement, according to Hyperion themselves..

Ok, to clear this up. AROS is based on Open-Source AmigaOS 3.1 codes. Most components of AROS being open-source-related. Still, according to the settlement Hyperion won,
they own the rights to use whe whole AmigaOS-concept,
being AmigaOS 3.1, 4 and beyond, to develop along with
compatible Amiga-systems designed to run AmigaOS natively.

There, now it should sound as right as possible. It's also what i understand from this..

@Helgis

AROS has nothing to do with any license owned by Hyperion.

Hyperion has no ownership to claim over AROS.

Thus, C=USA could not ask Hyperion for a license to use AROS on their machines since Hyperion is not in power to grant such a license.

The Amiga OS source has nothing to do with the AROS sources beyond implementing the same or similar api's. Hyperion does not own anything that would allow them to prevent anyone else from implementing said API's. Not even Microsoft can prevent anyone from creating libraries and such that are using the same API's as their own components (see wine for reference).


Quote:

There is no such thing as "Open-Source AmigaOS 3.1 codes"

You need to step back and get you head around the concepts involved here since you clearly have made a major mix up somewhere.

@Helgis
Quote:
That is incorrect. AROS is written from scratch and follows the Amiga API. If it was based on 3.1 source code Amiga Inc. would have sued them into the ground long ago.

Edit: removed some bits that just attract flies

@ssolie

I would not start crying if ainc was burried 6 feet below.

@orgin

I see. If that is the case what you say, then explain to the community why Hyperion will bring this case to the court with their laywers in USA. There is clearly a reason for that, and Hyperion pointed it out quite clear it had something to do with violating the settlement...

Perhaps i might have been wrong about something, but still i made a very clear point. Instead of accusing a person like me for being wrong, see if you have an excellent answer to why Hyperion intent to let their laywers investigate the case..

Many of the members in this topic suspected much of the same as i did, so it seems that several were wrong too as well..

@ssolie

It seems that several of us have been misunderstanding the Commodore USA-situation, so it's not without surprise it's pretty much confusing..

@Antique
Quote:
I find it interesting with the passing of Pentti Kouri that Amiga Inc's attitude towards licensing changed dramatically and they settled with Hyperion pretty darn quickly. I suspect he had a very large influence over what McEwen and others were allowed to do.

That doesn't excuse Amiga Inc's past behaviour of course but they do seem to be much more open to new market ideas now. Look at how easy it was for Commodore to get a license for example.

Perhaps this is the beginning of a new era of Amiga licensing for everyone. Oh, but the name doesn't mean anything. I keep forgetting that...

@orgin

Quote:

There are so many reasons why not, the main one being that you would still be locked to one or two mobos, or a custom board, and you lose compatibility with all existing OS4 native software - unless a PPC emulator is written, but then you need to bump up the CPU to a faster more powerful and more expensivce one in order to run the PPC code at the same speed we do currently, thereby losing any advantage we might have gained from the frankly massive time & expense put in porting OS4 to x86 in the first place.

Far better to port to ARM if you must port to another architecture, better price/performance ratio, the handheld market where ARM is common as the main CPU is expanding, ARM based netbooks are supposedly on the way, and there's always the BeagleBoard if you want a cheap desktop solution (although something a bit meatier with decent graphics would probably neat to be planned before a port becomes worthwhile - you need something to develop handheld applications on, after all).

ARM is expanding, and when people finally realise how crap Wintel is, full-blown ARM laptops and desktops shipping with Linux will surely come. It may take another ten years or more, but it will happen (this is my rubbish future prediction which I'm happy for people to point and laugh at in ten years' time)

Far better to be in an expanding market full of cheap potential hardware, than a declining one where people can just run Windows and won't dual-boot for an OS which has no apps. A static market with expensive hardware is not the best place to be either. Give it a few years, and a port to ARM will look like a wonderful idea, but it is too early to do this now.

As for AROS on Amiga-branded x86 hardware, it might draw a bit of interest (which is surely the point of the exercise), and it might cause a bit of confusion (which is probably partially Amiga Inc's intent), but overally it is likely to not make the slightest bit of difference whatsoever.

@Chris

You pointed it out in a much better way than i would be able to do. Thanks, mate

@Troels

Well, AmigaInc plays the last card:
Having the Amiga name as Amiga name, not the OS anymore, so this was "hardware licencing" option on their web site (when it existed).

However, its a shame this Commodore USA Amiga AROS PC is presented as new Amiga, and not SAM line or X1000

That is stab in the back and false adertasing,

There were "All In One" PC`s before.

They just use options Linux and AROS are free, and it seems they employed couple of AROS programmers (good for them).

As AROS development OK (like iMica etc.)
but presented as new Amiga, aaahhh how false
and not including the AmigaOS 4 existance.

If only they somehow explained that this is x86 PC for nostalgia (I hope with E-UAE) while real AmigaOS4 exists, it would be OK.

Now I am interested, will it be the Boing Ball or old Amiga logo?

@Chris

I don't want to get into the old x86 argument so I'll just provide some short answers below and then I won't mention it in this thread again.

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Nope.

Quote:

Only a very insane person would do that.

Quote:

Yes please, perfect opportunity to break away from many of the weaknesses of the AOS architecture.

Quote:

No thanks.