Re: consider the facts of the Stac case..

[amicus_curious]

"Doug Mentohl" <doug_mentohl@linuxmail.org> wrote in message 
news:goh9sa$moo$1@news.datemas.de...
> amicus_curious wrote:
>
> > Well, consider the facts of the Stac case  ..
>
> Microsoft wanted STAC to give away STACKER, and when they wouldn't comply 
> went ahead and included it in DOS 6.0 anyway renaming it DoubleSpace. When 
> called on it by Stac went to a third party VertiSoft and released 
> DriveSpace, a clone of STACKER :)
>
> http://www.vaxxine.com/lawyers/articles/stac.html
> http://web.archive.org/web/20041207004602/http://www.base.com/software-patents/articles/stac.html
>
> "stac says they are interested in doing something and our proposal is a
> good start" May 1992
>
> http://edge-op.org/iowa/www.iowaconsumercase.org/011607/4000/PX04268.pdf
>
> "Vertisoft will develop the Stacker conversion utility to our spec .. We 
> have a total exclusive to DoubleDisk", May 1992
>
> http://edge-op.org/iowa/www.iowaconsumercase.org/011607/4000/PX04253_A.pdf
>
> > They had very little money invested in that product, far less than
> what they got from MS.
>
> They were a company involved in data compression, before they got fucked 
> over by MS ..

Nothing new here.  Microsoft tried for a deal with Stac and couldn't come to 
terms, so they bought similar technology from DoubleStack and VertiSoft 
which was eventually found to be infringing on the Stac patents.  Stac was 
also found to be violating the terms of the DOS license due to reverse 
engineering.  They eventually came to terms and Stac got close to $100M 
bucks which was about 4 times their total revenues from Stacker in their 
best year.

That may be getting fucked, but I am sure that Stac enjoyed it.