If I buy something, it's generally held that I can do what I want with it. If you give me something, that's an entirely different situation. If I buy the rights to something for a certain period, you can be darn sure that there's an agreement I'm signing. This specific issue of processors being sold with an unlock code is happening at the retail level. Typically at this level, you're buying it lock stock and barrel. We're chartering new territory in this specific area. I'm familiar with the concept that you can give or sell something with restricted rights. Those kinds of agreements are usually contractual and occur between buyers with resources to spend on the transaction process. We are now seeing similar transactions move into the retail space, except we have buyers and sellers with vastly different resources, and that is where case law needs to be generated, and is indeed being generated (iPhone jailbreaking). To the average consumer (who, I'll admit is generally speaking dumb) they believe that if they go into the store to buy something, they own it and can do with it what they please, generally they operate the item in a way the manufacturer intended, sometimes not, and they (generally) should be free to operate it as they wish.
If, as a coproration you take a risk and ship a product with more capabilities that you wish to unlock later, either do a better job of QA in locking down said feature, or don't grumble when someone spends their time and their effort to unlock it. Are your manufacturing costs lower? Sure. But you're still maknig profit, just not at your desired level, so therefore, raise it to your desired level. If you find that your product doesn't sell at that level, then perhaps the market is right and your price is set incorrectly. Again this is at the retail level, if you in a business to business transaction signed a contract agreeing to not reverse engineer or figure out how to unlock additional features, then I'd side with the manufacturer. At the retail level, I'll side with the consumer, because the power level of the buyers and sellers are vastly different. Yes, caveat emptor and all that, but it's really an empty saying when the market favors the seller. On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 10:58 AM, Ken Schaefer <k...@adopenstatic.com> wrote: > There’s nothing “new” about this in case law whatsoever (at least from > English common law – I’m not familiar with continental law) > > > > Licencing has been around for the better part of 200 years. The ability to > split the rights of property into distinct parts (e.g. you can give > possession to one person for the term of their life, and then have it pass > to someone else) has been around for at least a century. > > > > Cheers > > Ken > > > > *From:* Jonathan Link [mailto:jonathan.l...@gmail.com] > *Sent:* Tuesday, 21 September 2010 9:58 PM > > *To:* NT System Admin Issues > *Subject:* Re: Intel wants to charge to unlock features already on your > CPU > > > > Typically, that involved the single issue of illegal possession of some > physical item. > > > > There's a whole area of new law that needs to be made on this area. We're > now in the situation where I legally own something, have legal physical > possession, but you're retaining certain rights in relation to that item, > and we've signed no agreement to that effect. We have 3,400+ years of, if > it's mine, I can do what I want with it, too. We have case law to that > effect. Are we now putting EULAs on hardware? > > On Tue, Sep 21, 2010 at 9:43 AM, Raper, Jonathan - Eagle < > jra...@eaglemds.com> wrote: > > Isn't stealing illegal in most countries? IIRC, that concept goes all the > way back to the days of Moses...about 3,400 years ago, give or take a > century ;-) > > > Jonathan L. Raper, A+, MCSA, MCSE > Technology Coordinator > Eagle Physicians & Associates, PA > jra...@eaglemds.com > > www.eaglemds.com > > > > -----Original Message----- > From: Ben Scott [mailto:mailvor...@gmail.com] > > Sent: Tuesday, September 21, 2010 9:00 AM > To: NT System Admin Issues > > Subject: Re: Intel wants to charge to unlock features already on your CPU > > On Mon, Sep 20, 2010 at 10:51 PM, Ken Schaefer <k...@adopenstatic.com> > wrote: > > You are getting what you paid for. And if you then decide you need > something better, you can unlock those features without having to replace > your CPU. > > It wouldn't bother me so much except that you're actually getting > the hardware, and then these companies inevitably try to enforce their > business model through legislation which makes "unapproved activation" > illegal. > > -- Ben > > > > > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ > ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ > > --- > To manage subscriptions click here: > http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ > or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com > with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin > ~ Finally, powerful endpoint security that ISN'T a resource hog! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbeltsoftware.com/Business/VIPRE-Enterprise/> ~ --- To manage subscriptions click here: http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/my_forums/ or send an email to listmana...@lyris.sunbeltsoftware.com with the body: unsubscribe ntsysadmin
