言歸正傳, 那就專談仿冒好了. 開開眼界看看大公司為什麼要高薪請律師當法律顧問. III

老美正反兩方對此事的看法
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http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/artic...L&type=business
Independent developer calls Tiger's Dashboard a copycat

http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/...ves/002905.html
Tiger takes on Longhorn

http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/...ves/002916.html
Apple's Konfabulator? June 29, 2004

Apparently Microsoft isn't the only software company with a penchant for "borrowing" good ideas from others. The people behind an independent product called Konfabulator are pointing out the striking similarity between their product for the Mac and a new feature Apple unveiled yesterday, called Dashboard, which will be part of the forthcoming "Tiger" release of the Mac OS X.

The headline on the Konfabulator home page is "Cupertino, start your photocopiers, a reference to Apple's earlier "Redmond, start your photocopiers" jab at Microsoft.

But like they say, there's no such thing as bad publicity. In that way, this turn of events might not be all bad for Konfabulator. Before yesterday, I'd never heard of the product. Last night, after reading about it on the Corante site, I downloaded it and tried out some of the desktop "widgets." I'm sure I wasn't alone. Posted by Todd Bishop at June 29, 2004 12:22 PM

Comments

I don't know if you remember them, but Apple used to have a framework similar to Konfabulator and you could access things within that framework from the Apple menu: Desk Accessories! In my opinion, Konfabulator's developers simply revamped the Desk Accessory idea for Mac OS X, and should not feel bad that Apple is doing the same. Once we had System 7 with its multitasking, desk accessories were just lumped in with all other applications, and the old Apple menu was expanded to include anything you wanted. The folks making Konfabulator (and now Dashboard) realized that Desk Accessories were actually quite useful because they brought common tools all into one spot that could be accessed quickly from anywhere. They could even have been described as "widgets" that you could use within the desk accessory framework, and developers could make their own desk accessories. Apple didn't complain when Konfabulator stole the Desk Accessories from them, and Konfabulator's developers shouldn't be upset now that Apple has brought Desk Accessories back into their OS after years of absence... even if they did probably get the idea to bring them back by seeing Konfabulator. Posted by: Matthew Smith at June 29, 2004 04:20 PM

Konfabulator stole its ideas from Apple's Desk Accessories - which came out on the Mac OS in 1984. Apple brought back Desk Accessories in the form of the Dashboard. Posted by: James Katt at June 29, 2004 05:30 PM

Oh, yeah, now that you say it, I remember having the calculator, etc., under the apple menu. (Is that what you're referring to?) But that still seems to be a long way from being able to press a function key to overlay a whole slate of programs across the desktop.

At any rate, you guys aren't alone in what you're saying. Check out this quote from a blurb on Dashboard toward the end of this MacFixIt story http://www.macfixit.com/article.php...004062903391029 :
"MacFixIt founder and contributor Ted Landau commented to me that widgets remind him of early Mac OS Desk Accessories." Posted by: Todd Bishop at June 29, 2004 05:52 PM

Damm Todd, Wintard comes to mind when I read this crap. I can only wonder if your computer history only goes back ten years. Here a few links to read up on:

http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.p...e&detail=medium

http://developer.apple.com/document...Devices-16.html Posted by: Joe at June 29, 2004 06:02 PM
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