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[eben]

For the last few months I've been making sporadic attempts to locate the copyright holder in the Amiga ROMs, with a view to allowing Raspberry Pi users to legally use emulators like UAE. Unfortunately I've met with little success.

Can someone enlighten me as to where the copyrights currently reside?

Eben Upton
Executive Director, Raspberry Pi Foundation

[Heiroglyph]

That may not be easy, the only group I've seen trying to enforce the copyright lately is Cloanto, who would potentially be a competing licensee.

It would be worthwhile to try them though. They might be able to license a portion of their own product to you if nothing else.

Great job on the pi BTW, looks like a good product that I'm very interested in.

[Ezrec]

Of course, you could always run UAE with the AROS m68k ROMs, which are open source (MPL 1.1 variant)

They provide quite a bit of AmigaOS 3.1 compatibility.

[billt]

Originally Posted by eben

For the last few months I've been making sporadic attempts to locate the copyright holder in the Amiga ROMs, with a view to allowing Raspberry Pi users to legally use emulators like UAE. Unfortunately I've met with little success.

Can someone enlighten me as to where the copyrights currently reside?

There's always the free AROS equivalents now... Ah, I'm late to that, sorry for the dupe. Though I would like a link to them, as my first quest came up empty to find them.

[kehil]

According to open source Kickstart alternative try to contact Toni Wilen thru http://eab.abime.net/member.php?u=257 as he is one of the developers. More info for example here http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?...rt+alternative

[Terminills]

Originally Posted by kehil

According to open source Kickstart alternative try to contact Toni Wilen thru http://eab.abime.net/member.php?u=257 as he is one of the developers. More info for example here http://eab.abime.net/showthread.php?...rt+alternative

or he can contact ezrec cause that's the other developer. :P

[Terminills]

Originally Posted by billt

There's always the free AROS equivalents now... Ah, I'm late to that, sorry for the dupe. Though I would like a link to them, as my first quest came up empty to find them.

http://aros.sourceforge.net/download.php

aros 68k iso extract it they are in the boot folder with a .bin and .ext extension.

[Heiroglyph]

I know Toni is only working on it for WinUAE so he will get it working, but as of right now, I wouldn't call it a working solution.

Knowing him, it eventually will be the best solution but it's far from perfect at the moment.

[eben]

Originally Posted by Heiroglyph

That may not be easy, the only group I've seen trying to enforce the copyright lately is Cloanto, who would potentially be a competing licensee.

It would be worthwhile to try them though. They might be able to license a portion of their own product to you if nothing else.

Do you believe they own the copyright, or do they just have a license? Their website implies the latter, but some of their efforts to actually enforce the copyright imply the former.

Originally Posted by Heiroglyph

Great job on the pi BTW, looks like a good product that I'm very interested in.

Thanks. It's been a real labor of love, and it's great to see it paying off.

[desiv]

Originally Posted by eben

Do you believe they own the copyright, or do they just have a license? Their website implies the latter, but some of their efforts to actually enforce the copyright imply the former..

They are definitely just a licensee...
That said, they might be your best contact to either:
a: Find out who the owner is. They should know who they bought it from.
b: Resell it. It's possible, as they are licensed for the ROM for emulation purposes, that they might be able to work with you on a license distribution.

Good luck, and thanx for shaking up the world a bit.. ;-)

desiv

[Heiroglyph]

Originally Posted by eben

Do you believe they own the copyright, or do they just have a license? Their website implies the latter, but some of their efforts to actually enforce the copyright imply the former.

My thoughts exactly. The ownership is quite a dispute with much questionable paperwork involved.

Personally, I think they had a license at one time and are just running with it since there is no one to dispute their claims.

I'm not aware of any licenses in perpetuity.

Thanks. It's been a real labor of love, and it's great to see it paying off.

It shows, I can't wait to get my hands on one. My Beagleboard has been a bit of a disappointment.

[eben]

Well, I've left a message with Cloanto. I'll report back if I get any useful clarification.

[Leffmann]

It seems nobody has been able to answer this for the last 15 years. A quick glance at https://sites.google.com/site/freeamiga/ shows just what a spectacle this is and how much illicit activity it has been surrounded by.

The only party enforcing the copyright is Cloanto, but they say they don't know who owns the Kickstart, and don't seem to be interested in finding out. They don't even seem to know who they got their own license from.

Cloanto are also the only party who profits from selling the Kickstart and Workbench software. What a coincidence.

If someone did own the rights and cared about protecting them then they would've come forward and settled this many years ago, and I more believe the theory that the rights perished with the liquidation of Commodore.

If someone actually still own the rights then it would most likely be Amiga Inc. or Hyperion Entertainment, but if even Amiga Inc. themselves can't or refuse to give any answers then it just further supports the theory that the rights are lost and that the software is in the PD.

If you're able to find any answers it would be great if you could let us know here as well.

[dammy]

Originally Posted by eben

Well, I've left a message with Cloanto. I'll report back if I get any useful clarification.

They can sell it to you per unit, but the actual owner is Amiga Inc which Cloanto has a license agreement with for the WB/KS 1.0-3.1's IP.

[gaula92]

Wow! Eben Upton posting in Amiga.org!

I have my Raspberry Pi since May and I love it. It's currently running Gentoo Linux and the awesome Risc OS.
I believe the way to go would be AROS (native port was talked about time ago..) with the AROS replacement ROM: no need to mess with thieves, in my opinion.
UAE on Linux on the Rpi is NOT a good idea, believe me. To archieve smooth scroll you'd need custom video modes on X and SDL on OpenGL backend. Another option would be the SDL on the framebuffer, with the adequate custom modes in /etc/fb.modes, but I don't know how good is the framebuffer driver for the Rpi.
What's your plan, if you can tell me?