Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Thank you, Tad, that's what I was trying to find out - whether the original poster was redistributing Bookeen's firmware (which would not be legal) or simply providing information about how to install it on other hardware, for people appropriately licensed to do so. If it's the latter, then obviously there's no problem and my concern has been addressed.
I would suggest, however, that before installing the firmware on a different machine, that it would be prudent for people to contact Bookeen and ascertain whether or not their software licence permits them to do so. I have a suspicion (but I may, of course, be incorrect) that it does not.
|
I fully agree that Bookeen has the right to expect that anyone wanting to use the Boo Reader should have to buy the Cybook Gen3. It's a good ebook reader.
However, once a person *has* purchased said reader, and, for the purpose of maintaining said reader, has downloaded a copy of the firmware update, that person has the right to take his or her copy and hack into it for personal use. It should not be used to 'give away' Boo Reader to competitors. Nor to sell the modified versions to others.
I know that Microsoft has made the proverbial "mountain out of a molehill" over keeping OS install discs and using them on later/other machines, but the fact is that a customer *SHOULD* be able to install that OS on any machine s/he owns. (God knows I tend to collect PCs... so the chance of me selling or giving away one of these is slim - at best.
) And look how many people ignore Microsoft's desires. The same reasoning applies here. If a person wants to take the chance of irreversibly modifying a legally-purchased, personal, EB-100 to run Boo Reader from a legally-obtained personal copy of the latest Cybook firmware, then, well, both of those devices belong to that person and he should be able to do so. In fact, he should be able to go the other way - install the EB-100 firmware over the Cybook firmware - not that I've seen any rational reason to do so, but it's the owner's choice.
(And if one of you owns a Cybook and an EB-100 and you've chosen to install the Ebook Reader (ebrmain) app on the Cybook, I *DON'T* want to know that you've sunk to such depths of depravity. Seriously, the reading software stinks!)
Derek