Download PolyLetter 1987 - PolyMorphic

·PolyLetter 8706
Page
I encourage them to do so, and to keep this dialog
going.
-- Bob Bybee, Stone Mountain, GA
CBob, some of your recollections do not agree with
the facts .
1. My OisAsmb .GO was released in June 83, and was
sold by direct mail promotion PRIOR to OIS80's July
83 appearance . By the time OIS80 was announced,
DisAsmb . GO had already sold several copies .
2. I furnished you with the relocatable file bit-map
code during mid 1981, well PRIOR to DIS80, and not
subsequent to it as you just claimed .
3. I sent you a copy of MakeRel and LoadRel on
November 18, 1982. My copy of the NOV/DEC 82
PolyLetter announcing MAKEREL was postmarked
November 20 . 1982. LoadRel and UakeRel were also
direct mail promoted prior to this date .
In all three cases you have reversed the order of
events.
I happen to know that a review comparing DIS80 with
DisAsmb was submitted to Frank Stearns and never
published. I can understand your loyalty to Frank
and your use of SPELL.GO, but that does not justify
misrepresenting the facts. You should have, at the
very least, referred to the records and gotten your
facts straight.
How.ever, let us be a little more thorough in
examining the historical record.
Bob, we had a couple of phone conversations about
the relocatable loader during the spring of 1981,
and knew we were both working independently on the
same item, both of which came from • analyzing the
disassembly of the WPS . GO loader of Poly's. I
cracked the bitmap code first and explained it to
you . This was while I was still in Virgin ia Beach,
which was up until June 1981.
Subsequently we both wrote loader programs using
the information I gave you and our own independent
disassembly of WPS.GO. On December Zt. 1981 you
sent me a copy of your relocatable loader program
which used the info I gave to you . The copy you
furnished me was called LOAD. Subsequent to that, I
began adapting the Poly to use 98 tpi drives and
wrote my program LoadRel and MakeRel to support the
new disk driver routines . Both were written without
benefit of your LOAD program, but used the knowledge
ga i ned from understanding how WPS.GO worked.
On September 19, 198Z you sent me copies of your
disassembly source codes for the ROMS, along with
the comment:
"I'm sending you these files for a couple of
reasons . first, to thank you for the assistance
you've given me on numerous occasions. And second,
because if I didn't send them to you, I know you
could get them anyway from somewhere else . "
I thought your comment a bit strange, but I sent you
a copy of my own disassembly source code in
exchange.
4
NOV/DEC 1987
On November 18, 198Z, I sent you a copy of
UakeRel and LoadRel. My copy of the NOV/DEC 82
PolyLetter, in which your llAIEREL.GO was released,
was postmarked November ZO. Obviously they crossed
in the mail. LoadRel.GO and MakeRel.GO were also
promoted by direct mail in advance of th i s
submission to you, and I had told you on the phone
about both of them Prior to this . At the time I
felt mildly annoyed that you had released and
promoted your own in PolyLetter, but chalked it up
to 'competition'.
This irritation was my motivation when I later
beat you to the punch with OisAsmb.GO by a matter of
a month.
I had been planning to convert DisAsmb . BS into
OisAsmb . GO for quite some time, but finally got
around to completing the job in May, 83 . After
having been 'stung' by you're having advertised your
MAtEREL program even though my MakeRel was first, I
decided to move more quickly on DisAsmb.GO. I sent
out a direct mail promotion in early June, and had
sold several copies by the time the Jul/Aug
PolyLetter announcing OIS80 hit the streets.
While we're on the subject of relocatable
loaders, I have come across a 'third party' version
which . has the original Poly WPS loader messages
still in it. Now that is neither reverse engineering
nor independent development. It is clearly piracy.
What you and I did with WPS.GO was akin to reverse
engineering. We learned enough about how it worked
to write our own . Now, I have never seen your
MAtEREL program in any form, but I did see your LOAD
program after I gave you the code for the relocation
bitmap.
In regard to Ethics, you appear to be guilty of
SO-SO Cnot ZO-ZO) hindsight. You must remember that
those times were before ROllABLE code was established
as subject to copywrite. I quote from my letter to
you at the time:
"As for selling custom PROMS, I won't be the first
one to do so . I know of three others, and none
caused any heartburn with Poly. It ' s not as if I'm
taking away their market, I'm not. l have also made
the source of my custom proms available to Poly for
inclusion Cor not) in their next version Cwho knows
when . .. >.
ten Gudis was most pleasant and
responsive the last time l talked to him . CNov 8Zl.
As far as copywrite laws, ROMable is Cmaybe)
protected from unauthorized duplication and sale,
which I am not doing. I think my Policy statement
"Cleared the air" on the question of possible
"Pirating".
As l understood you from our past conversations,
your point of view seemed to me to be expressible
as: "what is not (expressly) permitted is
prohibited" .
Since you mentioned my study of Eth ics, consider
the following. Article IX of the Bill of Rights
states: "The enumeration in the Constitution of
certain rights shall not be construed to deny or
disparage others retained by the people . " Further,