Nick Says:
March 7th, 2006 at 12:35 pm
I strongly doubt the authenticity of this letter:
1) The sentence “I swear, unter penalty of …” does not make a lot of sense when used by the copyright owner or a lawyer. First of all, if you are the copyright owner, why should you swear that you are authorized to act “on behalf of” him? Second problem, if you’re a lawyer acting on behalf of your client, you usually state that in the very first sentence which will read like this: “Dear XY: We represent Apple Computer, Inc. (”Apple”) with respect to its intellectual property matters.” The sentence in question can be found, however, via google. It is a part of a standard template used to report copyright issues to website owners.
2) The sentence “Apple has a good-faith belief that the use of the Material is not authorized by Apple, its agent, or the law.” is absolutely ridiculous. So Apple is in good faith (bona fide) that it has not authorized the use of the material? Really, if this was Apple, they’d simply state that they haven’t. And if it were a lawyer he’d write that his client hasn’t. Once more, this is part of said template … Additionally, why is the “agent” included? Doesn’t Apple know what its “agents” allow people to do? (Makes sense only if you were to report a copyright issue to website owners.)
3) So the signee writes about “unauthorized shots purporting to be of unreleased Apple hardware, iPod AV (”the Material”)” and “Apple’s exclusive copyrights in the iPod AV hardware”. Whoups. So he explicitly states the name of the mysterious yet-to-be-released product. Damnit. Is he gonna have to face a Cease-And-Desist-letter from Apple now?
4) “The undersigned, authorized to act on Apple’s behalf, states that (…) Apple is believed to be the exclusive owner of the copyrights”. Gosh! So Apple is *believed* to be the copyright owner? So we write this merry little letter and simply assume Apple could be the copyright owner? Honestly, would Apple write such bullshit? Would Apple’s lawyers do?
5) And go on reading the next paragraph of this letter. So first of all, the signee states that he believes Apple to be the copyright owner. But on second thought, that’s obviously not enough, so he changes his mind - and goes on swearing that all the information written above is accurate. Where’s the point?