Edible Apple

Well, it looks like we spoke too soon.  Psystar, showing a clear disregard for any semblance of rationality, will solider on and continue to fight the good fight against Apple.  Yesterday afternoon, however, a number of factors suggested otherwise.

First, Psystar’s website had been down for over 24 hours, hinting that changes were afoot for the Florida-based clonemaker.  Second, Psystar attorney Eugene Action told the Wall Street Journal that Psystar President Rudy Pedraza was planning to permanently shut down his company’s operations and fire its remaining staff.  But in light of the fact that Pedraza has previously been sanctioned by the Court for lying under oath, perhaps we should have taken Pedraza’s comments, albeit second-hand, with a grain of salt.

In an email correspondence with Computerworld last night, the Psystar attorney that we all know and love, K.A.D Camara, said that Psystar won’t be going anywhere just yet.

“Regrettably, Mr. Action was misquoted in an early story that seems to have been picked up elsewhere,” Camara stated, “Psystar does not intend to shut down permanently.”

And what do you know, Psystar’s website is back up and running as of Friday evening, though their Rebel EFI software is conveniently out of stock at the moment.  As a matter of fact, Psystar’s entire website looks pretty skeletal at the moment, with no products of any kind available for purchase – which makes you wonder if they sold any PC machines at all.

So what options is Psystar left with?

Well for starters, when Judge Aslup ruled that he was extending the permanent injunction to include Psystar’s Rebel EFI software, it was primarily because Psystar wasn’t entirely forthcoming about what the software did and how it worked.  Accordingly, the Court declined to “bless a product about which it knows little of substance.”

That being said, Judge Alsup gave Psystar a little room to maneuever and noted they would be allowed to file a new motion addressing the specifics of Rebel EFI if it wants to open up discovery on the matter and subsequently contract the scope of the injunction.  And that’s exactly what Psystar intends on doing, with K.A.D Camara noting that “Psystar will proceed to litigate the legality of Rebel EFI through the motion process…” In the meantime, though, Judge Alsup made a point to note that continuing to sell Rebel EFI would be at Psystar’s own peril.

Secondly, remember that Psystar filed a lawsuit in Florida this past August accusing Apple of violating anti-trust laws for tying OS X exclusively to Apple hardware.  Now if this all sounds eerily familiar, it’s because Psystar already raised this issue in the California case, only to have it shot down for lacking any legal merit.

As a brief reminder, Psystar first argued that Apple operated an illegal monopoly in the OS X market.  After that was dismissed, it tried to argue that Apple had a monopoly in the market for premium computers, which was also shot down.  And now Psystar has taken to arguing that Apple has a monopoly in the market for Unix based premium computers.  Now that’s some savvy lawyering right there.

Even though Camara stated that “Psystar will also proceed with its antitrust case in Miami”, don’t expect any surprise rulings to emerge out of Florida.  Psystar’s attempts to paint Apple’s vertically integrated products as monopolistic lack even a shred of legal weight, yet for whatever reason, Psystar seems to think it’s “winning” merely by continuing to present new legal theory after new legal theory, no matter how asinine they may be. More importantly, and as pointed out by Apple in a motion not too long ago, the issues raised in the Florida case have already been addressed in California , and we therefore wouldn’t be surprised if the Florida court eventually decides to either dismiss the case, or at the very least, transfer it to California where it would effectively be dead on arrival.

In taking in all of this nonsense and legal back and forth, one has to wonder why Psystar is perfectly willing to fight a legal battle that, point blank, they literally have no chance of winning.  We can only imagine that Psystar President Rudy Pedraza’s open hatred for Apple is clouding his better judgment, while K.A.D Camara merely sees this case as an un-parallelled opportunity to generate high profile exposure for himself and his firm.