Astrologers who claimed copyright on timezones apologize, drop lawsuit -- EFF declares victory!

A heartening development in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's ongoing effort to secure the Internet's timezone database, which was threatened when an astrology software company called Astrolabe claimed a copyright in the arrangement of the world's timezones. After EFF sought sanctions against the company's lawyers, the company dropped the suit, apologized, and signed a "covenant not to sue."

In a statement, Astrolabe said, "Astrolabe's lawsuit against Mr. Olson and Mr. Eggert was based on a flawed understanding of the law. We now recognize that historical facts are no one's property and, accordingly, are withdrawing our Complaint. We deeply regret the disruption that our lawsuit caused for the volunteers who maintain the TZ database, and for Internet users."

EFF Wins Protection for Time Zone Database

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jackbird

That’s an awfully strongly-worded apology for something already at the point of a legal proceeding. Are they paying EFF’s costs, too?
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_RHG2QORT54PKZY4LHHVHBOZBZY Abe Lincoln

Misunderstanding of the law!!?? How about a complete, total and epic fail on the ability to understand anything with numbers. That sounds a whole lot more accurate to me.
GawainLavers

Who could have seen this coming?

Ha! First!
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_KUVI66S63Q45PKO2ALBFT3NEGI Lindsey

I think people are getting a little ridiculous with copyrighting and trademarking every little thing. Apparently Beyonce and Jay-z copyrighted their daughter’s name “Blue Ivy.” Really? Is it really necessary?
- http://pulse.yahoo.com/_RHG2QORT54PKZY4LHHVHBOZBZY Abe Lincoln
  
  I’d just like the rights to the number 0 or 1. Btw, this is why Intel named it’s (old) cpu the “Pentium”. Intel took AMD to court saying “oh no… ’586′ belongs to us”. And, of course, the judge laughed them out of court. And that’s why the Pentium has a “proper” name instead of a number.
  - http://bhtooefr.org/ Eric Rucker
    
    However, in Europe, Peugeot got any three digit sequence that begins and ends with a non-zero number, and has a zero in the middle.
    - Ashen Victor
      
      Wait… what?
      - http://bhtooefr.org/ Eric Rucker
        
        As in, 101 through 109, 201 through 209, so on, so on, all the way through 909.
        
        It’s why the Porsche 911 is called the 911, and not its original development name, the 901. Peugeot sued when Porsche showed the 901 at an auto show, and Porsche quickly renamed it.
http://www.jeremiahblatz.com/ Jeremiah Blatz

Good news: the righteous prevail. Bad news: the astrology company is still in business and their lawyers are still members of the bar association.
japolo

this bodes poorly for my lawsuit relating to the ownership of the idea that the sun is hot. :/
Roy Trumbull

The astrological signs in daily newspaper listings and in horoscopes are based on where the signs of the zodiac were 2000 years ago. In the interval the Zodiac has acquired a 13th sign. Whatever you say is your sign is wrong. A few astrologers deal with the signs as they are today. But no matter what they do it is still just fleecing of the gullible.
http://imcravingpresidency.tumblr.com/ SedanChair

If you sue me on the astral plane, you better wake up and apologize
- noah django
  
  !
http://twitter.com/sixty4k sixty4k

Any links to the actual full Astrolabe statement?
howaboutthisdangit

If Astrolabe’s lawyers really have such a weak grasp on the law, maybe they should take their law degrees back to Wal-Mart for a refund.

More likely, though, they just wanted to get in on the IP troll, get-rich-quick action.
DewiMorgan

The sign of a good company (or a good person!) is not that they don’t screw up – it’s that they do the right thing once they have done so.

Almost always, the right thing is a public apology, acknowledging the wrongs done and explaining what you’re gonna do about it.
http://twitter.com/eclipticart Thü

Well, its just the consequence of what Astrology is all about. Therefore who believes astrology to be something, believes a lot other strange things too, even owning things nobody can own. But even many big companies do that nowadays.
strumpet windsock

They might want to have a little talk with Sanford Fleming, who did invent time zones.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandford_Fleming
TimRowledge

Oh boy are they in trouble now; I have a patent on the whole apologizing and expressing regrets to volunteers business method.

Profit!!!
Lyle Hopwood

If they’d had a good astrologer, they would have seen this coming.
http://disqus.com/Kimmoth/ Kimmo

We now recognize that historical facts are no one’s property

Well, how jolly decent of you.
noah django

>We deeply regret the disruption that our lawsuit caused for the volunteers who maintain the TZ database, and for Internet users.

translation: “we thought we could profit by tricking a judge into granting us a copyright on a natural phenomenon, but we got called out on our bullshit. please do not DDOS us, internet.”

all my rage.