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Omnimaga => News => Topic started by: critor on February 22, 2013, 05:58:03 am

Title: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 22, 2013, 05:58:03 am
It is commonly held, and explained on many sites distributing ROM images (for instance for gaming consoles), that downloading them for emulation purposes is legal if one has the hardware containing said ROM image.

Actually, the problem is much more complicated, and this "rule" is not legal, in the sense that it's not part of any piece of law.



At the end of the previous century, the TI calculators community spent significant effort on producing TI graphing calculator emulators, in which each user had to manually enter a ROM or OS image retrieved by his/her own means. That way, emulator authors passed legal problems (if any) on to their users.

Over the last few years, many changes have occurred in the emulation field:
(http://i43.servimg.com/u/f43/13/23/13/53/z80onl10.gif)
(http://img.removedfromgame.com/imgs/jstified76.png)

However, things also evolved on TI's side:
(http://i72.servimg.com/u/f72/13/23/13/53/smartv10.gif)
(http://i72.servimg.com/u/f72/13/23/13/53/produc10.png)



In this context, as mentioned on #cemetech, a "small" change has just been introduced in the TI-Software/App license, presented to users when downloading an OS from TI's site:
(http://i72.servimg.com/u/f72/13/23/13/53/eula10.png)
Quote from: TI
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS APP SOFTWARE LICENSE AGREEMENT   

By downloading the software and/or documentation you agree to abide by the following provisions.   

    Licence: Subject to your payment of any applicable license fee, Texas Instruments Incorporated ("TI") grants you a license to copy and use the software program(s) on a TI calculator and copy and use the documentation from the linked web page or CD ROM (both software programs and documentation being "Licensed Materials"). In addition to the copy resident on your calculator, you may keep a copy on your computer for backup / archive purposes only.

    Restrictions: [..]: You may not use the Licensed Materials on any emulator of a TI calculator unless the emulator is obtained from TI.



Yup, from now on, using TI's OS images with community TI calculator emulators is forbidden, which is in complete contradiction with the simplistic rule mentioned at the beginning of this post. :'(

Of course, we can think of the fact that no-fee virtual calculators that emulators provide conflict with calculator sales: why buy a physical calculator when one can have a virtual calculator on the computer for no fee ?
Several years ago, the "problem" didn't exist, but nowadays, smartphone or tablet are computers with a form factor not larger than calculators (and they're much more powerful !), so the situation changed...



Some persons will say that TI needs to evolve instead of taking part in downhill battles...
But however, let's try to look beyond the facts, as there might be even more important issues at stake. So, as we're now allowed to use ROM and OS images only with emulators provided by TI... would this mean that TI intends on investing even further in the area of simulation and emulation of their products?

We're impatiently and excitingly awaiting:
But we can also wish that TI removes such clauses...



Situation to be watched...



Source:
#cemetech (http://www.cemetech.net/projects/tisax.php) via http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=11296&p=135986


Edit: Indeed, TI is planning an online TI-84 emulator for the PARCC mathematics assessments for High School as you can read here (in french):
http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=10813
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: harold on February 22, 2013, 06:02:01 am
Does this apply to the OS obtained when buying a calculator as well, or only to an OS downloaded from TI's site?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 22, 2013, 06:03:11 am
How are they gonna check if you use an emulator? I do not use an emulator on my pc when I want to test software before uploading it to my calculator to protect it. I have not dumped the rom to my computer because I knew it would become illegal in a few years.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Lionel Debroux on February 22, 2013, 06:22:13 am
Attempting to criminalize users for doing anything that interacts with the greed for money of a select few, and the current situation in which they're milking customers through low-end products at persistently high price tags (a clear failure for the so-called "free market"), is despicable, corrupt business practice.
The music and movie majors are doing it, too, and it's not a good thing to be compared to majors wrt. greed and corrupt business practices...
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: northern_snow on February 22, 2013, 06:37:34 am
See, HP has released various emulators (hp15c, hp39gII, hp35s and so on) freely and officially on its website, while TI is trying to restrict community calculator emulation and sell the official emulator???

CASIO fx-9860/CG series are much more powerful than TI-83/84: higher resolution, faster CPU and higher precision accuracy.

Once more TI stands at the opposite of the community :(

PS. If TI is going to ban the jsTIfied, I think we can set up a server in P.R.China
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Adriweb on February 22, 2013, 07:28:39 am
If TI is going to ban the jsTIfied, I think we can set up a server in P.R.China

If that's ever going to happen (I doubt it....), we can actually say that jsTIfied is 'just' a z80 emulator that happens to emulate TI z80 calculator quite well... :D After all, it's up to anybody useing it that TI can be angry at, not a service provinding legal emulation which doesn't host anything of TI.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: chickendude on February 22, 2013, 07:55:27 am
How long ago was this added? It's possible it's always been there but we haven't noticed it 'til now. Really it's just yet another sign that TI doesn't really care about us, which i suppose isn't any sort of surprise. Like any (successful) company the $$$ comes first. Even if they did try to enforce it, though, trying to wipe out their (free) competition to force users to use their (non-free) "simulators" (i don't know if they even have debugging support...? Certainly nothing comparable to community emulators) would just be laughable. I can't see it having any effect apart from increasing the number of places you can find TI ROMs online.

Maybe a decade ago it seemed like half the community ended up working for TI at some point or another, now TI seems to be trying to push itself as far away as it can from the community ;)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: pimathbrainiac on February 22, 2013, 08:01:01 am
NUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU :'( :'(

Does this mean I can't use wabbit anymore?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: TIfanx1999 on February 22, 2013, 08:01:48 am
Wow, I thought this was fake news. I literally had to go to TI's website and check it.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Streetwalrus on February 22, 2013, 08:05:24 am
Just ignore this clause. I don't think they'll ever sue every emulator user, and there are some emus in circulation that have no author attached to it (no longer maintained), such as VTI.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Stefan Bauwens on February 22, 2013, 08:21:34 am
I did and do not submit to this. Therefore I have right to use any emulator I like.
No emulator, or online emulator has to dissapear since there's no problem(apparently) providing the tool. The problem is submitting to this and using the tool.
Don't submit and be free.(I guess?)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Xeda112358 on February 22, 2013, 08:25:48 am
This part of the license wasn't in place before, so when I downloaded the OSes, I did not have this stipulation to agree to. If I need to, I just won't download anymore of their OSes :P If I want a new OS, I will use a community made one or make my own :P
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: SpiroH on February 22, 2013, 09:29:49 am
I think that these Math/Science sellers are getting a bit scared that their profit margins will somehow be at risk with the advent of powerful community emulators that challenge theirs.

My guess is that, if anything, this will only contribute to foster the appearance of even better community emulators in order to get rid of this sort of ridiculous dictator-like behaviour.  After all, we all know that many (if not all) of the Maths's algorithms they include in their OSes belong to the Universe, to whom they don't pay a single dime.

They are are just a (small) TI company, doing the same thing for decades and decades, how do they dare to threaten the world in general? It's just pathetic, but OTOH somewhat typical too. :(
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 22, 2013, 09:30:45 am
I doubt TI has a legal case with jsTIfied and any emulator that was written without using any code from TI. Granted, TI could very well force authors to no longer provide any skin of their calculators and instead replace them with custom skins, but that's as far as they can go, since the emulators themselves contains no code from the calculators.

If TI ever got able to take action, then we would end up being stuck with their shitty ass emulators with horrible grayscale.

That said, I think TI might have a legal case for emulators that includes the ROMs or if they let you select the ROM on the server on which it's hosted.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Hayleia on February 22, 2013, 11:24:06 am
But lol, do they really think someone will pass all his/her life on an emu without buying the calc ? I mean, if you don't buy the calc, you are not interested in calc, so you don't emulate it. And if you use an emulator, it is to code things for your calc without fearing to crash it, or to try a calc that you will buy.
They are just preventing potential customers to try and buy their products, and customers to profit from their already bought device.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 22, 2013, 11:44:38 am
They CAN sue the creator of the emulator, right?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: TravisE on February 22, 2013, 12:32:35 pm
There's nothing wrong with an emulator, if it doesn't include any code it doesn't have a license to include. It just mimics a particular set of hardware. You could write your own code for the emulator and run just that. Copyright law has nothing to do there.

I'm not a lawyer, but I don't really see how they could ban an emulator skin that someone created themselves and allowed everyone a license to use it. It's just a picture of the calculator. It'd be pretty ridiculous if the makers of any product could stop you from taking a picture just because it had that product in the background somewhere.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 22, 2013, 01:14:08 pm
But what if I was to port the hardware to an fpga.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Juju on February 22, 2013, 02:24:09 pm
Well, that sucks.

Actually, under that rule, the emulators are perfectly legal, but their utilisation with TI's ROMs aren't. So I guess someone could always create a TI-OS-compatible OS, like what they did with ReactOS.

Anyway, you still should be safe as this rule probably isn't even legal (something about backup copies or something, plus some law about criminalizing stuff retroactively), and they have absolutely no way to enforce that rule (unless they add some mechanism that detects an emulator in the boot2, but I'm pretty sure that can easily be circumvented). So, I'm no lawyer, but I'm pretty sure the worst it would do is to void your probably already inexistant warranty.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Adriweb on February 22, 2013, 02:32:05 pm
the emulators are perfectly legal, but their utilisation with TI's ROMs aren't.
I believe it's exactly that.

Kinda the same thing with the torrent/p2p programs, whiel it's perfectly legal, 99.9% of their use go against copyright laws, but that's actually up to the users. Here, the emus are perfectly legal, and they actually happen to be z80 but optimized on the ti-calculators side, kind of.
I guess then it'd be only legal to put OSes like PongOS on them for example.

The blurry implîcations of this stipulation is whether it's retro-active for whatever was done before this rule happened. I can't think how that would be so, though. SO I guess we have nothing to fear, really, at least for anything done before this license got updated....

We acn only wait&see or what could happen. Maybe some big news during the T3 abuot all that, actually ?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 22, 2013, 02:38:52 pm
The OS is a free download from TI. They made it but how can they tell us what to do with it and what not? Another (silly) example: If there is a calculator image for download (.8xp) from the TI website and I would like to set it as my wallpaper, but they told that it is forbidden to do that (don't ask why) how can they tell me not to do that?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Ranman on February 22, 2013, 02:46:59 pm
Is this really a new addition to TI's legal agreement? I could have sworn I read that same line like 8 years ago when I downloaded an OS for my TI-89.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: AngelFish on February 22, 2013, 02:54:25 pm
The OS is a free download from TI. They made it but how can they tell us what to do with it and what not? Another (silly) example: If there is a calculator image for download (.8xp) from the TI website and I would like to set it as my wallpaper, but they told that it is forbidden to do that (don't ask why) how can they tell me not to do that?

Legally, you are only allowed to use the software if you follow the license restrictions. In actuality, I doubt they'll be able to enforce this restriction since it only applies to USERS and not emulator authors.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 22, 2013, 02:55:30 pm
edit: **

Let's run the OS on another emulator. If it's not a TI calculator emulator it's legal :D
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Builderboy on February 22, 2013, 03:05:55 pm
Cool story TI, I'm going to go boot up wabbit now...
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 22, 2013, 03:06:56 pm
Place this in your signature :)
(http://www.bcs1.org/webpages/hsmath/imageGallery/wabbit128x128_5e967b55-e122-414d-be68-7fa6f1f71ace.png)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Darl181 on February 22, 2013, 03:23:41 pm
(http://www.omnimaga.org/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=8057.0;attach=9637;image)
;D

TI never ceases to amaze me with this stuff..

Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 22, 2013, 03:50:44 pm
Is this really a new addition to TI's legal agreement? I could have sworn I read that same line like 8 years ago when I downloaded an OS for my TI-89.

Here is a part of the old french TI-App Software EULA from last year:
Quote from: TI
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS ACCORD DE LICENCE DE LOGICIEL D'APPLICATION (APP)

En téléchargeant le logiciel et/ou la documentation, vous vous engagez à respecter les dispositions suivantes.

Licence : Sous réserve du paiement de tous les frais applicables, Texas Instruments Incorporated ("TI") vous concède une licence personnelle pour copier et utiliser le(s) programme(s) logiciel(s) et la documentation afférente à partir de la page Web associée ou du CD-ROM ("Matériaux sous licence"). Outre la copie du logiciel installée sur votre calculatrice, vous êtes également autorisé à en conserver un autre exemplaire sur votre ordinateur à des fins de sauvegarde et/ou d'archivage.

Restrictions : Vous ne pouvez en aucun cas désassembler ou compiler en sens inverse la partie du programme logiciel des Matériaux sous licence qui sont fournis en format code objet.. Vous ne pouvez en aucun cas vendre, louer ou louer à crédit-bail des copies des Matériaux sous licence.
[...]
No mention of emulators.
Full EULA readable here: http://www.univers-ti-nspire.com/forum/6-questions-sur-ti-nspire/2874-ti-nspire-basique-ou-ti-89-titanium?limit=10&start=30

And here is the new french EULA:
(http://i72.servimg.com/u/f72/13/23/13/53/eulafr10.png)


So yes, it's new. Not sure if they changed this last week, last month or last year, but they did change this recently.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 22, 2013, 04:03:11 pm
From what I read, TI is only preventing us from running their applications on a non-TI emulator. Whether or not that includes the OS, non-TI calculator emulators are technically still legal, right?
However, the new clause is making everything hard for use, but TI doesn't care. In fact, maybe it doesn't want us to program on them. Another alternative theory is that it might be mistaken on how the online emulators work. You need your OWN ROM image, from your OWN calculator.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: flyingfisch on February 22, 2013, 04:06:18 pm
how typical of good ole TI :P
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 22, 2013, 04:11:31 pm
Hey, flyingfisch, you have a banner similar to mine!
On topic, fuck.
I'll have to buy a Casio Prizm and program some C on that, instead of my TI-89 Titanium. I simply cannot let TI get away with saying this.
But I'm a UCCP member, so I don't give a damn on what TI says. Actually, I can use TIEmu with PedROM and I won't be breaking TI's EULA.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 22, 2013, 04:13:45 pm
Is this really a new addition to TI's legal agreement? I could have sworn I read that same line like 8 years ago when I downloaded an OS for my TI-89.

Was a little harder, but this time I found back the old english EULA on the web archives.

June 2012:
Quote from: TI
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS APP SOFTWARE LICENSE AGREEMENT
By downloading the software and/or documentation you agree to abide by the following provisions.
License: Subject to your payment of any applicable license fee, Texas Instruments Incorporated ("TI") grants you a license to copy and use the software program(s) and documentation from the linked web page or CD ROM ("Licensed Materials"). In addition to the copy resident on your calculator, you may keep a copy on your computer for backup / archive purposes.
Restrictions: You may not reverse-assemble or reverse-compile the software program portion of the Licensed Materials that are provided in object code format. You may not sell, rent or lease copies of the Licensed Materials.
[...]

No mention of emulators.

Complete EULA here -> http://web.archive.org/web/20120626143305/http://education.ti.com/calculators/downloads/US/Software/Detail?id=6014&ref=/calculators/downloads/US/Software/Search/Results?cp%3D2%23view-1

So they did change this in the last 6 months.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: flyingfisch on February 22, 2013, 04:15:25 pm
Hey, flyingfisch, you have a banner similar to mine!
[...]
I'll have to buy a Casio Prizm and program some C on that, instead of my TI-89 Titanium. I simply cannot let TI get away with saying this.

Yep, the 84C is nothing but over-rated junk. :)


Also, you should buy a PRIZM... soon :)

On topic, please note that casio even lets you have a free trial version of their emulators.

Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 22, 2013, 04:30:36 pm
I made something small for this catastrophe. And sure, I'll play the sound and get my parents to let me buy a Prizm.
Alarm (http://uccp.ucoz.com/tieula.exe)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Adriweb on February 22, 2013, 04:32:09 pm
@Critor : nice find.

@flyingfisch (& blue_bear_94 while I'm at it) :
If you're here to bash nonsensely and uselessly the 84C, just go do that away, since


Do I have to remind that I too can proclame that the Prizm is "nothing but overrated junk" ? Let's take a look at this device you seem to overly love :
Let me compare it to another device which share pretty much the same price and can actually be compared with it : the TI-Nspire CX (non-CAS, otherwise the CAS would be just way too above for the prizm) :
 


(and that's just one of many, many things a lot of people could argue about)

I don't have more time to spen on stupid arguments like this anyway now, but yeah let's stop this and get back on topic.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: flyingfisch on February 22, 2013, 04:35:32 pm
[...]
I don't have more time to spen on stupid arguments like this anyway now, but yeah let's stop this and get back on topic.

Ok, but before that happens, I want to add that you are comparing apples to oranges. The nspire is not really a fair contestant to the prizm, just like the b&w nspire wasn't a true contestant to the fx9860. The TI-84 was.

Also, here is a great reason why the prizm beats the nspire: http://www.cemetech.net/news.php?id=443
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: AngelFish on February 22, 2013, 04:36:03 pm
I'd highly recommend that everyone calm down before this gets out of hand and I have to hit the fluffy pink LockThread button :)

Whatever your feelings of <insert device name here> and its manufacturer, discuss them as you might the weather.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 22, 2013, 04:36:35 pm
Actually, the Nspire CX costs more. And at least Casio isn't actively trying us to stop programming.

Also, I wasn't bashing about the 84C. I was just mentioning that FF had a banner not too different from mine.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: flyingfisch on February 22, 2013, 04:37:26 pm
Whatever your feelings of <insert device name here> and its manufacturer, discuss them as you might the weather.

agreed. I didn't mean to start a fight here, sorry.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: thepenguin77 on February 22, 2013, 04:46:49 pm
Well, I'll just add my little bit and say that you can't use an emulator on a math test. So I can't see students going their entire student career without buying a physical calculator.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: flyingfisch on February 22, 2013, 04:48:41 pm
Well, I'll just add my little bit and say that you can't use an emulator on a math test. So I can't see students going their entire student career without buying a physical calculator.

TI's just touching all the bases, thats all. Don't want anyone to get hooked with the emulator and buy the real thing, you know what I mean? :D
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: ben_g on February 22, 2013, 04:48:44 pm
If TI is going to ban the jsTIfied, I think we can set up a server in P.R.China

If that's ever going to happen (I doubt it....), we can actually say that jsTIfied is 'just' a z80 emulator that happens to emulate TI z80 calculator quite well... :D After all, it's up to anybody useing it that TI can be angry at, not a service provinding legal emulation which doesn't host anything of TI.
If they complain abouth jsTIfied, jsTIfied can just be made so it doesn't look like a ti-83 anymore. Emulating devices is not against the law, and when everything that references to TI is stripped from it, they have no reason to complain.

Also, I don't know abouth the american law, but according to the Belgian law, You are free to use copyrighted software in any way, if
1) You have legaly bought or obtained the software
2) You do not share or distribute the software in any way, in modified or unmodified form, unless you have permission from the author.

Nothing that forbids you from using it with an emulator. The worst TI could do is not letting you download their OS from their website. Dumping the ROM yourself and using that in an emulator should always be possible.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Stefan Bauwens on February 22, 2013, 04:52:20 pm
Okay.
An obvious reason seems to me that TI somehow is feeling that they're selling less calculators due to some emulators. I believe that people will effectively rather download a ROM illegally and use an emulator(without planning on buying one).

Therefore they decide to make there own limited emulators, so people still will buy the physical calculator too.
It's quite clear why they decided to do this and it's there complete right. If you want to use a ROM image, use your own calc so ou don't have to submit to this.
It defenitly isn't the end of the calculator emulators, like some people seem to think.

Also, it's wrong to, because of this, start saying bad things about the Ti-84C which may not be the best calculator. Therefore I will not put such banners in my signature.

It's sad that TI decided to do this, and perhaps they better should instead not allow OS/rom free for download for anyone, but ask for you to put a file on your calc that will return a code that's somehow linked with you'r calcs ID or something, which you then fill in on TI's website to check if you effectively have a calc.
(Ofcourse, that probably could be tricked)

Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: flyingfisch on February 22, 2013, 04:55:18 pm
Also, it's wrong to, because of this, start saying bad things about the Ti-84C which may not be the best calculator. Therefore I will not put such banners in my signature.

Its not because of this. I was going to do that a few days ago. ;)

no offence, please.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: ben_g on February 22, 2013, 04:56:25 pm
I think the main reason they don't do that is because the codes can easily be shared trough the internet. Also, iirc the ID/serial numbers follow each other. This also allows easy cheating.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 22, 2013, 04:59:27 pm
I believe that it would be almost impossible to create a system that cannot be circumvented. But also, there is practically no way for TI to know whether we're using their stuff on our emulators.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 22, 2013, 06:14:51 pm
Considering the fact that there's no way for TI to detect if we're using the OS on 3rd party emulators and that emulators that contains no copyrighted code are fully legal, then we are safe and we can move on.

If TI dares to send a DMCA notice to Omni, Cemetech, Ticalc and TI-Planet so that we take any 3rd-party emulator off our archives, then it won't win since they don't have a case. In fact, I think if the EFF can be involved like with the RSA keys in 2009, then it would be even easier to win.

Also it's not like they're losing much from 3rd-party emulation, because most people who use emulators are TI community programmers and gamers, not math students.

In conclusion, jsTIfied is safe, Wabbitemu is safe, VirtualTI is safe, TiEmu might be safe, but TI8xemu is not (since ROMs are included in it). Using all of those is safe too, as long as you have the calc, and even if you don't, then it's TI's job to add anti-emulation protections to their OSes or something to detect that you own the calc or the official emulator before the ROM can be used inside a 3rd-party emulator.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: AzNg0d1030 on February 22, 2013, 06:26:26 pm
Wait it says that you can't use TI's website's roms on any random emulator. Can you still use your self obtained one (through dumping your calculator) on any?

edit: Ah nvm I read the previous post
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 22, 2013, 06:33:04 pm
There are no ROM files on TI website, only OSes. You need to download their OSes or one from your calculator, then do a ROM dump using a third-party emulator or ROM dumping program. Some emulators might accept OS files directly, though.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: willrandship on February 22, 2013, 07:12:23 pm
EULAs are not legally binding. There's nothing to be concerned about, because this "rule" they introduced is in direct conflict with the DMCA. Seriously, this has absolutely no effect on us.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: jessedog3 on February 22, 2013, 07:22:27 pm
Is there some stipulation that you are bound by the software license included in the calculator packaging? I don't remember seeing TI's EULA in my 84+SE packaging, but I might have missed it.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: willrandship on February 22, 2013, 07:28:46 pm
They can't enforce the EULA at all. They have no legal power outside the law, no matter what implied contracts you have signed. This is because of the ridiculous ease by which people agree to the contracts.

The EULA is in the packaging. It's in the manual.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: TravisE on February 22, 2013, 07:29:20 pm
EULAs are not legally binding. There's nothing to be concerned about, because this "rule" they introduced is in direct conflict with the DMCA. Seriously, this has absolutely no effect on us.

In the US, EULAs have indeed been upheld as legally binding in some cases (though not in all).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/End-user_license_agreement#Enforceability_of_EULAs_in_the_United_States
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: willrandship on February 22, 2013, 07:37:22 pm
Those cases are rare, especially those relating to things such as reverse engineering which is FAR more touchy than emulation. It's a pity that the geohot case was settled out of court, or we'd have a more recent case to go by.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: jessedog3 on February 22, 2013, 07:49:35 pm
The EULA is in the packaging. It's in the manual.

Oh, thanks
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: AngelFish on February 22, 2013, 10:13:33 pm
They can't enforce the EULA at all. They have no legal power outside the law, no matter what implied contracts you have signed. This is because of the ridiculous ease by which people agree to the contracts.

The EULA is in the packaging. It's in the manual.

They can't enforce it, but it's (probably) not because it has no legal power. It's because there really isn't any way to prove damages from violation of this and they have no real power to do anything about an offender even if they could somehow magically prove that the EULA was broken. For consumers, this has absolutely no impact on them. The only case where I could see this being important is with TI's big customers: Schools. Schools are very likely to make a choice between a 3rd party emulator and TI's on the basis of an EULA. Schools are also the target market of the emulators and TI can much more easily enforce agreements with them. Similarly, TI also CARES about schools; not so much about consumers.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: alberthrocks on February 22, 2013, 11:49:52 pm
I think TI was aiming at prohibiting something like BootFree. At the same time, TI is also (likely) trying to hinder emulator development for the TI-84 C by forcing emulator developers to buy the device and tinker with it before being able to write a good emulator. Two birds with one stone (or EULA clause)!

Though to be honest, I wouldn't be surprised if they decided in the future to sneak something in the EULA for the calculator (box label and such) prohibiting use of it at all for dumping ROMs and emulating... assuming they haven't done this already! (Or are planning to when they release the TI-84+ C)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Sorunome on February 23, 2013, 12:06:54 am
why are they doing this D:
I mean, you still need a real calculator to legally use a third party emulator...
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 23, 2013, 02:11:29 am
Is there some stipulation that you are bound by the software license included in the calculator packaging? I don't remember seeing TI's EULA in my 84+SE packaging, but I might have missed it.
I think the EULA has been on TI website since 2004, but I don't remember seeing the OS use policies on TI website before.

And yeah I think they're trying to make extra money by having an emulator early. The warning message is most likely a dissuasive one, since it cannot be enforced at all. When the TI-84+ came out, it took years before they release an emulator, yet there were TI-83 Plus emulators since 2000. Now they announced TI-SmartView immediately.

By the way I hope TI-SmartView price is more reasonable than the PRIZM manager. The PRIZM is $129.99, but the emulator is $199.99. At least when you buy a TI-Nspire for $159.99 you get an emulator AND a calc.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Lionel Debroux on February 23, 2013, 02:12:54 am
I'll add that for emulation purposes, a boot code is required:
* neither for the TI-Z80 series, thanks to BootFree;
* nor for the TI-68k series, whose boot code is simply unneeded for emulation, lest one wants to emulate the OS sending & upgrade code;
* nor even the Nspire Clickpad & Touchpad series, where the boot2 distributed alongside OS upgrades is enough.
However, emulating the CX and CM series requires a dump of the boot1 (and dumpers are more legal than distributing some code containing TI's 3-DES keys).
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 23, 2013, 02:15:33 am
By the way, has there ever been any case where console emulators that includes no copyrighted code have been subject of lawsuits and cease & desist letters?

Also just to reiterate, in case the argument earlier gets misinterpreted at one point: The views of a few hardcore TI/84+CSE/Nspire haters does not necessarily represent the views of the entire Omnimaga userbase nor the team. Same goes for the PRIZM and other calcs. Just to ensure that no one thinks that Omnimaga is becoming anti-84+CSE/Nspire/Prizm or something. In fact I'm buying the calc the second it's available for sale to me, unless it's like $239.99.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 23, 2013, 06:47:08 am
Quote
In fact I'm buying the calc the second it's available for sale to me, unless it's like $239.99.
That's very specific :P

Most people don't even know what an emulator is. Why would TI even mention it in their terms and agreements? Because of the community??
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Stefan Bauwens on February 23, 2013, 06:49:43 am
why are they doing this D:
I mean, you still need a real calculator to legally use a third party emulator...
Not so. You can illegally download a ROM and use it(so without buying a real calc).
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 23, 2013, 06:49:50 am
In conclusion, jsTIfied is safe, Wabbitemu is safe, VirtualTI is safe, TiEmu might be safe, but TI8xemu is not (since ROMs are included in it).

TI8XEmu doesn't include any rom.
It's just that the app can be given URLs to load a ROM and a RAM backup to start with.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 23, 2013, 07:01:12 am
I acquired my rom by dumping it from the calculator as well. Can't we be like apple and take their OS, modify it and say it's not theirs anymore?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: SpiroH on February 23, 2013, 08:33:11 am
... Can't we be like apple and take their OS, modify it and say it's not theirs anymore?
It seems like "Yes, we can!" ;D
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: TIfanx1999 on February 23, 2013, 09:37:45 am
If I had to wager a guess I'd say TI added that last little bit to try to prevent schools from just emulating calculators without purchasing them and also to get schools to buy their own simulators/ emulators. I would also guess that the new license only applies to the current software available on their website. It's also worth mentioning that there is nothing stopping the community from writing their own OS from scratch, or porting one (in regards to z80s). The Z80 platform is very old. I wouldn't be surprised if there was at least one open source OS for z80 machines floating around out there somewhere.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 23, 2013, 11:32:28 am
However, user-made OSes will have to emulate the behavior of both assembly and TI-Basic routines, without using TI's code.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: TIfanx1999 on February 23, 2013, 11:37:26 am
If you want to maintain backwards compatibility yes. However, ASM could work as long as the old program didn't use any Bcalls(and the same safe ram areas were available), and an Improved BASIC interpreter could even be made.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 23, 2013, 11:39:39 am
Note that the OS is made to test both ASM and TI-BASIC programs. That includes ASM programs taking advantage of BCalls, so we can't assume that none of them will be used; same for the saferam areas.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 23, 2013, 01:09:35 pm
TI is planning an online TI-84 emulator for the PARCC mathematics assessments for High School.

Source: http://tiplanet.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=41&t=10813 (in french, sorry)


So, I think we might be starting to understand why...
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 23, 2013, 01:35:54 pm
Hmm interesting. The question, though, is how accurate are their emulators?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: TIfanx1999 on February 23, 2013, 01:40:46 pm
I doubt they will be accurate as far as hardware emulation goes. As long as they emulate the math functions properly TI will be happy. That would be my guess anyways.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Stefan Bauwens on February 23, 2013, 01:49:32 pm
Yes, that's what I fear too. They create these "emulators", which are kinda limited. The Nspire iPad app is rather a simulator, for example(which can not run Ndless, for example).

We cannot be limited to there "junk", and be forced not to use the hard, worked for, GOOD emulators out there.

Just remember about TI's license:
"This Agreement will immediately terminate if you fail to comply with its terms. Upon termination of this Agreement, you agree to return or destroy the original package and all whole or partial copies of the Program in your possession and so certify in writing to TI."
:P

Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Keoni29 on February 23, 2013, 02:12:17 pm
They did not ban it. They put it in their agreements. If you do not agree with it you can just use the OS you got when you did not have to agree with this. I still use 2.43 on all of my emulators and my calc.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 23, 2013, 02:12:23 pm
Just remember about TI's license:
"This Agreement will immediately terminate if you fail to comply with its terms. Upon termination of this Agreement, you agree to return or destroy the original package and all whole or partial copies of the Program in your possession and so certify in writing to TI."
:P

No problem! ;)
If you want to destroy your TI-Nspire permanently, just ask me... :P
And you might ask Brandon to permanently brick your TI-z80 Flash.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 23, 2013, 03:44:28 pm
Just remember about TI's license:
"This Agreement will immediately terminate if you fail to comply with its terms. Upon termination of this Agreement, you agree to return or destroy the original package and all whole or partial copies of the Program in your possession and so certify in writing to TI."
:P

No problem! ;)
If you want to destroy your TI-Nspire permanently, just ask me... :P
And you might ask Brandon to permanently brick your TI-z80 Flash.

You only have to destroy the software, not the hardware...
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 23, 2013, 03:52:49 pm
Just remember about TI's license:
"This Agreement will immediately terminate if you fail to comply with its terms. Upon termination of this Agreement, you agree to return or destroy the original package and all whole or partial copies of the Program in your possession and so certify in writing to TI."
:P

No problem! ;)
If you want to destroy your TI-Nspire permanently, just ask me... :P
And you might ask Brandon to permanently brick your TI-z80 Flash.

You only have to destroy the software, not the hardware...

Too bad - it would have been a pleasure to help you ;)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Ranman on February 23, 2013, 05:38:14 pm
Why is this non-issue still being discussed?

/me hides!
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 23, 2013, 05:41:28 pm
Because of its implications.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 23, 2013, 05:47:04 pm
Well at least people know that if TI ever enforces their rules that they have no chance to win, so there won't be people being scared and just deleting their emulators/ROMs or whatever from their site or computer (well, of course, when you receive a DMCA notice you have to temporarily comply, but after the EFF has fought back, you can put the files back up after 24 hours or so I think.)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: willrandship on February 24, 2013, 11:06:34 pm
@Keoni there's a EULA in the packaging which you agree to by using the calculator.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 24, 2013, 11:09:33 pm
Isn't it in the instruction manuals? I know my guidebook had a warning that the calc was sold as-is, but I don't remember anything saying the software couldn't be used in any third-party emulator or device.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Stefan Bauwens on February 25, 2013, 04:51:32 pm
TI(Belgium)-Cares replied to me: http://paste.bwns.be/p/f2c1160fe
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 25, 2013, 04:55:28 pm
Makes very little sense. It's not as if whether something from TI runs correctly on a non-TI emulator is of any concern to TI.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: critor on February 25, 2013, 05:22:29 pm
TI(Belgium)-Cares replied to me: http://paste.bwns.be/p/f2c1160fe

Fine... Then again why did they make this change now? ;)
It's been more than 20 years...
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 25, 2013, 05:24:13 pm
Because, maybe, they started to fail to make sense recently?
Or maybe they changed their opinion on the programming community.
Or they noticed our use of non-TI emulators.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Adriweb on February 25, 2013, 06:13:40 pm
They also may have (inappropriate) complaints from people working on emulators with weird behaviours thinking it was TI's fault

(if that's the case.... ahem)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 25, 2013, 06:15:56 pm
Then why wouldn't TI say that it's the emulator author's fault, instead of banning community emulation of TI's licensed materials altogether?
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 25, 2013, 06:28:40 pm
Makes very little sense. It's not as if whether something from TI runs correctly on a non-TI emulator is of any concern to TI.
It could just be to prevent hordes of people from yelling at them if they run into a bug/crash/whatever in an emulator, resulting in lots of false bug reports. But at the same time, I just think that they know they can't do anything to stop us from using their OS "innapropriately", but they decided to scare people to convince them to buy the official emulator instead. :P
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: SpiroH on February 25, 2013, 06:46:10 pm
Come on, for me it's obvious. They're just trying to increase their emulators sales ($$$) to protect their investment. That's all! ;)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 25, 2013, 07:35:33 pm
Who knows... maybe in order to discourage emulation they'll eventually replace the processor in the calc with a quad-core 3.5 GHz one and add 4 GB of RAM so that it's as hard as possible to emulate it on any modern computers? O.O
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 25, 2013, 08:06:09 pm
That would drastically increase the cost of the calculator.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: aeTIos on February 26, 2013, 03:58:48 am
WHAHAHA! I laughed so hard when I read this. So how exactly are TI going to sue me?
(http://www.sherv.net/cm/emo/laughing/rofl.gif)(http://www.sherv.net/cm/emo/laughing/rofl.gif)
rofl
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: ElementCoder on February 26, 2013, 04:02:36 am
Who knows... maybe in order to discourage emulation they'll eventually replace the processor in the calc with a quad-core 3.5 GHz one and add 4 GB of RAM so that it's as hard as possible to emulate it on any modern computers? O.O
And then still hardwire the limit to the 90MHz they're at now :P How are they planning to control this anyway.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Stefan Bauwens on February 26, 2013, 04:06:34 am
The way it sounds is that they basically totally don't wanna be held responsible for bad things that happen on the emulator.
So maybe they wouldn't really care if make use of an emulator at my own "risk".
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: willrandship on February 26, 2013, 06:18:39 am
If they want ridiculously difficult to emulate, they should roll their own FPGA soft processor that uses some really freaky stuff, and is totally black-box. Especially the ROM. Good luck causing a stack overflow when you don't know what bitsize you're using. (It would be 12-bit RAM, for one)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Hayleia on February 26, 2013, 12:59:48 pm
Come on, for me it's obvious. They're just trying to increase their emulators sales ($$$) to protect their investment. That's all! ;)
There are several kind of people:
- "basic" students, who don't care about emus. They won't buy emus. Especially if they don't own the calc, which they could not test if there is no free emu available, so really, they won't buy any emu.
- coders, who want to code efficiently with a fast emulator. But TI's emulators never were fast so those people won't buy emus (or make me dream, will TI manage to code something that truly works well ?)
- Teachers who use the emu they can.

So the only emulator sales are based on teachers. But will they really make more money on teachers by banning emus ? Personnally, I only saw a teacher use an emulator in my school once, and it was an official emu (I think it was TI SmartView) so TI won't make more money on my school by banning emus.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 26, 2013, 01:17:53 pm
One thing I am thinking about is that since education is their main focus, the fact that many teachers here use WabbitEmu (often from student influences) instead of the official emulator might hurt TI's sales. Maybe if TI offered deals to schools to buy calcs/softwares in bulk for cheaper, they might decide to not renew those agreements or deals if the school starts using third-party emulators with pirated ROMs. And of course some calc users might be illiterate about copyrights and might be scared of the message.

It's definitively what SpiroH's said. There's no way they can enforce that rule and I'm pretty sure that they're aware of that. That's unless, of course, in the future, government/police/ISPs manages to monitor your everyday computer activities and allow some companies to check if anyone is downloading certain types of files and/or how they use them. :P
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 26, 2013, 01:18:04 pm
I heard that some teacher use third-party emulators, though.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Lionel Debroux on February 26, 2013, 01:28:43 pm
And they're right to do so without paying a dime to an overly greedy company.
If they wanted fewer of their main target users to ever use third-party emulators, they could have taken emulation / simulation more seriously much earlier. It's their loss if they didn't see the light earlier.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 26, 2013, 01:37:52 pm
Don't some school get those calcs and softwares for far cheaper than us, though? I was sure that they got them for over half the price... ??? (In such case they could care less about the company's greediness, unless they cared about students being charged way too much)
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Lionel Debroux on February 26, 2013, 01:41:26 pm
Some schools, teachers and pupils do indeed get the items at discount prices... but at even at half the price, the devices are still overpriced :)
In our economical system, companies aim at making money... but they are under no obligation to milk consumers over so many years using the same old overpriced hardware (where a small variation is introduced once in a while).
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: fb39ca4 on February 26, 2013, 06:00:56 pm
One thing I am thinking about is that since education is their main focus, the fact that many teachers here use WabbitEmu (often from student influences) instead of the official emulator might hurt TI's sales. Maybe if TI offered deals to schools to buy calcs/softwares in bulk for cheaper, they might decide to not renew those agreements or deals if the school starts using third-party emulators with pirated ROMs.
It isn't pirated if the school dumps it from their own calculator, and it isn't against the license terms if they acquired it before the change went into effect.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: blue_bear_94 on February 26, 2013, 06:20:58 pm
What concerns me, though, is the inability for new users (not getting the ROMs before change) to use emulators.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Sorunome on February 26, 2013, 06:31:33 pm
What concerns me, though, is the inability for new users (not getting the ROMs before change) to use emulators.
Oh, wait, we can still use old roms? yay
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: Lionel Debroux on February 27, 2013, 01:06:20 am
New users will just ignore this new, unenforceable rule of not using the OS upgrade in a third-party emulator.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: DJ Omnimaga on February 27, 2013, 01:09:33 am
One thing I am thinking about is that since education is their main focus, the fact that many teachers here use WabbitEmu (often from student influences) instead of the official emulator might hurt TI's sales. Maybe if TI offered deals to schools to buy calcs/softwares in bulk for cheaper, they might decide to not renew those agreements or deals if the school starts using third-party emulators with pirated ROMs.
It isn't pirated if the school dumps it from their own calculator, and it isn't against the license terms if they acquired it before the change went into effect.
Oh I was refering to people who just download the .rom files on some websites like that one bay of pirate that many people know about or group.revsoft.org (although that's no longer available).

Seriously, though, I wonder what's the percentage of users who actually read licenses before agreeing to them when they install or download something?

Also, even if ROMs and ROM dumpers were no longer available anywhere, you can still download Flash Debugger and rename the .clc files.
Title: Re: TI bans community calculator emulation
Post by: christop on February 27, 2013, 02:21:36 pm
What is the point of the "license" on the TI-OS download pages? You don't need permission to use it. Copyright law (at least in the US) already allows end-users to install and use software without permission from the copyright owner. The "license" doesn't actually give you anything or allow you to do anything that you didn't already have the right to do in return. You can already legally download a copy from TI's site and install and use it in your emulator as you wish, or download it and install it on your real calculator.

There's simply no need to agree to the terms and conditions of the "license" to download and use a TI-OS file (and downloading a file from the download page does not indicate agreement, despite what TI might claim).

Edit to add: if you dump the ROM from your calculator, you are also not subject to any "license". You did not have to agree to any license when you purchased the calculator, and some license on TI's site does not apply to your use of your own calculator.

Edit to add again:
@Keoni there's a EULA in the packaging which you agree to by using the calculator.
The TI-OS EULA (like virtually every other EULA) is a contract, and you are bound to the terms and conditions of that contract only if you indicate assent, and simply using the calculator does not indicate your assent to a contract that is packaged alongside the calculator.

When you bought the calculator, you own the copy of software on it*, and you have full rights to use the software without accepting any contract. Under copyright law, TI has the exclusive right to copy and distribute the software but not to use the software. Use of software (or book, CD, DVD, etc) is not even covered by copyright law (after all, it's not a useright law), except when copying is required to make use of a copyrighted work, as it is with software (but as I mentioned, this right is explicitly granted by copyright law to the owner of a copy of software).

*A lot of trolls in the software industry would claim that you only "licensed" the software and didn't buy it, but they are mistaken from a legal standpoint.