Today, who morally owns MSX and its future?

Expert (105)

03-06-2012, 23:38

You can own something physically, you can have an intellectual property. But owning something morally, interesting. Legally (I think, not sure) it belongs to KN. To use a car analogy, if I'd create or 'upgrade' an old model VW beetle from schematics or scrapyard pieces - for non commercial purposes - VW, doesn't mind. As MSX is no longer commercially available, it is up to scene what to do with it. So that is where my vote went. But then again, if you polled this in ASCII corp., damned polls, target audiences and statistics...

Par MSXArnhem

Expert (82)

04-06-2012, 14:03

I agree with the previous post.

There's a difference between legal ownership and moral ownership. I haven't seen any contracts regarding MSX ownership, nor did I check the registered ownership of the MSX brand and the patents of the MSX design? But, if not expired or improperly protected (remember the old IBM PC?), ownership will probably be with ASCII or Nishi.

This means that the MSX scene is not entitled to commercially exploit the MSX brand. Yet, I see no reason why MSX enthousiasts may not develop new hardware and software for MSX. ASCII or Nishi may have legal ownership, the future is doubtlessly in the hands of the MSX scene as found on this website. From my point of view, they are the moral owners.

Par wolf_

Ambassador_ (10109)

04-06-2012, 14:50

Now and then I see statements like "MSX should always be this and that, because that was the original vision of Nishi". That's exactly what this poll is about. Legally it's still his machine, but does that mean we need to stick to his original philosophy? With the 1chipMSX we could completely alter the entire MSX implementation while still labelling it 'MSX'. But should we? Or should we stick to the predefined path? In other words, who is morally in control? Nishi or us?

Par MSXArnhem

Expert (82)

04-06-2012, 16:01

You can look at this from many sides. It can be a legal question, a moral question or a more practial or pragmatic question. Considering all facts and circumstances (that is, what I've learnt from reading internet sites like this), the MSX scene is now in control. But there's no definite answer to where it's heading. Some may prefer to stick to the original philosophy, while others may expand the platform far beyond it's original design.

One universal home computer standard was a very good business idea in the 80s (although a bit too late). But MSX is not a commercial product anymore, nor an 'offical' platform for office or science applications. It's a hobbist platform now for a very selected group of enthousiast. So there's no need to hold on to the old MSX business philosophy.

Myself? I picked up this MSX hobby for sake of 'good old times'. I'm considering some modern hardware (SD card reader), but I'm not interested in non-MSX expansions like SEGA audio/video chips.

Par MSXArnhem

Expert (82)

04-06-2012, 16:02

Refering to my previous post.... but who am I to considering them non-MSX???

Par meits

Scribe (6544)

04-06-2012, 21:34

I've seen the video of Nishi's lecture... Damn, I did not vote for him

Par hbarcellos

Hero (645)

04-06-2012, 23:11

MSX-BIOS, MSX-BASIC and MSX-DOS are all owned by Microsoft?
How hard it would be to ask them for that, and, sincerely, what our chances would be?

Par hbarcellos

Hero (645)

04-06-2012, 23:14

...and, we're just the MSX "ocidental" community. I really think we should try to invest more and more efforts into merging our scene with the "oriental" scene. They, alone, are probably 10 times our size...
I know about Japan and South Korea. Do we have more information about other countries, like China, North Korea and etc...

Par Manuel

Ascended (19469)

05-06-2012, 22:17

What kind of weird poll is this!?? What does the question even mean? And is it at all relevant? Who cares? Who tells me what I do with MSX thingies??

Par anonymous

incognito ergo sum (116)

06-06-2012, 06:14

Yeah, I kinda missed the option "Dunno", so didn't vote.

Par Huey

Prophet (2694)

06-06-2012, 10:08

I'm kind of surprised to see that voting is no longer anonymous. What is the added value of showing who voted what?

Par FiXato

Scribe (1743)

06-06-2012, 14:38

Wait.. where do you see who voted what Huey?

Par snout

Ascended (15187)

06-06-2012, 14:56

This short-lived behavior was unintentional and absolutely not desired behavior. It should be fixed by now, but JRT still needs to look into it. Of course, voting on MSX polls at MRC - irrelevant as they may be - should be completely anonymous.

Apologies to everyone - we'll do our best to make sure something like this doesn't happen again.

Par Konamito

Paragon (1041)

08-06-2012, 18:48

We, the users, are maintaining the MSX... Who cares about Nishi, Microsoft, ASCII or MSX Licensing Corporation anymore?

I DON'T

Par Samor

Prophet (2174)

14-06-2012, 08:52

at least this poll is going into a clear direction, unlike the previous two

Par Gradius2

Hero (652)

25-06-2012, 15:59

"WE the scene" should be had 90% at least.

The "others" (companies) didn't do a thing and wouldn't do it at all.

Par NYYRIKKI

Enlighted (6067)

25-06-2012, 17:32

I think Nishi is a hard boiled business man... That is not a bad thing, but it means that he cares more about money than MSX. We the scene care more about MSX than money. My moral says that people that care more about something than money are morally winners.

I don't mean that Nishi don't have some kind of dad's love towards MSX, but at least in Finland dad can make all the decisions until the subject is 18 years old. I think that same should apply here.

Par enribar

Paragon (1214)

25-06-2012, 19:42

This is a provocatory question...: what if we all together buy MSX brand and patents from http://www.itny.ne.jp/ ?

Today, who morally owns MSX and its future?

Commentaires (18)