PKWARE, by Tom Marshall (September 14, 1988) is found in Contempt (October 31, 1988)Ĭriticism of Bruce Wilson's creation of a Form Letter for Complaints regarding SEA vs. Steve Linhart offers his summary and opinions on SEA v. PKWARE: Shareware Company Threatens BBS World that Gave it Life (Petition) (September 5, 1988) Obituary for Phil Katz from the London Time (May 11, 2000) The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz, by Lee Hawkins Jr. PKWARE Case (August 2, 1988)Ĭonfirmation of Accuracy of SEA Transcripts from James Moran to Bruce Wilson (September 7, 1988) Press Release from System Enhancement Associates (SEA) regarding Settlement in SEA vs. PKARC Message Thread on Compuserve's IBMSW SIG Forum (September 18, 1988) (available below and elsewhere) related to the case. Tragically, Phil Katz was found dead in a hotel room in April of 2000, having diedĪ very large thank-you goes to Bruce Wilson for tracking down and sending a couple dozen files ARC format fell out of favor and succumbed to. Ultimately, SEA was sold to a Japanese Company in 1992 and Henderson moved back to The name stuck, and PKZIP became the standard for compression Mahoney), it implied speed ("zippy")Īnd sexiness ("zipper"). To a phone conversation between Jason Scott and Mr. Than he could reasonably expect to respond to.ĭuring this time, Phil Katz created a new compression program, which was named for himīy his friend Bob Mahoney (sysop of EXEC-PC BBS), who suggested "ZIP", because (according Him as the network spread more debates, contentions, and rumor regarding the legal case Ironically, Henderson's own work in architecting and improving Fidonet were used against Intention of bankrupting the company in legal fees. SUE, and blatant violation of SEA's claims to ownership with the Calls were made for protests, petitions, renaming The debate that raged over this event spread to many parts of Fidonet and on all sorts Publicized and covered of any up to that time (and years beyond). This was one of the first times thatĪ member of the BBS community sued another member, and it was certainly the most "look and feel", and direct lifting of ARC code. In April of 1988, SEA sued Phil Katz and PKWARE for trademark violation, use of the ARC What happened next was disputed by various parties (and the many versions and debates areĬovered in the files below), but the upshot was that Phil Katz released PKARC, a faster Because of the ease of useĪnd availability of this program, it quickly became the defacto standard for file archives
#PKWARE PKZIP CODE#
Was written at SEA, and the source code was freely available. The controversy raged around a program called ARC, released around 1985, which wouldĬompress and store groups of files as one file, making it easier and quicker toĭownload programs and support files at once off of BBSes. Work with Fidonet, including organizing the IFNA (International Fidonet Association) and Thom Henderson had previously been known for his
Others were involved (in the case of folks like Andy Foray, quite intimately), the lines The major players were Thom Henderson of SEA, and Phil Katz of PKWARE. Memories of the event are long in many minds, even if all the details are fuzzy. Network of Fidonet, the information about the case was spread far and wide, and the Intellectual property issues to the forefront of the culture. The landscape of the BBS forever, bringing in laws, trademark/copyright protection, and PKWARE (Phil Katz Software) legal case changed The SEA (System Enhancement Associates) vs. It quickly expanded into one of the largest controversies the BBS world ever saw. In the late 1980s a fight broke out between System Enhancement Associates (SEA), maker of the ARC program, and PKWARE (Phil Katz Software) over the rights of a program named ARC (or PKARC). The BBS Documentary Library CONTROVERSY: LAWSUITS: SEA vs.
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