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Comment by freehunter | Hacker News Reader

I think it needs rephrasing. There's a lot that can be argued when you phrase it as "counterfeit restore discs", but it's open-and-shut trademark infringement. I know that's not what Microsoft was arguing, but in reality that's closer to what the judge ended up going with when you account for the reduced "cost" per disc.

Like he said in his defense, if he had labeled it "Eric's Restore Disc" instead of putting the Dell and Windows logo on it, he probably would have skirted any real repercussions.

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> Like he said in his defense, if he had labeled it "Eric's Restore Disc" instead of putting the Dell and Windows logo on it, he probably would have skirted any real repercussions.

How is that a defense?!? Yes, it's true that if you don't crime, you don't get punished for crime, but... he crimed. And, from the article:

> Lundgren had 28,000 of the disks made and shipped to a broker in Florida. Their plan was to sell the disks to computer refurbishing shops for about 25 cents apiece, so the refurbishers could provide the disks to used-computer buyers and wouldn’t have to take the time to create the disks themselves.

These discs were INTENDED to be provided to third parties who didn't know who actually made them. This goes beyond trademark infringement, I think.

He wasn't charged with trademark infringement, so its irrelevant. If he had removed the logos entirely they still would have sent him to jail. And that's the precedent they've set to anyone who might want to try this in the future.

Do you actually know this, or like most commenters here, was your introduction to this case the Washington Post that everyone else read?

>if you don't crime, you don't get punished for crime

If only...

Fair enough.

Like he said in his defense, if he had labeled it "Eric's Restore Disc" instead of putting the Dell and Windows logo on it, he probably would have skirted any real repercussions.

I felt kind of bad about him going to prison until I read this, but that is some classic reasoning. When somebody is capable of justifying their criminality by just imagining away the main thing that makes it criminal, you need prison to tell them, yes, really, you can't do that.

"If it had just been a mule deer instead of an endangered species...."

"If I had just made the trades with my money instead of my clients' money...."

We use prison for a lot of purposes that it sucks at, but teaching people that they can't just yadda-yadda a crime away seems like a good use for it.

There are a lot of options between $0 fines and 18 months.

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