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No idea, but their update is late.

Source

This is the second report, and somewhat more to the point.

#6

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Maybe the bank has foreclosed on them after all. If it was going to happen it would have happened last week.

Or maybe Costel and Tim are nonplussed at Ben taking all the ownership.

Or maybe they're just rubbish at these things.

Or maybe none is true.

A delay would by itself mean little, it's more Thomas' grandiose countdown that's drawn everyone's attention to it. Poor Thor. He's still at stage 1 of the six stages of being a Hyperion developer (1=angry defence of employer, 2=slight misease, 3=disappointment, 4=denial, 5=bitterness, 6=leaving in a huff without a word).

But let's face it: a few years ago Costel bemoaned OS4's free upgrade cycle. Wouldn't be too surprising if they hold off on Thor's update and make it another paid OS.

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:-p

If ya'll are talking about the teased "Thec64 Maxi", I feel bad for you. It is unlikely to ever be released. If it does? Will be complete garbage.

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It's all crap. There's nothing any of these expensive hardware boards or expensive ARM-based The64 things can do that FUSE on a cheap PC (or even cheaper Raspberry Pi) can't. Or at least nothing that matters to any of the C64 games, of which few are playable today.

Reminds me very much of AmigaOS 3.1.4. Buy it, spend a couple of hours configuring it, then realise it's basically the same 1991 OS that we spent the subsequent decade trying to patch into usefulness.

The idea that people actually fight each other in court for this old abandonware is noxious in the first place.

And it does appear that the bank haven't taken out Hyperion, so this will continue for years to come. Oh joy.

[ Edited by KennyR 03.07.2019 - 18:01 ]

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The benefit of AmigaOS 3.1.4 (and 3.1.4.1) over a patched 3.1 is, that it incorporates source code changes patching some bugs where there are no patches for 3.1. Especially the new FFS is handy (no more trouble booting from > 4 GiB media/partitions) + the new diskdoctor too.

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That would be exciting if only there was actually any new software to run on AmigaOS 3.x.

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That isn't the point of an OS update is it?
Bugfixes on a revision number change this small is about all you can hope for.
Although it is a shame that more new software isn't developed.
There seems to be a market. Albeit smaller than before.

And more tools than ever to code with.
So, of course, the question comes back to "why aren't you writing anything"?

@thread

Back to topic.

Filing of July 2, 2019 now available

#6

>> "AmigaKit LLC" was last mentioned in 2011 or so, I think. It has been
>> Leaman Computing Ltd. (incorporated in 2009, still active today) using
>> "AmigaKit" as a mere label after that.

> Which Leaman Computing Ltd. do you refer to?
> This one?

This one. Whether that "Leaman Computing Ltd" at the New Zealand address is the same or a different company, I wouldn't know.

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Fun sections:

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That doesn't sound at all like the Ben Hermans we know!!11

Just like that lawsuit against MorphOS that was always in the works unless it should immediately cease and desist, eh?

and

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Ben owns it all, and yet sends out other people to do his dirty work.

> As [...] A-Eon [...] started taking on developers of their own, I'm guessing that
> having a few programmers on the books prompted the change for tax reasons.

This idea seems to be mixing up "A-Eon Technology CVBA" vs. "A-Eon Technology Ltd" and "AmigaKit LLC" vs. "Leaman Computing Ltd".

> a revision number change this small

Well, it was jumped from 3.1(.0) to 3.1.4, skipping 3.1.1 to 3.1.3 ;-)
But then, it's usually "version"."revision"."build", so the revision number wasn't even changed ;-)

Let's summarise. Around 18-19 years ago, an IP lawyer called Benjamin Hermans (fresh from a failure to grow a business based on porting failed Windows games to Mac, Linux and Amiga), made an awful mistake. He signed a poor contract with known fraudsters for AmigaOS 4, which inevitably failed due to its hardware price and lack of appeal outside the contemporary user base. Rather than accept this failure, roll it up and chalk it up to experience, he continued, taking on Amiga Inc.

So far, this has cost:

* Almost a million euros of debt, most of it his own.
* A small but vibrant platform and community destroyed due to infighting, mainly along the battle lines he himself drew to try to promote his product.
* Loss of Ben's extremely good job at a prestigious, well-paying law company.
* Damage to of other Hyperion partners, past and present.
* Loss of Ben's own personal prestige and credit record.
* Potentially thousands, or even tens of thousands, of users from MorphOS, the only polished AmigaOS successor, most of which have been demanding the hardware and polish it has for years without knowing it.
* Expense of thousands of owners who bought poorly supported AmigaONE hardware.
* Ben's marriage (although we can't be sure why he divorced, personal debt and constant legal haranguing wouldn't have helped).
* The destruction of NG AmigaOS, which is now spilling over to destroy retro AmigaOS.

And he still won't, can't, give up.

> Around 18-19 years ago [...]

17-18 :-)

> Benjamin Hermans [...] signed a poor contract

You mean the contract that hasn't turned out so poor for Hyperion, given what it was generally believed (and claimed) to grant Hyperion compared to its actual wording? :-)

> this has cost: [...] Loss of Ben's extremely good job

You mean the story where "AD's been duped"?

> this has cost: [...] Potentially thousands, or even tens of thousands,
> of users from MorphOS [...], most of which have been demanding
> the hardware and polish it has for years without knowing it.

I'm not sure I understand. Could you elaborate?

> this has cost: [...] Expense of thousands of owners who bought
> poorly supported AmigaONE hardware.

Weren't this only tens or low hundreds at best? ;-)

> this has cost: [...] The destruction of NG AmigaOS

So it took what it gave, right?

> which is now spilling over to destroy retro AmigaOS.

I don't think AmigaOS 1.x/2.x/3.0/3.1 can be "destroyed" by anything Hyperion did, does or will do.

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Nope. 2000 with finalising in 2001.

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No, I think it worked out great for Hyperion, and that they spent a million euros on hookers and blow.

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Ben no longer works for Monard and now works for ARTES, which is a law startup. This is confirmed.

Far less cushy job, and so probably less well paid. He's lucky he found a patron who is just starting out in law and doesn't seem to know any better.

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I could I suppose, but I'm really not up to spending the day trying to answer you while you nitpick the shit out of all the irrelevancies with a torrent of > > >

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1100 AmigaONE sales to begin with. So, no.

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Retro AmigaOS isn't the OS. It's the scene.

@thread

Re:Amiga Documents tweet about "firing".

The main site, version 3.0.2 now reports it this way:

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With "284" referring back to the tweet.

#6

>> 17-18 :-)

> Nope. 2000 with finalising in 2001.

No, the contract was finalized and signed in late 2001. This is publicly documented.

>> You mean the contract that hasn't turned out so poor for Hyperion, given what it was
>> generally believed (and claimed) to grant Hyperion compared to its actual wording? :-)

> No

Then maybe you don't remember the discussion on how Hyperion's 2009 press release regarding the 2009 settlement, stating the grant of very limited rights with regard to OS3.1, is quite different to the wording of the 2009 settlement agreement, granting Hyperion way more rights with regard to OS3.1.

>>> this has cost: [...] Loss of Ben's extremely good job

>> You mean the story where "AD's been duped"?

> Ben no longer works for Monard

True, but this is only part of your claim, which was that "this has cost: [...] Loss of Ben's [...] job" (emphasis mine). It's the difference between a confirmed fact and a rumour.

> you nitpick the shit out of all the irrelevancies with a torrent of > > >

The "irrelevancies" are though relevant enough for you to mentioned them, or make up. The quoting is necessary because some people tend to conveniently forget what they wrote three comments back. Quoting serves two purposes: Memory aid and a means to notice later changes to comments.

>> Weren't this only tens or low hundreds at best? ;-)

> 1100 AmigaONE sales to begin with. So, no.

Okay, the MooBunny zealots were wrong then ;-)

> Retro AmigaOS isn't the OS. It's the scene.

I would call this "retro Amiga", not "AmigaOS", but that's just me. The "scene" is free to ignore Hyperion's products, btw. And from reading sites like EAB and A1k.org, I don't have the impression that the Amiga retro scene is at risk of being destroyed. Most Amiga retro sceners completely ignore the lawsuits and what Hyperion does, and rightly so.

> Filing of July 2, 2019 now available

"Amiga assigned the majority of its copyrights (including the copyright in Amiga OS 3.1) to Counter-Defendant Cloanto, and all of its trademarks and remaining copyrights to C-A Acquisition Corp."

What could those "remaining copyrights" be? CoolTools?

> Re:Amiga Documents tweet about "firing".
> The main site, version 3.0.2 now reports it this way: [...]

And also:

"In June 2019, following further allegations of incompatibility and even fraudulent actions [281], it became known that Mr. Ben Hermans was "fired from Monard Law" [284]."

It's sad to see the Amiga Documents author resort to shit tactics like these. And it's not the first time at that (see comments #175 and #177). Up until about a year ago, I used to praise the Amiga Documents site as a place of knowledge and truth, but these increasing incidents of stating rumours as truths and on top of it referencing sources that are either piss-taking or do not back up the stated claims in any way make me question the author's motives.

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Not meant to argue his side nor offer explanation as to any particular text:

Twitter is obviously the way info appears first.
If you watch the main body of the site, there is a delay between updates.
At that time he seems to gather the info from new tweets and add it to the main body (with references when available).
That's when you get the narrative and timeline somewhat.
Both the twitter and the main site contain the disclaimer " if not referenced it's personal opinion only!", which applies to that narrative.
I'm not sure I'd use the word "motive", since I've not seen him write about motive. "Slanted"? Sure, since we already have an admission of personal opinion here.

The question an opposer to this material however, might well ask is "why doesn't Hyperion address any of the points in contention?" and "why don't Hyperion upload the documents that show their side of the story(filings)?"

I addressed that issue here

All I can tell you is that absolutely no one has written me to dispute what I wrote there. No one.

#6

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it was promised...

Oh well.

#6

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updated again here


#6

Well, it appears we know now how Hyperion escaped being wiped by the bank for its excessive debt:

https://www.companyweb.be/company/466380552/free-pub/16252553

I don't speak Dutch, and have no understanding of Belgian law, but from a layman's perspective it looks to me like:

- The company's worth has been divided into fractional shares by an auditor appointed by the bank.
- Ben now directly owns (and is now therefore personally liable for) most of the company's debt.
- No mention of Costel, Trevor et al. Could explain why Costel has... 'disappeared', around the 25th June when this actually happened.

But my understanding of law in general and Belgian law in particular is piss-poor. If anyone else has a different understanding, feel free to correct me.

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Gee, someone else in bed with Hermans got screwed? Naaaaaah, never! :-p