Tag Archives: Thoughts

Celebrating Douglas Bader

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As I am currently re-reading Reach for the Sky, I happen to know that yesterday was the 100th anniversary of the birth of Douglas Bader, a inspirational man who lost both legs (one above the knee) in an air crash while a trainee RAF pilot. A sporting hero and natural pilot, he used his immense self-will to overcome this setback and mount several other obstacles placed in his path.

Retired from the RAF as 100% disabled, he relearned how to walk on tin legs (never using a stick), drive a car (he needed the clutch pedal moved), play squash (with much falling, crashing and banging) and golf (to a very high standard). When World War II started, he used the force of his personality and his old contacts to overcome official resistance and become a pilot again. He was passed as 100% fit (while simultaneously being classed as 100% disabled) and took to Hurricanes and Spitfires alongside the mostly younger men who became The Few. He and his colleagues protected his nation from an unspeakable evil.

Following many airborne successes in the Battle of Britain and more crashes (one of which would have probably cost him his legs if they had not already been lost), he had a meteoric rise through the ranks. In 1941 Wing Commander Bader was either shot down by, or collided with, a German fighter over France. Unable to extricate himself from his plummeting tail-less aircraft, he only survived because the straps that were holding on his trapped leg broke free. Captured, taken to hospital and reunited with his leg (repaired by respectful German airmen), he escaped out of an upper-storey window on knotted sheets!

Although recaptured and deprived of his legs for a while, Bader made it his business to make life as difficult as possible for his captors. After several other escapes and attempts, he ended up in Colditz castle where he continued to make life difficult for the Germans until the inmates were freed by American forces in 1945. He immediately tried to get hold of a Spitfire to join in the ongoing fight, but was not allowed to do this. He did, however, get to lead the fly-past of 300 aircraft following the victory in Europe.

Douglas Bader continued to be an inspiration after the war, and was knighted for fighting on behalf of disabled people, often against the same kind of officialdom that he had to overcome in order to get back in the air. He was always especially supportive of disabled children, writing to one little boy who had lost his legs in an accident:

Don’t listen to anyone who tells you that you can’t do this or that. That’s nonsense. Make up your mind, you’ll never use crutches or a stick, then have a go at everything. Go to school, join in all the games you can. Go anywhere you want to. But never, never let them persuade you that things are too difficult or impossible.

The internal demons that drove Douglas Bader would have driven him to greatness with or without his legs. Not always a likeable man, often rude, always strident in his opinions (right or wrong), and holding some political views with which I would not agree, he nevertheless deserves great respect. At a time when Britain, and ultimately the whole free world, needed people of great strength and bravery, he was there. I am profoundly grateful to him and his colleagues for that, and to him personally for his example. If ever circumstances knock you down and you need inspiration to get back up again, look to Douglas Bader.

If you admire somebody, please let them know

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This post has nothing to do with CAD or the other subjects I occasionally cover.

Last month, I unexpectedly lost two of my colleagues to cancer. Wayne was a loud, larger-than life character, full of life. Paal (pronounced like Paul) was a quieter, more reserved man, but very friendly, funny and positive. Wayne occasionally rubbed people up the wrong way with his robust manner, but everybody who knew Paal liked him. I thought he was a great guy, but I never told him that. Now I wish I had. I never even knew he was ill, so when I read the email telling me he was dead it was quite a shock.

It’s not my place to tell you what to do, so please take this purely as a suggestion. If you know somebody and you admire them for whatever reason, let them know it. They will feel better, you will feel better, and if you come in to work one day and find they are gone, you won’t be left wishing you had said something positive to them while you had the chance.

As for cancer, I can’t prevent or cure that, but I have a little idea for something I can do to help. More on that later.

Vernor wins (for now), customers don’t

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Don’t get too excited, because I’m sure Autodesk will appeal, but as reported at Owen Wengerd’s CAD/Court, Vernor has won the right to resell his used copies of AutoCAD. While this is seen by some as a victory for customers, it isn’t. This doesn’t open up a brave new world in which we are allowed to sell the software we buy once we’re finished with it. If it had, I would be rejoicing as loud as anybody, because Autodesk’s ban on software transfers is an unconscionable restriction and deserves to die. But that’s not what this decision means. There are specific and paradoxical circumstances here, which allowed Vernor to win this case despite being morally wrong in my view, but will not benefit legitimate software users.

Vernor won (for now, and in one jurisdiction) because the court found he was not a party to the EULA. He didn’t read it, he didn’t click on anything to indicate his agreement to it, nothing. He just bought a bunch of books and discs and wanted to sell them on eBay. The fact that the item being sold is a remnant from software that had already been upgraded was not considered relevant. Neither was the fact that Autodesk is not obliged to provide the buyer of the discs with the codes they will need to make the software work.  The upshot is that this decision will allow a small number of people to buy and sell useless discs. What about the buyers of those discs who may not know they are useless until too late? Caveat emptor, I guess. Some other court can sort out that mess.

I agree with Ralph Grabowski that “software should be no different than any other consumer good: buy it, use it, resell it, or toss it”. I’d love to see Autodesk and other vendors forced to support a legitimate used software resale market (as they once did in pre-eBay days), but this decision won’t make that happen. It won’t help customers at all. If your firm has shrunk a bit and you have some spare licenses, you still can’t sell them because you are a party to the EULA (probably, although this area is still a bit fuzzy). But take heart! If you go bust, your creditors may be able to slip any discs left over from your upgrade history into a garage sale and hope that Mr. Vernor drops by. Mr. Vernor will be allowed to sell them, and the new buyers will be allowed to put them on their shelves and look at them.

Is that really a win for customers? I don’t think so.

Vernor v Autodesk – why I think Autodesk is right

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Well, there’s a statement I wasn’t expecting to make. Let me preface these comments with a disclaimer. I have no legal qualifications whatsoever. I make no claims of knowing who is legally right in this David v. Goliath legal battle; that’s for the courts to decide. When I make the statement that I think Autodesk is right, I don’t mean legally right, I mean morally right.

I have been following this fight with interest, but only in a half-baked way, third-hand via commentators (like myself, now). Based on my skimming of that commentary, my natural inclination to support the underdog, and my general dislike of of Autodesk’s previous and current legal adventures, I had been of the firm but privately held opinion that Vernor was right and Autodesk was wrong.

Today, after noting that new filings had been made, I had a proper look at some (not all) of the actual court documents themselves (thanks to Owen Wengerd’s CAD/Court), and surprised myself by coming to quite the opposite conclusion. I am now convinced that I was totally wrong.*

Until today, I was hoping that the court would support Vernor’s assertion that the First Sale doctrine applies in this case. Why? Because I feel that Autodesk is morally wrong in attempting to prevent the transfer of its software from one party to another.** At one time, Autodesk allowed AutoCAD to be resold (despite the EULA of the time saying that it wasn’t allowed) and indeed actively supported the transfer process. I felt at the time that Autodesk’s introduction of this restriction of a customer’s ability to resell AutoCAD was morally wrong. I still feel that way.

I also feel Autodesk is morally wrong in geographically restricting the sale of its software, and in several other areas of its EULA. I would be quite happy to have a court find that Autodesk is legally wrong in those areas, too. Despite that, I feel that it would be A Bad Thing if Vernor won in this case.

Why? Because Vernor was selling software that effectively didn’t exist. He was selling used copies of Release 14, when those copies had already been upgraded to AutoCAD 2000. To me, that’s clearly morally wrong.*** If the court finds that First Sale applies here, then that opens the floodgates to allow anyone to sell old copies of any software that has been upgraded, and keep using the new stuff. I really don’t think that would be good for anyone.

Those of you who have been upgrading AutoCAD for the last 25 years, I hope you held on to all your old copies, because you could be sitting on a gold mine. Of course, unless the court is going to compel Autodesk to acknowledge all these new “owners” of AutoCAD and support them with the various magic numbers required to keep them alive, there are going to be a lot of disappointed buyers around, the word will get around, and the bottom will quickly drop out of the market.

* This is not a first, I assure you.

** It has been stated elsewhere that Autodesk can actually be persuaded to allow the transfer of its software outside the usual restricted areas of merged companies, deceased estates and so on. This may be so, but it’s not something I would rely on.

*** This is a quite different moral proposition from somebody continuing to use an old version of software after upgrading, alongside the new version, on the same computer. That’s something I find entirely morally acceptable, whatever any EULA may stipulate.