Obviously, HP is well within their rights to do so. The electronics market
is also well within its rights to say screw you to such application
insensitive nonsense.

All this discussion of the matter is silly. The letter from HP indicates a
lousy attitude about support and the reaction that it sucks is reasonable.
The fact is that people will continue to distribute obsolete manuals because
there is a market. It is doubtful that HP and others will go to great
expense to stop it.

I am sure that the data from the database will be erased and never
accidentally show up somewhere else...right, sure.

Come to the real world people.

Leonard

"Spehro Pefhany" wrote in message
...
I think you underestimate the legal mind. One could argue that the
copyright infringement unnaturally prolongs the useful life of
unsupported HP/Agilent instruments, thus reducing the overall market
for new instruments. It's perhaps possible to dig up figures that
would support a cost to Agilent of x% of a new instrument for every
instance of infringement.