PKZips Phil Katz dead

From: Charles P. Hobbs <transit_at_lerctr.org>
Date: Thu Apr 27 21:05:55 2000

On Thu, 27 Apr 2000, Jim Strickland wrote:

> > Marvin wrote:
> >
> > > I just received this notice from a friend of mine. This was the first notice
> > > I had seen. Anyone know any more of the details?
> > >
> > > This appears to be a revisionist report with regard to why Pkzip was
> > > created. I still have some of the email (somewhere) that circulated from
> > > both Katz and the creators of ARC when the creators of ARC sued Katz for
> > > IIRC having something to do with PKARC not being 100% compatible with the
> > > widely used ARC compressions scheme used.
>
> I think the ARC people sued him because he hadn't licenced their compression
> algorythm. This goes back to my BBS days, but if memory serves, ARC sued him,
> he wrote PKZIP, and within a year ARC was no longer the defacto standard for
> BBS's. I believe the company that wrote ARC is now extinct. Serves them right.

They were called "System Enhancement Associates"(SEA) or soemthing
like that. PK wrote a faster version of ARC (called PKARC), SEA
sued, so PK wrote a new program called PKZIp. Word got out to all
the BBSs...in about 6 months, just about every ARC file was converted
to ZIP (besides, ZIP did a better job compressing anyway)

When did this happen? 1988-89?
Received on Thu Apr 27 2000 - 21:05:55 BST