As some of you may remember, about a week before Christmas TGT Soft filed a lawsuit against Stardock asking a court to make a declaratory judgment stating that TGT Soft could use Stardock's IconPackager .iptheme format without our permission with no liability.

Stardock's position is that its formats, such as .iptheme are protected under copyright and just as a simple matter of fair competition.  If someone wants to use our stuff, they need our permission in the form of a license.  I.e. you give us something we want we'll give you something you want.

After a few months of costly litigation, TGT Soft submitted a settlement offer in which they would license the .iptheme format (and .Bootskin) just as they had previously licensed the .logonxp format.

The exact details of the license are confidential as part of the settlement agreement. Suffice to say that Stardock is pleased with the results.

Stardock maintains its position that the people who make a thing have a legal right to say how that thing is used. In skinning, if you make a skin, and someone else wants to use it, you have to get permission.  If you want to use that thing for profit, then the other person (the creator of the intellectual property), at least in our opinion, has a right to benefit financially in some way as well.

Hopefully these events will serve as a notice that if you want to use someone else's stuff, you need to have their permission.  Stardock values its intellectual property that was difficult and expensive to create.

Stardock also maintains that that the icon artists themselves have control over WHERE their icon packages are distributed. Our license enables TGT Soft's Style XP to read in .iptheme files but it does not give them any rights to re-distribute the icon packages created by icon artists.