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Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

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Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#41

Post by yarcob »

I'm trying to come up with an explanation why TI would do that.

The only explanation I can come up with is that TI wants a closer relationship with their customers. They don't want to be a commodity chip producer.

When distributors host the datasheets, then customers would probably never visit TIs website, and just compare chips from multiple vendors on the distributors website. Customers are just going to pick the cheapest part that matches the specs.

Maybe TI wants to be seen as a premium vendor. They don't want customers to look for a LED driver on an electronics distributors website, they want you to look for a TI LED driver on ti.com. They can explain the benefits of their chips much better on their own website.

As someone who occasionally tinkers with electronics, I think this decision by TI sucks. I like that Mouser and Reichelt host all their datasheets. But I guess TI doesn't care if I'm going to buy two LM3886s or not.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#42

Post by cushychicken »

alexhutcheson wrote: post #32
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That was clear when Nokia fell and took down TI's OMAP processors with them and they just gave up to Quallcomm's Snapdragon without even putting up a fight. TI is now just rentseeking on their ananlog dominance and whatever sinking boat Intel is, TI is way worse.

TI might not be focused on phones and multimedia devices anymore, but their DSP chips are extremely well regarded, and some of their other chips are popular for industrial automation. I don’t think “rentseeking on their analog dominance” is a fair characterization.

It's hard not to view this sort of stuff as saber rattling (or, more accurately, whining) from the OSHW community.

TI is more than happy to work with you on their most cutting edge designs if you're shipping in appreciable volume. Talking a quarter million chips or more per year. That's just the way the wind blows in their business. Gotta recoup as much R&D expenditure as possible up front. I've worked with them on these sorts of designs. They employ tons of really sharp engineers and still make lots of high quality, very useful chips. You just have to buy enough of them for it to be worth it for TI to work with you.

No OSHW application I know of has ever moved enough units to cross this bar. Not even close.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#43

Post by phendrenad2 »

xondono wrote: post #33

I’m going to post the unpopular opinion here and say that this is OK in my book. This archive is distributing out of date documentation without making it clear that it’s out of date. This could cause a major problem for someone that uses it. The documentation for the same chip is perfectly available on TIs website, although to get older datasheets you’ll need to dig further (by design). There’s a ton of sites mirrori…

It's possible, and would also mean that TI didn't attempt to talk to bitsavers to get a new page added to the front of the old datasheet, which says "this is severely outdated and we have a nicer newer datasheet at ti.com - sincerely, Person McHuman, TI writer" and instead went right for takedown.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#44

Post by cushychicken »

b1ackb0x wrote: post #7

I don’t understand why chipmakers seem to always restrict access to documentation on chips. Their competitors will get it anyway. This only creates more problems for small developers.

Because in semiconductor business land, not showing what your most cutting edge products are, and who's buying them, helps you develop business opportunities and product lines several years ahead of your competitors.

It's a very different game than Intel's business model, which depended on a pure performance play and being 18-36 months ahead of all competitors tech wise. TI's strategy requires way more customer contact and development, because analog applications are so much more specific.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#45

Post by sokoloff »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #4
mjevans wrote: post #2

Using copyright tools to try to contain published documentation of facts about anything is roughly where, if possible, I boycott anything involved with that company to the maximum reasonable extent. It is clear that TI no longer has an interest in developing new products, or figuring out better ways of making existing products, and would instead like to rent-seek and make the world a smaller place.

That was clear when Nokia fell and took down TI's OMAP processors with them and they just gave up to Quallcomm's Snapdragon without even putting up a fight. TI is now just rentseeking on their ananlog dominance and whatever sinking boat Intel is, TI is way worse.

If they created that analog dominance, it’s hard for me to see that as rent-seeking. Cash cowing perhaps.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#46

Post by rpaddock »

I received a takedown demand from them because I had one of their documents on space grade parts on my site.

The main reason I put it on my site was because they made the document hard to get, otherwise I would have just put up a link to it.

It was clearly a Bot. A human would have seen it as a promotion for a line of obscure TI products.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#47

Post by rpaddock »

neya wrote: post #22

Cool, I was just going to use a TPA series amplifier for my commercial design this year. I'm just going to switch to ST Microelectronics which is what Bose et al use anyway. Good riddance. If you are stupid enough to DMCA 555 timer datasheets, you just shot yourself in the foot.

Being located in France ST is having a lot of personal issues right now. Lots of ST parts are getting hard to get so make sure you can get it. The ones you can get are going up in price.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#48

Post by numlock86 »

neya wrote: post #22

Cool, I was just going to use a TPA series amplifier for my commercial design this year. I'm just going to switch to ST Microelectronics which is what Bose et al use anyway. Good riddance. If you are stupid enough to DMCA 555 timer datasheets, you just shot yourself in the foot.

Good choice on ST. I can only recommend their products. While some tools are still wonky and quite archaic (which is sadly pretty much the standard in the industry) their tools are the lesser bad ones.

Re: Texas Instruments sent a DMCA takedown to a site archiving data sheets

#49

Post by redis_mlc »

mjevans wrote: post #2

Using copyright tools to try to contain published documentation of facts about anything is roughly where, if possible, I boycott anything involved with that company to the maximum reasonable extent. It is clear that TI no longer has an interest in developing new products, or figuring out better ways of making existing products, and would instead like to rent-seek and make the world a smaller place.

I remember the "golden age" of chip makers in the 80s giving a bookshelf of datasheets to every engineer who asked. (At the time, if you mailed a circuit design to an inside rep, he would also mail you all the chips for free to build it, regardless of price.)

Since then, some mfgs. have been restricting datasheets to avoid potential patent litigation.

This might be the case here. Possibly another example of death by a thousand cuts as our society gets more regimented.

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