Lisp Machine Emulators?

P. T. Withington ptw@pobox.com
Fri, 20 Mar 1998 15:04:43 -0500


On 3/20/98 13:02, Kragen wrote:

>On Fri, 20 Mar 1998, P. T. Withington wrote:
>> Symbolics is currently in limbo, but it would be a great service to the 
>> Lisp community if the assets were put into the public domain.  
>> Unfortunately, the sources are the primary documentation of all the great 
>> work that went on there; there is very little written documentation about 
>> the evolution of the technology.
>
>It would be nice if this could have happened before they went
>bankrupt.  Would this be legal?  It might be interpreted as destruction
>of assets that could otherwise be used to pay off creditors.

It would be legal for someone to buy them and put them in the public 
domain.  The creditors might be happy to take a few cents on the dollar.  
There was talk of any or all of MIT, Franz, Harlequin doing just this, 
but currently another party who is interested in the assets has them 
frozen.  (This is what I hear through the rumor mill).