Psystar recently made quite a splash in the geek world by claiming to sell PCs that run Mac OS X. However, there seems to be considerable evidence that Psystar is actually running a scam.
As Richard Koman of ZDnet points out, there are good reasons to think that something is up. First, Psystar has changed its address four times since April 14. While legitimate businesses do move, they certainly do not, in general, move that often. Second, Psystar is apparently not processing credit cards. According to Koman, the company that was processing credit cards for Psystar dropped them when the company found out what Psystar was selling. That is clearly not a good sign. Third, and perhaps most important, Psystar does not seem to have any lawyers in operation. If Psystar is selling PCs that can run OS X, they would seem to be in clear violation of Apple’s EULA. Yet, Psystar’s lawyers are (as of yet) nowhere to be seen. Apparently Psystar is claiming that Apple is violating certain monopoly laws and hence that it is okay to break the EULA and sell such clones. Logically, if a company was staking its business success on a legal dispute, then they would have lawyers in action. The lack of lawyers thus seems like a bad sign.
Koman takes Psystar to be a credit card and phishing scam. While this has not been established with certainty, the evidence does seem to support his conclusion.
If he is right, then many people will be rather busy calling their banks and credit card companies. Fortunately, I won’t be among them-while a Mac clone is a tempting thing, my skeptical nature saved the day for me once again.
Scammer need to stop. Why can’t people just be honest.