@me and pylenyh: Apple paid Xerox a lot of company stock to see the GUI research being done at PARC (or Palo Alto RESEARCH Center). PARC didn't develop products; they did research and let others buy the rights to use it. The only thieving that happened was when BillG extorted the Macintosh UI from Apple on the threat of killing applications in development for the Macintosh.
Oh, and Xerox's GUI research was actually nothing like what we take for granted today. All of the concepts in the modern GUI were developed by Apple, based on the research they paid to see from Xerox.
Apple paid Xerox a lot of company stock to see the GUI research being done at PARC (or Palo Alto RESEARCH Center). PARC didn't develop products; they did research and let others buy the rights to use it. The only thieving that happened was when BillG extorted the Macintosh UI from Apple on the threat of killing applications in development for the Macintosh.
Oh, and Xerox's GUI research was actually nothing like what we take for granted today. All of the concepts in the modern GUI were developed by Apple, based on the research they paid to see from Xerox.