Novell Sued Microsoft Through Caldera? 239
cheesedog writes "The intrigue increases: According to this article in the Salt Lake Tribune, the secret terms of the sale of DR-DOS to Caldera included the provision that Caldera would have to sue Microsoft (for Novell by proxy) over the OS and that they would have to do so without revealing Novell's hand in it. Did Novell indirectly create a monster? Caldera's 300 million winnings against Microsoft are now being used to fund lawsuits against Linux (and Novell)."
headline (Score:2, Insightful)
Novell found guilty (Score:5, Informative)
It's nice that you want to keep an open mind, but paragraphs 3, 4, and 5 of Judge Jackson's findings [groklaw.net], Novell did indeed arrange secretly for Caldera to sue Microsoft, essentially on Novell's behalf. I think that qualifies as "proven guilty."
Novell and Noorda (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:5, Insightful)
The overwhelming majority are innocent. Thus the presumption is based, not on some act of misplaced kindness that permits wealthy and influential to escape justice, but a simple acknowledgment of the true fact. Such injustice happens by other means. The presumption of innocence allows people to exist without be harrassed in the absence of reasonable evidence to the contrary.
And you are flat wrong about the government, anyway. The government prosecutes as a direct result of their presumption of guilt based on its unproven evidence. The Law, and not the government, presumes innocence. It is always a scary thing when people confuse government with law, even scarier when they equate the two.
But perhaps most frightening of all is when poeple confuse law with morality and uprightness. These are independent concepts, and as with intergalactic comets, only rarely do they meet each other.
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:3, Interesting)
I hope that you're talking about the population in general here, and not crime suspects in general. The majority of criminal suspects are not innocent, and they are in fact, suspects, because the evidence indicates such. Usually, where there's smoke, there's fire. Note that I did not say always, but usually. That's majority.
The Law, and not the government, presumes innocence. It is always a scary thing when people confuse government with law, even scarier when
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:4, Insightful)
The politicians dream up the laws, the lawyers write them, more politicians decide if we should live by them, and we can gradually swing the system around by firing or hiring the occasional politician. You should be voting for people who share your morality as best you can, or else you're going to end up living by someone else's.
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone has their own values, usually more or less derived from their parents and their religion/church. That's one of the important things about Democracy: Majority rule helps uphold the views of as many people as possible.
Certainly, most people will feel themselves limited in one form or another by the law. (Take speed limits, for example.) However, for any given specific matter, under ideal conditions, democracy helps gaurantee that most people will agree with the
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:2)
I applaud your idealistic perspective, but I must disagree with you.
The purpose of law throughout the history was (and still is) to be an instrument use by those with power to preserve it. You can put pretty faces on it, but in the end that's its purpose. Even the idealistic view about law in a democracy (assuming it working as it should, not as it does in practical cases) is based on this - people's power, people's
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:2)
Actually, I think there's a better explanation of this than the one you've given and that has been followed by a series of arguments
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:5, Funny)
There are some restrictions on published media, which is why the word alleged is awkwardly inserted into media reports.
In some places the word alleged works quite well. For example "the alleged software development firm SCO..."
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:2)
. . . is presumed innocent by the government and this whole thing ONLY applys to the government. I can presume that some one is guilty all I want.
Unless the individual is not a public figure, you tell everybody he is guilty, and he is found innocent. Then, you're guilty of slander [lectlaw.com] and/or libel (if you wrote it down). [lectlaw.com]
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:5, Funny)
"It's nice that you want to keep an open mind, but here's why you shouldn't."
Fuck idealism, right? I mean...we're talking about MICROSOFT here! Idealism only belongs in linux.
That being said, microsoft is poopy.
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:2)
Re:Novell found guilty (Score:2)
Why on earth everyone here talks that suing microsoft is evil?! it's the opposite. Suing microsoft is a Good Thing (tm)
Re:Jackson not exactly a bastian of impartiality (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Jackson not exactly a bastian of impartiality (Score:2)
Re:headline (Score:3, Insightful)
How could they sue without admitting to being the masterminds behind the deal?
Re:headline (Score:2)
Novell sued Microsoft through SCO (Score:5, Funny)
And the baby is Caldera's! And Steve Ballmer and Steve Jobs are stuck in the well while their evil twins go about their daily lives!
Find out the exciting conclusion on the next episode of As the Slash Dots!
Re:Novell sued Microsoft through SCO (Score:2)
Kinda like the U.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
The US funds the Afghans against the Russian army. The Afghans later turn all kooky and "kinda" go to war with the US.
I think that this corporate thing just reaches to the roots of the problems in American society -- one person "helping" another by fuelling their hatred against a third party, only to have it backfire on them.
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Insightful)
The point being?
Hey America and Britain formed an alliance with the very evil Stalin against a greater threat to mankind at the time, Hitler.
Was the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan evil? You bet.
Was it a good thing that America helped the Afghans and their foregin fighters, fight off Soviet Occupation of their country? Oh yes.
Hey , there was bound to be at least a few crazies amongst the Afghans that America backed to chase out the Soviet
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Interesting)
Very well put. Karma can be a "bitch", and a LOT of these stupid-assed corporate and corporate-bought state-level labor code lawyers need to remember the words of Redd Foxx, as Fred Sanford, when the character said, "I don't believe in doing unto others before they do unto me, 'cuzz I might get **done in** DO 'IN IT."
My variation on "live and let live" is "Let Live, then Live". Corporate hegemenony/imperialism, regardless of its nation of spawning, is ultimately going to cast upon itself a molten,
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2)
And how many of us will be oppressed before then, and how many of us will have to die to get our freedoms back afterward.
Your enemy's enemy... (Score:5, Insightful)
Seems quite a few people need to learn that lesson.
Dan.
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
Oh come on. As if the entire concept of expedience was invented by Americans!?!? As if this sort of thing hadn't happened over and over and over again since the dawn of recorded human history? As if it isn't happening right now in the European Union? In the Arab world? All over Africa? At the local PTA?
If you want to indulge in self-flagellation for human flaws, at least have the decency to do it in the name of the human race, instead of blaming it on America.
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
All the major european countries issued letters of mark to independent vessels, licensing them to pirate other nations, while keeping their hands clean.
Lets see, to keep things fair a good non-european example would probably be... shit. Ah got it. Shit, you know the Chinese and Japanese did this sort of shit all the time. Just cant think of any good non-european examples.
DAMN YOU EURO CENTRIC HISTORY EDUCATION!
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:3, Insightful)
OH WAIT!!!! ANOTHER AWESOME EXAMPLE! hehe. Syria, Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia with the Palestinians against Israel. These guys constantly encourage non palestinians to encourage hostilities with Israel.
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:5, Informative)
I think that to blame Americans for inventing this kind of short term tactical alliances is incorrect. The Americans did not invent this kind of world politics.
We can blame the Americans for not learning the lesson from the mistakes of others though.
Let me help you there with other examples from history:
In retrospect, there are differences between these scenarios, and Britian's, and the current American ones.
The current American scenario suffers from "enemy of my enemy is my friend" and from severe short sightedness. At best they are tactical, and they create long term enemies.
Foreign policy has been erratic at best, and extremely short term.
Examples of mistakes in supporting the wrong people abound:
In some cases, they are long lived, and endure various administrations: examples are the policy towards Cuba (no effect except on people and economy), Iran (more or less the same), and the long standing "Israel can do wrong" attitude.
None of these policies were productive.
As another poster pointed out [slashdot.org], the same short term high gain, long term no gain policy is rampant in the corporate world too. Outsourcing internet dot com bubble bursting, and accounting scandals is the direct result of such penny wise dollar foolish policies.
So, will the Americans learn and adjust? Or are they doomed to repeat the mistakes of history?
Re:I might add Egypt and Saudi too (Score:2)
Add to that the recent boasting by Bush and Blair that Libya has abandoned WMD plans and has "reformed" itself.
Qaddafi is now portrayed as a redeemed terrorist supporter, and an example of how Saddam could have avoided war,
That is all fine and dandy, but the real question is: Are Libyans more free now? Do they have more democracy now? Is Qaddafi or his Green Book gone?
What is the message here then? If you obey what Bush and Blair say, then all is well, and people go to hell?
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2)
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Funny)
A true Slashdot hero, yessiree...
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Insightful)
and i think that this post reaches the roots of the problem of widespread anti-american sentiment across pockets of the globe -- one person "projecting" the problems of the administration onto the "society" as a whole. mass generalizations are massively ignorant.
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually, it also reaches the roots of american sentiment to speak of "pockets of resistance" when in fact, it's masses upon masses of resistance against the U.S. foreign policy
...from "pockets of the globe"
widespread anti-american sentiment across pockets of the globe
come now. it's pretty obvious from my statement that i'm fully aware of the "masses upon masses" of "resistance" to which i was not e
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2)
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Interesting)
Yeah... sort of how the Allies funded Stalin and the Soviets in the war against Germany. Should have let Hitler have the whole damn continent, eh?
Look, life isn't perfect, but by trying to pretend that it is, you are only making things far worse. I wonder how all the peace mongers would react if Hitler (the original, not some barely literate moron with a Texan accent) was alive today. You'd probably just
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't spend too much energy wondering -- just read history to find a confirmation of your suspicions. The overwhelming sentiment in America before Pearl Harbor was antiwar; Americans saw Hitler as just another cruel, powerhungry dictator on a landmass full of cruel, powerhungry dictators. They weren't interested in entering yet another expensive war to help a group of nations that were still engaged in avoiding repayment for WWI debts. Charles Lindbergh wrote in this vein; his work is interesting.
He changed after Pearl Harbor, though. Almost the entire nation did.
-Billy
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:4, Insightful)
This is why our industrial output fell behind Germany and Japan in 1970, and this is why we keep making a show of attacking small countries that pose no direct risk [Vietnam, Iraq]. Emmanuel Todd makes a more complete argument of this American failing in After the Empire
[unfortunately he doesn't quite explicate all the social mechanisms completely, but many insightful points].
In terms of the software sector, if these companies would spend more time innovating [like Apple or GNU] rather than forcing out the competition [Microsoft] or litigating [Novell & Caldera] then the long-term outlook for U.S. industry, including software exports would be more robust.
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2)
You think this might have something to do with not having the same ruler for 20 or 30 years, like some countries do? It is kind of hard to keep the same long-term focus when different elected officials come into office every few years.
I think this is a factor for sure. How can you think long term while your time horizon is 4 years, one of which is spend campaigning for a second term?
However, one must weigh the danger of absolute power and dictatorship against this short term thinking. Which is more
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2)
Re:Kinda like the U.S. (Score:2)
Those who don't know history are doomed to repeat it.
Those who do know history are doomed to watch it repeat....
This statement while funny is actually rather sad if you think about it.
A moot point now that SCO is... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:A moot point now that SCO is... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:A moot point now that SCO is... (Score:2)
Re:A moot point now that SCO is... (Score:2)
Good point... (Score:5, Informative)
Is it the end though? I doubt...
Re:Good point... (Score:2)
I wonder if fool.com is just being nice here, or the lawyers were being cautious (which is reasonable)? An almost 0% chance would certainly be "less than 10%" as well
In related news... (Score:5, Funny)
It's sad. Laugh. (Score:3, Funny)
Nevertheless, the irony would be enough to kill a medium-sized vulcan town.
He said she said. (Score:5, Informative)
Of course Novell responds in the negative. Canopy is using a rather interesting attack here though. Many of the people working with Canopy now worked for Novell back when this suppossed oral contract took place. They claim no one at Novell knows about it because all those people who once worked for Novell have moved on. This of course puts them in the spot of saying "We know everything because we were there and you people running Novell now have no idea what you're talking about. Our guys worked for Novell back then, and they know what was said."
Novell's defense is simple. Show me a written contract.
The court decided "He said" (Score:5, Informative)
Re:He said she said. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:He said she said. (Score:2)
A blow to Darl's plan, too (Score:2)
Looks like this might prove a blow to the plan, si
So I can be sued because..... (Score:3, Funny)
FreeSoftware will only become genuinely free when it becomes easy enough to create that most anyone, regardless of their limited resources (time, knowledge, etc.) can do it for themselves. And this is based upon the primary objective of programming, which is:
Programming is the act of automating complexity so as to make it easy to use and reuse that complexity by the user, regardless of who that user is. This act is a recursive act as shown in programming in any language above machine language, in that such language above machine language is itself an automation of complexity for creating further automations of complexity.
So.... does this mean teh world is going to be sued for reaching the ultimate programming objective and putting those with lessor intents out of business?
No, you're safe (Score:3, Funny)
>Programming is the act of automating complexity
You've been fairly successful in encoding the ultimate compexity in your posting, therefore you're King of Complexity and Hero of Open Source!
Check your code for looping bugs, though!
Re:No, you're safe (Score:3, Funny)
Like saying "how can nothing have value?" in suppression of the value of "zero".
there is no compound complexity as you suggest.
There is only defining a complexity so as to have an easier to use interface to its use.
Where the recursion is simply that of further creating complexity using the easier to use interfaces to parts you are including in the complexity you a
Live by the sword, die by the sword. (Score:4, Interesting)
They had the rights to AT&T Unix stuff.
BSD Unix was a free OS that was used to create stuff like TCP/IP and other things that directly related to the early commercial success of Unix.
As a show of gratitude companies led by Novell helped sue to stop the free distribution of the BSD operating system. They claimed they just wanted to protect their IP.
Eventually when it turned out that the court case would end up being painfull they settled out of court.
It finally made it so that BSD had to remove every bit of code that was related to Unix. This turned into a near fatal blow to BSD, one that they never recovered from.
Now Novell owns a Linux Distro. A Unix compatable operating system dedicated to being free.
The owners of the Unix IP are suing them to stop the distribution of Linux and pay royalties to a company that they helped create.
A company (Caldera, original SCO change it's name and sold its company off to Caldera) whose early success came directly from using Linux!
Live buy the sword, die by the sword.
Hopefully this will be a lesson to the industry don't bite the hand that feeds you (free software).
Re:Live by the sword, die by the sword. (Score:4, Informative)
No. Novell acquired the AT&T IP after the lawsuite was already in progress.
It finally made it so that BSD had to remove every bit of code that was related to Unix. This turned into a near fatal blow to BSD
Hardly. Most files from AT&T UNIX were licensed under the terms of the BSD license; only a very few files had to be removed, and they were very easily replaced.
Re:Live by the sword, die by the sword. (Score:3, Interesting)
I can't comment on how easy they were to replace (I obviously didn't work on them), but it does seem true that the stir and contraversy over BSD allowed the growth of another free operating system without a lot of open source competition, namely linux. I don't think anyone would argue that *BSD's install base would be much larger had the law suit never taken place and created so much FUD. The various BSD's would likely hold the
Re:Live by the sword, die by the sword. (Score:2, Interesting)
The growth of Linux is more due to the license than due to any doubts about the legitimacy of BSD. The unfortunate truth about the BSD license is that the majority of changes to BSD code do not return to the community, but are incorporated into propietary applications and operating systems. This is what makes the BSD license "more free" than the GPL, because it does allow for appropriation iof code, but does not ensure
Re:Live by the sword, die by the sword. (Score:2)
The most complex BSD is dying troll ever?
Hmmm.... And what if: (Score:5, Funny)
Just spewing out semi-humorous consipracy theories, as all the twists and turns in these shenanigans are quite amusing.
Re:Hmmm.... And what if: (Score:2)
There's one tiny flaw in your logic: with knobs like Ransome Love and Darl McBride at Caldera's helm, Microsoft didn't need to bother doing anything to run Caldera to the ground. They did that themselves just fine...
For those not familiar (Score:5, Interesting)
Also, while Caldera initiated the suit against Microsoft, Caldera later split in two and the DRDOS operations went to the embedded division, called Caldera Thin Clients, then later Lineo. Lineo never got much of the settlement money, Canopy and Caldera Inc (the original company, who had nothing to do with DOS anymore for years when the suit ended) got most of it. And their lawyers.
Oh, and also, you might be interested to know that Ray Noorda, the man behind the suit against Microsoft, was the former CEO of Novell, and everybody close to the suit knew Caldera was Novell's tool.
It's Not Like This Wasn't Obvious (Score:5, Informative)
The connection to the SCO/IBM suit is also obvious, if you ignore any good guy/bad guy spin. It's the same business model playing out in the new case, but hopefully with different results.
Re:It's Not Like This Wasn't Obvious (Score:2)
Anyway, you guys are karma-whoring jackasses. May you be modded to hell.
Re:It's Not Like This Wasn't Obvious (Score:3, Informative)
That Novell didn't want to be associate
Why would anyone believe anything SCO said? (Score:2, Insightful)
pop culture (Score:2)
How this is different from SCO shilling for M$ (Score:3, Interesting)
Novel sought to hide it's involvement from Microsoft, fearing retaliation. It would be easy enough for Microsoft to have done that, as the DRDOS case itself proved. At the time, Microsoft making your code look bad was deadly. Novel sought to protect itself from Microsoft and recover a little of the damage already done.
Microsoft sought to hide it's involvement with SCO from the public and watching anti-trust regulators. Microsoft learned that their public smear campaign against free software had backfired and sought proxies to say the same things. Microsoft seeks to further injure it's competitors but does not dare level such factually unsubstantiated charges themselves. The rapidly disintegrating SCO case is proving that there was never any merit to the accusations and the whole thing was designed simply to slander a competitor they can't break by any other means.
Both cases show what happens to people who deal with Microsoft.
Not a $300 million monster. (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, no. A portion (and I suspect a very significant portion) of Caldera's $300 million winnings against Microsoft went to Novell. That is the entire point of Novell's current lawsuit against Caldera. From the linked Salt Lake Tribune article, "Novell wins breach-of-contract dispute with Canopy Group [sltrib.com]":
As stated in paragraph 5 of the opinion of the Utah Court of Appeals in Novell, Inc. v. The Canopy Group, Inc. [utcourts.gov] (see also here [groklaw.net]):
Novell may have created a monster, but not a $300 million monster. Indeed, Novell received some undisclosed portion of Caldera's recovery against Microsoft, which Novell can now use to battle... Caldera.
Actually, this still works well (Score:2)
also, this was CALDERA that was funded, not sco.
but in the end, it still doesnt matter.
Re:Actually, this still works well (Score:2, Insightful)
The Lesson Here Is ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Sure, an agreement with someone you've known for years is one thing, if the stakes are relatively low. But, otherwise, get it in writing.
It's hard to believe that people in charge of a corporation would be that stupid, but there it is.
I mean c'mon... (Score:2)
Re:I mean c'mon... (Score:3, Informative)
IBM is still selling PC-DOS [ibm.com] for $67.
Re:I mean c'mon... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I mean c'mon... (Score:3, Interesting)
Wow...I said something incorrect and I got a pair of reasonable replies and no flamage.
Slashdot never ceases to surprise me.
But now SCO is suing Linux on Microsoft's behalf!! (Score:2)
Since Caldera bought SCO and MS had settled with DR-DOS when Caldera bought them.
More Unix "political disunity" to the advantage of MS and possibly at its behest.
===
NB: political disunity != technical disunity - almost all unix software is emminently portable to other Unix/Unixlike platforms
Lets see here, History lesson. (Score:4, Interesting)
At least all Linux kernal mods have to be approved by Linus. It's more control than AT&T ever exerted when it mattered.
Correction... (Score:4, Informative)
Thompson, Ritchie, Plauger, Kernighan, Pike, and so on used the PDP-7 and later PDP-11 for a number of purposes. UNIX started as a platform to experiment with file systems, the game (space war) was not related. AT&T Copyrighted and Trademarked UNIX, but as a regulated monopoly were legally constrained from selling UNIX commercially.
At no time were they in a position where they lost control because they were "stupid" or "didn't copyright it".
Re:Correction... (Score:2)
You are right however about the restrictions on AT&T being able to sell it. The way they treated Unix the first few years was a harbinger of what open source is now. After some Govt. adjustments to the settlement they tried to reign it in and make $.
Re:Correction... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Lets see here, History lesson. (Score:3, Insightful)
AT&T did not think to copyright UNIX for a number of reasons. One was the legality of a copyright on software was still very questionable; remember when you "leased" proprietary software for 99 years? Another, was that AT&T was not allowed to sell hardware or softwar
Software rental (Score:2, Interesting)
remember when you "leased" proprietary software for 99 years?
Apparently, a life-of-the-copyright lease seems to be coming back into vogue so that publishers of computer programs can work around the consumer protections codified in sections 109 [cornell.edu] and 117 [cornell.edu] of the U.S. copyright law, which apply only to the owner of a copy rather than to a lessee.
Who Created The Monster (Score:2)
Now due to software patents were seeing a decrease in innovation and a increase in companies that do nothing but sue over patents without contriubting to jobs or taxes in any appreciable manner and are tieing up our legal system with their money grubbing tactics.
Norda( of Caldera ) was CEO of Novell (Score:5, Interesting)
So, is this really THAT interesting and new? Not if you've been in/around the industry for about 10 years. IMO.
There's nothing here. Move along, move along.
LoB
imbecils! (Score:2)
Novell concealed ... not really (Score:5, Informative)
Hardly secret, as the Utah courts have already noted. Novell sued them and WON for their share of the proceeds. SCO tried the usual tricks of getting greedy and trying to rewrite the contract unilaterally, trying to bring in oral agreements, then as usual, got shafted by their own evidence.
Groklaw [groklaw.net] has already covered it.
best quote: The district court perspicuously noted that the Canopy position "requires the court to reach the anomalous conclusion that by taking the attorney fee provision out of the agreement it really was writing the provision into the agreement."
Old saying? (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, all I have to say is, what goes around, comes around.
You'd think (Score:2)
New info (Score:3, Informative)
News articles at the time said that the agreement with Novell allowed Novell to get a cut of the settlement. So this was not completely secret.
News articles at the time said that Caldera paid $400,000 for DR-DOS, not $1,000,000 as this recent article says.
News articles at the time said that Microsoft's settlement was $150,000,000, or, at least $150,000,000. That much was listed in Microsoft's books, for the settlement. But some said this was just the first installment, and that the final amount might have been $600,000,000. This recent article said $250,000,000.
IIRC the original founders of Caldera were former Novell executives, and proteges of Ray Noorda.
One of the articles pointed out that Bill Gates stepped down from being President of Microsoft within days of the settlement. That article speculated that the suit was not really about money. That article suggested it was a grudge match between two billionaires, where the older one wanted to teach the younger one some manners, and that Gates resigning was one of the conditions of the settlement.
I don't like seeing this suit conflated with SCO's legal actions against linux users and firms that use of develop for linux. Caldera had an irrefutable case against Microsoft. Microsoft was guilty as sin.
I'd like to think that if the settlement hadn't suppressed Caldera's evidence against Microsoft that Microsoft would have ended up being taken apart by now.
Re:Caldera and Novell are the same company.. (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Caldera and Novell are the same company.. (Score:5, Informative)
No, the Canopy Group and Novell were both founded by Ray Noorda, the Canopy Group being the company he started after being booted out of Novell.
Re:Does it get any better? (Score:2)
Oh wai... I am!