Novell Releases SCO Letters 424
cyxs writes "Here is Novell's page with letters that have been sent back and forth between Novell and SCO. Very interesting read."
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Novell Releases SCO Letters
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THEGODDESSOFTHENETHASTWISTINGFINGERSANDHERVOICEISLIKEAJAVELININTHENIGHTDUDE
Next News (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Next News (Score:3, Funny)
The letters S, C and O are used many times by Novell, the fact they are seen in different orders and configurations throughout the letter just indicates the effort that Novell have expended to obsfuscate the violation.
Re:Next News (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Next News (Score:5, Funny)
quick note Re:Next News (Score:4, Funny)
You forgot to ask for money.
New News (Score:3, Interesting)
Fascinatingly, SCO reports that the discovery materials exceed "more that 60 pages", i.e., presumably less than 70. This is to cover 11 interrogatories that they have not answered with the necessary specificity, according to the courts.
Those interrogatories compel SCO to identify, in particular and among other things:
Why aren't we done with this? (Score:5, Interesting)
Wasn't SCO supposed to reveal their cards a couple days ago? Haven't seen a lick of news about that... maybe they missed the deadline cuz all the executives have fled to tropical islands without extradition treaties.
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:2, Insightful)
That's not how it's done anymore. These days an executive will just buy an overly large and overly expensive house in Florida, declare bankruptcy (the house is shielded), sell the house and live off the proceeds.
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:5, Informative)
sPh
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:3, Informative)
I know Colorado has no such act, so you can lose your house in a lawsuit, no matter how small. I believe Arizona has a limit of about $100K on the value of the home protected by their Homestead act, but that is from memory.
will I be sheilded? (Score:5, Funny)
What if you are walking past and some of these loosed assets fly toward you. I imagine a flying fridge could take your eye out!
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:5, Informative)
*Then* we might now.
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:4, Informative)
Here [groklaw.net] is the groklaw story.
isn't that more than a little noteworthy? (Score:3, Insightful)
Now, they've supplied whatever they know about the nature of IBM's contract violations and the resultant "IP" violations, and SCO requests
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:2)
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:5, Informative)
IBM must evaluate their response up to 23rd, which is the next court date. And if this isn't saisfactory SCO might get it's case thrown out.
Possibility of SCO case to get thrown out is not possible in my opinion. At least it wouldn't be a smart move from IBM if they would succed to get this far. This would lead to other possible complaints from SCO side, and state would be far from peace. It would be better for IBM to bleed SCO dry and take over them as the result.
One response that would throw SCO case out is a list of people entitled to see SCO IP. If they don't name my name (I was entitled too see their kernel which I have freely downloaded from their site), they haven't fully complied with IBM's request as in FULL LIST OF PEOPLE ENTITLED TO SEE SCO IP.
Second possible case of throwing case out lies in SCO complaints (if they stay at last complaints about header files). As they say in brute: without SCO knowleddge there would be no *X, but then again complaining about defines and constants??? Hell IBM could produce a 5year old child that could write header file, thus where is the IP value if 5year old child can do it?
IBM Could Produce A 5 Year Old Child... (Score:5, Funny)
"Hell IBM could produce a 5year old child that could write header file..."
And his name is Linux?
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:3, Insightful)
Possible, but not very likely. Dismissal is certainly an option for the court as a discovery sanction, but it's a pretty extreme one, and it would need to be done (or at least approved) by the District Judge, not the magistrate who's currently handling the hearings.
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:4, Interesting)
- IBM will be found guilty
- IBM will pay for damages, $1 Billion (or $3 Billion tripple damages) SCO must prove how much damage they have actually suffered, now how much they wish they had suffered. Wasn't their product already on the decline before IBM even got involved with Linux?
- SCO has been completely made whole for their damages. Thus they cannot charge end users for any past "damages".
- The infringing code will be removed from Linux -- thus no future damages.
- SCO could not pursue end users or distributors for past damages since SCO has not fulfilled their duty to mitigate their damages. In fact they have stated exactly the opposite in public. Darl says he wants the case to drag on for as long as possible, we're racking up extra damages every week. He doesn't want to show the code, because it would be removed from Linux.
- Even if SCO were to win and all of the above happen.... IBM will continue to countersue SCO for patent infringement going back 20 some years on patents that cover all past, current or future products of Darl and gang and their descendents down to the 10th generation.
- IBM will still press their counterclaims of GPL infringement by SCO. (IBM has copyright on some code they wrote which IBM licensed anyone including SCO to use under GPL, and which license SCO has violated, thus infringing IBM copyright.)
- Novell is likely to sue SCO over the fact that SCO does NOT own copyrights to Unix.
- Red Hat's case will still be heard regarding Red Hat's claims. (Tortious business interference between RH and their customers, Lanham act violations due to SCO's public statements, etc.)
And that will be the end of this whole fiaSCO. All that will be left of SCO will be a Caldera. (i.e. a smoking hole in the ground.)Someone on Groklaw said it best about how SCO has it all backwards...
Re:Why aren't we done with this? (Score:4, Interesting)
Due to incorrect, inaccurate SEC filings, and the ensuing SEC investigation into their stock pump and dump scam, Darl and gang will end up behind bars where they belong.
I hope this answers your question about what happens in the slashdot world if SCO actually did have a case and finally properly answered the discovery requests as they were supposed to have done many months ago.
Awesome (Score:2, Funny)
Novell, the enemy of the enemy of my enemy who is the enemy of my greater enemy, is my friend, I think.
Re:Awesome (Score:5, Funny)
You're weird.. if I wasn't at work, I wouldn't even be here...
---
One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say. -- Will Durant
enemy of my enemy (Score:3, Insightful)
I am glad to see SCO being struck down, but I am not happy to see Unix copyrights and contracts being used to do it. Remember this it does NOT MATTER who owns Unix, because SCO's claim that Linux is an unauthorized derivative work of Unix is B.S.
Novell may be the friend of the GNU/Linux community now, but remember, SCO was a friend of Linux once too, before they changed hands and fell under the con
And SCO plays copycat again (Score:5, Informative)
SCO Purchases Specific Novell Assets [sco.com]
Wish they were so quick with pointing out what contract/copyright/trade secrets, if any, are actually violated by anybody they accuse of doing so...
When are the Red Hat and IBM cases scheduled for resolution anyway? This whole thing is going on for far to long. Why does it take so long to resolve these issues through the courts...
Re:And SCO plays copycat again (Score:2, Insightful)
Because there more outstanding cases than people in the US.
Re:And SCO plays copycat again (Score:3, Funny)
I'd assume that most don't.
Re:And SCO plays copycat again (Score:5, Informative)
SCO is basing its claim to copyright on Amendment 2, but it is a tenuous claim at best.
thad
Re:And SCO plays copycat again (Score:3, Interesting)
The gray areas are that Schedule 1.1(a) includes "all rights and ownership of UNIX and UnixWare", then Schedule 1.1(b) excludes "All copyrights and trademarks, except for the trademarks
Obligatory Groklaw link (Score:5, Informative)
Re:"obligatory *" (Score:2, Insightful)
Beats me. I think every SCO related article here should also link to Groklaw's analysis of the story. As for karma or mods, whatever.
site was "groklawed" earlier (Score:5, Informative)
(b) Buyer shall not, and shall not have the authority to, amend, modify or waive any right under or assign any SVRX License without the prior written consent of Seller. In addition, at Seller's sole discretion and direction, Buyer shall amend, supplement, modify or waive any rights under, or shall assign any rights to, any SVRX License to the extent so directed in any manner or respect by Seller. In the event that Buyer shall fail to take any such action concerning the SVRX Licenses as required herein, Seller shall be authorized, and hereby is granted, the rights to take any action on Buyer's own behalf. Buyer shall not, and shall have no right to, enter into future licenses or amendments of the SVRX Licenses, except as may be incidentally involved through its rights to sell and license the Assets or the Merged Product (as such term is defined in the proposed Operating Agreement, attached hereto as Exhibit 5.1(c)) or future versions thereof of the Merged Product.
(from section 4.16 of the Asset Purchase Agreement). Novell was doing a license audit in 2Q 2003.
Novell to SCO (Score:4, Funny)
And here is my letter to SCO, for the records... (Score:3, Funny)
Dear SCO,
Fuck you, your wives, and your bastard kids.
-------------end archive---------------
SCO's response. (Score:5, Funny)
----------begin-----------
Already did. You're next, penguin boy.
Love, Darl
-----------end------------
Slashdot loves you (Score:4, Funny)
The name on the copyright registration (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The name on the copyright registration (Score:3, Funny)
PDF's are being converted to text at Groklaw (Score:5, Interesting)
From the looks of it, it appears that Novell is about to hit SCOX with a breach of contract suit. Additionally, the letters point out that the MS and SUN contracts should pay 95% of the amount to Novell.
With that in mind, it appears that SCO has lied on their latest earnings statement (fraud) as well as withheld information from Bay Star, etc...
SCO is in a lot of touble.
Hard to discern much.. (Score:5, Informative)
Summary from Groklaw (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2004011 30 20257821
May 12, 2003, SCO: We own UNIX. Those Linux thieves stole it. Now we are going to make them pay!
May 28, 2003, Novell: Your letter annoyed us. You don't own UNIX, we do.
June 6, 2003, Novell: Stick to the facts and stop threathening us.
June 6, 2003, SCO: We do own UNIX, stop telling everybody you own it. You did that on purpose on the same day as our earning annoucement. We also want to know what IBM told you and what you told IBM.
June 9, 2003, Novell: You can't just terminate IBM's license, so stop claiming you will. We do have the right to tell you what to do, you know.
June 11, 2003, SCO: We do own UNIX and we can do what we want. Stop telling everybody we can't, or else...
June 12, 2003, Novell: Come on, you can't be serious. When we signed the contracts we promised IBM you could not terminate the license. We at Novell keep our promises.
June 12, 2003, SCO: Okay, now you've done it. You didn't listen, so now we are giving IBM permission to keep using AIX. You may not like it, but it the way it is. The license will not be terminated!
June 18, 2003, Novell: Our press release about the copyrights coinciding with your earnings annouchment was purely coincidental. We do not want to hurt you, we are just protecting our interests.
June 24, 2003, Novell : You signed contracts with Microsoft and somebody else. You can't just do that without telling us first. What's up with that? So, we demand to get copies and demand that you do not do this again. Once we have the copies we will determine if you have to give their money to us instead.
June 26, 2003, Novell: You keep telling you own the patents and copyrights of UNIX. We do acknowledge you had the right to acquire 'some' of the copyrights and we are still looking into it how much exactly you are entitled to. In any case, you do NOT own the patents.
July 8, 2003, Novell: Please stop bothering our former executives.
July 11, 2003, Novell: You haven't paid us in 6 months, cough up the money! Also, we are definitely going to audit your ass.
July 17, 2003, Novell: We don't like you. You tell people lies. You thought you couldn't do that, so we didn't pay. Luckily for you we determined you could do that, so we will pay. Also, regarding the audit; we're busy, please come back later.
August 4, 2003, Novell: We noticed you registered the UNIX copyrights. We do not agree with that. You had to demonstrate you needed the copyrights and you didn't do that. Tough luck, the copyrights are still ours!
August 7, 2003, Novell: You withheld our money! No mather what your reasons are, you can't do that. We want assurances that this will never happen again. Compy!
August 20, 2003, Novell: You know what, we have a technology license agreement. We want copies of the source and binary code for all versions of UNIX and UnixWare. We tried to call, but you never called back. We want the code and we want to know when we can have it.
September 10, 2003, SCO: We don't agree with your interpretation of our contracts. You are conspiring with IBM to destroy us. SCO is not going to let this happen.
October 7, 2003, Novell: You seem to think that AIX modifications made by IBM are subject to restrictions. Sorry, but that is simply not true. IBM owns their own code and can do with it what they like. Stop bothering IBM.
October 7, 2003, Novell: You seem to think that IRIX modifications made by SGI are subject to restrictions. Sorry, but that is simply not true. SGI owns their own code and can do with it what they like. Even if SGI did contribute UNIX code to Linux, it was very small amount of code and it was removed very quickly. This simply does not warrant terminating SGI's license, so stop threathening that you will.
October 7, 2003, Novell: We heard you are going to send invoices to Linux u
Re:Summary from Groklaw (Score:5, Informative)
That doesn't make sense until you replace Novell with SCO.
Correct, the July 17 letter is from SCO (Score:2)
Re:Summary from Groklaw (Score:5, Funny)
SCO:We own you.
Novell: OMG STFU nUb
Novell's current marketing model (Score:5, Informative)
I also like how they aren't going to "change" SuSE (at least, not yet). Their best bet would be to use SuSE as a development crew - moving things ahead, keeping a separate product (rather than wrecking it the way WordPerfect pretty much was), and incorporating it's advances into Netware [insert whatever number here] as an "added value Enterprise product" - much like Fedora versus Red Hat Enterprise.
Type 2: We will indemnify you. This doesn't bother me too much - after all, SCO is playing "Big Bad" to Linux out there: "Use Linux, and we will sue you." Novell is providing some legal peace of mind. Granted, you have to buy their "new" product, but my feelings are horribly hurt by that - after all, they have to pay for the scum sucking evil hearted - I mean, laywers after all.
Type 3: We actually own the UNIX copyright. This ties into Type 2 in a certain respect, only without lawyers. This is to give current SuSE and other Linux customers less fear. Basically, it boils down to this:
"We know that SCO says they own the UNIX copyright and because of that they think they can get money from you for anything Linux.
"Bullshit. The fact is, Novell still owns the important copyrights, and we won't sue you. See? We're nice.
"Please buy our products."
Type 3 doesn't bother me that much either, since it at least appears to be "We're nice people - honest!" Granted, they are still an amoral corporation which pretty much means they're not doing it out of the charity of their hearts but because they want to make a buck - but you have to admit *right now* they're at least showing more class than SCO.
Either way, I'm not concerned. I figure about 12-24 months from now, this will all go away when the lawsuits finally fail and SCO and such run out of money to pay the heartless gutter snipes - I mean lawyers, President Richard Simmons will be in office with the War on Fat, iTunes Music Store will enjoy brief market domination before being the aliens arrive from Zardon VI and eradicate the earth when they learn we've evolved lawyers.
Or - something like that. Just my opinion.
One last thought (Score:2)
So as long as SCO is in the news, Novell probably figures to ride on their coat tails and get practically free advertising.
YOU FAILED IT. (Score:2, Insightful)
Dumbass.
Re:YOU FAILED IT. (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd wager their increase has more to do with general stock market speculation of an overall economic recovery and increased business spending on IT infrastructure rather than enthusiasm for Novell's somewhat confusing business strategy.
Re:Novell's current marketing model (Score:3, Funny)
So, uh, are you trying to say something about lawyers there?
guttersnipe - n - a person of the lowest moral or economic station
I was going to comment that you had it all wrong, but that was before I looked up the definition.
Carry on.
Well I'm shocked (Score:4, Funny)
We know. But that's the wrong story. (Score:5, Informative)
The real news is that SCO had a deadline to disclose to IBM, "with specificity", exactly what the claimed infringements are. That was yesterday. Neither IBM nor SCO has announced anything.
On January 23rd, there will be a hearing on whether IBM is satisfied with what SCO disclosed. Then we'll know quite a bit more.
A short summery - SCO is cooking it's books! (Score:5, Interesting)
SCO says that they have the right to enter into new kinds of agreements and that the Microsoft and Sun licenses are not revised versions of the previous unix source licensing arrangements, so Novell can go pound salt.
Novell asks SCO to stop harassing Novell's customers (all existing Unix source licensees) and trying to ammend contracts they have no rights to ammend, threatening to terminate liceneses for IBM and SGI that only Novell has the right to do so, being a general pain in the a**, and that generally SCO are a bunch of lying cheats (yes, it's all in there, fun reading).
SCO doesnt say anything about being lying cheats, but claims Novell's Unix source licensees are their licensees, even though Novell has a 95% revenue interest, and SCO receives 5% "commission".
In short, this correspondence provides a foundation for Novell to say SCO is in violation of the original Unix purchase agreement, and could form the basis for Novell to have SCO's rights to Unix terminated. Since SCO knowingly failed to list money potentially owed to Novell on either their earning statements and their official SEC filings, or the potential risk to loosing most of their recent income, SCO is probably in deep sh*t SEC-wise, which probably explains the mysterious exit of that SCO employee in charge of doing the SEC filings right before their last earning report was do. Naturally he would not wish to be the one to sign a false earnings statements.
I guess looking at this, Bubba will soon have a new "Mc"-bride at club fed.
Re:A short summery - SCO is cooking it's books! (Score:4, Funny)
How's that for understanding where their head is at?
Gerry
Asset Purchase Agreement (Score:5, Interesting)
From the letter dated 12 June 2003, from Novell and IBM:
Accordingly, pursuant to Section 4.16(b) of the Asset Purchace Agreement, Novell, on behalf of The SCO Group, hereby waives any purported right SCO may claim to terminate IBM's SVRX Licenses enumerated in Amendment X or to revoke any rights thereunder, including any purported rights to terminate asserted in SCO's letter of March 6, 2003 to IBM.
This, in a nutshell, is Novell withdrawning SCO's right to terminate IBM's license, which was reported last year on Slashdot [slashdot.org]. What I really want to see, however, is the ubiquitous Asset Purchase Agreement, which appears in both this letter and most of the other ones; the whole dispute (at least, between SCO and IBM) appears to hinge on this agreement. Unfortunately, the agreement will probably never see the light of day, for reasons of corporate confidentiality.
Re:Asset Purchase Agreement (Score:3, Informative)
Unfortunately, the agreement will probably never see the light of day, for reasons of corporate confidentiality.
I correct myself! SCO has just published the Asset Purchase Agreement [sco.com]. Thanks to Carl [slashdot.org] for pointing this out in another post.
Re:Asset Purchase Agreement (Score:4, Informative)
...and here is the exact text of Section 4.16(b), taken from the relevant part [sco.com] of the Asset Purchase Agreement:
(b)Buyer shall not, and shall not have the authority to, amend, modify or waive any right under or assign any SVRX License without the prior written consent of Seller. In addition, at Seller's sole discreation, Buyer shall amend, supplement, modify or waive any rights under, or shall assign any rights to, any SVRX License to the extent so directed in any manner or respect by Seller. In the event that Buyer shall fail to take any such action concerning the SVRX Licesnes as required herein, Seller shall be authorized, and hereby is granted, the rights to take any action on Buyer's own behalf. Buyer shall not, and shall have no right to, enter into future licenses or amendments of the SVRX Licenses, except as may be incidently involved through its rights to sell and license the Assets or the Merged Product (as such term is defined in the proposed Operating Agreement, attached hereto as Ehibit 5.1(c)) or future versions thereof of the Merged Produc.
Whew, a bit long winded. Obviously, Novell is Seller and SCO (or was it Caldera back then?) is Buyer. Anyhow, I've emphasised the important paragraphs, which from my reading certainly do say that:
IANAL, but it looks like SCO has no contractural basis for terminating IBM's SVRX license without Novell's say-so; and since this say-so hasn't been given, it appears that IBM's SVRX license is still valid.
Re:Asset Purchase Agreement (Score:4, Interesting)
Interesting that the music industry is mentioned. (Score:5, Interesting)
"Similar to analogous efforts underway in the music industry, we are prepared to take all actions necessary to stop the ongoing voilation of our intellectual property or other rights."
And in response to the specific piece Jack Messman says in his response:
"In your letter, you analogize SCO's campaign against the Linux community to that of the record industry against major corporations whose servers contained downloaded music files. There are crucial differences between the two campaigns. The record industry has provided specific information to back up its allegation, while SCO steadfastly refuses to do so. In its allegation letter, the record industry provides evidence of allegedly infringing activity that is specific to the targeted company. This offers the company real notice of the activity, sufficient information to evaluate the allegation, and an opportunity to stop the activity if it determines the allegation is true. If SCO wants to compare its actions to that of the record industry, it should follow the example set by that industry and present specific evidence of the alleged infringement."
At the very least, read this entire response [novell.com] from Novell to SCO regarding it's letter to Linux customers. Jack has pretty much voiced *all* the concerns that the Slashdot community has come up with in a direct letter to Daryll.
This should calm the fears of many (Score:5, Informative)
IT managers and and other executive decision makers who have been nervous about all the warning shots fired between the battleships in this war of words can finally feast their eyes on tangible evidence demonstrating the untennable position of Darl McBride.
In particular I point to the letter dated 12 Jun 2003 from Novell to SCO regarding the Asset Purchase Agreement between the Santa Cruz Operation, Inc. and Novell, Inc., September 19, 1995.
In this letter, Jack Messman pretty clearly identifies the absurdity of Darl's claims be referring to very specific portions of the Asset Purchase Agreement, which give IBM "irrevocable" rights, and states that Novell also retains certain rights, over which SCO has no say.
Now, I ask you, does this not sound like a man who is sure of his position and the position of his company? It seems to me that Linux users (corporate, individual, or those who've ascended to the next plane of existence) should be well in the clear from the majority of any claims SCO might possibly level. This evidence combined with the confidence exhibited by multi-million dollar legal defense funds set up to help those who might be the target of SCO legal action will go a long way to reassuring executives.
Now, if only the judges in this case would hurry up and slap SCO back into the last century, where they should have stayed...
Re:This should calm the fears of many (Score:4, Interesting)
These unethical capitalists and their actions make me very affraid for the future and welfare of our society. Don't forget these corporations have a lot of influence in the media. How far do you think they'd be willing to go to make a profit? Judging from America's favorite "reality" shows I bet most people would do just about anything for money. Even if it means selling us all out, selling our children's future, etc, etc, etc.
Doesn't this bother anyone? This is a very serious social and psychological problem. And it is a feedback loop that won't fix itself. The media, education system, judicial, legislative, and executive systems all rely on the status quo for job security. What incentive do they have to improve things or change? In fact, they lie to us in order to maintain the status quo (Advertisements, War on Drugs). This is a cycle of continuous manipulation that's called capitalism.
Watch the movie Grass sometime, maybe it will make a little more sense to you.
November 21st Document, Second Page (Score:3, Insightful)
2.1 Section J of Ammendment No 1 prohibits SCO from entering "into new SVRX Licneses" except "as may be incidentally involved through [SCO's] rights to sell and license UnixWare software or the Merged Product."
2.2 With this prohibition in mind, Novell has noted SCO's recent introduction of its "SCO Intellectual Propety License for Linux," in which SCO attempst to enter into new SVRX Licenses with Linux end users.
Lawsuit Necissary (Score:5, Interesting)
Some might not argee with me, but I think this lawsuit by SCO was inevitable for the Linux community. I have believed that Linux couldn't be considered a completely viable choice for many companies until something like this happened. Why? Because it hadn't been tested.
Linux is based on a new concept that many people don't understand. The right to freely use and change and redistribute doesn't make the Cooperate heads comfortable. Add that to the fact that most, if not all, distributions claimed not to take legal responsibility for their products. I believe that after SCO loses their lawsuit that companies will start providing legal immunity to their customers. In fact this is already starting to happen. Novell with their move into the Linux world has started to do this, IBM I believe is starting in some form or another and there could be others that I am not aware of.
Linux is going through its growing pains and afterwards it will be better for it. Once Linux moves through this, it will be well into it's young adult life. There will still be a lot of growth and "pain" involved but it will move on. While I know many will say, "But Linux has been around for many, many years," I say to them that yes, but it hasn't been tested legally. This will give it the legal ground to move forward and grow.
I remember several years ago during my early years in college one of my professors saying some time soon somebody would try to profit off of Linux's growth, they would take legal action and try to undermine the base that Linux is founded on. He also said that Linux wouldn't, and in reality, couldn't be a heavy weight contender in the marketplace until something like this has happened.
I believe that when all is said and done with the lawsuit Linux will be a better off and will show to all the skeptical CEO's and anybody else that is listening that Linux is a great foundation to build their network on and more.
Re:Lawsuit Necessary (Score:4, Interesting)
Wow (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's a summary... (Score:5, Funny)
Novell: Where's your proof?
Darl: They did it, I saw 'em!
Novell: Where, show me...
Darl: It's over there!
[Novell turns around while Darl bolts out of the room]
karma police (Score:4, Informative)
Re:karma police (Score:3, Insightful)
This isn't even a real news site - Slashdot doesn't generate stories of their own. Why do you expect all of the comments to be new, original, and unique to this site?
Just for giggles... (Score:3, Funny)
Holy shit, that would be interesting... and funny.
The Unanswered Question (Score:5, Funny)
All this hupla. Over Unix License. (Score:5, Funny)
Remember to let SCO know how you feel. (Score:5, Interesting)
The movement to link litigious bastards [sco.com] to http://www.sco.com/ would be more interesting if we all let SCO know exactly how you feel. Make sure your link says http://www.sco.com/?sco=litigious%20bastards [sco.com]. (The query parameter will naturally appear in their server logs.)
Interesting SCO is Paying Novell???? (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm no lawyer, but I am an author and my publishers have to pay me royalties BECAUSE I OWN THE COPYRIGHTS TO MY WORKS. The same would apply here. So SCO doesn't even hold the copyrights, what a twisted web Dark weaves.
Smeagol (Score:5, Funny)
I am sure it is all very interesting, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
But, having seen the first file, I really do wonder if McFraud believes CEOs of companies such as Novell really need to be told, in words of one syllable, what Linux is and why its development model differs from proprietary software. It seems to me that he is the one who fails to grasp the situation. He really seems to be unable to grasp that huge teams of programmers are not the way to develop good software (as the Convicted Monopolist has proved time and again...) he does not seem to comprehend that anyone with a brain, a PC and a compiler is able to develop good code, if they want to. Many of course would not bother with the learning curve, they would rather do other things, which is OK of course, but they probably could, if they wanted to. The clever people will certainly create bigger programs of better quality quicker, as we all know. But none of this involves the race of supermen, with super facilities, which McFraud seems to suggest are necessary. Mere mortals, with slowish PCs, simply take a bit longer, but because there are lots of them, each doing their own little bit, and putting the bits together occasionally, it still happens at a respectable pace.
I think that like another nasty piece of work we like to revile on /. (the one who missed the Internet for several years, despite prodding from his employees, who now calls himself the Chief Software Architect), he simply is too stupid to understands what it is all really about.
Unix as a money-spinner has had its day (and thanks to stupid commercial and legal issues it never did spin as much money as it could have), in fact the OS as such has had its day. Wise companies like IBM, Sun, Oracle, Novell realise that now, and know that the future for them is in building hardware (if they are in that business) and/or providing middleware and support. McFraud is simply living in the past. BTW, the next thing to expire as a money-spinner will be the "Office" suite, they are almost two-a-penny now (strictly, two for zero pennies for the pedantic), a far cry from the $400 spreadsheet or WP originally. The fact is that like commodity hardware, commodity software is starting to get very much cheaper. In fact hardware costs are the driving force. It once may have seemed reasonable to put a $400 Lotus 1-2-3 on a $4000 PC/AT (guessing at prices, from the vague recesses of my fading memory, they might not be quite right), but to put a $400 Office suite on a $300 PC is sheer folly. The economies of scale apply to software far more than to hardware, likely marginal cost of an Office suite about $1 for the box and CD, but the Monopolist, the Fraudster and such like have tried to conceal that fact from the gullible public.
I look forward to reading more of McFrauds rantings when the load on the servers subsides.
Novell As Superhero (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it just me, or does it seem like every time we saw back-peddaling or inaction from SCO on some assinine demand it's because Novell beat the slop out of them with "Section 4.16(b)" of thier software agreement on UNIX licensing?
They even cracked SCO upside the head on behalf of IBM once or twice about SVRX licensing.
Novell vs SCO litigation now almost a certainty (Score:3, Interesting)
A gross misunderstanding (Score:5, Funny)
Ladies and gentlemen, today I would like to show you exactly what I mean. For Exhibit A, I would like to show the contents of /etc/hosts where you will clearly see our IP:
Exhibit B, the output of traceroute, where you clearly see that this 127.0.0.1 is SCO's IP, ZERO hops from our main...Increase the burden on SCO (Score:3, Interesting)
I found that quite interesting, mainly that this appears to directly contradict SCO's claim that they own all AIX code as it is derived from "their IP"
If you're interested in this letter, it's the Novell to SCO letter [novell.com]
/. Effect (Score:2)
Re:Sluggish already, and the files are PDF (Score:2)
Text files on Groklaw (Score:5, Informative)
We can Slashdot them instead... :-)
Mike
Re:Text files on Groklaw (Score:3, Informative)
Well, groklaw is hosted at ibiblio, which in its turn is hosted on ncren. I believe all of slashdot is a tiny spike in their overall traffic, which includes students of many major universities sharing music from their dorms. :)
Re:Sluggish already, and the files are PDF (Score:3, Informative)
Re:mirror mirror (Score:2)
Re:mirror mirror (Score:3, Informative)
This is equivalent to saying "you don't need the source, the binary is all you'll ever need." Presumably Novell did this so that if there was something in the letter which wasn't accurately represented by a text-only rendering of the letter, they couldn't be accused of having knowingly stripped that off.
Besides, some karma-whoring AC[1] will post the text conversion by the time I get this response posted anyway.
[1] I know, no such beast.
Re:mirror mirror (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Egad (Score:2)
Re:Egad (Score:4, Informative)
PDF is WAY over used and should be band from text-only use. Leave PDFs for flyers/presentations/manuals
Re:Egad (Score:4, Informative)
However, these are not just the text. They are scans of the original documents. The average
Re:Egad (Score:2)
Re:Egad (Score:5, Insightful)
sPh
Re:SCO court date? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:You've GOT to be kidding me! A .zip file ?? (Score:2)
Re:The impact of the lawsuits in our enterprise (Score:4, Funny)
If the second half of that quote rolls off your tongue that easily, then I think you've been in IT management longer than engineering.
Re:The impact of the lawsuits in our enterprise (Score:5, Insightful)
Heh. Business lingo aside, it very much wouldn't have been wiser for the owners of SCO's OpenServer UNIX to have done so. Linux has completely eaten SCO's lunch with the exception of fields where necessary products for the operation of a business are available only (or cheapest) on SCO's OS line. Real, cheap(er) *NIX for mass market hardware instead of highly marked-up "big iron" was SCO's market before Linux came along and did everything SCO did better for free. SCO's OS line is dying, and there's pretty much nothing that they could've done to save it as a sellable products.
Instead, SCO acted in what an Ayn Rand-ite would've called its own "rational self-interest." SCO knows that its major source of revenue is going to be useless soon, so it's attempting to get another one. Building essentially a completely new software product line in a new market niche is far too high-risk and too low of a payoff compared to attempting to exploit the IP that they think they own. The current spate of lawsuits is a high-risk gamble too, but it's one with a much, much larger potential payoff.
Also, there's the whole principal-agent problem caused by the fact that the future of the executives of the board is not strongly yoked to the company going down in flames. Together, you have a recipe for callous, self-interested behavior by people who are committed to the idea that money is the best measure of success.
Instead we have been deploying Solaris and Mac OS X for the satellite locations.
Congratulations, you have played into SCO's hands. You have not adopted the platform that has killed theirs, and you have given money to Sun, a company that has decided to pay SCO a license for the product you purchased. This is exactly what SCO was hoping for.
Astroturfing? (Score:3, Insightful)
1. A newbie comes from nowhere, posts an SCO press release and gets a +2 moderation.
2. Somebody points out that it's the 1st post ever by EZEZ and gets moderated down right away.
3. My prediction is that this one will also be moderated down.
Re:SCO Reiterates Ownership of Unix Intellectual (Score:5, Insightful)
EZEZ is an SCO shill (Score:5, Insightful)
People, please realize that EZEZ is just shilling for SCO.
This is really interesting.
1. A newbie, EZEZ, comes from nowhere, posts an SCO press release and gets a +2 moderation.
2. Somebody points out that it's the 1st post ever by EZEZ and gets moderated down for pointing out the suspiciousness of EZEZ's posting history (none) and posting content (an SCO press release).
Thank you for the chance... (Score:5, Insightful)
Just go read the documents. It clearly says: All rights _with_the_exceptions_listed_. Uh, oh, small omission, right? go to the exceptions list and you will see that nearly ALL Trademarks, Copyrights and Patents are excepted.
Apparently all the Intellectual Property that was transferred in the original Purchase Agreement were the trademarks UNIX and UnixWare. The open group now owns the UNIX trademark so all the Intellectual property left is the trademark to UnixWare. Now you know why you haven't seen a lawsuit for "intellectual property" from SCOX.
Amendment 2 indicates that additional rights may be transferred. Correspondence indicates that this transfer has not taken place (even A2 validity seems to be still "unverified")