Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Not Underwriting SCO's Legal Fees?
An anonymous reader wrote in to say "Linux Business Week carries this morning a claim that Microsoft only bought a Unix license from SCO Group because there's been a prior development project underway at Redmond that warranted it. "The license was not seen as a way to underwrite SCO's legal fees," says a source within the company. "The idea of getting a SCO license had been under consideration prior to the IBM lawsuit." "
There is no way of either truly confirming or denying this. Microsoft won't, i am prepared to bet, actually say what they are working on, and Very few people trust M$ to be telling the truth. End discussion, really.
An infinite number of monkeys will eventually come up with the complete works of
There's been a development project underway for some time, he said, that would have required a SCO license to go forward.
Shucks, and the conspiracy theory looks so good in print.
Anybody buying this?
That's possible, why not ? after all, I doubt Microsoft developed Passport to run on top of Windows, since it's mission-critical.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Let's say this is true. Hey, it may well be.
There's still something to be learned from all of this - namely Microsoft's problem with people not trusting them is very real.
In short, Microsoft is not a company that a lot of people would give the benefit of a doubt.
After so much FUD, how can we trust them?
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
What bothers me is not the lie, but the pervasiveness of this sort of attitude. They don't want to admit their true motives, so they lie and the mass media doesn't call them on it.
My question is simple: why are they bothering? They have financial interest in seeing Linux, and MacOS, failing. If Linux's market share expands, theirs contracts. Nothing difficult to understand here.
Unfortunately, that their pathetic lie being allowed to go un-challenged means that otheres will keep right on lying in ever more pathetic manners. Let's have some artistry here, if someone wants to lie to me I expect it to be plausable, not rediculous.
Its rather like the political "doner's" lie: "Oh, no, I'd never bribe a politician. This particular politician just wants to give me special favors because its part of his political philosophy, I'm just giving him money to express my support of that philosophy."
Since that excuse works so well in politics why not everywhere else: "Oh no officer, I wasn't paying that woman for sex, she simply has a philosophy of giving oral sex to strangers, I'm merely expressing my support for that philosophy."
Really, MS, politicians, their lies are just too transparent to be amusing. We need a better class of lies damnit. Either that or some honesty, that would be original too...
"Mission Accomplished" -- George W. Bush May 1, 2003
[*sarcasm*]I'm sure everyone believes that. But even if it isn't true, Microsoft could be "licensing" SCO to uphold their own position on intellectual property, which is that you must obtain a license and pay for everything. It fits in perfectly with their business model, and should hardly come as a surprise: we always knew where they stood. That this could be a little "down payment" on what they hope to get out of the litigation against IBM is a bonus.
Always look on the briight side of life! (whistle, whistle)
Microsoft has been distributing their Services for Unix software for some time now. If you will remember, the entire purpose they attended LinuxWorld last year was to show this product and even hand out free CD's to try.
Basically, Services for Unix runs on Windows and is designed to replace UNIX servers by offering some similiar services such has NFS and NIS. The idea here is for companies to gracefully migrate their servers away from UNIX and lock them into a MS products.
I just don't understand why Microsoft didn't purchase this license years ago when the Services for UNIX was first started.
They don't need SCO code for any UNIX emulation.m l and I guess they will get actually better support for what they probably want to do
1. They can take (F,N,O)BSD code and get a perfect UNIX(ish) layer.
2. If they want to pay somebody, they can go to http://www.windriver.com/products/bsd_os/index.ht
Just tell me what is the benefit of SCO code from the MS point. I'll tel you - they know SCO was going to do something and now they are covering their traces with smoke.
I still Believe that this is more of a Cover your @$$ issue than it is a IP Rights Issue or a Bash Linux Issue.
I mean they've been sued once by SCO already and lost because of DRDOS and SCO is now suing IBM Over Unix. Guess who's next in line that has a big pile of money sitting in a corner of a room that has Unix IP. Most likely Microsoft Lawyer XP(TM) is advising Bill that paying the Royalities is cheaper than going through yet another reputation damaging lawsuit over Unix.
MS is taking the bullseye off of it's back to allow them to work on their Unix Stuff without worry and forces SCO to go after other companies such as Sun.
In Soviet Russia, Trojan exploits YOU!
From what I understand, Apple already has a license (someone please correct me if I'm wrong...) Also, SCO claims that IBM took SCO code and put it in the Linux kernel, which would not affect BSD at all. Of course, there is nothing stoping SCO from claiming that (for example) Apple did the same thing - releasing SCO IP back into the BSD tree.
The whole thing is just SO full of crap of course that no sane person believes anything SCO says anymore.
every reasonable explanation is accused of being a lie.
The newspeak accusation works both ways. The best way to disarm your enemies when you're actually doing something nefarious is to accuse them of lying about *you*, putting them on the defensive instead.
So who do you trust, baby? Microsoft or the "Linux Community"? Who has a reputation for openness, and who for secrecy? Who has been caught in lie after lie, scheme after scheme, extinguishment after extension?
It makes Microsoft look like a bunch of petulant three year olds. I actually think the only reason anyone tolerates them is that their behavior is so unbelievably bad that no one actually thinks it could possibly all be true.
microsoftword.mp3 - it doesn't care that they're not words...
SCO needs money to pursue legal case. Microsoft has money and wants to cover their ass. SCO also wants a high profile license to help bludgeon IBM. It makes sense for all involved, especially if Microsoft was considering it for a while.
.5X and 1.5X in legal fees, AND a 20% chance that we pay 10X in royalties and between .5X and 2.5X in legal fees. Therefore, it is cheaper to pay now.
They probably got a license on the cheap. Should SCO beat IBM, the license fees would go up. I'm pretty certain that the bean counters made this decision.
If we pay now, we pay X. If we don't pay now, there is an 80% chance that we pay 0 in royalties, but pay between
I don't think that it was the lawyers, I think that it was the accountants. Besides, accountants HATE uncertainties. This way they get off the hook and can focus on their business, instead of another legal case.
Alex
I just don't understand why Microsoft didn't purchase this license years ago when the Services for UNIX was first started.
...
It makes sense to me.
For the purposes of their "Services for UNIX" effort, there is no need for a license whatsoever. They could just install linux and *BSD on a flock of development machines, with no license required. Software that runs on all these is going to be highly POSIX compliant, so porting it to other unix-like systems should be easy. Buying a few Solaris, HP-UX, OSX, AIX, etc. unix test machines would suffice for the rest of the market. They could even buy a few Caldera/SCO boxes to add to the test lab.
Unless they really want to muck around in the innards of SCO's commercial offerings, there's no need of a license at all. The only reason to do this is to supply non-portable apps that run only on SCO.
So what remains is the only reasonable explanation for their licensing SCO's stuff: They want to give SCO a big chunk of money for some purpose other than developing software for the unix market. One guess what this reason might be
Those who do study history are doomed to stand helplessly by while everyone else repeats it.
So, SCO is parroting everything M$ wants. That's what a whore is good for. If there's a technical basis for the suit, SCO has yet to present it. All they've said is stupid and untrue stuff about the accountability of free software and innovation being a corporate exclusive. Sounds like the same old M$ bullshit people never believed in the first place, but now they can think badly of SCO instead of M$. Woops, statements like this remind us how's in charge.
What more could M$ want? About a year of FUD to delay free software deployment until Paladium is in place. It's not working.
They also said:
But if we didn't have any actual use for the license, it absolutely would not have happened.
I'd like to know what use that was, beyond the admitted desired statement. How long have they been using Services for Unix? Uh-hun, and now they think they need a license from someone else? Yeah right.
Microsoft, you suck.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
When I buy a license for a product that I'll be using for a project, I don't put out a press release. I can only assume that Microsoft doesn't either. What are the chances that the MS PR department even knows that there is a SCO project underway, and if they did, why would they think it worthy of telling the world?
The only thing I can conclude is that at the very least, MS is trying give the SCO claim some validity (due to the timing). At worst, they are actively funding this effort.
By reading this sig, you agree to the terms of my sig license.
This really isn't about SCO lawsuit - SCO has enough cash in the bank to pursue it.
Microsoft recently came the realization that one of their products "Services for Unix" wasn't licensed according to their new aggressive IP stance - ie, anything that is Open Source exposes you to liability and needs to be avoided.
Purportedly, the product derives code from BSD. Rewriting the code would remove the copyright issues, but not the underlying IP issues that Microsoft is sowing FUD about.
So the only solution is to push their liability onto someone else - ie, SCO. SCO now claims ownership for Unix's IP and gives Microsoft cover. Microsoft can now use IP issues to attack mainframe *Nix -> Linux/BSD migration and pose Windows Server as a fully IP safe alternative. The SCO lawsuit is just icing on the cake.
+--------------------- You idiot! I told you we were facing the wrong way!
Rambus tried to sue everyone a few years back, they didn't benefit and neither will SCO. Regardless of how "dispassionate" business is supposed to be, people remember how you treat other people, a litigious company is not someone you want to do business with bcause they might just turn around and bite you too.
This time hopefully SCO will not survive the bad publicity. Just don't buy any of their products and they will shut up or shut down. Leaving Microsoft to do their own dirty work.