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IBM Doesn't Comply With SCO's Deadline
prostoalex writes "IBM refused to settle with SCO and comply with their deadline, expiring Friday the 13th. "We've got a strong defense case, and we're going to fight it", IBM representative is quoted."
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I hate to say this, but who actually thought IBM would give in to this undersized bully?
Someone hates these cans.
On the other hand, if SCO loses, it will send a strong message to the world: "Stay away from anything GPL, or you'll find your proprietary code taken away from you."
If SCO lose because their rights have not been infringed upon, as seems likely, then that doesn't say anything bad about the GPL at all. How could it?
...of something strongly in doubt.
First off, SCO has to prove that the code in question is in fact "theirs". Considering the rather incestuous family tree that is UNIX that is not so cut and dry.
Additionally, there are allegations that SCO has been helping themselves to GPL'd code without credit or redistribution.
No, the thing we're learning here is that if you really have an IP case against Linux or another GPL project than just be right out in the open. Document the code and PROVE your case. Don't hide behind lawyers, NDA's, horribly out of context quotes and vaguely threatening letters.
And, oh yeah, it helps if you can at least stick to one story for greater than a week.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
And if SCO wins, it'll send a message to the world that you can't trust any GPLed product, because a contributor might suddenly determine that, oops, some of the code in it was "unintentionally" released-- and therefore, you never really had a license to use/distribute it in the first place.
Of course, you really have to break this case into four separate decisions:
1) Did IBM steal proprietary code from SCO in violation of an NDA, and include that code in their Linux release?
2) Does SCO even own the copyrights to that code, or do they still belong to Novell, in which case the determination in (1) may or may not be important.
3) Assuming (1) and (2) break in favor of SCO, does SCO have the right to sue Linux end-users for posessing/distributing Linux code, even if the end-users didn't know they were breaking the law? This turns on...
4) Does SCO's distributing their own version of Linux (under the GPL) invalidate any copyright claims they might have made on code that was (without their knowledge) included in the Linux codebase? In other words, if you steal my code and hide it in a corner of the Linux kernel, can I legally be deprived of my rights to it just because I distributed a copy of Linux?
Quite frankly, the best outcome is for SCO just to drop this nonsense.
I'm rather suprised more people aren't mentioning this. IBM has bankrupted more than one smaller fish in the past who tried to play them in the court room only to find themselves under a mountain of patent infringement lawsuits months later.
When it comes to litigation, IBM is a prize fighter who knows where to hit and knows to hit there very hard.
So there are three possibilities as I see it:
1) SCO wants to be bought out. Darl McBride has mentioned this in the past as being a reasonable thing for SCO's shareholders.
2) SCO wants a token settlement from IBM to use as a weapon for suing other companies who have Linux deployed without a Unix license.
3) SCO has a solid foundation to their case.
Hiring a well-known lawyer like David Boies (ahem, didn't the justice department win the battle but lose the war in their anti-trust suit against microsoft??) seems to imply either #1 or #2. Giving "experts" very small selections of code (80 lines?? give me a break!) for media propaganda suggests either #1 or #2.
I guess agree with what you closed with, SCO probably doesn't even have a case to begin with.
Education is a better safeguard of liberty than a standing army.
Edward Everett (1794 - 1865)
I think you've been too confused by the idiotic "They GPL'd their code when they sold linux", which is probably not true.
Only because they probably don't have any code inserted into Linux. But if they did, it would be under the GPL.
SCO clams that someone from inside IBM inserted their code into Linux
No, they are most definitely NOT claiming this.
They are claiming two things - first that "someone" put their code into Linux.
Second, they are claiming that IBM used "knowledge" of their OS to make Linux better.
The two issues are completely separate.
There are no allegations of code theft against IBM. Their sole complaint is "Linux hackers suck, so the only way that Linux could compete against us is if IBM helped them."
Now, if there really is SCO-owned code in Linux, SCO distributed that code knowingly. They know it's there, they know that the kernel is covered under the GPL, and they are still distributing it.
SCO is implicitly licensing their code under the GPL because they continue to distribute Linux. They must have agreed with the GPL, because nothing else grants them the right to continue distributing it.
even if they had never touched the GPL they still would have had code leakage
True, and thier actions state exactly how much any alleged code is worth to them.
The doctrine of laches says that if an injured party wants to claim damages, they must minimize the damages. Since SCO won't allow anyone to remove the alleged code (they refuse to say what the alleged code is, or where it is), then they are unable to claim injury.
By refusing to tell anyone what the alleged code is, they are effectively saying that any code that might be in the kernel is worthless to them.