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The Power Behind the SCO Nuisance
akahige writes "Forbes has a fairly detailed story about the sordid history of The Canopy Group and all the various companies they've sued -- Microsoft (who they beat) and CA (this case is still pending), among them. Before joining Caldera, Darl McBride sued IKON Office Solutions, for whom he worked -- and won. And it also seems that a bunch of Canopy power players also sit on SCO's board of directors. The short summary is, 'these guys are professional litigious bastards -- be exceptionally wary.'" A local user's group is planning a protest for tomorrow. Reader myst564 writes: "After reading all of this SCO press I remembered that SCO once offered up all of their 'Ancient UNIX' (their words, not mine) source to the world while retaining all copyrights (i.e, no OSS license). Interestingly enough it WAS located here but isn't any longer: SCO's Ancient Unix. What's more you can read about the original release here at: Linux Today. I downloaded the source myself way back then but never did anything but delete it! Anyway, check out this comment. It's interesting that this was predicted in 2000!"
Quote: "these guys are professional litigious bastards"
:)
Given the statement that's a fairly brave thing to say in a public forum
Thanks for the libel, we were wondering who we were going to sue today. See you in court!
Sincerely,
The SCO Corporation
In Soviet Rush, today's Tom Sawyer gets high on you.
Lets all invest our money in SCOs stock!! Then they are guaranteed to tank and go out of business in no time! It's time we made this tech bubble burst work FOR us.
Outdoor digital photography, mostly in New Engl
Yep, no person can own an idea--Amazon.com owns them!
It has now become clear to me that SCO has a very good chance of winning every single one of their claims.
By observing the public statements made almost daily by SCO and their spokespeople, the secret of their strategy has emerged and I now clearly see it. There is a very real and serious danger here.
Really, I must hand it to SCO. A brilliant legal strategy.
I don't believe the open source community has previously contemplated this particular type of legal attack.
SCO's strategy is simply this: they will win all claims, because IBM's lawyers will be unable to present a good defense, because IBM's lawyers are unable to concentrate, due to their inability to stop laughing. This will be especially unfavorable if this laughing behavior carries over into the courtroom.
Those who would give up liberty in exchange for security and DRM should switch to Microsoft Palladium!
Turns out it's actually a firm that breeds goats in New Zeland. No, really!
Never mind that stuff about decaffeinated coffee. What about weaning people onto deSCOffeinated Slashdot once this is all over? There'll be millions of geeks worldwide going "need..... SCO...... news......." and shaking.
"SCO is basically owned and run by The Canopy Group, a Utah firm with investments in dozens of companies. Canopy's chief executive, Ralph J. Yarro III, is chairman of SCO's board of directors and engineered the suit against Microsoft in 1996. Darcy Mott, Canopy's chief financial officer, is another SCO director, along with Thomas Raimondi, chief executive of a Canopy company called MTI Technology (nasdaq: MTIC - news - people ). In this cozy company, SCO even leases its office space from Canopy--a fact disclosed in Securities and Exchange Commission filings, along with the fact that SCO's chief financial officer, Robert Bench, has a side job as a partner in a Utah consulting firm that last year billed SCO for $71,200."
Buy 'em a pair of concrete shoes, and make 'em sleep with the fishes. I don't think these guys have any idea who they are messing with. Some of the guys at IBM are not boy scouts. Capiche?
How ya like dat?
I almost wish now that I had been using SCO's products all along -- Just so I could make a declaration about how "I will never use them again!"
But alas, some malevolent twist of fate has conspired to keep me from such bliss....
"The evil of the world is made possible by nothing but the sanction you give it." -- Ayn Rand
In other words, like many religious folk, the money-grubbing fsckwits in the sue-the-world movement are a) convinced of their own righteousness, and b) sure the whole world, including judges, will take their word for it.
Doh! I've been trolled by Forbes!
The evidence is clear, right from the fresh 2.4.21 kernel (under bluetooth):
"Say Y here to compile SCO support into the kernel or say M to compile it as module (sco.o)."
Pretty strong evidence there, huh?
Your honor, I downloaded the file, but I did not decompress.
"These guys in Utah are no dummies. The crunchies in the Linux community should be paying more attention. "
I have a hard time taking seriously a writer who uses the word "crunchies".
For some reason, all I can picture is that scene from independence day where a bunch of people (SCO) are standing on top of the building cheering for (taunting) the big alien ship (IBM) that is slowly hovering over them, and without warning, emits an enormous death ray that quickly vaporizes them and destroys most of the city. IBM might move slowly, but they carry a big stick.
This article indicates to me its more like a duel between two masters.
IBM: [struggling to keep SCO away] There's something I ought to tell you.
SCO: Tell me!
IBM: I'm not left-handed either.
Or does SCO seem to be more and more like the black knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail?
IBM: You fought well sir knight, but the battle is mine.
SCO: Tis but a scratch!
IBM: A scratch?! I just took your arm off!
SCO: It's just a flesh wound!
ETC ETC ETC.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
Blah Blah Blah SCO Blah Blah Blah SCO Blah Blah Blah SCO Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah !!!!!! So ends the SCO rant!
We don't need no stinking sig!
I'd say this is actually the most bizarre claim made by SCO yet.
I wouldn't. I think the most bizarre claim is that SCO says IBM misappropriated trade secrets yet they have posted the code online freely accessible themselves.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
The comment
...that someone made on an online discussion, oh, about a year ago. It cracked me up so I saved it:
Richard N. Turner - Subject: I'm Reminded of An Old Post... ( Feb 23, 2000, 15:39:02 )
``SCO should do the industry a favor and disband, pausing only to bulk-format all their drives so that none of the evil source code can inadvertently escape into the world. Their marketing people and their tech support people should be sent to camps to be retrained for professions more suited to their skills and their buildings should be torn down and burned.''
I think thats a bit prophetic.
Why have 1 person driving a backhoe when you could employ 20 with shovels?
Yeah, #5 for SCO's business plan :
5) NOT Profit.
Linus uses an 8 space indent, which as far as I can tell is pretty rare
;-)
I'm surprised nobody has told him that you can adjust that in vi.
Think I should post the info to LKML
All your code base are belong to us.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Actually, I have some bad news for you all. I have copyright and full dsitribution rights to the "Hello World" (c) program. If any of you have ever started off a project with "Hello World" (c), regardless of what your program eventually became, then I own the full rights to your program. And I'm gonna sue you all for a combined 1 gazillion dollars.
Random is the New Order.
By the men who moil for gold; Whoops, never mind...
I would love to have been a fly on the wall when the Caldera Board of Directors hired Darl McBride. I wonder if it went something like this:
Chairman: Your record certain is very impressive Mr. McBride. In closing, do you feel that there is anything else about yourself that we should know to help us with our choice? .. I sued my former employer for many millions while I was working for them and won. .. You're hired! You're our kind of guy!
McBride: Well, I did, uh, that is
BoD: [Many looks around the table and private whispers]
Chairman: Mr. McBride
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Anyone else hear "Canopy group" and instantly think about the evil Umbrella Corporation from the Resident Evil games? I mean, jeez, if you're going to run an evil empire, shouldn't you try picking a name that's just a little less conspicuous?