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Skeptical Reactions To SCO From Around The Globe
IpsissimusMarr writes "The Inquirer reports that 'The biggest computer manufacturers in Japan that build systems running Linux will hold out against blustering by SCO to extract license fees based upon unsubstantiated infringement claims, it has emerged.' Its nice to see more support from the business world denouncing SCO's tactics."
janda writes "ComputerWorld is reporting that several companies, including Coastal Transportation, Burlington Coat Factory, and Boscov's Department Store are taking a wait-and-see attitude towards SCO and their new 'Linux license' arrangement.
Best quote from the article:
'I don't remember signing anything with SCO saying I owe them any kind of licensing fees.' (Tom Pratt, Coastal Transportation)
I find it refreshing that companies are starting to stand up to SCO's blackmail attempts."
An anonymous reader points to this story at Mozillaquest according to which IBM says that SCO does not have a viable claim to JFS, NUMA, RCU, etc., writing "IBM says it owns the AIX code it contributed to the Linux kernel despite SCO claims that it has registered its Unix System V copyrights. A big problem for IBM and the GNU/Linux community might be the inclusion of JFS, NUMA software, RCU, etc into the Linux kernel. SCO claims it owns them. However, IBM, SuSE, and kernel.org's Richard Gooch reject SCO-Caldera and Darl McBride's claims that GNU/Linux contains SCO-owned or SCO-copyrighted code. ... The Linux kernel code is copyrighted under the GNU GPL. IBM owns its AIX additions and copyrights to Unix System V code and its development of JFS, RCU, and NUMA software code."
arilian writes "According to this article from ARNnet, SCO's new license may leave them open to litigation by other contributers to the Linux kernel." Bruce Perens and intellectual property lawyer Jim LaBarre are quoted in this one.
Finally, Joe Barr writes "I just filed a complaint against The SCO Group with the Securities and Exchange Commission. It was easy. I used their online complaint form at:
www.sec.gov/complaint/cf942sec9570.htm.
The basis for my complaint is that SCO is using false and unsubstantiated claims of IP rights to UNIX and Linux in order to manipulate its stock price and force consumers to purchase SCO licenses.
Maybe someone else would like to do the same."
Yeah! Just had to do this at least once in my life!
One word: Insane.
"I just filed a complaint against The SCO Group with the Securities and Exchange Commission. It was easy. I used their online complaint form... ...
Maybe someone else would like to do the same."
If a lot of people file complaints, perhaps that will cause the SEC, or the government in general, to take some serious notice of this serious problem.
no thanks
How valid is it to complain (via the online form mentioned) when one is not an affected or threatened party in this matter?
http://thechubbyferret.net - Ferret pictures and informative links.
But after reading the zillionth manifesto, harebrained legal opinion and statement of noisy defiance from the Linux world, I have to confess my first reaction to learning there really is illegally-copied SCO code in Linux will be to laugh my ass off.
Geez, Joe Barr. Maybe the MPlayer guys will issue a rebuttal.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
You can complain about all the SCO articles, but really, people have to realize that this has a HUGE impact on software in general, not just *nix. The decision here will set a precedent to possibly be used for decades, if not a century
But, here's my gripe, which you can skip by not reading further. I would like to see more home-jobby builds, not necessarily case mods (though, i would like to get a layout of how to build an ATX wood case. heh). We like to see the simplest webservers, the cheapest way to do things on a college shoestring budget. I'd like to have an automatic CD-burner. I want to see what random Linux distros and programs can do for me, though i may never use them. More of the fodder! That is all. /rant
It has hardly been updated in a decade! We're talking X11R5, no support for pthreads without installing extensions, etc.
In this world, your OS can't be "just as good as" Windows to survive. Linux, Solaris, AIX, and Mac OS X are each doing well because they are substantially better at what they do than the competition.
On the upside, they are allowing free use of Unix Version 7. Well, sorta free. apt-get install simh and boot the sucker up if you want to see the somewhat humble beginnings of UNIX.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
Why don't we just create an SCO topic, or even better, sco.slashdot.org. That way, those of us who don't like the bi-hourly updates don't have to see them.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
but such is the state of current IP and IP laws
It is good to see, that people are realizing that this is mostly smoke and bluster. In the end, however, it doesn't matter. What matters, the only thing that will really matter, is when the US government either says "You're right, here's your blank check" or "You're wrong, now shut the hell up." And compensation for all the trouble they've caused would be nice, too.
It amazes me that a company can do as much dammage as SCO, even if it is at the time being only damage to a reputation, without having to offer some sort of proof. The government is supposed to hold people blameless until they can prove otherwise, but corporations can throw accusations around all they please. We can learn a lot from Germany and australia in this regard.
Thomas Galvin
That's why. You could patent my work, and if I never challenge it, then you can say it's yours all you want.
SCO is stating that any code which IBM develops becomes property of SCO, due to a licensing agreement. So looking up patents is a moot point.
Aside from stating that IBM's license for AIX is perpetual and irrevocable, they have stayed quiet. If they were to come out and say "We own RCU. We own NUMA. This is why...", IBM could kill a lot of the FUD flying around in one swat.
Of course, to IBM, this would be tipping their hand too early.
Maybe there is someone out there that can answer this.. It seems that there should be something here for the Federal Trade Commission http://ftc.gov too. Is it, anticompetitive/antitrust behavior by SCO, or possibly fraud? What is the complaint that we should make to the FTC?
Complaints are good, but you want to have a _serious basis_ for them, not just geek conjecture.
Otherwise, you're just going to piss the SEC off, and open yourself up for a lible suit.
There is some interesting evidence that this whole lawsuit is part of an insider trader scam. Look in the discussion from yesterday's SCO story, and you'll find some links to stuff on Nasdaq.com, and SEC filings, showing SCO executives purchasing SCO stock at bargain basement prices right before filing the lawsuit against IBM, and then you see those same executives selling may shares at dramatically inflated prices, in the last few weeks.
If you want to find the links quickly, take a lot at my recent postings, one of them is from yesterday, and it's where I posted exactly what I sent to the SEC.
// TODO: Insert Cool Sig
Or you could just use the 2.4.x kernel source provided on SCO's site, which is obviously provided because of the GPL. And SCO already said they won't hold their *own* customers accountable -- or at least before they were trying to extort licenses.
You mean watered-down unix right out of 1992.
The only real advances they did was SCOAdmin, a curses-style interface where you could manage the system.
We use SCO Openserver 5.0.6, nothing special. Supports 40 users, will not support more because I'm just not buying licenses for it. I'll move to Redhat just to spite them.
And oh yeah, Red Hat's boxes don't go crashing down when you hook them to a MS DHCP server. SCO's sure did. Nice TCP/IP stack there McBride.
Ass.
What if SCO runs out of money and then allows itself to be acquired by Microsoft. Microsoft buys all of SCO's assets and continues the legal battle with Microsot's huge reserve of money and full-time lawyers.....
Looking for a job?
Want your resume written professionally?
DON'T USE TUNAREZ!!!
What are SCO's actual damages
Since SCO refuses to disclose which parts of the kernel contain "their" code (even when asked by Linus), and that they continue to make Linux freely available via their FTP site, the actual damages are zero.
Trust me, the SEC knows. At least part of it does: I run a bunch of their systems, and the SCO BS has been lunchtime discussion amongst the techies for the last few weeks. . .
In order to see the disputed code, SCO makes one sign a NDA. Fine. What's to prevent him from passing the data to someone else who then posts it?
Umm, the NDA?
If you think it can't hurt you, why don't you sign it?
And if you still think it's a good idea, read this.
I had just thought it was moronic until I read the "warning to linux shops" ( http://sco.com/scosource/gartner_warning.html ) and afterwards have since filed every complaint form I can find about that company..
.gif thing, they are just shooting themselves in the stomach to slowly bleed to death..
yea, they are all bluster and think they *have* something.. but look what happened with the
I will *never* allow this company or any others I work for to have any dealings with them now, and further I will urge any customer of mine to drop any dealings with them. That is power of Linux users I bet they never thought they would see..
I have purchasing power and you SCO will never see it. (I hope your stockholders read this)
anime+manga together at last.. in real time.
The problem with such statements is that many of us that are affected are not really involved parties. There are certain rules that govern whether or not you have standing to sue. Beyond that, what else can we really do? Will mailbombing the FTC with the same basic complaint achieve anything?
This is a situation where "involved parties" need to step up and take action. This is what has happened in both Germany and Austrailia. The same needs to happen in any country where SCO has a presence.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
In other news, as of 15:07EST, this thread is one of the top stories on Google news.
Right now, thier shares are at 14.71USD a piece. Assuming thier stock prices rise as we buy, lets project a 15.5 avg price per share. The question is, and I can't find this offhand, is how many shares of stock we'd need to buy?
I know I'd chip in for 6 shares, and if 100,000 linux users/slashdot readers all bought an avg of two shares, we're looking at 2.5 million shares purchased... Which gets us what % of the company, exactly?
Ok, after digging on finance.yahoo I've found that there are 13.1 million shares outstanding. that means we need to buy 6.56 million shares.
We need 101.68 million dollars.
Ouch. That really throws my numbers out of whack.
Ok then, we need 6.56 million linux users to buy a share a piece, or 1 million users to buy just over 6 shares a piece.
Thats a big organizational challenge... Anyone at FSF or GNU ready to take this on? (the buy-shares forms/donations system and handing over rights for voting with said stock to said org. Realisticly, it might be easier for people to donate cash towards buying stock, not buying it direct, thatway FSF or whomever gets full control of whats bought)
Also: I don't think selling the operation to redhat for a dollar would be the right solution though - thats too politically (in linux circles) charged (to let one distro get thier stuff) - I think thier assests should be liquified, and the results split 50-50 with the fsf getting half to fund dev projects, and 50% going back to the stockholders. Of course, there wouldn't be much left once you consider that many customers with support contracts (and yes, some people have paid sco for support, even pre lawsuit) would want refunds.
Also Also: Yes, I know many people would be against this on moral grounds - 'its the principle of the thing!' - but how many hours and how much money will we waste trying to promote linux against this FUD-crap from SCO? And, what sort of message would a SCO buyout send the world... It'd tell M$ and everyone else that f-ing with Linux is a dangerous proposition, because the community will unite and topple all who oppose us...
just my 3.14 cents...
man is machine
People keep saying this, but the people who say it aren't reading what SCO is saying.
/. posters say "So what if SCO doesn't believe it's clean, if we remove the offending code, it will be clean and then they'll have no claim."
SCO has said publicly that it no specific section of Linux can be removed or re-written to make it "clean". Their argument is that once SCO's IP was copied into the Linux kernel, later versions of Linux-- all of it-- became a "derivative work" and thus the entire kernel is now "SCO IP".
The only way they feel you could "clean" Linux is to revert to kernel 2.2 and restart development from there, but none of the existing developers or even Linux users could work on development because they've already been tainted-- all current Linux users have already seen the secret SCO IP in Linux kernels they're using. Any code created by current Linux developers or users would therefore be written with knowledge of SCO's super-duper technology, so SCO says that any code written by current Linux developers or users would therefore be "SCO IP" from the day it is born because it is a derivative work. And so they would still have to sue you for licensing fees over it, even though you just wrote it five minutes ago.
So, SCO says, we're letting you all off the hook. Since the only way to "clean" Linux development would eventually kill it completely (since no existing Linux developers or Linux users could work on a clean version), we'll be generous and let Linux live, and just charge license fees instead.
Now I've seen other
But they don't have any claim now; by most peoples' standards, they're making fraudulent claims to manipulate their stock price.Why does everyone think that if we remove some code from Linux and send a nice card to SCO saying that's what we've done, SCO will sit down and say "Okay, you're clean now. Thanks, Linux people!" and then withdraw their case?
And in fact, they've said they won't.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
I'm curious... could a group of Linux developers who contributed to the Linux Kernel file a class action libel suit against SCO? Perhaps in Britain...
Subject of Your Complaint: Investment
Name of Company You Are Complaining About: The SCO Group
Street Address: 355 South 520 West
Suite 100
City: Lindon,
State or Canadian Province: Utah
Country: UNITED STATES
Zip Code or Postal Code: 84042
Company Web Site: www.sco.com
Phone Number: (801)765499Ext.
How Did the Company Initially Contact You?: Internet (Other)
Explain Your Problem: (Please limit your complaint to 2000 characters.): This company is making unsubstantiated claims about its rights to intellectual property.
It is claiming that it owns IP that is used in the Linux kernel version 2.4
It has not after a significant amount of time notified anyone about what IP is being illegally used.
It stock price has gone up by 500% over the last 4 months while no concrete evidence for there claims has been presented
2003-07-15 WILSON, MICHAEL SEAN
Senior Vice President 6,000 Option Exercise at $0.66 per share.
(Cost of $3,960)
2003-07-15 WILSON, MICHAEL SEAN
Senior Vice President 6,000 Sale at $10.66 - $10.8 per share.
(Proceeds of about $64,000)
2003-07-14 WILSON, MICHAEL
Senior Vice President 6,000 Option Exercise at $0.66 per share.
(Cost of $3,960)
2003-07-14 WILSON, MICHAEL
Senior Vice President 6,000 Sale at $10.77 - $10.87 per share.
(Proceeds of about $65,000)
2003-07-11 OLSON, MICHAEL P
Vice President 8,000 Automatic Sale at $10.40 - $10.99 per share.
(Proceeds of about $86,000)
2003-07-09 HUNSAKER, JEFF F.
Vice President 5,000 Automatic Sale at $11.76 - $11.814 per share.
(Proceeds of about $59,000)
2003-07-09 HUNSAKER, JEFF F.
Employee 5,000 Planned Sale
(Estimated proceeds of $55,000)
2003-07-08 BENCH, ROBERT K.
Chief Financial Officer 7,000 Automatic Sale at $10.91 - $11.12 per share.
(Proceeds of about $77,000)
2003-07-08 BROUGHTON, REGINALD C.
Senior Vice President 5,000 Automatic Sale at $10.90 - $10.95 per share.
(Proceeds of about $55,000)
2003-07-08 BROUGHTON, REGINALD C.
Employee 5,000 Planned Sale
(Estimated proceeds of $56,450)
2003-06-25 BROUGHTON, REGINALD C.
Sr Executive Vice President 5,000 Automatic Sale at $10 per share.
(Proceeds of $50,000)
2003-06-20 BROUGHTON, REGINALD C.
Senior Vice President 5,000 Sale at $11.08 - $11.1 per share.
(Proceeds of about $55,000)
2003-06-20 BROUGHTON, REGINALD C.
Employee 5,000 Planned Sale
(Estimated proceeds of $53,750)
Does European law have anything along the lines of the law used in Germany? If so we can shut SCO down right across Europe.
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
I noticed a comment a few moments ago that hasn't yet been moderated above the default threshold. Please go take a look. Would anyone who knows better please care to comment on whether or not this complaint is reasonable, valid, and safe to submit without aggrivating the SEC?
Join Tor today!
One of the executives here were I work hold quite abit of SCO stock. Not because he supports SCO, but because their stock prices are rising. He said that he is keeping a watchful eye, and that he knows SCO can't win. He just notes that it's money and he wants a cut of it. He is a business man. Business is about money, and that justifies his actions in his mind.
I will take the code, though I do not know the way...
In a way, it is good that they would say this, because it is obviously overbroad. It is another statement that fails the smell test. How could someone who has never read the kernel code know their IP?
It also shows again how they are twisting the law to generate FUD. Their supposed rights to any derivative code are based on their contract with IBM. Which Linus did not sign.
Under what legal philosophy can they be talking about "tainted" code? It could only be trade secrets. Can't be copyrights. Authors read books written by other people, just as programmers see copyrighted code all the time. If you read a copyrighted implementation of a hash table, that doesn't mean you can never write your own hash table. Not patents, because then it wouldn't matter where the code came from.
Even if they can claim some ownership over e.g. the code written by IBM, that does not necessarily make that code a trade secret owned by SCO. They would need to argue its status as "secret" on top of justifying their ownership claims.
Ahh, but the problem there is that the whole 'ownership of derivative work' thing only works when there is a contract in place. If I copy a chapter of a book and put it in my book, that's copyright infringement, but it doesn't make my book now owned by the plagarized author. Same with trade secrets and any other form of IP "protection".
There is no contract between SCO and "Linux", so the derivative work angle will not work. It also wouldn't work even if IBM did do something wrong, since they don't own the rights to the rest of Linux either so nothing they could have done could change the ownership of any of that copyright or any other IP besides that which they added.
Securities fraud is a crime. Reporting it is like reporting any other crime. The state is responsible for enforcement once notified.
end of line
The executives of a public company have certain fiduciary duties to their shareholders.
If the company is a heavy user of Linux, the costs of the SCO licenses could be extremely expensive.
If the executives of the company purchase the SCO license, they could possibly be opening themselves up to shareholder lawsuits accusing them of not performing their fiduciary duties to their stockholders.
For exmaple, if a company only has one or two Linux systems, the executives might find it worthwhile to go ahead and purchase the license. However, if the license fee is $700 per CPU and they have 5,000 CPUS, that would be $3,500,000 dollars in license fees -- easily enough to draw the wrath of their shareholders.
In other words, if a company has very many Linux systems, it might be a very good idea to discuss the issues with their lawyers before agreeing to pay SCO a penny.
Details About the Transaction(S): Santa Cruz Operation (SCO) is using unsubstantiated claims of their IP rights to the Unix and Linux kernel (The core of their respective operating systems and distrobutions) source code to raise it's stock prices and force consumers to purchase SCO licenses.
Any Additional Information: I understand you will be getting a number of simmilar comlpaints from others as the result from the posting of this online complaint form on a popular technical website, slashdot.org. Let me speak for others and for myself in saying that this is a very serious issue and the thousands of contributors to Linux and the rest of the world-wide Open Source community are outraged at the slanderous and unethical business practices SCO has demonstrated in the past months. It is not only a harm to those who are heavily involved in Open Source development, but anyone who distributes Linux or Linux-related software. I have a small business in Northern California, in which I am currently focusing on providing Open Source solutions to other small and midsize businesses in order to save money spent on software licensing and related costs. I undoubtedly claim that the unethical practices SCO is taking will affect, either indirectly or directly, my success in providing other small and midsize businesses with Open Source solutions. SCO must be silenced in their allegations and blatant FUD (Fear, Uncertanty and Doubt) to the public until they provide substantial evidence to the public otherwise.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Linux's JFS support doesn't come from AIX -- it comes from OS/2, to which SCO holds no copyright nor any other IP rights.
The OS/2 implementation of JFS was a ground-up rewrite, based on the JFS specification, which is owned completely by IBM. SCO might claim that they have copyrights to the original AIX JFS sources (a dubious claim), but they can't claim they own the JFS _specification_. That's owned by IBM.
As mentioned above, the OS/2 implementation was a ground-up rewrite based on this spec. The OS/2 version of the code was then ported and integrated into Linux by IBM.
Thus I can't see how SCO could have any sort of claim on JFS in Linux. SCO has no contracts with IBM pertaining to OS/2 technologies.
Score one for the good guys...
Yaz.
Really... I'm curious here. What *can* they do to someone who could even file for personal bankruptcy with no serious disruption to their life?
The only thing I can think of is that SCO probably wouldn't let them sign the NDA in the first place.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Everyone buy ONE, thats right one stock. Wait for the next shareholder meating(this will work because the lawsuit is going to drag on forever anyway) then force the arses on the board to drop the lawsuit and or off the board of directors.
hey it might work
Ahh.. The mind what a wonderful trap!
Why hasn't any Linux company -- or Torvalds himself -- sued SCO for a) tortious interference with a contractual relationship, b) trademark infringement, or c) fraud? If I tried to sue J.K. Rowling for stealing a sentence from me and started sending letters to buyers in an attempt to claim royalties for the all Harry Potter books sold, you could be sure she'd countersue my ass into oblivion.
So what's up, Linus?
filmcritic.com - Movie reviews on Internet time
SCO has always claimed that there was a lot of Unix code in recent Linux kernels, hundreds of thousands of lines they claim.
That's simply not true. In earlier interviews, SCO said that "the tainted code is not in the Linux kernel that Linus [Torvalds] and others have helped develop. We're talking about what's on the periphery of the Linux kernel."
That is directly contradicted by their current (incredible) claim that there is hundreds of thousands of lines of their code throughout the kernel.
There is a point at which "evolving your strategy" blends into a liar or con man frantically changing their story.