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Red Hat Sues SCO, Sets Up Legal Fund
An anonymous reader writes "Red Hat has released a PR Newswire article stating that it intends to sue SCO Group to prove that it doesn't infringe any of SCO's intellectual property regarding the Red Hat Linux platform, and to hold it accountable for its actions and smear campaign. They've also announced the creation of a legal fund, to which they've pledged $1M US dollars to fight complaints such as these, called the 'Open Source Now' fund."
This story is here as well:
Red Hat files suit against SCO
CNET article about the suit: http://news.com.com/2100-1016_3-5059547.html
As seen on Yahoo Finance. Time to buy? :)
Red Hat has 90 million in cash and short terms, hardly "poor".
http://biz.yahoo.com/fin/l/r/rhat_qb.html
> I'm sorry, but IBM (the company that has made billions in revenue off GNU/Linux) should be floating the bill.
I agree to an extent, but from another POV it's Red Hat rather than IBM that has most to lose. A goofball ruling might have IBM handing over a few Bills, but Red Hat would go out of business altogether.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Red Hat Takes Aim at Infringement Claims
Complaint launched against SCO claims, Red Hat pledges $1MM to create fund to protect Linux
SAN FRANCISCO--August 4, 2003--Red Hat, Inc. (Nasdaq:RHAT) today made two significant announcements to protect Red Hat Linux customers and the worldwide Linux industry. First, Red Hat announced that it filed a formal complaint against The SCO Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: SCOX, "SCO"). The purpose of this complaint is to demonstrate that Red Hat's technologies do not infringe any intellectual property of SCO and to hold SCO accountable for its unfair and deceptive actions.
"We filed this complaint to stop SCO from making unsubstantiated and untrue public statements attacking Red Hat Linux and the integrity of the Open Source software development process," said Mark Webbink, General Counsel at Red Hat. "Red Hat is confident that its current and future customers will continue to realize the significant value that our Red Hat Linux platform provides without interruption."
To further protect the integrity of Open Source software and the Open Source community, Red Hat has established the Open Source Now Fund. The purpose of the fund will be to cover legal expenses associated with infringement claims brought against companies developing software under the GPL license and non-profit organizations supporting the efforts of companies developing software under a GPL license. Red Hat has pledged one million dollars to be provided as funding in this initiative. For more information please e-mail opensourcenow@redhat.com.
"The collaborative process of Open Source software development which created the Linux operating system has been unjustly questioned and threatened," said Matthew Szulik, Chairman and CEO of Red Hat. "In its role as industry leader, Red Hat has a responsibility to ensure the legal rights of users are protected."
About Red Hat, Inc.
Red Hat is the world's premier open source and Linux provider. Red Hat is headquartered in Raleigh, N.C. and has offices worldwide. Its European headquarters is based in Surrey, UK, with offices throughout Europe. Please visit Red Hat on the Web at www.redhat.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
Forward-looking statements in this press release are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of Section 21E ofRed Hat Takes Aim at Infringement Claims
Complaint launched against SCO claims, Red Hat pledges $1MM to create fund to protect Linux
SAN FRANCISCO--August 4, 2003--Red Hat, Inc. (Nasdaq:RHAT) today made two significant announcements to protect Red Hat Linux customers and the worldwide Linux industry. First, Red Hat announced that it filed a formal complaint against The SCO Group, Inc. (Nasdaq: SCOX, "SCO"). The purpose of this complaint is to demonstrate that Red Hat's technologies do not infringe any intellectual property of SCO and to hold SCO accountable for its unfair and deceptive actions.
"We filed this complaint to stop SCO from making unsubstantiated and untrue public statements attacking Red Hat Linux and the integrity of the Open Source software development process," said Mark Webbink, General Counsel at Red Hat. "Red Hat is confident that its current and future customers will continue to realize the significant value that our Red Hat Linux platform provides without interruption."
To further protect the integrity of Open Source software and the Open Source community, Red Hat has established the Open Source Now Fund. The purpose of the fund will be to cover legal expenses associated with infringement claims brought against companies developing software under the GPL license and non-profit organizations supporting the efforts of companies developing software under a GPL license. Red Hat has pledged one million dollars to be provided as funding in this initiative. For more information please e-mail opensourcenow@redhat.com.
"The collaborative process of Open Source software development which created the Linux operating system has been unjustly questioned and threatened,"
We have more to fear from the bungling of the incompetent than from the machinations of the wicked.
Yahoo Finance reports that Red Hat has a market cap of 1.159 Billion, while SCO only has a 151.9 Million market cap.
While market capitalization does not tell the whole story, it does show that Red Hat is a much more financially powerful company.
With that and the fact that they almost certainly have a rock solid case, the fact is they should sue the shit out of SCO.
This is a SEPARATE issue from the "Open Source Now Fund". I havne't found a copy of the filing, but making unsubstantiated and untrue public statements about your competitors is a serious buiness law violation.
"For more information please e-mail opensourcenow@redhat.com" from redhat
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
The story hit the newswire and other sites like Linux Weekly News long before it showed up on slashdot. Use some common sense.
Prevent email address forgery. Publish SPF records for y
RedHat has done some very great things for the Linux community. The GPL of the QT license is all due to them, and they were the only gnome player for the longest time.
This lawsuit with SCO is potentially another feather in their cap.
However...
It is pretty easy to show that RedHat doesn't care much about the Linux hobbiest community.
RedHat has to survive, granted, and that means money. Perhaps RedHat thinks that it used to waste money on a hobbiest market, but it is those users that have brought RedHat into the enterprise.
Now I bring SUSE and OpenBSD.
Suse already got an injunction against them in Germany. German courts pretty much told them to shut the hell up unless they could back their allegations up, so they... shut the hell up. Not a peep out of them in Germany since.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
Friends don't let friends enable ecmascript.
AT: The SCO Group, Inc. Third-Quarter Financial Results Conference Call WHEN: Thursday, August 14, 2003, 9:00 a.m. Mountain Daylight Time. HOW: If you would like to participate in the live call, you may dial 1.800.811.0667 or 1.913.981.4901; Passcode: 452322. You may also join the call in listen-only mode via Web cast. The URL is listed at http://ir.sco.com/medialist.cfm .
The actual complaint, not linked from the story, can be found here.
Check out page 2, paragraphs 4 and 5:
http://lwn.net/images/ns/rh-complaint.pdf
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism, since it is the merger of state and corporate power." -- Benito Mussolini
It is cowardly, and a betrayal of whatever it means to be a Jew, to act as a white man
-James Baldwin
It's seven counts...
1 for a declaritory judgement that there is no Coprighted SCO code in RedHat Linux, or if there is, that it's not enforceable.
2 for a declaratory judgement that there is no SCO owned Trade Secrets in RedHat Linux
3. False advertising
4. Deceptive trade practices
5. Unfair competition
6. Tortious interference with prospective business oportunities
7. Trade Libel and Disparagement.
Source: http://lwn.net/images/ns/rh-complaint.pdf
At first it just looked like they were covering themselves, but the last 5 show that they're on the offensive.
Advanced users are users too!
It's really nice to make things like that proper hotlinks...
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/030804/lam110_1.html
Forgive me if this is up here somewhere already, but I ran a search through the replies and didn't see it. This is SCO's amusing response, lifted off Yahoo's biz section - I would imagine this would actually be admissible as evidence of some of Red Hat's claims! (Particularly regarding the last two sentences.)
Matthew J. Szulik
CEO
RED HAT, INC.
1801 Varsity Drive
Raleigh, NC 27606
Dear Matthew,
Attached is the letter I discussed with you during our July 31, 2003 telephone conversation. Instead of actually sending the letter, I thought it was best to telephone you and speak in person to see if we could resolve the issues between our companies short of litigation. We left the conversation with a preliminary agreement to meet and continue our discussions further.
To my surprise, I just discovered that your company filed legal action against The SCO Group earlier today. You, of course, mentioned nothing of this during our telephone conversation. I am disappointed that you were not more forthcoming about your intentions. I am also disappointed that you have chosen litigation rather than good faith discussions with SCO about the problems inherent in Linux.
Of course, we will prepare our legal response as required by your complaint. Be advised that our response will likely include counterclaims for copyright infringement and conspiracy.
I must say that your decision to file legal action does not seem conducive to the long-term survivability of Linux.
Yours truly
Darl C. McBride
President & CEO
Favorable tax laws and easy to file paperwork.
SCO System V for Linux
Uh... I just ran into this while browsing SCO's site. It seems to contain more vague threats and accusations, to the tune of "everyone using Unix apps under Linux has pirated SCO's libraries."
Does anyone know what this is about?
My bicyles
I've always had it explained that fascism is a political philosophy and capitalism is an economic system. The Nazis were socialist (German National Social Worker's Party), not capitalists.
Although, I'm curious to hear of a free market, socialist economy.
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
These are certainly the popular definitions, but they are not the ones my economics professors, primarily Sam Bowles and Herb Gintis, taught me. I wouldn't rely on general dictionary to define economic terms. Furthermore, their socialism definition fully jibes with what I said. They say nothing about planning or market model, only ownership and administration. Similarly the Fascism definition does not contradict my statement. As for a real world example of a market socialist economy, that was certainly the direction Chile was heading quite rapidly until 1973. Soviet Russia under the NEP (New Economic Program) was more slowly moving to a Market Socialist system, with some limited private ownership mixed in, until Lenin's death. Likewise, in the eighties China undertook a partial marketization of their agricultural system. Farms were all collectively owned, but peasants were granted individual plots. They were under contract to seel a certain amount of their crop on the governement market. Any remainder they could sell on private markets. Furthermore, collectively and state owned enterprises compete all the time in mixed free market economies. Look at the European auto industry. Until the eighties' rash of sell-offs, Volvo, Renault (IIRC) and Fiat all had some state ownership.
Among the more influential Market Socialist theorists in this country was the Individualist Anarchist icon Benjamin Tucker who, contrary to Libertarian mythology, proposed the complete elimination of private property.
The Nazis used the word Socialist, but they were nothing of the sort. Was the German Democratic Republic democratic? For that matter, is the Democratic party in the US primarily composed of Democrats? It was pure propaganda. The Nazi economy most certainly was Capitalist. The means of production was entirely privately owned. And Fascism was much more than a political philosophy. There was a religious restoration element for one thing (one of the differences between Fascism and Nazism). Fascism was very clear about it's economic agenda: state planning under private owhership. As Mussolini said, it was at its core the merger of state and corporate power. BTW, there is also non-Fascist state capitalism. Arguably postwar Japan was such a system as well as the Republic of Korea for many years (some would say the ROK was actually Fascist).
If you are interested in Market Socialist economics I highly recommend you read (or write) Bowles and Gintis, since they are well known current Market Socialist economists. They are most famous for their paper arguing that rational corporations maximize market share, not profit (except under specific conditions). The first state (non-anarchist) Market Socialist was probably Oscar Lange, if you want to start ar the begining. John Roemer at Berkely is a Market Socialist well known for his critique of the Labor Theory of Value from a Game Theory perspective. IIRC, Michael Piore at MIT is very good, although he may be more of a Structuralist. It has been a long time and my memory fades.
Ever the iconoclast, Joe Stiglitz once wrote a very interesting critique of Market Socialism based on the hypthesis that markets aren't really that efficient as resource allocation mechanisms. I think it was called Wither Socialism.
It is cowardly, and a betrayal of whatever it means to be a Jew, to act as a white man
-James Baldwin