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SCO: Code Proof Analyzed, Linus Interviewed
Arker writes "Bruce Perens has now obtained a copy of the entire slide show from which the recently scrutinized SCO-related Linux code excerpts came, and has analyzed the remainder of the 'evidence' they presented there. Their other code exhibit turns out to have been the venerable Berkeley Packet Filter(!), and their revised line-counts are consistent with simply adding together all the lines of code that have been contributed by Unix licensees." Also, Iphtashu Fitz writes "A new interview with Linus Torvalds has been posted on eWeek.com. In it he slams SCO over the recently leaked source code. Among other things, he points out in the interview that some of the code in question has been removed from the 2.6 kernel ['because developers complained about how "ugly" it was'] before SCO even started complaining."
I really respect the guy. I hope that he is around when Linux finally overtakes the OS world once and for all.
Well, they are smoking crack.
The funny thing about this whole mess is that it just doesn't seem to matter how clear it becomes that SCO is just completely insane -- people in the press still put on a game face and act like they are serious. That is truly, truly sad.
I want to see an article from a non-open source advocate called "SCO is Smoking Crack". Maybe the judge will hold as much.
Thinkgeek needs to put this priceless quote on a t-shirt and donate the proceeds to the legal fund RedHat created.
Generally, no. I work with NDA material that's subsequently leaked (by other parties) all the time, and usually it's the leak-er that's considered at fault, not the person who republishes the leak. Presumably SCO could go after whoever sent the powerpoint pitch or took digital photos of the slides if they could find them.
Most of the companies I know that find sensitive material that is still marked "confidential" re-published by the press simply request that it be removed, but it appears that the reporting on the material itself is fairly well protected; I would imagine Bruce's commentary would fall under the reporting but things like slide photos or the slides themselves (if the "confidential" remained on the slide during the presentation) might be iffy.
As an aside, a lot of companies knowingly let "confidential" documents leak as a way of unofficially distributing the information. SCO could be hoping that this would result in very damaging reports without ever having to provide the code snippets publically -- it leaves an out of deniability "that was an internal document never meant for the outside world and it wasn't reviewed by our lawyers for accuracy, yada yada"
But this is SCO, so the fact that Bruce used the same alphabet as SCO in his report is probably grounds enough for them.
This came up in the recent Samba discussion, but I think it's worth reiterating.
If you have hold the copyright on any GPL code that SCO is distributing, sue SCO. They have stated that they do not intend to be bound by the GPL; their actions show that they do not plan to adhere to the terms of the GPL. It is reasonable to believe that they intend to violate the license (indeed, I think they have already). I think it would be reasonable to seek an injunction against SCO to prevent them from redistributing your code unless they agree that the GPL is valid and they are bound by it.
Imagine a beowulf cluster of lawsuits, hackers in jurisdictions all around the USA (or around the world) filing suit against SCO. Their stock price will plummet - that's a language they'll understand. They will be forced to respond.
What are the possible outcomes? These come to mind off the top of my head:
- They capitulate and agree publicly that the GPL is valid and they intend to adhere to it in redistributing GPL software. Major PR victory for free software.
- They agree to stop redistributing GPL software because they agree that the GPL is valid. Major PR victory for free software; major loss for SCO because they then have no viable product. This seems unlikely. Without product, SCO's sole source of income is lawsuits. Furthermore, in acknowledging the validity of the GPL, they open themselves up to further lawsuits seeking damage for their violating the GPL (which I think it is clear they have, in DEMANDING fees for GPL software). Their stock price plummets.
- They refuse to acknowledge the validity of the GPL. A judge (or judges) grant injunctive relief and force them to stop redistributing GPL software, affirming the validity of the GPL. Minor PR victory for free software. SCO no longer has products to distribute. This seems unlikely simply because I don't think SCO would go this far; again, without product to sell, their stock price plummets.
- Other companies avoid dealing in or distributing GPL software, fearing a Beowulf cluster of lawsuits. This seems quite possible; care must be taken in pointing out that suits are filed ONLY because SCO has violated and has stated their intention to violate the terms of the license.
So head down to your local library and check out a couple of legal texts. Find out how to file a copyright infringement suit in federal court in your jurisdictin. Learn to use "Whereas" in a sentence. Pay the filing fee, and pay a process server to Fed-Ex a letter to SCO to let them know they're being sued. Specify damages if you wish, but the goal (IMHO) is their acknowledgement of the validity of the GPL.
Most importantly, publicize what you've done; email every Linux news site out there, as well as major tech news sites. Get the information out there where the mainstream tech and stock analysts can find it and be disturbed at the liability that SCO has incurred in declaring that they do not intend to abide by the GPL.
Poor SCO pointy-haired-bosses... I can see it now (names omitted to protect the guilty):
-------------------
PHB1: "Hey PHB2, I'm putting together this PowerPoint. I suppose I should slap some code in there to make this suit look more legit."
PHB2: "Yeah, good idea." (PHB2 goes to Etrade to dump a bit more stock)
PHB1: "I've got this copied code the IPI [Intellectual Property Investigative --ed] Team passed on to me, but Legal says we can't release it."
PHB2: "Yeah, $600 an hour to tell us we can't disclose it to the press and claim it's top-secret priceless intellectual property at the same time."
PHB1: "No kidding." (pause) "You ever seen code like this?"
PHB2: "Linux hippies. I dunno, it's all greek to me."
PHB1: "Genius! What a brilliant idea, I'll show those hackers the code in Greek!"
PHB2: "Hey, you're good..."
(peck, peck, peck)
--LP
The reason it was ugly was that it duplicates the function of some other code in the kernel.
It is hard to believe that the code was ugly. After all, it was written by ken/dmr and withstood 30 years of scrutiny.
They're silly but probably valid under our current system; e.g., one of them is a patent on tree-structure GUI widgets for system configuation.
And they have a million more. I'm infringing about twenty-three IBM patents just by posting this.
Remember, IBM as a company has made their money by keeping their "i"s dotted and their "t"s crossed. Several world governments contract IBM to handle very important and sensitive data. I doubt that IBM does anything of the scale that this is on without reasearching very carefully what they're doing.
This isn't to say that I especially trust IBM over any other vendor, but they have a much greater tendency of putting their money where their mouth is, delivering good business products and supporting them.
Remember that Aptiva that you played around with for a while and hated back in your introductory computer gaming phase? It probably still works, doesn't have capacitors that blew out like ABIT and Gigabyte have had, has drivers for every major OS from Windows 3.1 and OS/2 2.1 to XP, and will run for the next ten years without much trouble. They build computers, not consumer appliances.
I have an IBM PS/2 Model 95 at work that I still have powered on. It's a 50MHz 486 with Microchannel architecture. It's probably the best built computer in my office. IBM doesn't do things half-assed.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
That's the "fallacy of a balanced story" in action. Usually you see this effect in politically controversial coverage - one "side" makes a fairly reasonable, if a bit biased, statement and the other side says something totally whacko that sounds like it might be reasonable if the only background in the topic you have is the news coverage itself.
I bet if I were to actually cite such a case in current events I'd get modded up to +5. Instead, I'll just do something equally inflammatory and say, "turn to any major news channel - CNN, Fox, MSNBC, Al-Jazeera - and you'll see it in almost every story they carry." You just might not recognize it as such since your background in the story topics is probably as limited as the general population's background in unix/linux.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
Those are some big punches to pull and the only reason to pull them is to cover your ass in case someone really presents something infringing. If you say it's all BS instead of demanding a look, you hurt your credibility. By continuing to demand an honest answer from SCO, the free software world continues to show that SCO is not being honest. You can only refute SCO's nonsense as they put it before you. You can demolish claims on end users, you can show monitary damages don't exist, you can show revealed code is public, but you can't prove that there's no infringing code at all. If you do that, it makes you look irresponsible and that is something free software coders are not.
The "smoking crack" phrase is just a figure of speech for deranged and fradulent, which the current claims are based on the code presented. It would be very difficult to prove that cocaine is actually part of McBitch's Microsoft compensation package, so I doubt someone level headed like Linus would use the phrase literally. Not yet at least.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
I certainly don't agree with this. 'Just a university lab by university students' tends to be the state of the art. Especially if the students are PhD students. I have never done anything in industry even remotely as state of the art as I did as a PhD student.