Slashdot Mirror
SCO Invoices For Unix Licenses Get Closer
beggs writes "BusinessWeek, InfoWorld and the EE Times Online all have stories about SCO's plans to send out license invoices to Linux vendors for 'Unix license fees for Linux.' The experts advice: Wait and see what happens with the court cases before you pay." RowLowy points to ZDnet's story, which says that "SCO will pursue commercial Linux users who have discussed their Linux work publicly ... However, it won't take action until it's done more research on those businesses." JayR writes to say that Michael Dell recently told a gathering of Dell investors that Dell Computer will offer no protection from SCO lawsuits to customers who buy Linux-based systems from Dell. Keep score: an anonymous reader points out that SCO executives are still selling off their stock. Total proceeds in August of over $600,000. Senior Vice President Reginald Broughton tops the list with over $300,000."
I'm just waiting for mister SEC to intervene.... It's looking like just a matter of time.
So.....this means that SCO is (hypothetically) going to send me an invoice for $699 for each Linux box I'm running, having offered no actual proof that they own any of the code therein.
Cheeky bastards. I could just as reasonably send my clients an invoice for the use of the proprietary PHP code on my web page.
Don't Panic!
Jesus, and you people think that SCO is uninformed.
The VP Jeff F Hunsaker has sold 60% of his holding in the last 2 months!
James
PHONY INVOICE SCAMS
The anatomy of a typical phony invoice scheme is as follows:
The Call:
While there is no set formula for these invoice schemes, most involve the use of an initial telephone contact. The call helps the swindler obtain the names of key business contacts, as well as some important details about the operation of the business and its products or services. The persons making these calls are, for the most part, remarkably smooth operators. Often brazen and forward in their approach, they have been known to talk their way through a chain of receptionists, secretaries, assistant managers, supervisors, and vice presidents to gain access to heads of companies. In most cases, however, they need gain access to only lower-level employees.
The Invoice:
The con artist's next contact with the intended victim usually comes in the form of a phony invoice sent through the mail. The invoice, which includes names, figures, and other details that add to the appearance of legitimacy, may be paid unwittingly along with a number of other routine bills. In many cases, the amount of the invoice is just small enough to slip by the check writer's attention. The swindler has had considerable experience calculating the most effective dollar amount, depending on variables such as the size of the firm, and the control it seems to have over its management system. Thousands of mass-mailed invoices, each for a small sum, may prove more luc-rative for the con artist, than several large invoices.
The Scare Tactic:
Scare tactics sometimes are used to increase the odds of success. A phony invoice, or past-due notice, stamped "Pay This Bill Now" or "We Are About to Start Action" may intimidate the victim into rushing to make out a check without carefully investigating the supposedly delinquent charge.
SOLICITATIONS AS INVOICES
One of the most common variations of the phony invoice scheme are solicitations disguised as invoices. These documents, which are actually solicitations for the purchase of goods or services, are carefully designed to look like legitimate invoices for goods or services ordered and received. In some cases, the small print may identify the bogus bill as a solicitation. The deceptive solicitation may be received through the mail, or it may be presented in person by a con artist who visits a business office on the pretext of saving the company handling charges.
The business that pays a solicitation disguised as an invoice may receive the merchandise or service it was duped into ordering; more often, it will not, and efforts to trace the fraudulent firm that issued the "invoice" will prove futile.
If they're sending via USMail, and you live in the US and receive one, send a copy to the USPS Postal Inspector. That's mail fraud, and the USPS takes a dim view of such things.
I suspect the FTC wouldn't particularly like it either... Your state's Attorney General might be interested in the extortion issue, too.
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
Show your hate for SCO. Get a cool t-shirt and donate to the Open Source Now Fund.
Filed: 08/28/03
Entered: 08/29/03
Return of service executed
Docket Text: Return of service executed re: Subpoena served on Canopy Group c/o Ralph Yanno on 8/26/03
If they can prove that SCO was not an independent corporation, it's all over for Big Brother and his holding company. This is not discovery - that would have been against SCO.
Looking through the history of 2:03cv00294/ SCO Grp v Intl Bus Mach Inc, I found the schedule for when things are going to happen.
10/1: Amending of Pleadings
10/22: Discovery Cutoff
11/10: Deadline for Filing motions
3/11/05: Attorney Conference
3/28/05: Final Pretrial Conference for 2:30
4/11/05: 5 Week Jury Trial
By the 22nd of next month, SCO will have to release to IBM the offending code as part of the discovery phase. The question is how fast it will be leaked.
And we get to watch this whole specatacle until May!
If you get one of these letters, I suggest you go to this link:
l Fr audComplaint.htm
https://www.usps.com/postalinspectors/fraud/Mai
Essentially, sending a fraudulant invoice through the US mails is a crime:
"Extortion (18 USC 873, 876 & 877)
Postal Inspectors investigate extortion and blackmail when demands for ransoms or rewards are sent through the U.S. Mail. Inspectors also strictly enforce laws prohibiting mail that contains threats of kidnapping, physical injury, or injury to the property or reputations of others
Mail Fraud (18 USC 1341, 1342 & 1345; 39 USC 3005 & 3007)
The Postal Inspection Service is committed to protecting postal customers from misuse of the mail. Inspectors place special emphasis on mail fraud scams related to advance fees, boiler rooms, health care, insurance, investments, deceptive mailings and other consumer frauds, especially when they target the elderly or other susceptible groups."
The guys who investigate it are U.S. Postal Inspectors, who have very draconian powers, and have very wide-ranging jurisdiction.
I've been swashdotted -- Elmer Fudd
There's a big loophole in the insider trading laws and the SCO execs are taking advantage of it. There is a safe harbor if you have a plan to sell shares at predetermined points in time over a long enough period. The SCO execs have such a plan filed back in January at the same time that the lawsuit grumblings began to be heard.
Look for another press release to boost the stock price next Monday, September 8, when some of the top execs will be selling again.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
Extortion is when you use fear to extract money
from people you have no prior business relationship,
and without giving reasons why they legaly have
to pay you. I am sorry, "pay so I don't report
you to the authorities", or "pay so I don't
sue you" is illegal. It is simple extortion,
as plain as it can possibly be.
Microsoft is hosting a page called "Resources for Competing with Linux" with the news section pointing to all the best FUD stories. Does this add to the evidence that this whole thing is being encouraged by MS? Also on the same page under Microsoft's response to recent press there is a halloween style point by point rebuttal of a pro linux article, but I can't open it because it's protected by passport for some reason.
From the National Fraud Information Center:
If the invoice/treath came by mail (in the United States), contact U. S. Postal Inspection Service instead. They are more likely to investigate if more people comlain.
Assignment:
Even before the invoice goes out, national media, especially financial media read by the "pointy haired bosses", should print a "fraud warning" against this invoice. It should be factual, and state that legal proceedings are pending.
All SCO could have done about this was to sue for libel but that case would be even weaker, and also easier to understand for judges and the general public.
Irene KHAAAAAAN!
Actually, it doesn't really look like a pump-n-dump.
Looking at the filings on Edgar for SCOX there is a SC 13G "Statement of Aquisition of Beneficial ownership" from a VC firm called Integral Capital Managment LLC, on 8-28-2003 for 680,000 shares.
The SCO executive sales could very well have been necessary to free up the shares for this purchase.
It will be interesting to read SCO's 10-Q for this quarter when they release it.
Interesting comment from JF
Quote
Unless you are using the DMCA to get rubber-stamped subpoenas like the RIAA, a subpoena means you showed a judge enough evidence to convince them that you are probably right on a point related to the case.
The fact that IBM got a subpoena indicates that laid some pretty damning evidence in front of a judge. Any indication of which jurisdiction issued the subpoena?
If it was the courts there in Utah, that at least SQUARES the power of the evidence in my opinion given that SCO/Canopy has the hometown advantage. J.F. 9/3/03; 11:07:56 AM
Help fight continental drift.
(Disclaimer: This may be redundant but I have my preferences set to Newest First)
If SCO is mailing notices asking for any kind of payment when their legal rights have not been determined by a court, it's extortion - a federal offense in the US.
If they are sending out an invoice for services not rendered or products not sold by them, it's mail fraud - an even bigger federal offense.
The USPS takes a very dim view of people who do this. SCO has a better chance of being prosecuted for mail fraud than extortion.
Microsoft's VP of Customer Service is Helen Waite. If you are having problems with their products go to Helen Waite.
Umm ... you can clearly copyright an engine design. Design it, print out the instructions and blueprints for making it. Stick the (c) on it and send it to the copyright office. It's a written work, it gets copyright.
What you have done is not to copyright the design, but copyright the blueprint and instructions.
If someone then uses your documentation (without making copies) to build an engine per the design specifications, they have not infringed on your copyright.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
TOP 15 Institution Name
Integral Capital Mgmt
Pequot Capital Mgmt
Barclays Global Investors Intl
Whitney Asset Management Llc
Royce & Associates
Weiss Peck & Greer
Oberweis Asset Mgmt
American Century Investments
Vanguard Group
Lehman Brothers Asset Mgmt
Northern Trust Co (chicago)
Zweig Dimenna Partners
Highland Capital Mgmt Corp
Fidelity Mgmt & Research Co
Deutsche Asset Mgmt (new York
zeke
Stowell added: "Sooner or later the invoicing will reach European companies I'm sure. We will not be limiting this to a US only market."
This warning seems to be a clear breach of the German injunction.
For that matter, so is the material on SCO's main web page here, which makes the unproven allegation "customers unknowingly received illegal copies of SCO property", among other things. I can't think of any reason why the injunction would be limited to material on the German-language page, which is, after all, also served from the U.S.
Have you got your LWN subscription yet?