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SCO's Open Letter to Open Source Community
joefish_only_1 writes "SCO CEO has posted an open letter to the open source community. There's some things Mr McBride mentions that I hadn't heard of yet, like an admission by Bruce Perens that "UNIX System V code is, in fact, in Linux, and it shouldn't be there."" A slashdot reader posted a comment recently
that breaks it down quite well.
Bruce stated that removing teh rog copyright notice from bsd code that sgi submitted was not right.. now my opinion but that a submission of the same code with copyright notice intact is legal to do fro Linux kernel
Once again McBride is lying..
remember folks some BSd code was org System V code defined as opensourced as part of an out of court settlement between at&t and a cl university..
Don't Tread on OpenSource
I read the Letter earlier, and it struck me that as with so much SCO posturing, this one gets it wrong too. Darl points the finger at the Open Source development process and Linus as the problem.
Instead it is clear to anyone involved in Open Source development that it is the responsibility of the submitter to submit only code they are legally entitiled too. If an SGI developer did strip SCO copyrights from code and was allowed to submit this code to Linus for inclussion, then it is SGI who have the problem. It has long been understood that the very process of submitting code to an Open Source project was an implicit decleration of ownership of that code. The same rules apply in business; unless you're SCO you can only sell something that you own yourself.
I've yet to see a good rebutal of Darls Open Letter, but I suspect ESR or Bruce is typing one up as we speak..
Mr. McBride is a troll. don't feed.
There's all this unsubstantiated talk. If SCO wants the Open Source community to take them seriously, they should publicly release the code which they claim to be in Linux, and furthermore, provide proof that that code did not exist legally before SCO made it "theirs."
A blog like any other.
Actually this is a good thing. When they're resorting to exaggerations like this, it shows how little SCO really has.
I posted this in the previous SCO thread, but am reposting it here where it is more appropriate. Most of the typo's have been cleaned up too. You can also see the full text in my journal.
An Open Response to Darl McBride's Open Letter to the Open Source Community
(First Draft)
Dear Mr. McBride,
First, let me introduce myself. My name is John Gabriel. I have been working in the technical field for 15 years, as a Network Administrator, Applications Manager, Network Manager, Sr. Networking Engineer, and now, Freelance Consultant. And, yes, I'm an MCSE.
My first experiences with Unix occurred in the late 1970's, during school field trips to local colleges. I also did Unix technical support for students while taking a class in Pascal in the late 1980's. My first experience with Linux dates to 1994, when I downloaded whatever Linux kernel was available at that time.
While I did install it successfully, on a Compaq Deskpro 386/25, I quickly abandoned it as the system didn't have enough memory to support X Windows. Several years later, in 1998, I became a Caldera customer, with a purchase of Caldera OpenLinux Base ver. 1.22, with Linux kernel 2.0.33. I ran into similar problems again.
About a year ago, I became interested again Linux, and now run Linux on my home workstation in a dual-boot configuration with Windows XP.
About 4-5 months ago, I began following the SCO v. IBM story. I was at first inclined to be open-minded towards SCO's claims. It wouldn't be the first time a small company has had its copyrights violated by a larger vendor, though the violator is usually, in my experience, Microsoft, as exemplified by Caldera's history with DR-DOS.
However, the more I researched the story and SCO's claims, the more convinced I became that SCO's claims were, well, baseless. Being the type that usually likes to "root for the underdog", I was surprised by my conclusions.
Anyway, that's enough introduction. What follows is an Open Response to your Open Letter to the Open Source Community. I grant everyone, including you, permission to re-publish it, or quote from it, without restriction, except that my comments be properly attributed to myself. Consider it under a "BSD-style" license if you like.
1) The most controversial issue in the information technology industry today is the ongoing battle over software copyrights and intellectual property. This battle is being fought largely between vendors who create and sell proprietary software, and the Open Source community. My company, the SCO Group, became a focus of this controversy when we filed a lawsuit against IBM alleging that SCO's proprietary Unix code has been illegally copied into the free Linux operating system. In doing this we angered some in the Open Source community by pointing out obvious intellectual property problems that exist in the current Linux software development model.
Mr. McBride,
Response to Paragraph 1 of your "Open Letter":
This is very difficult to respond to, because your analysis of the issues and of the reasons for the Open Source community's anger is, in the words of the great physicist Wolfgang Pauli, "so bad it's not even wrong."
For instance, your own lawsuit against IBM does not allege that "SCO's proprietary Unix code has been illegally copied into Linux" -- it alleges that code *owned* by IBM but under contractual "control" rights to SCO has been copied into Linux. Surely, you don't dispute that IBM owns the relevant copyrights and patents to NUMA, JFS, and RCU?
Or do you dispute Section 2 of Exhibit C on your web site, the ATT-IBM sideletter agreement, which states in part, "we (ATT) agree that modifications and derivative works prepared by or for you (IBM) are owned by you"?
The truth is there are many reasons the Open source community is angered with you and the actions of The SCO Group and The Canopy Group, none of which have to do with "intellectual
OSS leaves just as much to "chance" as a closed source model.
How does a closed-source shop know that one of their developers hasn't cut'n'pasted something from glib? Same was as OSS: ask the developer, and assume that they're not out to screw you.
Finally, your solution would be expensive - who would pay for it?
You cannot generalise from a person, or even several people, to an entire community.
Agreed. But are you arguing that ESR shouldn't inform the proper authorities about the crime he knows has been committed?
That would, IMO, be the right thing to do - stop the activities of someone whose actions harm the community and its reputation, and demonstrate (if demonstration is needed) that we have respect for the law. On this point, Mr McBride is right.
Gerv
That is true, but it still doesn't mean that guilt of one "open source community member" = guilt of all.
Your comparison of being a black person to being a member of the open source community is mildly offensive. Contrary to how many open source developers and advocates present themselves you are not born being an "open source". This is a choice you have made.
The open source community is just that, a community. What one person or sub-group does inside this community does reflect on the group as a whole. Instead of comparing it to a minority group you should be comparing it to a company or club. If one person in a company/organizaton does something of questionable ethics it does reflect on everyone else. It is therefore in that organizations best interest to police itself.
I believe the same is true for the open source community. By sticking to a set of values and admonishing those that don't the open source movement will gain more acceptance.
One should not theorize before one has data. -Sherlock Holmes-
I remember after everyone analysed the SCOForum code prominent people saying things like that (eg. Open Source coders violated SCO's license because they didn't include the BSD attribution statement) and I knew right away they made a huge mistake. I'm sorry to see it's been confirmed.
Anyone who purports to speak for this community should realise the stakes involved and wise up.
In the efforts of Messrs Perens and Raymond to be balanced and reasonable they have given the enemy (Daryl McBeezlebub) significant ammunition. Quoting people out of context is part of lawsuit public relations 101. SCO will hammer away and keep repeating this like an autistic child and unfortunately some weak minded people will be swayed by this argument. If you ever watch television talk shows this is the most common technique for winning arguments.
I think Linux is still winning the public relations war but really, please don't accept collective guilt unless you personally fucked up. Because for all we know SGI has legitimate rights to that code.
Likewise, we cannot have a situation in which computer users fear they may be next to suffer ruinous litigation if they take a business or legal position that angers SCO.
This is quite a well-crafted piece of FUD: it perpetuates the notion that Linux is being developed by a bunck of pimply-faced hackers in their parents' basements, and that the developers don't care about IP rights at all. In fact, he is making the hidden accusation that the current open source development model does not "respect the rules of law"
However, the Open-Source Development Model is the most thought-out software development model that I know of, as far as a legal sense goes. Let's face it: who actually reads and follows those shrink-wrapped software licenses? I'm willing to bet that the only people who take them seriously are the open-source developers and users, because the license is the only legal right they have to open-source code. (They're also possibly the only ones anal enough to read the entire click-through license on commercial software). I've always held that if more people actually read what was in those commercial software licenses, there would be a lot more people swearing off commercial software for good.
The GPL and BSD licenses are well-crafted legal documents, and the transparency of the development process should put to rest all patent and copyright infringement concerns: if something infringes, the proof is there for everyone to see, and the maintainers are responsible for removing it, because it never should have been there in the first place. When Microsoft or SCO violates a source-code patent, there's no way of knowing because you can't see the code!
Given many recent statements by people related to SCO (including the Perens quote that others here have said is taken out of context, and SCO's blanket assertion of rights over BSD code that looks to be included in the AT&T settlemnent) that have turned out to be, at best, exaggerations, and at worst, outright lies and mischaracterizations, one has to wonder which side has more respect for the rules of law.
May I suggest that we just ignore this new troll from McBride?
It add nothing substantially new to the discussion.
The only thing McBride hopes to accomplish with this letter is to discredit the community once again. It makes no sense to dissect the letter and refute every false claim, because this will either be ignored or countered with more lies. Can we just stay calm and think of ways to get through to the few uninformed decision makers who believe the libel.
...and it's *not* meant as an "open letter to the open source community." This letter was written as a PR move, plain and simple. It's riddled with half-truths and full-on lies. McBride knew damn well that the open source community would be able to debunk almost everything he says, but he also know that the media wouldn't. Mr. Reporter reading this letter will simply take everything in it as fact and report it, which is exactly what SCO wants. After all, why would this letter contain lies? So far the media has barely touched SCO's opposition, but take a look at the list of headlines that simply discuss SCO's claims.
Last week someone made a comment that noted that SCO releases something like this right before some of the executives stock is scheduled to sell. The comment closed with something along the lines of "look for more FUD on Monday." Hmmm... is Tuesday close enough?
I think this is the most interesting part of the letter, and indicates a change in focus for them, or at least another case of "we're going make every argument we can think of, regardless of the validity"
This could be read to mean that they claim the BSD release of 'ancient unix' isn't valid for commercial purposes even though it was licensed under a BSD license.
We're beyond stripped-out copyright attributions (which was Mr. Peren's problem with the SGI code) if that's the case, but I don't think there's anyway to justify this argument. IANAL, maybe someone else is.
When I first started working on an OpenMP extension to gcc, I bristled at the FSF copyright assignment process.
I was wrong. I now see the value in FSF copyright assignments, which create a paper trail for documenting contributions to free software.
While the SCO attack dogs are extortionists, their greedy actions have shown weaknesses in the free-wheeling process of Linux development.
The "free" and "open" software communities can argue, until they are blue in the face, about the validity of copyrights, patents, trademarks, and other forms of owning ideas. Under existing law and practice, however, those concepts do exist, with the weight of law and tradition behind them -- and ignoring that reality is foolhardy.
Think of copyright assignment as akin to virus protection. I shouldn't have to protect myself against malicious software, but I am wise to do so. By the same principle, tracking contributions to the kernel is excellent protection from the desperate shakedown tactics of a company like SCO.
All about me
It contains such juicy tidbits like:
In the long term, the financial stability of software vendors and the legality of their software products are more important to enterprise customers than free software.I think the enterprises customers can speak for themselves on this matter, and they clearly have spoken...
In enterprise installations, it is customary for the customer to be charged an additional 15% of whatever they payed for the software each year for maintenance. (which ends up being about 13% of the total).
Let's take a theoretical enterprise customer who owns 12,428 computers (you'll see the reason for the oddball number in a moment). Now, if they just spent $700 per client on software, plus an additional 15% on maintenance, they've spent about 10 million in total. Now let's assume that the client software was free, but the maintenance stays the same, then the company has gone from spending 10 million, to ~1.3 million. Now let's suppose that someone at this company likes round numbers, so they take an additional .7 million and hire 10 people (at a nice $70k/position). The company has just saved 8 million dollars (!!!), and now has an additional team of 10 developers whose sole job is to make sure that the client software works best in their environments... The customer doesn't have to re-release this code, because they're not selling it, so no liability for them. And even if they decide to (which we hope they will), it's not part of their product line, so they're not directly helping their competitors...
Face it, McBride, enterprise customers are the ones for whom it makes the most sense to go to free software, and to not put all of their eggs in one basket (software company).
The reason the Darl McBride's of the world don't like Open Source is it takes large amounts of money that went to a single company, where it could be nicely controlled and funneled to the top of the hierarchy (CEOs and the like), and instead distributes it in smaller amounts, spread out, and only to the people who can get the work done.
The large corporations of the world are spending this money anyway, and Open Source is just a way for the doers (developers, admins, e.g. instead of deciders/managers) to take a share.
I know it sounds awfully corny, but in a society that's doing it's best to recreate nobility and privilege, open source is way of taking some power back for the people. The cathedral creates centralization of power and wealth, which lead to class hierarchies. The bazaar distributes power, which leads to an educated and informed participant, and higher standards of living for the majority.
Not really - it would be better to compare it to a religion than a company since the 'Open Source Movement' is more of an ideology than anything else. So since, SCO's from Utah why not substitute "mormons" for "open source": you're not born a mormon, you either become one by choice or are indoctrinated into the community by your parents just as parents indoctrinate their open source ideology onto their children. But just because there are mormons out there kidnapping young girls, it doesn't mean they're all guilty by association.
And to top it off, the Jackass suggests that the open source community needs a "sustainable business model". What a unbelievable case of tunnel vision.
I'm considering writing a video driver for my notebook computer's built in computer camera. Why? So I can sell the driver? Uhm, no. Simply because I want to get it to work on Linux. And if some company tries to sell a driver, that doesn't mean I'm only doing it to compete with them. It doesn't mean I have to start charging for it, or make a "sustainable business model".
This guy really is in his own world. And it's obvious there is no oxygen on it.
You are checking your backups, aren't you?
By prefacing his "no warranty" line with a patronizing "Open Source must become more mature" statement he gets two for one. We, of course, recognize this to be yet another of the blatiantly false bits of tripe that McBride has come to be known for. Despite its misleading "Open letter to the Open Source Community" title we are not the target audience for this; the target audience is the managers who make the financial decisions, but don't actually know what is going on. His careful implication that propriatary software is warranted may be effective with them...
Finally, we have his implication, again never explicitly stated, that Open Source is nothing more than a bunch of neo-hippies. Since most managerial types are politically conservative, and old enough to remember and dislike hippies, this implication is intended to strike at the average manager's prejudices. If he can get "Open Source == Damn Hippies" into many people's heads he believes, possibly rightly, that this will create a more hostile environment towards Open Source (much like the current "Open Souce == Communist" line of BS).
On a related note, I'll also point out a bit of his tripe that is aimed at us. His repeated implications that the Open Source concept were fine as long as we were working with toy systems, but now that we want to be grown ups we must adapt to the prevailing (propriatary) business model. This is intended specifically to cause doubt and fear in the Open Source community. Those who haven't given the isssue much thought may agree with this. It is nonesense. The Open Source model is a competitor to the Propriatary model. It is not inferior, and it may be superior. When Henry Ford invented the assembly line he did not think to himself "Well, I guess the Assembly Line was OK as a toy system, but now that I want to be a big boy I'd better switch over to the way everyone else does it." So too, must we refuse to be tricked into believing that the Open Source development model is for children. It is not. It is new, it is different, and it must compete in order to prove its superiority.
"Mission Accomplished" -- George W. Bush May 1, 2003
The full text of the subpoena contains several provisions whereby Canopy may apply to withold documents. These provisions include the protection of privelege, litigation strategy, and trade secrets. I expect Canopy's lawyers to avail themselves of these provisions.
But are you arguing that ESR shouldn't inform the proper authorities about the crime he knows has been committed?
...that the attack is happening. So the authorities know this. I'm sure SCO has also made sure they know.
...that he wanted the attacks to stop. So the authorities know this. Not that ESR has any control over the attackers, other than perhaps some respect in their eyes.
...that he did not know the identities, and did not want to know the identities of the attackers. So the authorities know this.
ESR stated in public....
To make sure the authorities are fully informed, ESR, or anyone else, can forward ESR's public remarks to the authorities. I have a difficult time imagining that with SCO involved, the authorities have not already contacted ESR and interviewed him to obtain the facts I just described.
That would, IMO, be the right thing to do - stop the activities of someone whose actions harm the community and its reputation, and demonstrate (if demonstration is needed) that we have respect for the law. On this point, Mr McBride is right.
McBride is wrong in so many ways.
As to your other points, how do you stop the activities of someone you do not control, or even know the identity of?
Hey, I've got an idea! If you want to demonstrate your respect for the law, why don't YOU cooperate with the authorities in stopping all terrorist attacks!
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
It doesn't imply universal guilt; however it might be indicative of institutional "guilt", be it wilful or negligent (cf Catholic priests).
Can you apply the same logic to open source? I don't know, I still haven't graduated from the famous Slashdot School of Analogy.
The weaknesses are to do with "free speech" and the spreading of disinformation. In Europe regulation tends to be tighter, the constraints on expression of views by parties in litigation are much tighter, and the silencing of anyone making unsubstantiated allegations that adversely affect another business tends to be a fast track process. Hence the non-action in Germany.
McBride is also pushing carefully selected buttons by trying to show that (a) he has the force of a large legal firm behind him and (b) that his opponents are somehow liberal, pinko, anti-business, unpatriotic, you name it. He knows that his large opponents won't behave like that because they are too staid (IBM) or because they want to maintain an image of reliable business practice and stability (Red Hat, SuSE), while his small opponents won't get quoted in the business press. And knows that the story is too boring for 99% of the population, so investigative journalists on big papers won't be interested.
My suggestion? Make it worth someone's while. Someone with access to the necessary resources start a fund. Hire a decent PR company. There has got to be at least one that is perhaps not already working for large software companies and would like some real exposure. Place a one off full pager in the Wall Street Journal, or whatever the PR company recommends. No mention of Eric Raymond or other well known figures, just originating from an independent coming together of developers and systems implementers. See where it goes from there. Perhaps the ad could mention the number of contributors, ranked by size of company, at the bottom.
I would certainly put a few $ into such a scheme. Would anybody else?
Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
As quoted from Linuxworld feedback forum:
ProgrammerMan commented on 8 September 2003:
Darl, I see little benefit in publishing this letter. It says nothing new and does little or nothing to settle the disputes over the Linux kernel. It would appear to only stroke your ego and allow you to continue to spread false claims in an illegal attempt to scare Linux users into paying protection money for that which you refuse to document or prove.
About the denial of service attacks, this is likely the work of one irresponsible person, if indeed there was really ever an attack. It's rather curious that SCO didn't put out a press release or make any demands that it stop what would seem to be a significant attack. You also cannot demonize the entire open source community for the actions of one vigilante. I would think you'd realize by now that if SCO executives weren't constantly attacking and insulting open source developers in the media with their ongoing campaign of hype and sensationalism, people like this wouldn't have the motivation to do what they do.
Regarding the SGI code, you fail to mention that code improperly being contributed is just as likely to happen in closed source projects. In fact, it may be more likely to happen there since the code is secret and not visible to outsiders, so the temptation to take some code that you don't have the right to use may be stronger. Why would someone be foolish enough to intentionally contribute illegal code to an open source project that the entire world can view when they know the chance of getting caught is significantly higher?
About the flaws you repeatedly claim in the open source development process, there is no practical way to trace the origin of all source code, regardless of whether it's used in open or closed source. I think SCO's (and most software companies') own development process is equally flawed if not more so. There have been claims that there's GPL code in SCO's Linux Kernel Personality Layer. IBM claims you are infringing on at least four of their patents. Microsoft has recently been stung by patent lawsuits for SQL Server and Internet Explorer. There simply is no way to know that a project with millions of lines of code in it is all legal.
The claims of one million lines of infringing code are propsterous and blatant lies and you know it. There are only about 3.4 million lines of code in the entire 2.4.20 kernel. To claim that nearly all the code changes between the 2.2 and 2.4 kernel are illegal defies reality. Similar claims of over 800,000 lines of illegal SMP code are equally false.
I believe you are intentionally including IBM's code in the count, but this is incorrect. Blake Stowell admitted in a MozillaZine interview that IBM is the copyright owner of all the enterprise code they donated to Linux. Unless IBM's contract compels them to transfer the copyrights to SCO and they actually do so, IBM is the owner of this code and you have no right to claim any ability to restrict its use.
About your repeated use of the terms "intellectual property" and "IP," there is no such thing under the law. There are only copyrights, patents, trademarks and trade secrets. Your repeated use of these weasel words is a feeble attempt to make your claims look more credible. You need to state exactly what type of right you are claiming.
You show repeated instances of hypocrisy through your letter, and one of them is the claim that IBM and Linux vendors don't offer a warranty. Does SCO offer such a warranty on their OpenServer, UnixWare, or Sys V source code licenses? I didn't think so. Neither does Microsoft, as witnessed by the Timeline lawsuit over SQL Server. No company, even ones the size of IBM or Microsoft can afford such liability.
You also incorrectly refer to IBM as a Linux vendor, but they do not sell Linux. IBM partners with Red Hat and SuSE for
Then you accuse the open source community of not following the rule of law, yet SCO has violated the rights of others by continuing to d
Artificial intelligence is no match for natural stupidity.
SCO also seems to have missed a little irony here as well. The infringer was working for a company; he wasn't a commie hacker working on open source in the basement of his parent's house. This code was "developed" under the watchful eye of responsible capitalists, yet copyright infringement happened anyway. I wonder what copyright infringements there might be in SGI's (or even SCO's) proprietary code, and why SCO doesn't seem too worried about that.
-- Pot is safer than Beer
I think the CEOs of software companies are hoping the software business will become just like the music business, where the creators and consumers get shafted and all the profits go to the middleman.
Fortunately, I don't think the software industry will necessarily go that way. Software is valuable to its creator in and of itself; it doesn't need to be sold to create value (although it can be sold to create additional value). A CD is of less use to a musician; it must be sold before the creator gets much value from it. This difference will ensure that there will always be open source software.
There is another factor at play in this as well. A lot of companies that create proprietary software are outsourcing their development to India and other cheap countries. Pretty soon, the only development done in the U.S. will be open source. We should support American programmers, and use only open source software! In fact, if open source software were in wider use, there would be more demand for American programmers. With open source, there is plenty of generic code lying around and all that has to be done is customization for a particular business need. Outsourcing is really only good for the mechanical programming tasks, which are already done for you with open source development.
-- Pot is safer than Beer
That reminds me of a quote from Sports Night. Isaac, the executive producer, who is black, says, "I love you, Danny, and because I love you I can say this: no rich young white kid ever got anywhere with me comparing himself to Rosa Parks." It doesn't even matter if the comparison is reasonable (not that I think yours is), it just won't get you anywhere ...
The oldest version of this code we've found so far is in Donald Knuth's The Art of Computer Programming, published in 1968.
So the code can't have been legaly copied from there (it's copyright).
In this case Knuth has the deciding vote on how legal the use is. Has anyone asked him?
Even more, the code from "TAOCP" is likely written in pseudocode or MIX and while the pseudocode is likely to be protected by copyright, I'm not sure if a translation of it into C would be - as the algorithm may be the same, but the expression of it very, very different. Enough so that I suspect a patent might cover it, but copyright would not.
September 9, 2003
Open Letter to Darl McBride,
I would like to briefly respond to your open letter to the Open Source Community, dated today. I consider myself to be a member of that community, having developed Open Source software myself, although I do not claim to be any kind of "leader", or to represent the views of other members of the community.
Firstly, I would like to join you in condemning the Denial of Service attacks that took place against your web servers. Using vandalism and illegal tactics is not an appropriate way for people to respond, however strongly they disagree with you or SCO's words or deeds. In your open letter, you quoted Eric Raymond's reaction to the DoS attack, but you seemed to suggest that he knows the identity of the perpetrator. I can't speak for Mr Raymond, but I believe that in the letter you quoted from, he actually said that he DID NOT know the perpetrator; it was an associate of the perpetrator who contacted him. Do you have any evidence to suggest that Mr Raymond is not co-operating with the authorities in helping them to bring the perpetrator to justice?
The memory allocation code you mentioned, does, at first blush, appear to have indeed been copied illegally by SGI, and perhaps SGI have some got some explaining to do. However, this is a very tiny part of Linux as a whole, and the notion that "one million lines of UNIX System V protected code have been contributed to Linux" is obviously based on an incredibly improbable reading of copyright law in terms of what you consider to be "derivative works" (one that if upheld, would turn copyright law on its head).
Contrary to what you suggest in your letter, in my experience, members of the Open Source community understand very well and fully respect copyright laws.
In fact, a very telling remark in you letter where you talk about "transferring copyrights in contributed code to Open Source", leads me to believe that we understand it better than you do Mr McBride. Open Source is NOT THE SAME as Public Domain. Open Source software relies on Copyright Law to protect the authors. There is no "transfer" to some nebulous Open Source status. When I write a piece of software, I as the author, hold the copyright on that work. When I choose to release it, I license it to my customers using the GNU General Public License, the BSD license, or some other Open Source license. My customers agree to the terms of the license. If they violate the terms of the license (for example, they attempt to sublicense my work), they are in breach of our agreement, and they are misappropriating my work.
In your letter, you refer to "problems that exist in the current Linux software development model". The Open Source development model, by its very nature, is transparent. Any intellectual property problems can be quickly identified and addressed because the code is out in the open. I contend that there is absolutely no way for SCO to tell whether a closed-source system such as Windows, AIX, etc has code copied within it. You are holding the Open Source community to a higher standard than the proprietary software community.
Finally, I'd like to address the 5 points in your summary.
"1. Fair use applies to educational, public service and related applications and does not justify commercial misappropriation."
I agree.
"2. Copyright attributions protect ownership and attribution rights--they cannot simply be changed or stripped away."
Absolutely agree. Perhaps SGI have some explaining to do here. But also, I'd like to hear your explanation of why the Regents of the University of California attribution is missing in the Berkley Packet Filter that showed up in your slides at the Las Vegas presentation?
"3. In copyright law, ownership cannot be transferred without express, written authority of a copyright holder. Some have claimed that, because SCO software code was present in software distributed under the GPL, SCO has forfeited its rights to this code. Not so - SCO