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Merrill Lynch Rips Sun

cosjef writes "In an open letter to Sun, an analyst for Merrill Lynch tells Sun to change or risk adding itself to the junkyard of formerly-great technology companies like DEC or Data General. The letter even recommends taking the helm away from McNealy, whose 'brash and contrarian personality have been synonymous with the company's image and success. Unfortunately, the act is getting old.' Sun's mistakes are well documented, but the biggest one is believing that what made them successful in the past would make them successful in the future."

8 of 428 comments (clear)

  1. GNAA - 0 to hello.jpg in 4.6 seconds! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Dear Sir/Madam:

    I am Mr. Darl McBride currently serving as the president and chief executive officer of the SCO Group, formerly known as Caldera Systems International, in Lindon, Utah, United States of America. I know this letter might surprise you because we have had no previous communications or business dealings before now.

    My associates have recently made claim to computer softwares worth an estimated $1 billion U.S. dollars. I am writing to you in confidence because we urgently require your assistance to obtain these funds.

    In the early 1970s the American Telephone and Telegraph corporation developed at great expense the computer operating system software known as UNIX. Unfortunately the laws of my country prohibited them from selling these softwares and so their valuable source codes remained privately held. Under a special arrangement some programmers from the California University of Berkeley did add more codes to this operating system, increasing its value, but not in any way to dilute or disparage our full and rightful ownership of these codes, despite any agreement between American Telephone and Telegraph and the California University of Berkeley, which agreement we deny and disavow.

    In the year 1984 a change of regime in my country allowed the American Telephone and Telegraph corporation to make profits from these softwares. In the year 1990 ownership of these softwares was transferred to the corporation UNIX System Laboratories. In the year 1993 this corporation was sold to the corporation Novell. In the year 1994 some employees of Novell formed the corporation Caldera Systems International, which began to distribute an upstart operating system known as Linux. In the year 1995 Novell sold the UNIX software codes to SCO. In the year 2001 occurred a separation of SCO, and the SCO brand name and UNIX codes were acquired by the Caldera Systems International, and in the following year the Caldera Systems International was renamed SCO Group, of which i currently serve as chief executive officer.

    My associates and I of the SCO Group are therefore the full and rightful owners of the operating system softwares known as UNIX. Our engineers have discovered that no fewer than seventy (70) lines of our valuable and proprietary source codes have appeared in the upstart operating system Linux. As you can plainly see, this gives us a claim on the millions of lines of valuable software codes which comprise this Linux and which has been sold at great profit to very many business enterprises. Our legal experts have advised us that our contribution to these codes is worth an estimated one (1) billion U.S. dollars.

    Unfortunately we are having difficulty extracting our funds from these computer softwares. To this effect i have been given the mandate by my colleagues to contact you and ask for your assistance. We are prepared to sell you a share in this enterprise, which will soon be very profitable, that will grant you the rights to use these valuable softwares in your business enterprise. Unfortunately we are not able at this time to set a price on these rights. Therefore it is our respectful suggestion, that you may be immediately a party to this enterprise, before others accept these lucrative terms, that you send us the number of a banking account where we can withdraw funds of a suitable amount to guarantee your participation in this enterprise. As an alternative you may send us the number and expiration date of your major credit card, or you may send to us a signed check from your banking account payable to "SCO Group" and with the amount left blank for us to conveniently supply.

    Kindly treat this request as very important and strictly confidential. I honestly assure you that this transaction is 100% legal and risk-free.

    Signed, GNAA president

    PS. If you have mod points and would like to support GNAA, please moderate this post up.

    ________________________________________________
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  2. YES BUT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I for welcome our sun ripping overlords!!!!!!!

  3. ahh sun by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    stick it too sun where it doesn't shine!!! They only want you to make beleive their cow brown!

  4. 3 early post noise by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I for one love the noise accompaning these early posts!

  5. and... by Random+Outsourcer · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    You should hire us.

    --
    India! where outsourcing is in!
    Hire Us: http://www.outsourcing.in
    1. Re:and... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      how is that off topic? it's funny! sometimes i wonder what goes on here...

  6. Lynch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Now let David Lynch analyze Sun. That should be interesting.

  7. You better duck. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Here come the mods.