NY Times Reveals SCO/Canopy Group Hypocrisy

rjamestaylor writes "The New York Times reports that 'SCO, the company that touched off a computer industry slugfest last spring by suing I.B.M. over its use of Unix software, may find itself embarrassed by a similar claim against a company once related to SCO.' Note that the reporter, John Markoff, ties together Noorda's Canopy Group companies, revealing that: 'Canopy is now SCO's largest shareholder, with two seats on the company's board, and has played an important role, analysts say, in shaping SCO's legal strategy.' He even quotes SCOSource shill Laura Didio as saying, 'All roads lead to Canopy...'"

Comments

Lawsuits as Legacy?

[fuzzybunny]

"Mr. Yarro said: I know I've been painted in a rough light. I hope that our companies are our legacy and not our lawsuits."

It's a bit late for that, isn't it? While on the one hand, the massive publicity of the SCO lawsuits may have had, to some degree, the effect of creating some doubt in the minds of cautious CIOs/CTOs, by associating the word "Linux" with "unresolved, potentially damaging IP issues", the comparative lack of visibility of anything actually produced by SCO, combined with the massive media coverage of their seeming focus on litigation will certainly badly tarnish what's left of that company after this whole thing is over.

Large companies, which are normally fairly conservative on adoption of "new" technologies, will be just as loath to look at anything coming from a company so strongly perceived to be as lawsuit-happy as SCO...

Re:Why was it sealed?

[rongage]

Typically, especially in a civil suit, a case can be sealed on request of both parties involved. This is typically done when one of the parties (usually some company) doesn't want "damning evidence or testimony" to be made public. This company would most likely propose a settlement offer that is contingent on the case being sealed and that the other party be prohibited from discussing the case publically.

In short, it's to prevent bad publicity from getting out.

Remember the battle-cry of the Slashdot'er - IANAL!!!

Coolest story bit: GPL upheld in court/litigation

[23]

Applying my "grep -i $anything_interesting $daily_sco_story" yields:

Facts from the story: Montavista writes software under GPL. Lineo uses said software but removes copyright notices. Montavista sues Lineo over that (copyrights must be retained under the GPL)! Montavista wins (settlement).

How cool is that. And here we have people bitching that something as the GPL won't hold up to any major court challenge.

Smile, people. This is really cool considering that numerous people believe the GPL won't stand a chance in court.

roland

Re:GPL involvment

[Greyfox]

So far, not one company that's found to be infringing on the GPL has been inclined to take it to court. I guarantee you that IP lawyers in every IT firm in the USA has looked at the GPL long and hard, and they've all come to the same decision about it. That's why no one's dared take it to court. If a company thought it could just loot the OSS code base wholesale, it'd do so in an instant. Companies and their boards don't have morals, they just exist to make money. Upper management goes through a special operation to remove any hint of a conscience.

IBM's legal department is probably bigger than the entirety of SCO. They employ a lot of really bright lawyers and those guys do their homework. They wouldn't be fighting the fight if they thought they could lose, and I suspect they have several knockout punches which they will unveil at the appropriately embarassing times.