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SCO Calls GPL Unenforceable, Void
wes33 writes "Groklaw has a link
to SCO's replies to IBM's amended complaints. Some
choice bits: '6th Affirmative Defense -
The GPL is unenforceable, void and/or voidable, and IBM's claims
based thereon, or related thereto, are barred. ... 7th Affirmative Defense - The GPL is selectively enforced by the Free Software Foundation
such that enforcement of the GPL by IBM or others is waived, estopped or otherwise barred as a matter of equity. ... 8th Affirmative Defense -
The GPL violates the U.S. Constitution, together with copyright, antitrust
and export control laws, and IBM's claims based theron, or related thereto, are barred.' Comments are pouring in ... not all of them
complimentary to SCO or its legal strategy." Considering that the GPL and the GNU project rely on and affirm the protections of copyright, this seems like a strange argument to pursue.
The only problem with all things I see here is DarlandCo. will probably never see the inside of a prison cell, which is unfortunate.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
It just wouldn't feel like the start of the week without some new mind-numbingly idiot drivel from the SCO.
7th Affirmative Defense: The GPL is selectively enforced.
8th Affirmative Defense: The GPL is Unconstitutional and invalid.
9th Affirmative Defense: ???
10th Affirmative Defense: Profit!
Whatever it is I'm complaining about, I'm sure the Republicans did it. This is
"Comments are pouring in ... not all of them complimentary to SCO or its legal strategy"
/. article will help at least
This
At least he proves that people can run around beeing flaming idiots, thus upholding the bill of rights.
"The GPL violates the U.S. Constitution, together with copyright (laws),"
:)
Yes! I, too, feel that current copyright laws violate the U. S. Constitution! I'm glad somebody has finally come on-board with this, even if it is SCO.
It doesn't matter how the EFF handles GPL violations since they are not the licensor. If they were, then unequal application of the GPL would only invalidate (if it did invalidate) the licence of the GPL software owned by the EFF.
If Linus is unequal in his pursuit of his intellectual property rights vis a vis the GPL that only renders Linus property rights at issue, not the GPL. The GPL is a licence (like the Microsoft Shared Source Licence, or even EULA) and not an institution. Since the GPL is one of the more innovative licences we often lose sight of that fact.
(IANAL, of course)
Later,
Phil
Why would a Wookiee -- an eight foot tall Wookiee -- want to live on Endor with a bunch of two foot tall Ewoks? That does not make sense!
But more importantly, you have to ask yourself: what does that have to do with this case?
Nothing. Ladies and gentlemen, it has nothing to do with this case! It does not make sense!
Look at me, I'm a lawyer defending a major record company, and I'm talkin' about Chewbacca. Does that make sense? Ladies and gentlemen, I am not making any sense. None of this makes sense.
And so you have to remember, when you're in that jury room deliberating and conjugating the Emancipation Proclamation... does it make sense? No! Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, it does not make sense.
If Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit! The defense rests.
If the GPL is unenforceable, then unless SCO got written permission to distribute the code by all the myriad other kernel contributors (and in fact the developers of every other bit of GPL'ed software that they are distributing in their own distr - still available via FTP) then they themselves are in breach of all those people's copyright over code they wrote.
Please, I beg ANY developers of GPL'ed code that is in SCOs distro on their FTP site. Please sue these bastards for breach of copyright. I am willing to pony up $100 to anybody about to do this.
This madness has just got to end.
What on earth? IANAL, but isn't the whole basis of copyright law that the copyright holder can do whatever the hell he wants to with his material? It may be the case that the GPL is selectively enforced--possible if highly doubtful--but to call it unconstitutional is like saying that laws protecting churches from arson (like all buildings are protected from arson) are unconstitutional because they represent an establishment of religion.
This is how I understand it:
Copyright law says that I, as creator of my work, can control how it is used and by whom.
Licences give me the power to selectively allow freedoms to be given out.
The Microsoft EULA is an example of such a licence, in which paying the licence fee for a Microsoft product allows limited usage of the product as per the terms of the licence. That's what one pays for when they get the product, the right to use it under the terms of the accompanying licence.
The General Public Licence allows one as a Copyright owner to selectively give rights to users to use the product as long as they accept the licence. Said licence tells them that any derivative works must also be licenced under the GPL.
So what am I missing here? Is SCO saying that licences shouldn't exist? Are they saying that Copyright law is wrong? Have they just simply gone out of their minds? Because the licensing business model has existed in the software industry for ages.
The idea behind the GPL is nothing new, it's just intended to guarantee freedom rather than restrict it. It's another type of licence, and it's certainly as valid as something any other software vendor would choose to put on their products.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
7th Affirmative Defense - The GPL is selectively enforced by the Free Software Foundation such that enforcement of the GPL by IBM or others is waived, estopped or otherwise barred as a matter of equity
I guess they don't know the difference between copyright and trademark. Selective enforcement has zero effect on enforcebility of copyright. Black letter law.
8th Affirmative Defense - The GPL violates the U.S. Constitution, together with copyright, antitrust and export control laws, and IBM's claims based theron, or related thereto, are barred.'
Export control laws? I see, now. Their defense is "We're to fucking retarded that we need a keeper. Please give us money."
They forgot to mention that the GPL makes the Baby Jesus cry.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
If the GPL stands up in court, it's SCO's case that is going to be crippled.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
"Over a 4% drop"? That seems practically insignificant.
The thing that really bugs me is what goes on with financial news all the time - they'll interpret market movements as the obvious effect of X news event without demonstrating any link. "Microsoft issued two new security patches today, and so happy investors raised stock values 4%." It's exceptionally naive to assume that only the events you care about affect what happens to stock prices.
Correlation does not imply causality. It could just as easily be that the SCO-execs-and-cohorts are pulling stock prices to refill their pump-and-dump tanks - it's really all speculation.
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
American weapons inspectors working throughout the Iraqi country side are claiming that the GPL is seriously hindering their efforts to find Saddam's cache of WMD. When asked how exactly it is hindering the effort an inspector replied, "It's just un-American and that's bad mmmkay."
Futhermore, high ranking army officers are also said to be frustrated by the GPL. "It is quite simply conter-productive in our efforts to find Saddam and to bring law and order to Iraq", said an officer, speaking under anonymity.
And finally, graffiti was seen on Redmond, WA train claiming, "GPL = French". Underneath was written, "it's '==' you insensitive clod".
"She's a West Texas girl, just like me" - G.W Bush Iraqis
If the GPL is invalid, then while SCO was redistributing Linux (and still continued to do so after bringing suit), the company was infringing copyright, because nothing other than the GPL gives SCO the privilege to do that. If SCO gets the GPL on Linux declared illegal, watch kernel contributors with deep pockets sue SCO for copyright infringement.
Will I retire or break 10K?
see the body of my original reply :D
This was bound to happen. The idea of a genuinely free ride flies in the face of thousands of years of economic theory. Free software is done "for the love of the game" (please no technicality trolls... I'm just trying to illustrate a point here).
The notion of a free product that is in many ways superior to its commercial counterpart scares alot of people. It's frightening to any business minded person that there is a large wealth of talented developers who are making an amazing product and not only distributing it free of charge, but giving away the source as well. To a business person, this is simply nonsense, but to those of us who beleive in creating something useful and of high quality "just for fun", it's not only a hobby, but a cause.
It was only a matter of time before this ideology was challenged. This is that challenge. Fortunate, they are standing on a pretty weak argument, and up against an 800lb gorilla.
~my $.02
Come on people, we all knew from the beginning that this open source thing wasn't going to fly.
-credits to the Simpsons on that one
SCO had the gall to cite ESR's definition of 'FUD,' which at the time related the origin of the acronym as applied to IBM. When their papers were already filed with the court, ESR tacked on a little 'bonus,' which the court will read because SCO cited it:
http://catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/F/FUD.html
i have said it before, and i will say it again...
SCO has every reason in the world to see the GPL killed. That reason is that they have (most likely) been using GPL'd code in their proprietary code. They want to see the GPL nulled and voided so that when "they win their case", they can, at a later date, keep right on using Linux code in their shitty products.
i'll keep saying it - this is the whole of the "why" behind their case, i'm telling you. They don't want to have to pay up to anyone - let alone thousands of individuals, for abusing their GPL code in their products...
because after this - everyone will go after them.
guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
Geez... Been in law school for under 3 months and it's already coming in handy.
The deal behind the litany of affirmative defenses is that under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (Rules 8(c)-8(d), for those who care), if SCO doesn't assert these defenses in its response, then it can't assert them later. So, the standard trick for lawyers is to put in everything but the kitchen sink.
Also, under rule 8(e), they're allowed to state as many defenses as they can, 'regardless of consistency.'
Now, they're really only supposed to list the real defenses and they could get into trouble for listing frivolous ones (I think their first affirmative defense is frivolous, for example). But, sanctions for this sort of thing don't happen as often as they probably should. They do run the risk of PO'ing the judge, though....
So after reading your post, I thought "Hm, I wonder if SCO is still distributing or selling Linux somewhere." So I went to SCO's front page just to poke at it out of mild, idle curiousity. There's a little box on the front page that says "Looking for a promotion, contest, or campaign? Enter keyword here." If you enter something that's an SCO product it forwards you there. If you enter anything else it forwards you to a search page. Okay, I thought, what the heck, let's see what happens when I type in "linux". I did so, and to my surprise was promptly forwarded to
/products/linux/ on this server.
http://www.sco.com/products/linux/, which said only:
Forbidden
You don't have permission to access
For no good reason, I find this funny.
P.S. Searching for "Caldera Linux", on the other hand, returned some search results, including this absolutely fascinating page, which describes a developer-only "technology preview" of.. "the upcoming linux 2.4 kernel". The page seems to still be under the impression you can still sign up for SCO's "OpenLinux Developer's Network". They have e-mail addresses and an 800 number that points to the voice mail of some poor fellow within SCO named "Chris Morris". Hm.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Two points:
1) You have to realize that this is SCO's *Answer* to IBM's counterclaims. This means that it has to (a) respond point by point to IBM's complaint/counterclaim, admitting, denying, or otherwise, well, answering each allegation, and (b) give a list of "affirmative defenses" to IBM's overall complaint. (a) is self-explanatory. (b) is a list of arguments and/or facts that mean that, if true, even if everything that IBM alleged in its complaint/counterclaim is true, SCO should still prevail.
Hopefully you can guess, then, that the defense attorneys will throw pretty much anything they can think of into the "affirmative defenses" list. In fact, a lot of them are practically boilerplate -- they're things that "everyone" puts in an Answer. For example, the 25th AD says "IBM lacks standing to assert that SCO infringed some or all of the patents at issue." Of course the defense is going to throw this in -- it's a basic constitutional issue. The point is that SCO has to (in general; there are a few defenses SCO can raise later) plead any and all affirmative defenses it can think of in its answer, lest it waive any (which, obviously, would be bad for SCO and practically malpractice for its attorneys). Just as IBM doesn't have to have complete proof of each and every allegation in its complaint/counterclaim, SCO doesn't need complete proof for each reply and each of its affirmative defenses in its answer.
The claim that the GPL is unenforceable is, frankly, an obvious affirmative defense that really needed to be made in the reply. I would think, though, that SCO would prefer not to have to prove that particular defense.
2) People seem to be caught up in the "selective enforcement" affirmative defense. They are right that enforcement is wholly up to the copyright-holder. However, wrt the GPL, we're talking about a contract. Waiver and estoppel are easy and obvious defenses to make in litigation over contracts; I can't really imagine a situation where you wouldn't throw them into your reply as a matter of course.
The way I look at it is this.
The GPL mindset is designed, at the very core, with the sole end goal of making the best computer program possible. Everything else-- the financial success of companies like Redhat included-- is merely a means to that end, or coincidental.
The capitalist mindset is designed, at the very core, with the sole end goal of making a bunch of money. Everything else-- creating a good product included-- is merely a means to that end, or coincidental.
People can sit down and found an open source or a commercial software products with these not being their goals, but the open source project or the company will, in time, take on a life of their own. The project will fork, and leave the hands of the maintainer, if the maintainer does not do everything he can to promote it being the best program possible. The company meanwhile will eventually pass out of its original creator's hands, usually into the hands of a board of directors who care only about making the most money possible.
Because these different mindsets are so different, things the open source community does tend to seem completely mind-bogglingly nonsensical to the commercial community, and vice versa. Both sides would have an easier time understanding each other if it were understood on both sides that with a GPLed program, it is not the people, it is the source code, that is in control; and with a company it is not the people, it is the corporate culture, that is in control. Some groups of people do a better job of keeping a reign on their code/corporation than others, of course, but this is still what things seem to tend toward.
Now, there's something slightly more complicated going on here. It is that in most cases, the corporate side of things comes from a culture in which capitalism as a philosophy reigns supreme. This philosophy says that the free market will always defeat everything, because it is ultimately efficient. The mutual selfishness of everyone, acting upon each other, will ensure that only the strongest companies survive, the market winds up with the most fitting goods possible, and the capitalist system overall ends with as much wealth within it as is possible. They then get confused when these open source "things" crop up that don't seem to follow the rules of capitalism at all. They get confused because their philosophy tells them that the way to succeed is to let capitalism optimise everything; but then they see "inefficient", unoptimized, seemingly altruistic open source succeeding, they can't understand why that is. The first thing they've missed is that the open source world is going for a completely different kind of "efficiency" than the capitalist world. Both worlds want efficiency; they just want efficiency at different things. The second thing they've missed is that Open Source does indeed work within a survival-of-the-fittest free market very much like the one capitalism describes. It's just that it isn't a market of money. It's a market of ideas.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
Okay, it is just barely possible that a failure by the Free Software Foundation to enforce the GPL on works that the FSF holds the copyright to bars the FSF, as a matter of equity, form enforcing it on FSF-copyrighted works. "[M]atter of equity" is a rather broad argument, and a judge can drive a truck through it if he is so inclined, though it ups his chance of being reversed on appeal.
However, the actions of the FSF in no way impacts IBM's enforcment of its licensing terms for software to which it holds the copyright, whether or not they license it under the GPL. The FSF and IBM are different corporations, even if they, like SCO itself, have used the same license on some software.
Example: I could license software on which I hold the copyright to you under terms identical to a Microsoft license. I could then fail to enforce that license. That would in no way impact Microsoft's right to enforce its licenses on its software, ever. Similarly, how the FSF treats violations of FSF licenses to FSF code has no relevance to IBM's rights regarding violations of IBM licenses to IBM code.
Frankly, if I were the judge, I'd pin SCO's ears back for making the argument. Yes, shotgun claims area common practice, but this is especially ridiculous, and needs to be discouraged.
... Guys, don't forget that we are talking about IBM here... No one can honestly call them the "little guy"
IBM will surely have first class lawyers, and no matter what you think of the judicial system and judges/politicians only thinking about money and what not, who do you think they would side with? IBM or sco?
I'm betting on IBM.
"Computer games don't affect kids; I mean if Pac-Man affected us as kids, we'd all be running around in darkened rooms,
The Open Group may have to step in to defend the UNIX trademark as the pice at groklaw points out that they are claiming that Linux is an unauthorized workalike to UNIX(TM) however SCO has no standing to make that cliam since it is the open group who controls weather or not an OS is a UNIX(TM).
Now the open group has already stated that the UNIX trademark belongs to them and that they are neutral in matter of SCO v IBM. They have no flavor of Linux certified as a UNIX, so SCO can not arbitrarily assign the UNIX trademark. It sounds to me like the Open Group may have to step in and defend its trademark in court, as if SCO didn't already have to beat up an 800lb gorilla with a spoon.
Did Glenn Beck rape and kill a girl in 1990? gb1990.com
SCO has admitted to violating the copyrights of dozens of companies and hundreds of individuals on content probably worth hundreds of millions of dollars. They are now by far the biggest pirates ever. I think it's time of all of these copyright holders to contact SCO's ISP, xo.net, and demand that SCO's site be pulled down. To do this, you send by fax or paper mail to xo.net an identification of the copyrighted work that you believe has been infringed (specifying the portions that you claim), an identification of the material that you believe to be violating it, contact information for you and for SCO, the statement "I have a good faith belief that use of the copyrighted materials described above on the allegedly infringing web pages is not authorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law.", the statement, "I swear, under penalty of purjury, that the information in the notification is accurate and that I am the copyright owner or am authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.", and your signature. (Assuming that what google requires is what is mandated by law).
I'd enjoy the whole SCO fiasco if SCO spent the time before their case comes to trial shut off the internet for running a warez site.
Communism has been tried before,
Incorrect. Communism has never been attempted by any human civilization. You may have been confused by the Soviet Bolsheviks, who claimed to be "Communist", but they were liars. As were the Maoists who imitated them.
If Communism is ever tried, it might succeed in one of a few ways. Possibly, Marx will have been correct, and the natural evolution of a mature, capitalist society will be towards greater and greater corporate control, until a handful of merged companies + unions control the entire economy, and are indistinguishable from the government.
Or, there's the even more off-the-wall chance that a resurgence of Christianity will bring with it the recognition that their religion is doctrinally Communist (as laid out in Matthew 25:44, amoung many other places). Some people think Communism implies atheism, but they are independent social factors. A strong religion might be one way to overcome the natural greed that impedes Communism.
It sounds like the GPL is going to get an airing in court. IBM and most of the other big firms with a stake in Linux probably want that because the GPL is the cornerstone on which Linux was built.
And how nice that SCO is being an obvious pack of assholes about the whole thing. This puts the defenders of the GPL in a much better situation than if they had been reasonable.
You'll recall how, when the Forces of Law'nOrder try to set a precedent confirming the enforcability of some new law (especially if it's constitutionality is questionable), they'll go after the worst scumbag they can find first. (Like going after child pornographers when trying out the latest restriction on the free press.) Once they get the precedent set, they can then use it to club anybody else who publishes something they don't like.
SCO, by taking on the entire world and insulting the intelligence of the judges who will be handling the case with a stack of obviously bogus claims, has voluntarily put itself in a position with respect to the GPL of the child pornographer picked by a prosecutor to try out a new censorship law. VERY convenient for the GPL side.
This reminds me of a saying from the heyday of usenet news political discussion/debate groups. Often there would be a regular poster on one side who would trot out every tired, repeatedly disproved, position of that side of the argument. He could never be convinced to change his position. But he'd make a DANDY foil for presenting the counter-arguments, for the edification of thousands of neo-lurkers who hadn't yet heard them. Then, a few weeks later, once a new crop of newbies had gathered and/or another news item made the subject front-page once more, he'd rehash them AGAIN. How convenient!
After a few iterations some of the posters would get bored or annoyed with him and start asking how he could be discouraged (or kicked off, if the group was moderated). Then the old hands would point out how CONVENIENT it was to have someone from the "other side" to periodically hoist the strawmen and give the rest of us an opportunity for a bonfire.
SO convenient, that it would often be said that "If [whomever] didn't exist we'd have to invent him.", i.e. we'd have to plant a shill in the crowd to do the same function (but less believably, because someone who actually believes the opposite position won't get the rhetoric quite right.)
Of course you'd never know if [whomever] actually WAS a shill - a particularly convincing one. (And that uncertainty also helped. It implied that if he WAS a shill, he'd only be raising arguments that were defective. So simply by raising one of "his side's" arguments he discredited it. B-)
SCO has been so PERFECT in this role that the old saw applies.
If the GPL can't handle a legal challenge, it's better to find that out sooner rather than later.
SCo has been so perfect for our side that it's almost enough to make you wonder if SCO *IS* a shill.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Captialism: Man exploits his fellow man.
Communism: The other way around.
It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
Than I suspect Darl and Co will get jail-time.
Someone should have warned them about this.
GPL=void.
Samba=no longer able to be distributed.
SCO sells Samba as part of Unixware.
Willful infringement for the purpose of commercial/finanical gain.
Felony charges. Minimum 3 years in prison.
Generally, I believe that the amount of prison time is proportional to the distribution. In SCO's case, it is going to be pretty damn big.
And, you know, depending on why the GPL is declared invalid (not that I think it will be, infact, I'm pretty damn sure it won't) one of two things may occur:
a)GPL won't actually be found invalid, instead, SCO's crazy ass-ed interpretation of the GPL will force them into some kind of bind where they will be inviolation of it, and loose the right to distribute under it
b)It will be found invalid in some tiny and specific way, and only the current revision of the GPL. GPL v4 will come out quickly, fix whatever error existed, and the opensource world will have a hell of a time moving everyting over to it. Or even better, it will only be found inapplicable to the linux kernel for some crazy reason, in which GPL v3.x for linux will be released, fixing the problem.
If either of these occur, or the GPL is just plain busted, SCO execs will go to jail and owe huge fines.
Not that it is much consolation--->It would really suck if the GPL was crushed. But it would feel good that the people who did it were screwed in the end anyways.
WhiteWolf666 an exBush supporter. All you new-school,compassionate,save the children Republicans can rot in hell
Extremely insightful pointing out that communism has never been tried before (at least not on a scale large enough for anyone to notice). It's true, communism has been a red herring for the former Soviets, the Chinese, eastern block Europe, and any of the far eastern states that claim communism only to "hide" the fact that they're merely dictatorships.
/. readers are probably a bit outside the norm when it comes to that human nature. Then again, most /.ers are a minority when compared to the masses that don't think a little extra effort can go a long way in society.
I also agree that Marx was probably correct, in that capitalist society is doomed to merge larger and larger corporations with government, until they are one in the same. I honestly think we're seeing evidence of the early stages of that, considering the influence large corportations already have on policy/law making.
I don't agree, however, that communism would ever work on a large scale. I base this on human nature alone though. While everyone working toward the good of the state and sharing the fruits of their labor is a noble premise, it never takes long for society to divide itself. It's happened everywhere, and not by accident. People who think their work is more important want more for that work. People who don't think they're making a difference don't want to work as hard. It's also in human nature to eventually do as little as possible, as long as you're getting by or ahead. That's why we have such great inventions as the tractor/combine, telephone, even the tv remote. I will work to create something that will save me time and energy, so I can relax more, or sit around a bit, or get a little more sleep, or...
I realize that communism isn't completely about the sharing of work in the state. It's about sharing power as well. In that light, human nature also takes it's run. Those with more influence eventually start exercising it (we've seen this happen throughout history many times). What you have at that point is something resembling an ologopoly.
Communism might work if you can remove human nature, and most
Saying Android is a family of phones is akin to saying Linux is a family of PCs.
I searched the SEC website and found no information about ongoing investigations. (Apparently it is their policy to not publicize investigations.) I filled out a web form on their site and was quite surprised to receive a phone call the next day from an SEC investigator.
I spoke with the gentleman for about 45 minutes. He's a stock geek, and I'm a computer geek - different worlds, to be sure.
I did my best to communicate what I believe are the essential issues in this matter - that SCO
Is filing lawsuits to manipulate potential investors' opinions about them and their products
Is lying about the core issues in the case
Is a sham - not really developing technology but using IP (their definition) to wrest dollars from "infringers," and
That the leadership within the company is pumping and potentially dumping stock
The investigator listened patiently to my explanation and asked good "process" questions - he heard what I had to say.
He indicated that he wanted to be sure that he understood my issues (IP and copyright issues are not day to day issues for them)
Unfortunately he indicated that he did not believe that he could express my concerns cogently, and that there was not enough volume of stock being sold by insiders to justify starting an investigation.
He did tell me that if we could demonstrate that SCO leaders knowingly lied about their products or other companies, he needed to know about that because that was substantive enough to justify an investigation.
Note that we don't have to find where they sold stock on the basis of the lies, only be able to demonstrate clear false statements.
I found it interesting that
a) They would contact me
b) They would listen to me
c) They want to protect the public from abusive leaders, and
d)They would show me how to help them initiate an investigation.
Find the lies and report them, and the SEC will get engaged. Remember that what seems completely obvious to a tech geek may not be clear to a stock geek. (and vice-versa) Do the legwork, find the proof and then in a clear, concise, non-inflammatory way using layman's terms communicate that to the SEC, and they will do their job. They can't do what they don't understand. Remember that they have to prove it in a court of law, not a court of open-source advocates.
Regards,
Anomaly
PS - God loves you and longs for relationship with you. If you want to know more about this, please email me.
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
That's called fascism. And yes, there have been academic papers categorizing fascism then comparing modern American politics. American Fascism is a real possiblility, just because they won't all dress up like Nazis and try to kill an entire ethnic group or two outright doesn't mean it's not fascism.
Fascism is a danger to all democratic states, as it requires a democratic state to breed fascism. Read this for some primer info:
Rush, Newspeak and Fascism: An exegesis
BTW, Communism is bunk. It will never work, black markets are part of a body of evidence that shows humans are pre-disposed to capitalism at some level. Also Marx was railing agains the oligarchic crony capitalism, not the free and fair markets that the large part of American capitalism enshrines. Marx would probably be an economist if he'd grown up in modern America. But, he'd still see the danger of the crony capitalism we've seen with the recent Wall Street fraud. He'd probably be rapidly anti-Fascist too.
Quit sitting around on the fringes between libertarians, neo-cons and commies. There have been a lot of moderate voices who have studied all of these different systems and agree that free markets with enough regulation to keep the markets fair for new entrants is the wisest course. Regulate where it makes sense, free markets where it benefits all citizens. As Roosevelts' VP Henry Wallace once said,
Arrogance is Confidence which lacks integrity. -- me
Matthew 6:20
Giving is from the heart, not from the state. Remember also to "Render unto Caesar what is Caesar's, and unto God what is God's"; and "There is no authority on earth which God himself has not established.""But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
>If the GPL is invalid...
>then SCO is guilty of pirating the Linux kernel!!
Absolutely. It actually should be worse than that for SCO:
EVEN IF the GPL is NOT invalid, SCO has publicly rejected its terms.
So the validity of the GPL does not enter the discussion, period. SCO has no right to use the software unless it has negotiated some other license terms, period.
I'm surpised we aren't already hearing about TRO's being filed, C&D's being sent, and suits being filed on this. It's pretty simple: GPL software is licensed, not sold. Either you accept the terms of the license, or you do not. If you do not accept the terms of the license because you believe the license to be invalid or because its terms are not legal in your jurisdiction or because of other interests you may have, that's just too bad for you.
If your mortgage agreement has an illegal clause in it, you don't get your house for free.
If I don't agree with what's written on my parking ticket, it's not going to stop my car from being towed if I don't move it.
If I have legal problems that prevent me from agreeing with the GPL, I cannot use SAMBA on my network, period.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.