SCO Will Pay You Not to Use Linux

Verteiron writes: "As if things weren't weird enough already, SCO is now planning to pay companies to migrate away from Linux.. even if it's not toward UNIX. According to the summary over at Groklaw, SCO will provide 'financial incentives and discounts' to users that switch to 'other operating systems that have a stronger IP basis than Linux.' This doubly amusing when considered together with the following statements straight from SCO's 8-K form filed with the SEC: '...plans to expand SCO's intellectual property licensing program to allow for migration alternatives to end users... and continued efforts to protect SCO's UNIX intellectual property rights and SCO's belief that the private investment will enhance SCO's ability to pursue currently pending legal actions... SCO has a history of unprofitability and has only realized revenue from its SCOsource licensing initiative during the last two quarters...'"

Comments

At last...

[__aavhli5779]

Nice to see some confirmation finally that SCO is not in the business of selling software, and has only the destruction of Linux as its objective.

This should clear the air a bit and help wake up those poor souls who still think that the SCO Group is some sort of software company, and not a lawsuit factory with a worthless, deprecated UNIX implementation on hand that they're not even developing to any useful degree any more.

And on the speculative front, I'll refuse to be 100% sure that Microsoft and/or Sun are behind SCO's actions until I see some sort of paper trail, but this makes me sure enough.

Re:doesn't this sound like another

[flossie]

What would happen to Linux if MS owned the rights to UNIX?

Development would cease while al the Linux developers chatted on Slashdot about the impending anti-trust cases against Microsoft launched across the globe.

Seriously, there isn't the remotest possibility that Microsoft could buy SCO if it would actually have a measurable effect. Of course, that is all predicated on the notion that SCO and its "IP" does actually count for something. Personally, I don't think it would make the slightest difference. IBM/SGI/SUN/etc. already have the rights to the stuff that matters and any new owners of SCO would not be able to withdraw those rights on a whim.

The ubiquitous: Read the article

[piobair]

SCO is offering _discounts_ on licenses.

Meaning if you switch over to another OS now you don't end up oweing SCO the full license for linux ($699 or something) that they're claiming you now owe. You'll probably just end up oweing a mere $500 (or whatever - even I couldn't stomach reading the details on that in the article).

As was posted on Groklaw

[Mistlefoot]

Wasn't sure how to post the message as a link...

"A somewhat more realistic interpretation of "Migration path with
discounts" would go more like this:

1) You already owe SCO money for their IP that you are using in Linux, 2) SCO
knows this was unintentional and says "Hey, we know you didn't mean to
infringe our IP, but you did. Since it was accidental, we'll charge you LESS
if you stop infringing our IP quickly by converting to something that does not
infringe our IP"

Basically extend the licensing that they were already doing:

$699 - Binary license
$599 - License current and prior use of SCO owned Linux IP on one server and
migrate that server to xBSD within 6 months.
$499 - License current and prior use of SCO owned Linux IP on one server and
migrate that server to HP-UX within 6 months
$299 - License current and prior use of SCO owned Linux IP on one server and
migrate that server to Windows 200x within 6 months

The discount is to what you pay THEM, and does not affect what the other vendor
charges you for their OS."