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SCO Fires back, Subpoenas Stallman, Torvalds et al
SirFozzie writes "SCO has just, within the past hour, announced that they have fired back against IBM's legal broadside, with one of their own, filing subpoenas against several of the biggest names in Linux. SCO filed subpoenas with the U.S. District Court in Utah, targeting six different individuals or organizations. Those include Novell; Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux kernel; Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation; Stewart Cohen, chief executive of the Open Source Development Labs; and John Horsley, general counsel of Transmeta."
He's got my donation anytime!
um MS bought several unix liscences from sco like a year ago. no mysetery really. but the real motive is sco's own greed. it just so happens that it coincides withs MS's goals so they threw some money at it.
sPh
Oh dear. Darl probably noticed that their stock didn't go up to $45 but rather went back down to around $14 and panicked and subponeaed a few guys in the lawsuit to make investors believe that they are competently litigating this.
Luckily the Pump seems to be a bit dry today, even after they opened their mouth; is it a sign that investors are catching on on their scam? I surely hope so.
Also, being served a subponea hopefully will be the last straw for Linus before he files a copyright infringement suit against SCO.
"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." Bill Gates,
If Stallman makes it into a courtroom he'll wind up with a contempt of court charge against him. I wonder if he can resist pulling his "I'm sorry, I don't know what you're talking about." or "I won't answer unless you ask the question with my preferred terminology." when an attorney uses "free" and "open-source" interchangeably or refers to the "Linux operating system.
In fact, if I were an SCO lawyer I'd definitely bait him until the judge sanctioned him.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Didn't Alan Cox write a lot of the "offending" code? Besides being far more important to Linux than many of the subpoena'd people.
That part about Caldera (now SCO) supporting his writing the very code they are suing over might cause problems for them, though...
Yep, agreed. His integrity is up there with the angels.
I have a horrible vision of the lawyer ripping him apart over the rights of closed-source programmers though. RMS thinks all programs should be free, not by choice but as a part of the natural order of things. Any competent lawyer should be able to do a character assassination on him, and by association the entire open source movement, with that material. I could, and I'm not a lawyer.
The other poster's comments about him being precise are valid too - he is. And he's a clever guy, but his principles and beliefs, while noble, verge on religious, which will just be ammunition in the hands of a lawyer
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
It's surprising that they didn't include Bruce Perens and/or ESR in their list. Those two have been pretty involved in pointing out SCO's FUD. SCO even implied that ESR was being paid by IBM to attack them!
I'm not sure what the point of sending a supoena to RMS is though. Perhap the braintrust at SCO is unaware that free software != open source software? I'm sure he would be happy to send them a copy of the free software manifesto. It might not hurt if he sent them a copy of the BSD ruling as well.
If SCO ever had a plan beyond:
they are doing a very good job of hiding it. It just looks like one ad-hoc decision after another. Since they initiated the proceedings against IBM, the chewbacca defense isn't an option, and it is difficult to see any coherent strategy at work here.
Of course, slashdotters are not the intended audience. SCO is playing to the analysts who will repeat what they have been told about SCO's claims being legitimate in order to keep those share prices up there. It is obvious that SCO is not interested in speaking to people who know something about software and technology.
*** Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket?
It's not the first time RMS has faced such accusations, nor will it be the first time he has responded to them. It won't be the fifth time, or the 20th time, or the 100th time. The internet gives a public persona a great deal of practice in responding to attacks. People just as intelligent as SCO's team of lawyers have been attacking RMS (at least verbally) for a long time, often with with no qualms about disingenuously misrepresenting his views.
I'd be much more worried about Linus, who has not been as willing to put himself in the middle of arguments, and is more apt to compromise. He'd be more likely to answer a question honestly, without recognizing the path down which the lawyer is trying to (mis)lead him. RMS won't lie, but he'll know not to offer facts or interpretations in a form that will provide ammunition for the lawyer.
RMS may be an extremist, but he's not a zealot. He's not blind to the opinions and perspectives of other people, even if he doesn't agree with them.
Why would Microsoft license a company that distributes software that is a DIRECT competitor to their Server software? Would it be to infuse a poor company with money so they can fight a lengthy legal process? I would be willing to bet the farm.
Mmm... IBM requested proof of SCO's claims. That's how our system of "justice" works, the plaintiff files a case then proves it by providing evidence.
In alleged response to IBM's request, SCO filed a bunch of its own subpoenas. Exactly how is that "firing back"?! The only way SCO could "fire back" is by responding to IBM's request, i.e., PROVE ITS CASE!!!
SCO's subpoenas are nothing but a delay tactic. It's an attempt to avoid firing back as long as possible. SCO is not ready to let the world know it has absolutely no proof.
For any SCO supporters out there, ask yourself this: If SCO had evidence, why is it STILL hiding it?! An author cannot sue another author for plagiarism, but refuse to tell exactly what was plagiarized!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
There are ogg recordings of 12 of his speeches from the last 3 years on the GNU philosophy audio page.
Also note that the issue of the name "GNU/Linux" is not about credit (more explanation here)
And an explanation of the fiasco regarding Stallman being asked to talk at a "Linux User Group" is available here.
Expert in software patents or patent law? Contribute to the ESP wiki!
I just posted this in an earlier SCO story, but I thought it was worth posting again -- I sent a letter to our congressman, Barney Frank (D- MASS), about SCO's abusive use of the court system. He sent this reply:
- - - -
September 26, 2003
Dear Mr. Minsky,
I share your view that the suits being brought by the SCO Group
against the users of the Linux system are an entirely inappropriate
use of the legal systems for broader corporate purposes. While I have
not been able, obviously, to examine these in detail, the suits do
not appear to me, from what I have read, to have any merit, and in
fact seem to be motivated, as I said, by an effort simply to prevent
the use of Linux for competitive reasons.
There is, unfortunately, a very limited role for Congress here. I
agree with those who would like to see us "stop SCO from punishing
innocent consumers to inflate its other legal claims." But under our
separation of powers doctrine, Congress has no role whatsoever to play
in the pursuit of particular cases. We can pass laws which prevent
certain types of suits from being brought, but it is very, very
difficult to pass those in a way that would be retroactive ? that is,
that would apply to existing suits. And the problem with this suit is
not that it is of a sort of legal claim that is inappropriate to
bring, but that it is totally unjustified on the merits. In other
words, the remedy here is for these suits to be dismissed on their
merits and Congress has no role, as I have said, in doing that.
I am prepared to join in expressions of extreme disapproval of what
SCO is doing, and I will be consulting with my colleagues to see if
there is a movement to do that. I hope that will have some impact on
them. All of these lawsuits brought against individuals will of course
be dismissed but I realize that is of little consolation to people
who have had to go through the trouble and expense of defending against
them. It may be that at some point a judge will act decisively enough
in this regard to prevent this proliferation of suits, and while, as I
said, our Congressional role is very limited here, I will be
encouraging anything we can do along these lines.
Barney Frank