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OSDL Releases New Paper on SCO's Claims
Ridgelift writes "The Open Source Development Labs have released a paper entitled SCO: Without Fear and Without Research [PDF, HTML version at the FSF] where Eben Moglen debunks SCO's claims to copyright infringement, and also discusses how they contradict themselves by citing that the GPL is both invalid and provides them legal protection. More information at the OSDL site and via an Internet.com article."
From Gartner's comments last week, it becomes clear that SCO's claims, press-releases and lawsuits are damaging the adoption of Linux, in the short-term, in corporate environments. I believe that is, partially, what RedHat's case against SCO is about.
So when do we expect that axe to fall? With the IBM case going into Oral arguments next month? Is there not anyway that this process can be accelerated by one of the judges, so that this hideous trainwreck can be put to bed.
Though Slashdot may not have anything to publish if there wan't a faily SCO story.
They've kept the Open Source world on the defensive. They experience consistent gains in the stock every time they announce a new initiative in their war on Free Software. They've been able to keep this going for far longer than I would have thought possible, and if this gets to trial the potential is there that they will prevail.
Who would have thought litigation was a way of making a living off of Free Software? I don't like what they're doing, but I have to confess my opinion of their strategy has changed. Fortunately, the rabid response they no doubt expected to provoke from the Open Source community hasn't manifested itself; I've been quite impressed with the professionalism and quality of the response as well. Keep posting these stories... we just can't get enough SCO.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
I am not sure I follow this argument: Is it obvious (or known) that the code that SCO has distributed contains everything that, say, a RHAT distribution contains? Or could it (in principle) be that SCO's distro (old and unkempt as it is ;-) does not contain the "infringing" pieces while other distributions do?
Thanks.Similarly, has SCO distributed all of IBM's contributions to Linux (thus necessarily including the alleged trade secrets)?
Hey, did I miss some bad news for SCO? SCO stock jumped from 14$ to 16$.
Quoting the paper posted in the original article: "Unless SCO can show that the GPL is
a valid form of permission, and that it has never violated that permission's
terms, it loses the counterclaim, and should be answerable in damages not
only to IBM but to all kernel contributors."
Could this eventually be used to force SCO to pay kernel contributors because SCO was in fact infringing on their GPL'ed code?
Nullum magnum ingenium sine mixtura dementia (There is no great genius without a mixture of madness) - Aristotle
So what's his plan? Personally I think (2) is the answer, and he's sticking around for the money. He must be hoping there will be a buyout, perhaps by Microsoft or someone else of worth, which would raise the value of the stock he's been given.
SCO is a bit more like RAMBUS was.. Other than RAMBUS had some legal legs to stand on... Wheres RAMBUS now ?
Who needs WiFi when we can have Packet Over Sheep! http://datacomm.org/PoS-InternetDraft.txt
To what degree is the mainstream media reviewing reports like this recent one from OSDL? If they are, they're certainly not reporting it. It's looking pretty biased to me!
...There's a chance for more "dramatic gains in the SCO stock price"
...The ability to yank one million lines of code out of five million is substantial; Investors seem to believe that SCO's suit has merit
So, to the average investor, SCO's claim that they matched 1 out of 5 million lines of code in Linux is pretty damning evidence.. whereas domain experts like us can easily see through these lies. Hopefully this comes to light in the courts, 'cause people like us are certainly screaming in a vacuum right now!
I'm thinking that the the financial/business media is leaning towards SCO side since SCO represents a more conventional corporate america, and Linux / GPL threatens that model?
Windows Server 2003 does have some "Unix" type technologies in it, including NUMA and LPR/LPD. Their event scheduler is based on AT.
Then, if you want even more Unix type technologies, there is always the addon package called "Unix Services for Windows".
Ron Gage - Westland, MI
This is a question best answered with another question...
Does anyone remember Della Croce, who falsely registered the trademark "linux" and attempted to extort licensing fees from the various companies who were selling cdroms (back then, many people purchased cdrom rather than downloaded ISOs).
At the time, it seems to drag on forever. Ultimately, the patent and trademark office assigned ownership of the registered "linux" trademark to Linus Torvalds.
In 6-7 years from now (based on the assumption SCO will lose or implode in 2004 or 2005), SCO will probably be a long distant memory, and the result will be absolutely no doubt about the validity of the GPL and openness which allows infrigements to be seen... just as today there is absolutely no doubt about the trademark, all thanks to the unscrupulous efforts (now mostly forgotten) Della Croce.
PJRC: Electronic Projects, 8051 Microcontroller Tools
This is to assume that Caldera or the previous SCO didn't willfully put it into THEIR distribution of Linux. Since SCO had to both review the code in question, compile it for their binaries and document it, it will be difficult to say they didn't know it was in there.
Banjo - The more I know about Windoze, the more I love *nix
Its important to continually restate the basic facts of the case. SCO is using the "Big Lie" propaganda strategy. To do this you keep saying big lies, the bigger the better. Eventually, some subset of the listeners will come to believe the lie, and another larger subset will come to believe some subset of the lie. In addition, all will be cowed. "Best not to risk it" being roughly equal to "you win". This method was perfected by Josef Goebbles (not that I want to trivialize his crimes through comparison to SCO). Of course Goebbles had sufficient control of the media to ensure no confilcting messages or inconvenient facts got in the way. Darl doesn't have that luxury. But the best way to counter the strategy is continual restatement of the facts in a credible manner. This paper should be viewed in that light, and is an excellent contribution to the cause.
How many people here are employed by companies doing software development? How many people here are PAID to develop software? How can any of you, in your right mind, even consider supporting the concept of "free" software?
I spent 35 years of my life making money as a programmer (before returning to the "Hard(ware) side of the Force").
And before that I studied under Bernie Galler. In the same issue of CACM as Djikstra's "GOTO considered Harmful" letter, Bernie lamented the choice of some programmers to charge more than reasonable media, copying, and shipping costs for a copy of some source they wrote. His lament predicted the entire commercialization of software and its resulting inhibitory effects on the advancement of the art.
As an author of custom software applications for clients, my main problem was not competition from free software vendors. It was the lack of freely-reusable source code, which forced me to spend extra time re-inventing a plethora of wheels before "assembling the wagons".
If I had had access to the current results of the open-source movement, I could have been far more valueable to my clients - by completing things more rapidly or building more capable software. Thus I could have charged each customer more and moved to new customers more quickly, establishing a better reputation for productivity.
It is only the commercial software market that has any need to adjust its business models due to "competition" from open-source. This market employs a very small subset of programmers. And they're primarily employed by a few, large companies where most of the profit goes to administrators and investors rather than individual contributors.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
He stated that M$'s "donation" to SCO was merely a PR investment by M$ to bash Linux.
You know its bad news when someone in the PR industry knows whats up.
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