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SCO Letter to Fortune 1500 Now Online
e6003 writes "The text of the extortion letters that SCO sent out in May 2003 to the 1500 largest US companies is now online. Read in all its glory the lies and misconceptions that SCO has about Linux and the kernel development process. Pamela Jones, the proprietor of Groklaw, suggests Linus Torvalds would have a great case for defamation as a result of this letter and subsequent events."
can be found here.
Did you have to link Groklaw? Its not fair to /. the happy fun (para)legal site.
For your information, the text of the letter has been available here for a few months.
The only reason this is news is that its a document attached to the court docket for the December the 5th hearing on the motions to compel discovery.
An infinite number of monkeys will eventually come up with the complete works of
Spell it correctly and it works.
http://www.sco.com/scosource/
This worries me. Either people are so dumb, or SCO has some ace up its a^Hsleeve.
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The submitter:
Pamela Jones, the proprietor of Groklaw, suggests Linus Torvalds would have a great case for defamation as a result of this letter
The article:
Now that Linus has a lawyer, maybe they'll take note and consider if the necessary elements for an action for defamation are now available. They are hard cases to win, particularly for a public figure, so they may not want to go that route
The requirements to file a suit? Yes. A "great case"? Hell no.
It's scheduled for April 11, 2005. It will be amazing if SCO can make it long enough to see even the beginning of the IBM and Red Hat trials.
Oh well.
Please check this article from OSDN. Linux kernel developers are well known and actually SCO's definition for commercial software "built by carefully selected and screened teams of programmers" describes better the reality of Linux Kernel development.
Maybe IBM could lend him one of their lawyers.
Heck, there are probably a number of lawyers who would take the case pro bono just for the publicity. You can't get a much more sympathetic plaintiff.
He also needn't file a multimillion dollar suit. He could choose to ask for one dollar, plus costs, and an injunction against further libellous statements. He doesn't look greedy, and SCO still faces a court declaration that their remarks are defamatory.
Still, it would probably end up soaking up a good bit of his time, and he has better things to do...
~Idarubicin
What you're describing is communism. Socialism isn't about forcing people to work for a common good. In fact forcing people to do anything AGAINST their will is one of the things socialism is against.
Mainly, socialism consists of making sure
1) Those who work for an employer can't be abused (e.g. summarily dismissed, locked out, paid different rates - trades unions stuff)
2) Ensuring the better off in society take care of those at the lower end of the scale.
The most successfully socialist countries are in Scandanavia where taxes are huge (up to 75%) but things like dental care and hosptials are free for all, drugs are subsidised by the government, there are adult education schemes, the whole lot of it. And while people are being gouged in terms of tax, their standard of living is nonetheless increased as it all gets returned to them in kind.
This is the big difference between socialism and capitalism, socialism you give up significant funds to better society, which will in turn better your life. In capitalism you make and hold onto as much money as possible, so you can afford to better your life, as society won't do it for you.
By and large the core policy of socialism is donating to society for the benefit of all. In one sense it's a form of charity, except more reasoned, and engineered so you get something back from your donation.
It is has nothing to do with communism (which incidentally has nothing to do with the totalitarian regimes practised in China, Cuba and formerly (presently?!) the USSR).