Groklaw Outlines More SCO Linux Contributions

An anonymous reader writes "Groklaw today reported that they have discovered another SCO programmer, Tigran Aivazian, who has committed code to the Linux kernel. According to the latest story Mr. Aivazian contributed a microcode update feature, a testing program, and made contributions to SMP and vmalloc. This new story adds weight to earlier stories about Caldera coder Chris Hellwig's additions to XFS, SMP and JFS. " Also on the SCO front, an anonymous reader writes "SCO's last Open Letter has drawn two new responses, one from Red Hat cofounder Bob Young, and the other from Jon 'maddog' Hall. 'maddog' makes a carefully reasoned rebuttal that defends the GPL and includes observations like 'How could the founding fathers or the early legislators have foreseen the Web, or even computers?' Young curtly offers McBride the following advice: 'Be less vocal' - making him the King Canute of Linux, perhaps, because it ain't gonna happen anytime soon."

Comments

We see the flaw is SCO's defense

[pbug]

But when push comes to shove the courts system is going to have the final say so. I hope with all my heart that whatever judge oversees this case will make the correct decision and squash SCO like the bug they are.

Re:SCO programmer adding code means??

[fermion]

IANAL, but I think this question, and maybe the article, kind of misses the point. One good point has already been made, the the programmers are not rogue.

The second point is that this is not a case where copyrighted material has escaped, been used by a competing company, and the competing company is claiming that because the copyrighted material is now in public view, it is no longer under copyright protection.

This is a case where the accused party is perfectly willing to discuss specific instances of copyright violation, and, if proved valid, remove the code.

The things that complicate this is whether IBM was under the standard or modified UNIX agreement, and whether anyone who ever worked in UNIX can be considered to have stolen IP from UNIX.

And this is why most of the discussion on this topic is irrelevant. The suite against IBM is probably a valid question, and maybe even justifiable due to the previous action of IBM. If the laws are followed, it will only affect IBM, at least until another battle is fought to prove the code in Linux is substantially similar. At which point the code will simply be removed and life will go on.

This is why they are trying to attack on the second front, essentially saying that Linux stole everything from Unix. There is no reason to show specific code, because all the code in effect breaks copyright because it was all done by people who saw Unix code. Saying that a programmer here and there legally contributed little pieces of code does not mean that overall product is does not break Unix copyright. Many would say this is a silly argument. But this is not something that will be won in courts. This will be won in the marketplace. And even thought the OSS software has no more risk than closed software, people may begin to believe that it does. And by fight SCO on the battlefield it selects, with articles such as this, we play into their strategy.

There are only two things that matter. First, the real battle is between IBM and SCO. That is the lawsuit that is filed. That is the only battle SCO needs to actively defend. If SCO wins, Linux will adjust the code. I think everyone has said this. Until a judgment is handed down, nothing needs to be done.

The second is the assumption that Linux breaks copyrights from Unix. SCO is not putting anything substantial into this fight. It is merely a distraction to make the OS community waste time. The only reasonable response is to sumarily state that there is no legal basis to find that Linux is derived from Unix and no known copyright infringement exists. If any are found, they will be corrected, as in the past. If asked why this is true, all one needs to do is ask why SCO has not filed suit to defend their point. At this point it is all words.

OSS can and should define the battlefield, and not just respond to SCO. I am sure that people will correct me or mod me down if they disagree.