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IBM, Intel Set Up $10m SCO Defense Fund
An anonymous reader writes that the "NY Times reports that a group of companies, led by I.B.M. and Intel, plans to announce today that it is setting up a $10 million legal defense fund to help pay for the litigation costs of corporate users of the popular GNU/Linux operating system if they are sued. ZDnet also has a story on this." otisaardvark points out that "The fund is to be administered by OSDL (Open Source Development Labs) and so, amongst other things, could bankroll legal costs for Linus."
Big, Rich friends :-))
:-)
Of course, IBM and Intel aren't doing this out of the kindness of their hearts, but it's still a nice gesture, 'cos it works for us (well, them, I'm not a kernel contributor
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
the timeing of this is interesting with today being the day that SCO has to show evidence in court of IBM's infringment on their copyright.
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IBM & Intel won't just throw all this money away would they. I think what this means is:
We're pretty damn sure that Linux is clean. You can be sure too, because if you get sued we'll pay the legal costs for the time being, but since we know that you (we, Linux) will win in the end, SCO will have to pay and so it won't cost us a dime.
And so our Linux bussiness can roll on. It's more than PR. It's saying we'll win.
Ofcourse, it is yet another news article with SCO's name in it, but it also seems like IBM and Intel think they need a crapload of money to defend people, which in turn suggests that there is something to SCO's claims.
SCO really wants to go to court, but ofcourse they know they don't stand a chance. This amount of money on both sides could make for a spectacular trial.
At the same time, some people, who hadn't figured it out yet, might realise that there is no way on earth SCO is actually going to win.
Besided that, i wonder if IBM and Intel did return-on-investment calculations on this. Maybe they figure the kudos will be worth more than 10M.
help pay for the litigation costs of corporate users of the popular GNU/Linux operating system if they are sued.
That leaves grandmas, 12 year old girls, and nerds in parent's basements out in the cold.
I guess we now know who SCO is going to target next.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
It will be interesting to see how much of the code for X86 that sco is claiming as stolen actually came from intel. Either intel reference code for talking to the bios or for talking directly to the chipset peripheral controllers tends to show up everywhere. Plus there is intels own work on SMP operating systems. Hypercubes were an intel specialty.
Now if adaptec joins in sco could be in for a ripping the like of which has never been seen
$10 million? Thats enough money to fund OSDL for three or four years! More proof, as if needed, that this case is principally about lining the pockets of the legal community.
--rhad
Slashdot needs to interview Natalie Portman.
So the only thing that is "validated" here is, that SCO might (threaten to) sue you if you use Linux. We know that already, nothing new there. It's in IBMs (and other Linux-Distributors) best interest to put up a good defense in the first SCO vs. Linux-end-user case since the outcome of such a case will have high publicity value.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
Advanced Server is still GPL, the only way they get you to pay for it is by not distributing binaries, but if you happen to obtain binaries in some way, installing and running them is perfectly legal. You can even redistribute it under the GPL as long as you remove/replace the redhat-artwork package, which is the only part of the distro you can't legally distribute.
Sure, it's nice to have corporate support, but is anyone else a little worried about big businesses real interests in Linux? We live in a capitalist society : the interest is money and profit. Just makes you wonder what kind of support linux is going to need from these boys in the future, and how dependent they are going to be.
And I for one welcome our new lawyer overlords.
Say, remember when the Romano-British employed one lot of maurading Saxons to protect them from another lot of maurading Saxons? How did that turn out? As I remember, the Saxons won by default... and then decided to pay one lot of maurading Vikings to protect them from another lot of maurading Vikings...
Tort. Reform. Now.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
As are many others here! Let's hope that IBM's contribution helps get that ball rolling. It takes money to mount enough of a challenge to get SCO's case pitched into the circular file, hopefully with prejudice.
I notice that a lot of folks are questioning IBM's ultimate motive here. Of course, their motive is to make money & defend their interests. But until SCO's spurious claims are properly squashed, nobody -- whether it's "profit-mongers" or the "free as in beer" crowd -- will be able to move with any certainty.
"Obviously, I'm not an IBM computer any more than I'm an ashtray" (Bob Dylan)
haha, "all this money"? $10 million is a drop in the bucket compared to what IBM could make once it clears this legal bull up and goes on selling Linux workstations/servers. They're not looking out for anyone but themselves.
Sorry, my karma just ran over your dogma.
Actually it hurts SCO's claims...
On of there PR thingys was indemnification, by creating this fund IBM is showing that they don't believe SCO will win.
They are also making sure that whoever SCO is going to target can defend itself properly. Nothing could be worse than some linux user getting sued and loosing due to lack of funds and setting a precedent.
Jeroen
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
MS is floundering, and Intel's fate is too tied to them now. Perhaps they want to free Linux of the SCO cloud so that they can continue to rocket into the mainstream. = more diverse markets for Intel and a shot at re-charging the flatlined processor market? Also maybe a way to cozy up to the OpenSource community to perhaps steal some light from AMD? Like you said - they aren't doing this for free.
Is the juice worth the sqeeze?
But, but, it's not an indemnification, it's a legal defense fund...
It's not agreeing they're guilty and paying their consumers a compensation, is just helping their consumers don't get harrassed by SCO litigation spree.
I'm a chainsmokin' alcoholic sociopath, so-ci-o-path
Would that include the free Solaris license you can get by downloading it from Sun, or just a license for SCO's own Unix?
A typical legal strategy for a battle like this is for the side in SCO's position to tackle a bunch of little guys first to build up precedents without actually having to prove their case against an oponent equipped with a like legal force. IBM and Intel are simply serving notice to SCO that that isn't going to fly here. They will put on their defense wherever SCO goes instead of waiting for SCO to come to them.
If they're going after 800lb gorillas...
http://moneycentral.msn.com/scripts/webquote.dll?i Page=lqd&Symbol=scox
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It doesn't even bear predicting (because it's a sure thing) that Darl will vomit forth more bombastic FUD today or tomorrow in response to this.
SCOX stock is the only currency they have. They pay their lawyers in it. If it collapses, they are done.
But, their bubble can't have much longer to run though... For all the threats, intimidation, spin, etc, SCaldera has YET to take any action on their copyright claims...
Sooner or later, the Emperor will be exposed for the streaker he is.
Corporatism != Free Market
" In SCO's legal reasoning (take appropriate psychodelics to get into that state), the Unix license is an agreement that a given customer has entered into, and in their opinion the use of Linux somehow represents a breach of that agreement by using the same intellectual property without paying for it. It gives them a "gotcha" on the customer in question, at least in their view."
It seems to me that SCaldera is trying to retroactively change their license terms (ie: contract) with their customers to make it a violation to use Linux if you licensed OpenServer or UnixWare.
Legally, I'd think that (IANAL) unless such language was SPECIFICALLY already there when the customer signed, it's an extremely weak claim.
Such language would also almost certainly be illegal in some, if not most jurisdictions, as it's anti competitive.
If anyone wanted confirmation that SCaldera's business plan is a MS funded FUD machine stock "pump n dump", the fact that they are DIRECTLY attacking their own customers, their SOLE source of ongoing revenue should do it.
SCaldera isn't a business, unless you count shilling for Microsoft and Barratry as legitimate business practices.
Corporatism != Free Market
For what it's worth, if SCO sues and loses, their stock price immediately hits the shitter, and there will be nothing to recover for IBM/Intel. So whatever money they use for defense is lost...if there is any.
That said, it's money well spent because they could easily lose that much money in sales from timid IT managers/legal departments. So it's worth their $10M purely as an advertisement.
That said, I don't believe SCO will ever end up in court against IBM anyway, because they get more money from keeping their stock price up as long as possible. I see Canopy looting SCO right before an actual court date (probably one with Red Hat they can't avoid) in case they lose. If they accidentally win, well, that's a nice unexpected bonus for them.
And so our Linux bussiness can roll on. It's more than PR. It's saying we'll win.
It's certainly putting their money where their mouth is. But I think all they did is call SCO's bluff. The only other thing they accomplished is blocking the possibility that SCO could have gone after small companies, hoping to establish a precedent before they go after the big (blue) fish. By IBM telling SCO they won't get an easy victory against a chump defendant, I think they keep SCO out of court as a plaintiff altogether.
All in all, good move.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
" Why do people ignore IBM's past? They're so easy to forgive IBM , and yet so quick to jump down Microsoft's throat for any little thing.
Imagine if Microsoft was doing team-ups like this. Slashdotters would be all over them for the "unfairness" of it all."
Microsoft already HAS "teamed up" and is intimately involved in this thing, or at the very least encouraging it.
$8 million dollars to SCaldera for licenses they didn't need, for one thing...
You can bet Microsoft will _NEVER_ "team up" with anyone fighting a cause for FOSS... The whole reason they are funding SCO's FUD driven pump n dump is because of the fact that the GPL is "Kryptonite" to their Embrace, Extend, Extinguish business model that they have used thus far to maintain their monopoly.
I forgive IBM for past transgressions because it seems they LEARNED from the mistakes they made in the 1980's. If they hadn't, it's likely IBM would have gone the way of Digital and other former dominant players...
Microsoft could crush Linux forever tomorrow... If they released Windows complete with source under the GPL. Won't ever happen.
Corporatism != Free Market