SCO Expands Licensing Money Chase Worldwide

drizst 'n drat writes "Article posted recently on ZDNet that 'companies outside the United States that use Linux now face the threat of legal action from the SCO Group, following the announcement on Wednesday that SCO's licenses are available worldwide.'" And cbiltcliffe writes "Vnunet is reporting that SCO is now threatening legal action against UK businesses that run Linux. Yet again, they claim they're going to initiate legal action against Linux users 'within a couple of weeks.' (Funny...weren't they saying that back in September?) They also claim that Novell and HP indemnification schemes are essentially useless (similar to SCO's Linux licences). It definitely appears the media is getting somewhat wiser to the FUD, however, as the story reports 'The run-time licence only permits use of what SCO says is its IP,' rather than 'The licence permits use of SCO's IP' like we would have heard a couple of months ago."

Comments

Go Go Super WIPO

[Mirell]

So have they got WIPO to approve their claims?

Novell

[nattt]

Until Novell and SCO sorts out who owns what, anyone can just tell SCO to go to hell. That's if there's anything of SCO left by the time IBM finish with them. Anyone who now pays SCO money is stupid.

Time for more "put up or shut up"

[Ashtead]

As far as I know, they still cannot make this kind of claims in Germany. And good luck to them (they're gonna need it!) if they really try something more substantial than their current FUD propagation anywhere else around here.

Unless and until they can prove in a court of law that they really have these rights they claim, they cannot expect to be paid. On the contrary, they can expect to be investigated for fraud, an perhaps subject to criminal charges of extortion...

And trying to dodge the GPL does not count. Either the GPL is valid and must be obeyed, or it is invalid which makes everyone distributing Linux and other GPL'd software into copyright infringers. This latter seems somewhat less than likely...

Re:If there is a ruling in the US against SCO...

[eln]

Yes, they could, but since any defendants could just lift the arguments straight out of the US case and probably win if the other country's laws were similar, it's unlikely they would. Plus, if the prevailing Slashdot opinion regarding SCO's real motives is actually true, the executives will be living it up in Bermuda while the company files bankruptcy right about the time the US verdict is being read.

SCO are psychotic

[pitr256]

According to InfoWorld, SCO is now claiming that in it's response to IBM interogatories, they have submitted no examples of copyright infrigement.

Blake Stowell is quoted as saying, "We've not introduced copyright infringement as part of our case with IBM. We've tried to make it clear that it's a contract issue."

Seems quite odd when a SCO press release from yesterday says exactly the opposite. Old Darl said this, "SCO is willing to enforce our copyright claims down to the end user level and in the coming days and weeks, we will make this evident in our actions."

What freakin planet are these guys from? I'm sorry, but I despise them like I despise neo-nazi, racists, thugs.

I'm sorry that I ever bought a Caldera product...

This is Getting Really Predictable

[TheWanderingHermit]

SCO is just like the schoolyard bully that keeps pushing other kids around until someone hits him in the stomach and leaves him in pain. I was the kid who would never fight, but when one of these guys got to be too much and pushed me around, I fought them. I didn't even have to win. Once word got around that I (the kid who hated fighting) could even hold my own with them, their reputation as a bully was gone.

That's what SCO is doing. They're pushing everyone. When they don't get enough attention, they make more threats. They keep threating more and more people and companies. As long as they can rant and rave, their stock stays high, but once someone (like IBM, hopefully) and kicks them down a notch, it'll all be over.

They know they have nothing. They know the only thing keeping their stock high is the bluster and fuss they keep making. They're reaching out as wide as possible to bully the schoolyard, the neighborhood, and, soon, the whole world. When they reach the end of people they can threaten, they'll have to act. If they had the strength to act and actually do something, they would. Since they don't, they're Shakespeare's idiot, telling a tale full of sound and fury signifying nothing.

Notice who the targets are.

[Jaywalk]

SCO claims they're going after companies with whom they've already had "unsuccessful" discussions. The lesson is clear; it's dangerous to even talk to these nut jobs. Better to discard their mail and not return their phone calls.

I predict one of four things will happen with the threatened lawsuits:

• They will claim that they have been successful enough without the suits and let the deadline slide by, which is what they did last time.
• They will sue someone on an unrelated issue, as they did when the sued IBM for a contract dispute.
• They will be told by the court that they have to settle their dispute with Novell over who actually owns the stuff before they can sue someone else for copyright infringement.
• They will claim the target of the lawsuit settled without going to court. The name of the target will never be disclosed.