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Australian Firm Asks SCO To Detail Evidence
An anonymous reader submits A Perth, Western Australian company called CyberKnights has told SCO ANZ's MD to detail its IP claims or face legal action for fraud. SCO has just released licenses for Australasia and claims enquiries by several companies already."
finally someone got their act together, lets hope others take heed.
sorry officer, left my sig in my other computer.
And especially now at election time such political issues crop up as whether the Republican laissez faire approach to business or the Democrat central control approach to business is more desirable.
Yeah, I know everyone's more interested in Dean making an ass out of himself in that speech after the Iowa caucus, but the longterm health of the American economy is much more fundamentally important than some passing gasbag.
The story is about Australia, but since Oz is perhaps the most culturally similar country to America (barring Canada, of course) it makes sense to really consider what kinds of steps are necessary to prevent fraud in business. Should the approach that Americans are taking now which is primarily a Republican-style approach of letting private companies duke it out in court and leaving the arbitration to judges the right way to go? Or is the Australian method, similar to the approach approved by Democrats, of forcing the company's books open by law the right thing?
I'm torn. Both approaches are relatively unsatisfactory and have repercussions which may be unintended. Pesonally I lean towards the Republican position of leaving private entities to fight amongst themselves with as little governmental intervention as possible.
I have been pwned because my
That being said, our high standards of evidence are something we should be proud of. I just think that the stupidity/ignorance defense should be done away with at a corporate executive/director level. We need the equivalent of Sarbannes-Oxley for ALL corporate behavior, not just the financials, since there are other kinds of corporate fraud damaging the economy and the public trust in America, beyond misleading 10K submissions.
Just think of the stock market as a giant slot machine where you need a broker to pull the handle. Pure unadulturated greed is what keeps it alive. Investing in SCO is a excelent example of this greed. Gotta make a gazillion buckaroos before the end of the day. Like all gambling addicts, the invester is probably trying to recoup their losses from other investments. I'm sure some will make out very nicely.
What?
As Americans sit and watch other countries do what we should have done 4 months ago, I can only shake my head in dismay at all the money we throw at lawyers to settle something that any moron could figure out.
This isn't Roe v. Wade, it's a simple verification of the code, no ethical delimas to deal with here.
The FSF and the kernal hackers could have a feeled day with SCO right now. This along, with the aborted attempt to sell binary-run time licences that restrict, rights in a similar fashion, may be exactly the mistakes the GNU/Linux copywrite owners have been waiting for. For all of SCO's claims that the GPL is auntie copywrite and unconstitutional, the licence itself is found to be unenfoeable.
The problem with this strategy is that if you *do* pay them, you legitimise their claim. That sort of thing is exactly what they want. It gives them ammunition to fire at IBM and others.
It's in your best interests *not* to pay: if they do eventually manage to prove that they own Linux, you're no worse off then than you are now. If they don't (which is almost certainly the outcome), then you've saved yourself the money.
-- Your mother uses Emacs.
it's not wrong in and of itself, but let's look at Enron as an example. They certainly maximized shareholder value for a while there. Unfortunately they acted illegally and certainly immorally in the process.
It's a catch-22. In the 70s, there was the belief that the board and corporate executives weren't really doing all they could to maximize shareholder value, so they started paying them heavily in stock options and incentives. The result has been many executive who will do whatever it takes, including breaking the law, if it makes the shareholders happy. And if they do manange to increase stock price enough, they can afford enough lawyers that their misdeeds go unpunished, and you might even make enough money and enough campaign contributions that the feds could change their mind about prosecuting you.
Basically the problem is that companies are run by humans; usually very clever and creative people. They found they can get rich by a little bend here, a loophole there, and a tiny little bit of fraud over here. Since everyone is happy when shares go up, a whistleblower is ostracized since they might hurt the value of the stock!
For the exact same reason apple stock went down after apple announced higher then expected earnings. Because the stock market is a giant casino that's why. The value of a stock has nothing to do with the company, what it does, how much money it makes, who runs it, or who works there.
Stocks go up because lots of people think it's going to go up. Stocks go down because lots of people think the stocks going to go down.
It's as simple as that and there is nothing more to it. It's a mass psycosis.
War is necrophilia.
What ought to happen is this:
The Executives get to pick *ONE*
A) I'm a total idiot. I had no idea what my company was doing - I'm not liable for the companies misdeeds.
B) I knew exactly what was going on. That's what I'm paid for. I'm personally responsible for the acts of my company.
However, if they pick A, the shareholders, companies and entities owed funds by the company, and anyone who can show damages can sue the execs personally for fraud and deception. Clearly they got everyone to believe they had the skill to perform their jobs, but didn't. Thus, their pay and all assets resulting from that pay go directly to the company, and all who suffered from it's demise. (This should equally apply to the board positions, as they are the ones who are *supposed* to make sure the company in under good management and run properly.)
Cheers,
Greg
The only reason it's exported is because nobody's silly enough to drink it here.
Wrong? Well that's subjective, although I agree with you.
Stupid? Hardly. He's managed to steal the Presidency, enrich himself and his wealthy friends, illegally invade two countries (whilst fooling most of the US population), get away with changing a $200Billion budget excess into a $500billion defecit and he's managed to do away with a lot of the civil rights US citizens used to have. And there hasn't been an armed revolt and he's still a serious contender to be re-elected.
So no I don't think he's stupid, I think he is fucking smart. The stupid people are the ones who are putting up with it and paying the price. (US national debt no stands at around $24,000 for each and every man, woman and child in the country - that's how much El Presidente has borrowed in your name). Not sure how you put a price on the civil rights you guys have lost recently but it must be greater.
Bad analogies are like waxing a monkey with a rainbow.
Actually, I find Nastro Azzuro's an excellent refreshment after a hot day's traipsing round Roman ruins. Italy has enough German tourists that it's paid them to learn how to make a reasonable beer.
Are yu sure this is insightful? Is looks a little like paranoia, trolling or just plain ignorance.
Economics/Finance 101:
The stock market exists as part of the giant asset allocation machine that is modern capitalism. People with savings (retirement plans, mutual funds) buy shares in companies. These companies have "floated" on the stock exchange because they either need capital (i.e. they sold shares to raise money from the public), or because their founders or early investors wish to realise gains or to diversify their assets.
In theory, a stock's value should be the discounted (net present) value of its future dividends.
Now, the excitement comes for companies whose futures are extremely unclear.
Take SCO - a company I have written about for investors. Now, if SCO wins its court case, then future dividends to shareholders (and David Boies) could be huge. Assume they get $1.5bn from IBM, and then $1bn a year in licensing from Linux. That is a cash flow you can value - and it is probably - after taxes, costs, and expensive security systems - worth about $6-8bn.
Now, SCO is currently valued at (according to Yahoo! Finance) $220m. The market - therefore - is assigning a chance that this court case will succeed of around 2-3%.
Does this Australian court case significantly change the probability of success in the US? No, it doesn't. Which is why SCO's stock price has hardly changed.
(By the way, I wrote a long piece, for investors, on the probability of SCO's case being succesful, and concluded that SCO was "all mouth, and no trousers".)
--- My dad's political betting
You'd hope in vain. Executives go to minimum security prison, which is code for "rich white man prison where you are actually guarded from rape".
But for the vast majority of wealthy offenders, they will never see the inside of a courthouse, much less a prison. Ken Lay's Enron stole billions from California, with the White House providing political cover ("it's all the environmentalists' fault! Black Helicopters! Conspiracy theorists! And by the way, here's Arnold!") and will never even see the NEWS about his crimes, if he chooses not to, much less do a perp walk.
Steal $20 from a cash register, go to jail and get raped. With the People cheering and demanding pay per view.
I just noodled the reason why people don't care about wealthy people getting away with major crime: they want to BE the guys getting away with the crimes. They think it's cool! Moore might actually have nailed it: the Horatio Algier syndrome (YOU can be the rich guy who gets away with it -- it's the American Dream!) So people want, in a perverse way, a stratum of people who get all the cash and can't get convicted. In America, it's barely possible to join the elite -- although stats show most such people are just born to their status.
I have perspective born of experience. I grew up in a poor neighborhood, where just walking the street could get you arrested if you didn't look right to a cop. I've had cops break into my house right in front of me.
Contrast it to my later experience in the Chicago northern suburbs, where drugs were sold openly around school. The young scions of the suburbs openly assaulted and battered people of different colors, shapes, and religions. Car theft was common. You'd see kids you know driving around and smashing people's cars with rocks.
And there was NO CRIME RATE among these kids, officially. They never "committed" crimes -- it was invisible to the local cops, unless it was committed right in front of them.
Rich and/or connected people don't commit crimes, and they certainly don't go to jail. Well, there are exceptions, but you get the drift.
PMITAP is for the poor.