Darl & SCO Overview

HAL9OOO writes "I found an article that as well as giving a good overview of "SCO - The Story So Far" also provides an interesting insight into the character of a certain Mr Darl McBride Esq." It's a fairly lengthy article providing a lot of insight. Necessary reading to anyone new the SCO/Linux thing, and recommended to anyone who just wants some interesting details on SCOs position on the whole thing.

Comments

Re:I've had enough

[JordoCrouse]

1) Buy out SCO. Hostile style. Buy up enough of the stock to have them vote to merge under IBM.

Lets see. Lets look at our friend Mr. McBride. According to the SEC, he has 8,000 shares that he purchased at $1.13 (thats $9040). If IBM came in on a hostile takeover today, they would probably end up paying about $10 / share (the current price is $9.26, but a hostile takeover is usually a little higher). So, at $10 bucks a share, Mr. McBride is looking for a gain of $70,960 - all for nothing more than acting like a complete asshole.

That to me sounds like a real good way to get out:

1) No need for pesky proof
2) Get rid of a operating system that drags down any company that owns it like a pair of concrete slippers.
3) ??
4) Much, *much* profit.

IBM can handle the heat. I think they should call SCO's bluff and see what happens then.

Article Text - Formatted

[Anonymous Coward]

Its taken more than a decade, millions of man hours and an international movement bent on software sovereignty to poise Linux as the fastest-growing player in information technology. Now, on the cusp of punching through proprietary softwares kung-fu grip on the market, a fuming little Utah County company threatens to stomp Linux dead in its tracks.

Ive been pounding the table here for a year or so saying theres no free lunch, and there is going to be a day of reckoning for every company that thinks they are going to try and sell a free model. Thats Darl McBride, president and CEO of the SCO Group, a perennial loser at selling UNIX and, until recently, Linux operating systems.

Filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission show that SCO posted hundreds of millions in losses from 1994 to 2002.

But ever since determining it owns the ark and the covenant to the enterprise software industry, says McBride, SCOs bad fortune is on the upswing.

Through a series of intellectual property transfers, SCO wound up with the rights to certain dated distributions of UNIX, the proprietary software platform that Linux was patterned after. SCO asserts that code from its UNIXes was copied into recent Linux releases. Now the company is demanding that commercial Linux users cough up licensing fees for the UNIX in their Linux, or prepare for a tussle with SCOs lawyers. And to show it means business, SCO has taken on computer giant IBM in a lawsuit that could reshape the balance of power among software makers. SCO insists Big Blue owes it billions for allegedly illegally contributing UNIX code to the Linux kernelthe core chunk of code underlying most distributions of the Linux operating system.

Should SCO prevail, besides reaping its own billions, software megalith Microsoft stands to win the war of enterprise operating systems. Linux has crept up on Microsoft, challenging its stranglehold on the server market by offering better prices, performance, security and reliability. And several Linux companies are positioning themselves to take a stab at Microsofts 94 percent hold on desktop operating systems. Its a sign that the open-source software development model is edging out Microsofts proprietary model.

People are tired of buying cars with their hoods welded shut. Thats what theyve had in the software industry for years, says Bruce Perens, a Linux cheerleader and open-source advocate.

With Linux software, source code is open for anyone to improve upon or add to, the premise being: the more heads you have working on each problem, the less likely something will be overlooked. Whereas proprietary software is locked up, accessible only to its owner, who isnt necessarily driven to make the best product, but rather the easiest buck. And, as opposed to selling the operating system as a product in itself, open-source proponents see it as the infrastructure upon which valuable applications can be added, and services rendered.

Leading the charge against Linux is McBride, the blustering executive every Linux dweeb has come to loathe. Hes no geek, says Benjamin Choate, a self-trained Linux user living in Logan. His tans too good.

Choate is among the Linux devotees calling SCOs claims ludicrous. Whats more, they say the company is embellishing its position to sow fear, uncertainty and doubtFUD for shortin the minds of Linux developers, vendors and users. SCO opponents say its a mudslinging strategy to scare Linux users into paying up, and to make the slingers product look more inviting than the slingees.

See, SCO isnt really even SCO. Its proprietary claims are for works it didnt create. The veracity of those claims, many critics believe, hasnt stood up to the most trivial scrutiny. And at every turn, those same critics say the company has revealed itself to be inconsistent and unforthcoming, leading them to conclude that SCO is merely extorting Linux users for unwarranted damages. A short history lesson is probably in order.

In June 2002, t

Perchance did you see it on slashdot?

[Anonymous Coward]

This story was previously linked as http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/01/22/17 24207&mode=thread&tid=106&tid=185&tid=187&tid= 88

Reprise:Evidence of origin,ownership,copyright+GPL

[NZheretic]

What evidence of origin,ownership,copyright + GPL
by NZheretic : Mon 09 Jun 03:30AM:

SCO's evidence of origin and Function dictates form

What proof did SCO present for the origin of both fragments of source code?

What proof did SCO present to show the SCO code did not originally from old BSD,Linux or public domain publications?

Who put the SCO source into Linux? - Was put there by Old Novell/SCO/Caldera in the first place?

What proof did SCO provide to show that the person had access to SCO's Unix sources?

The latter question raises another issue. The similarity is just as likely to be due to both operating systems performing the same role. Form is often directed by the function it performs. Function and variable names are often dictated by the API and common terminology.

Both the current Linux and Unix kernel developers have attended the similar university courses and read the same publicly available documentation. The works of W. Richard Stevens are very influential as a reference toward modern Unix and Linux and have dictated the implentation of APIs and TCP/IP stacks in both.

Copyright WHAT Copyright

From Groklaw .

Now that copyright is back on the table in the SCO case, you might like to

read the law on copyright.

SCO held another telephone conference today, but you had to be on time. I tried to call in later, when I was free, to hear the recording, but although the operator told me it had been recorded, it wasn't being made available. She suggested I contact SCO and ask to hear it. Meanwhile, someone who did listen posted on Slashdot as "mec" and he or she heard this question and answer :

[question #3] Stephen Shankland, CNET --

"Q: Copyright office does not have an assignment on file [for the Unix copyrights from Novell]. 'Is it your understanding that the copyrights have not been registered yet?' A: 'Stephen is correct ... [if we need] we will change the assignment of copyright ...' [we can do that at any time]."

If this is true, that they failed to register, it puts another interesting twist on this story. (Novell put a twist of its own, by posting a press releaseon its site saying that while the Amendment that SCO sent them seemed to support their claim "that ownership of certain copyrights for UNIX did transfer to SCO in 1996", Novell doesn't seem to have the amendment in its own files, and patents for sure didn't transfer.)

It's true you can register a copyright any time, but you can't sue for infringement until you have registered and you can't get certain damages for infringement that occured prior to registration: "Before an infringement suit may be filed in court, registration is necessary for works of U. S. origin." Section 411 says it precisely like this:

" 411. Registration and infringement actions10 (a) Except for an action brought for a violation of the rights of the author under section 106A(a), and subject to the provisions of subsection (b), no action for infringement of the copyright in any United States work shall be instituted until registration of the copyright claim has been made in accordance with this title...."

You are limited as to remedies without registration, as Section 412 sets forth:

" 412. Registration as prerequisite to certain remedies for infringement11