EV1 Servers CEO Responds To Customers

Retalin writes "EV1 CEO Robert Marsh gave his customer base a written explanation for the purchase of his decision to purchase a SCO License late last night. The most interesting quote was this: "It has been argued by a Linux Journal reporter that I have essentially called the various GPL Linux developers plaugerists. This is false as I would never make such a claim against them. They are some of the brightest minds for whom I hold a great deal of respect.""

Comments

Eh

[FuzzzyLogik]

It's not a big deal, if it turns out he wasted his money, then so be it. it was more of a way to protect his business, if something happens and the tables turn, he's not going to be sued and have to pay that, in other words, the cost of being sued would be way more than having to buy these licenses. it was just simply more cost affective to buy the licenses and if they turn out to be trash, so what, the customers who had doubts had peace of mind at this point.

Re:Eh

[Anonymous Coward]

It IS a big deal - the money goes right to SCO to help them fight other Linux users.

Re:Eh

[Kevitt]

It is a big deal. Why? Because EV1 buying into SCO's FUD lends said FUD credibility. Now in court SCO can point to EV1 specifically as an example of one of the largest DC's agreeing to their terms. It may not lend any credibility to those of us with a clue, but who knows how the demented minds of our courts will interpret this? I'm afraid the interpretation will be one of lending credence to SCO's claims. Dunno if I'm making my frustration/worry clear here, but I hope you get my drift. I view this as a fairly dark day in the Linux/SCO battle.

Marsh is happy as a clam..

[Motherfucking Shit]

Because sometime later today, SCO is going to sue one of his competitors...

Re:Marsh is happy as a clam..

[AKnightCowboy]

Because sometime later today, SCO is going to sue one of his competitors...

SCO really reminds me of the mafia. Pay me an IP license fee and we won't sue you out of business. Are MBAs like Darl McBride the new organized crime figures? I'm suprised no one has tried using the RICO laws against SCO.

From the article:

[ImaNumber]

"DC2 Opens on Wednesday with limited server availability. Initial deployments are likely to be dual drive/1 GB configurations. Additional configurations will follow as time and space allow." Yep...its a publicity stunt...

Who you callin' a plaugerist?

[Snart Barfunz]

What an itiod! It's people like him who give snodware delevellers a bad mane.

Whose side is he on?

[Vexler]

Isn't the gist of what he said pretty much the same thing that Darl says about Linux and its suppporters? i.e. We have to do what is right for our business and circumstances.

Now, it is interesting that he did voice support for open-source projects like Linux. But then he also affirms that his license is one of IP from SCO. Just sounds like he is trying to be a crowd pleaser and ended up with the wrong crowd.

The CEO can't afford a spellchecker?

[gentlemoose]

For God's sake. While I realize the bulk of you asshats can't spell your way out of a paper bag, one might expect that the CEO of nearly any corporation would care enough about his company's public image to run a public statement by *somebody* with an eye for grammar and spelling before publishing it on the net.

The 10-second perusal:
oru
indictment on Red Hat
fullly
plaugerists (I can't work out how to pronounce this one...)
SCOs ...
I give up. Once I hit "SCO already has like $60 million on hand ", I couldn't take it any longer.

By all means, everyone, give your money to EV1 Servers, the company with a flair for... damn. I can't think of anything relevant to rhyme with "flair".

Re:We're being too hard on the guy

[gl4ss]

except that now they're just opened the door for getting sued. the 'license' doesn't protect you from being sued, in fact it does just the opposite.

he probably just paid diddly on the licenses which brings an intresting point to taken into consideration: what is the REAL price of sco IP license, 6.99? or 0.699? since nobody is going to buy it at 699$ per cpu...

(however they might think of it as an insurance AND extra publicity and leading some customers into thinking it's an insurance)

and point b: THEY'RE NOT SMALL! THEY'RE NOT A SMALL STARTUP! THEY COULD HAVE DEFENDED THEMSELFS EASILY IF THEY EVER HAD GOTTEN SUED(besides, rhat would have been the one to sue!)!

point c: of this bs-graph is that they've been willing to do some poster childing before and maybe thought this time too that free pr couldn't hurt.

Why he's an idiot (part 1 out of ...)

[ksp]

"We did, however, license certain IP from SCO."

And what IP may that be? Elaborate, please. What does SCO own that you had to pay for when you are using Red Hat Linux, from a company that will cover the risk for you?

I wonder what long-term consequences this has for EV1 when they publically say that they believe SCO is right and their server OS (Linux) was more or less pirated from SCO. I suspect that no matter what the result of the trial is, this guy is f*cked because he signed SCOs papers.

Re:We're being too hard on the guy

[Anonymous Coward]

He is just being conservative and figures that it's worth paying for liscenses (he peobobly got a better deal the $699 as well) instead of risk a lawsuit.

He was already indemnified by Redhat. The only way this would make sense from a business perspective is if a) he thought Redhat were going to go out of business, or b) there's another side to this deal that we don't know about (e.g. kickbacks from SCO).

Personally, I think neither are true, and he's just stupid. That's reason enough to switch hosting companies.

Re:Well...

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, come on now! You mean you don't know?

A "Plaugerist" is one who plays the very rare musical instrument known as the plaug, or plauger. As everyone knows this is a cross between the bagpipes, the harmonica and the old english crumhorn.

Old statutes, still on the books, prohibit the playing of the plaug at or near the full moon, or anywhere within 1 mile of a breeding colony of horseshoe bats. Audiences generally contend that it sounds best when either played, or listened to, underwater. Some extremists advocate it's use only in all helium (or other inert gas) atmosphere for the best effect.

It led, via a very convoluted path, to the expression "plaug and play", now I believe, claimed as part of the IP license which you can buy from SCO.

Makes no sense.

[eddy]

I read this earlier today. Marsh is just doing spin. End-users were never liable anyhow, if there'd been a problem they'd refer SCOX to EV1 (since they're buying the service from them), which would refer to RedHat (the OS supplier) which is already in litigation with SCOX anyhow.

He claims this was 'cheap' insurance. However, he refuse to tell us how much it actually was. If it was so cheap, why wouldn't he like to be able to tell his customers "Look, we only paid $X, it's cheap!". On the other hand, if it was cheap then SCOX wouldn't want the numbers to be out there ("We gave away 20K server license for PR-rights" wouldn't sound too great), which brings us to the fact that EV1 was in a position of power over SCOX, and chose to agree to not disclose the sum. In other words, they're helping SCOX out.

I think that Marsh is pretty much alone in thinking this was a good idea. There was no pressure from linux-customers _at all_. He's He did this for the PR. New server-center around the corner, using SCO to make headlines sounded great!

He just can't admit it in public. Reading his 'this was a sound business-decision'-bullshit is sickening.

SCO says: "Copyrights and patents are protection against strangers," [...] "Contracts are what you use against parties you have relationships with. From a legal standpoint, contracts end up being far stronger than anything you could do with copyrights." -- http://e-businessadvisor.com/doc/12514

Enjoy your new friends, EV1LServers.

Re:It's a big deal for other reasons too

[inode_buddha]

If I am to believe this post from groklaw:

Weeding through the noise at Yahoo, I found this from one of the dependable
regulars:

About EV1
by: korbomite
Long-Term Sentiment: Strong Sell 03/01/04 09:36 pm
Msg: 100568 of 100685

EV1 has become famous as a porn hosting site:

http://hosts4porn.com/profiles/ev1.cfm

and

http://www.webhostingtalk.com/archive/thread/140 12 4-1.html (hint why they
changed their name from RackShack--their IP address was blackholed for porn
spamming)

and

From Wired Magazine:

QUOTE
Since mid-September, numerous myNetWatchman participants have received repeated
probes on port 135 from a handful of Internet protocol addresses assigned to
Everyones Internet (EV1.net), an Internet service provider in Houston, according
to Baldwin. The numeric addresses translate into "NetBIOS machine
names" that begin with WEBPOPUP and that have appeared in several recent
ads, he said...EV1.net officials, who did not respond to interview requests, are
investigating the issue, according to Baldwin...Now that spammers have pioneered
the Windows Messenger technology, worm writers may be next to target the
service, according to Harlan Carvey, a security engineer with a financial
services firm..."I'm sure we're going to see spyware or malware that makes
use of this," Carvey said.
ENDQUOTE

from
http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,128 2,55795, 00.html

and

http://jdo.org/hamas.html (That's right: Hamas and the al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigade
terrorists use EV1 as their ISP and hosting provider)

and

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/10/02/106 49 88318651.html (hackers and
Trojan writers)

k

#END

Truth is definitely stranger than fiction. It would seem that both companies
figured that they could get some mileage out of the license deal if they spun it
the right way (and the truth and backroom dealing would only stay quiet). After
all, reports have it that Marsh and McBride were pal-ling around in California
during the past week at a trade show.

The tinfoil hat in me says "Follow the money".

The most probable possibility

[RoLi]

Let's face it. Nobody in their right mind would pay SCO million(s) for their license, especially EV1servers who are RedHat customers and are protected from SCO through RedHats programme: link

The only possibility that makes sense in my opinion is that EV1servers dealings with Microsoft included the SCO-deal as well. Microsoft has a strong interest to channel money to SCO, they have already done so by buying licenses from them they don't need.

So I think EV1servers has essentially become Microsoft's cash pipeline to SCO.

There just is no other way that makes sense. Please don't forget that RedHat protects their customers (like EV1servers) from SCO, so even if EV1servers pretends to think that SCO has a chance and even if they pretend to think that they have to pay before the trial is over, they simply don't need a license.

I'm sorry, but he's an idiot

[Arker]

It does indeed sound like he did this with the best of intentions.

But no, I'm sorry, no word less strong than 'idiot' could possibly begin to describe the path to hell he just set his company on, with the best of intentions of course.

TSG hadn't the slightest grounds to sue them before. Of course, under the US legal system, you sue first and the court checks if you have any grounds later, so they could have cost him some lawyer time.

But doesn't a company that size pay a retainer already, for just such reasons?

TSG had no grounds to sue them before, no grounds to be involved with them in any way shape or form. Now they've signed a contract. 'Contracts are what you use against people you have a relationship with' as Mr. McBride so eloquently stated.

This contract gives EV1 nothing whatsoever they didn't already have, in the sense of assets, positive things. It does give them plenty of liablilities. It gives TSG a contract that may give them cause for a suit in the future. It may very well be violating their license under the GPL, rendering any new linux installations they undertake copyright infringement, punishable by a statutory fine of $125,000 US per incidence as well. It in no way makes their position any more stable, but rather opens them from attacks from every side that they were completely and utterly proof against before taking this license.

I said it before, in the last article on this story, and I'll say it again, either EV1s attorneys are utterly incompetent, or their management is, or both. Go to Groklaw, read this license. It's a license for nothing, it gives the buyer nothing, it's only possible purpose is to set the buyer up for a lawsuit later. Anyone that would pay a dime for this thing after reading it is just plain stupid. If TSG was offering to pay you $699 per processor, flat rate no bulk discounts, it would still be a bad deal.

I am (happily) not personally involved with them at the moment. If I were I would terminate that relationship immediately. I certainly will not even consider entering any business relationship with them in the future. A company that size that can't afford an hour of a lawyers time to look at such a thing before they sign it has no future in this world, that's just the cold hard facts. EV1 customers - find an alternative. Today. Not to punish these folks - this kind of incredible stupidity is its own punishment, and quite sufficient. But simply to protect yourself. If you make the change now, you can do it with minimal hassle. If you wait until someone summons these bozos into a court, it could be a lot more painful.

His customers and he are already covered; so WHY?

[leonbrooks]

EV1, porn capital and Windows Popup spammer extraordinaire, is the end user here. EV1, not the customers, would get sued. And since they use Red Hat, they're indemnified even if TSG win their barratrous suit. They had nothing to gain by paying the Danegeld, so why did they do it? Evidently Mister HeadSurfer plans to get the money back somehow, all we need to do is find out how and we can probably blow TSG's racket right open.

EV1 don't give you a discount for choosing a FreeBSD server instead of MS-Windows 2003 or Red Hat Enterprise server. Why not?

EV1 were one of the first big rollouts of MS-Windows 2003, does this suggest anything to you about their real feelings? As in, "We'd love to go all Windows, Bill, but our customers aren't interested. Is there anything else we can do for you? Help out a friend?"

Death of a thousand pinpricks

[dillon_rinker]

His response to charges that he is funding SCO's lawsuits:
SCO already has like $60 million on hand and our small fee would not go very far defending an action such as this

No single raindrop believes that it is to blame for the flood. Presumably this CEO also believes that donating $25 to Al Qaeda doesn't promote terrorism, or that dumping a gallon of used motor oil in a river doesn't promote pollution. Or that buying somethng from a spammer doesn't promote spam.

EV1Server Refugee

[xheliox]

We made the switch last night to ServerMatrix.com. Hopefully they won't screw over the Linux community too.

We had a total of 3 servers with EV1 which will all be offline by the end of the month. Certainly my 3 servers will not hurt them, but hopefully many more are taking similar actions.

EV1 has made untold amounts of money off of Linux and then to sell it down the river without a fight is just plain wrong. There's no other way to say it.

Microsoft + SCO + EV1 = anti-trust

[glassesmonkey]

Had to repost this brillant post from previous EV1 story.

by ImpintheBox (153919) on Mon Mar 01, '04 02:00 PM (#8432077)

Microsoft provides SCO $millions in loan cum licensing deal (to attack their No. 1 threat, Linux)

EV1 has amazingly low, low pricing for Win2003 servers.

Microsoft touts EV1 in Win2003/Linux case study.

Netcraft names EV1 the top Win2003 hosting provider.

EV1 buys SCO license in $million+ just days before Q1 conference call
and on the day of the PIPE and Boies deals deadline

Some Questions for Mr. Marsh...

[ArtDent]

Mr. Marsh owes his customers much more information than this. Specifically:

1. What price was paid for this "IP license"? A claim like "our small fee would not go very far defending an action such as this, much less prosecuting one" is totally unconvincing while the amount of the fee remains secret. Moreover, obviously customers will be indirectly footing the bill for this, so they need to be able to figure out just how much it's costing them.
2. Exactly what IP was licesnsed? Did Mr. Marsh in fact "license certain IP from SCO," or did he in fact license uncertain IP -- agreeing to their standard whatever-IP-may-or-may-not-be-in-there wording?
3. What are the terms of the licensing, and to what degree are customers protected? Since, he's claiming to have done this for the protection customers, he'd better tell them what their rights and obligations are. For example, are there any restrictions on their ability to access, modify, or compile Linux source code?

I hope that all of EV1's customers demand answers to these questions, as forcefully as necessary. They need this information to assess whether they are, in fact, better or worse off as a result of Mr. Marsh's decision.

Re:Some Questions for Mr. Marsh...

[friendklay]

The price which EV1 paid to SCO should be of great interest to all EV1 Customers and potential customers. There are two possibilities:

1. EV1 paid a paltry sum just to get a 'good name', that they are the only SCO-Risk-Free hosting provider.
2. SCO paid them an undisclosed NDA bounded sum and and gave them the "License to use Linux".

Both ways SCO profits by being able to point at the large number of Linux Web Site which have signed up fo SCO Linux License. EV1 profits by having paid very little. Because they paid very little they would profit in the long run. That is some of us might get angry and boycot them, but others would be delighted and switch to EV1 servers just to get that protection. Either way EV1 is beting that more will switch to them. Thats my $0.20

Slashdotted already!

[Mirk]

The site is slashdotted already. Here is the text of the open letter:

Dear EV1 Users,

We were smoking crack. Sorry.

Yours, etc.

Brief, to the point. I like it!

Grammar?

[aisnh]

I don't know about any of you, but it would take a large amount of convincing to buy any of this company's services, let alone invest in them. This man, supposedly the CEO of a (reasonably) profitable business repeatedly makes errors in grammar and spelling throughout a letter to his customers.

• "We did not license a linux distribution..."
• "...various GPL Linux developers plaugerists..." (What are those? People who transmit the plague?)
• "SCO already has like $60 million on hand..." (Like, oh-my-god! That's like sooo much money!)
• "Whatever your position on the various suits, which SCO has said will increase." (This is not even a sentence.)
• "There is significcant risk"

That is by no means an exhaustive list. The letter is riddled with unprofessional colloquialisms and poorly-constructed sentences. Even the parent company name (EV1) is formally listed as "Everyones Internet." Missing an apostrophe, Bob? -Aaron

Re:Grammar?

[Westech]

I have many sites hosted in EV1 and have been following the business for a long time (it used to be named RackShack.) Every time Robert Marsh posts something online, it is filled with poor grammar and misspellings. At first, this turned me off (If he can't learn to spell, can't he at least afford a secretary to proofread his announcements!) but now I've gotten past it. I think that he is a great businessman who runs a profitable company that successfully delivers a quality product to its customers. While I do not agree with his decision on the SCO issue, I can understand his reasoning. Likewise, while I still think he should have his announcements proofread before making them public, it doesn't seem to be hurting his business any.

I think that in Mr. Marsh's mind it's all about business. Each decision is based on cost-benefit analysis.

For example:
To him, it is worth the "licensing" fees to remove the possible costs of defending a lawsuit.
To him, the increase in sales gained by presenting a better image by posting gramatically correct announcements would not outweigh the cost of hiring a proofreader.

Of course, this is all simply my opinion from observing the company from the outside.

Re:Full Text -- Translation

[MinutiaeMan]

Translation: "We didn't want to get sued, so we gave SCO a big wad of cash to make sure that they don't send their lawyers after us."

In the Mafia, this kind of practice is known as "protection." They'd force local shopkeepers to pay them money to not send their goons to trash their stores. It annoys the heck out of me that SCO can get away with extorting this kind of money from companies before they've even proven their case in the IBM-Novell lawsuit(s). But then, everyone here agrees on that point.

Re:Full Text

[parliboy]

Regrettibly, I find myself and my people in the crosshairs of your anger (no criticism on the .asp, please -- it's not my site build.)

Will it influence what we do in future decisions, if we need to expand our server ops? Yes. Will we pick up tomorrow and move on? No. We have dozens of websites (not a lot, but given who they are, we have some measure of pride) who are in the middle of the most important periods of their calendar year. It would be suicidal to say to them, "Hi, you may see some issues over the next couple of days as we change providers; sorry if this impacts you right in the middle of your online conference registration and your members can't access your site."

Also, don't suggest we figure take the extra time to make the transition smooth for our clients -- many of us are still students ourselves; I'm in my last semster of an education degree and typing this from the "big honkin' desk" at my student teaching post right now. I barely have time to keep my shoes tied -- hell, I switched back to velcro just to be safe!

For those who have the resources, be it in time, manpower, or money, to leave EV1 on your timetable, good for them. For the rest of us, please show some patience. Not everyone who is staying is happy about this, but unless you're volunteering your personal time to help out EV1 clients who want to leave, what you're asking is unfair and unreasonable.

My Response

[Bob9113]

Just sent the following to EV1:

Hi,

I rent one of your servers (the machine from which I'm sending this). I have been extremely pleased with your uptime, bandwidth, and pricing. I would like to remain a customer.

I have read your open letter regarding the SCO license in the forums, and understand your position. I also think some of the counterpoints that have been made are quite valid. I think there is an easy way to recover the support of those who see Linux as an important part of the national and global economy.

Please consider contributing to the OSDL's legal defense fund.
http://www.osdl.org/about_osdl/legal/lldf/l ldf_des cription.html

I will be on vacation until early next week. Upon my return, I will check the front page of your website. If there is a large public notice that you have given the OSDL's Linux Legal Defense Fund a contribution equal to or greater than the amount you paid SCO, I will be very happy to continue using your service.

You have chosen to give money to highwaymen who have made baseless allegations about their ownership of some small portion of Linux. If you genuinely feel that SCO has earned your money, it seems abundantly clear that you owe far more to the people who actually wrote Linux. What better way to invest that money than in defending Linux from the same highwaymen that have just held you up at lawyerpoint?

You currently pay Red Hat for their support services. According to the license under which Linux is distributed (including the license under which SCO distributes Linux), you do not have to pay for the intellectual property. If you choose to pay for the intellectual property rights to Linux, you should be paying the people who own those rights. In this case, that money can be best spent by defending those authors' right to their intellectual property.

Thank you for your time,

Robert Bushman