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Computer Associates Pays Off SCO

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the say-it-ain't-so dept.

jford235 writes "Forbes reports that CA has paid the fee to SCO for their license. The deal went down in August but today CA has says that they have taken steps to "distance itself from SCO"."

18 of 299 comments (clear)

  1. oooh, this is grey area... by garcia · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "(SCO) is grasping at straws to purport CA as a SCO supporter," Computer Associates said in a statement. "CA stands in stark disagreement with SCO's tactics, which are intended to intimidate and threaten customers."

    In August when CA did this they weren't intimidating/threatening? CA didn't know any better because they weren't paying too much attention to SCO's bullshit and not enough to the people who actually have a clue?

    Sucks when you are caught between a rock and a hard place I guess.

  2. What is it with Forbes and inaccuracy? by Penguinisto · · Score: 5, Insightful
    This is getting to be an ongoing grudge with Forbes... First their editorialists skew every fact they can find in attempts to cheerlead SCO on, now this.

    Didn't CA already explain the whole Canopy/SCO financial thing?

    /P

    --
    Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
    1. Re:What is it with Forbes and inaccuracy? by cosmo7 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I think Forbes supports SCO as a Microsoft proxy. The article is full of statements which don't really make sense.

      I particularly liked this part: "Generally, if an IP holder is able to demonstrate that others in the industry have taken a license, thereby respecting the IP holder's claims, that can be used as evidence that is persuasive to a jury,"

      So the score is SCO 4 GPL 4,000,000.

  3. Yeah, CA paid for them - $0.00 by mflaster · · Score: 5, Insightful
    From Dow Jones Business News:
    The Islandia, N.Y., company, one of the biggest makers of corporate software, said that although it signed the licenses, it didn't pay for them -- and never would.

    Mike

  4. Key legal ammunition? by msgmonkey · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This article starts of with a complete untruth by stating that this "Purchase" is "key legal ammunition". It is no such thing has it will not have relevance in the court case so is more propaganda ammunition than anything.

  5. Misleading lede by LightStruk · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Computer Associates International Inc. said on Monday it has licensed the freely available Linux operating system software from SCO -- a move that could become key legal ammunition for the SCO Group Inc. in a battle over who owns the software.
    The editor who let this lede get published should be taken out and, er, fired. It does not make a shred of difference in court if somebody actually caved to SCO's extortion; just because CA believed SCO's lie does not make the lie true.
    1. Re:Misleading lede by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Hell, they let Daniel Lyons post some rambling bit of nonsense wherein he "investigated" Groklaw. He read the PO box from her domain registration (which is NOT even the town where she lives...) and discovered that IBM might have an office somewhere in that general area. He then found out that IBM, once upon a time, had given some computers to Ibiblio (which recently became the host of Groklaw).

      That's it. That's the supposed "connection" between them. And half of it was WRONG.

      And Forbes let Daniel Lyons publish that. Why? Because PJ chastized him for not bothering to do ANY research. And now we see how poor his researching skills really are. Hell, I could do better than that, and I'm just an amature. Yet, given what I know, if I had access to some of the databases PIs use, I could probably have PJs info in a few minutes. And I'm just some schmoe, not an "investigative reporter."

      The lesson here? Forbes' "research" consists primarily of corporate PR documents. IBM hasn't put out any, SCO has, so Forbes prints SCO's story and never bothers to research after that.

      At least, that's the most consistant interpretation I can give of it. In the mean time, guess which magazine I tell everyone NOT to bother reading or subscribing to? I would encourage the rest of you to do the same, unless you want to read rehashed press releases for some reason...

  6. Forgive them by RailGunner · · Score: 3, Insightful
    I know a lot of people are going to be upset (and understandably so) with any company who pays SCO protection (er, I mean licensing) money.

    But we have to look at it from the businesses point of view. Until the case with IBM is settled, and SCO is proven to be the litigous bastard Microsoft funded puppets that they are, many companies will unfortunately make a business decision - pay a little money now, rather then possibly a lot later in lawyer's fees. So I can't entirely blame them.

    But given the article and the memo leak that it is in fact MS that paid SCO a significant amount of money in order to start their puppet suing with the explicit goal of creating FUD about Linux, why hasn't any federal prosecutor stepped up and done an investigation on Microsoft and SCO? File racketeering charges against these guys - they're no better then the Mafia.

  7. Pressure... by Sentosus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The damage has been done now.

    It is nerve wrecking for a person to be sued. For companies, if you turn out to be the target of a company attempting to make money out of litigation, you have very little course for action that will save you. You fight it and you lose money, while the trial is going on, you are dragged into the light.

    You pay them off and there is a chance that the deal could bite you later.

    There are no paths to getting out of this. CA just took the option that they thought would be better. Now they are tossing themselves back into the fight when SCO decides to release the details of the deal.

    They should have not commented, put out a generic statement about how they do not endorse others, and let it ride.

    SP --- Prays that we stop giving SCO attention.

  8. Re:Misleading Headline by jeroenb · · Score: 4, Insightful

    They were purchased in the sense that CA had some business with Canopy. Canopy then figured "Hey, let's mention that this stuff also includes Linux licenses blah blah" and the CA people said: "Well if it's not going to increase the price, why not?"

    So in the end CA bought licenses, but only because SCO wanted to put the licenses down as "sold", not because they would have sold them in any other way.

    It's like giving away free stuff along with other things, then later claiming everybody bought your stuff when they just bought something else.

  9. Re:Misleading Headline by squiggleslash · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Even worse, the story is completely consistant with the claims quoted yesterday which reported:
    By acquiring the UnixWare licenses ( ed: as part of a settlement of an unrelated lawsuit brought by Canopy, not SCO), CA indemnified itself against a possible Linux lawsuit from SCO, said Sam Greenblatt, the senior vice president and chief architect of CA's Linux Technology Group. "We did an agreement with the Canopy Group and in the agreement with the Canopy Group, we acquired UinxWare(sic) licenses," he said. "For every UnixWare license you acquired, you got indemnified for that number of Linux licenses."
    Kind of wierd to post this. Am I missing something?
    --
    You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
  10. The only reason SCO is doing this by mslinux · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "Generally, if an IP holder is able to demonstrate that others in the industry have taken a license, thereby respecting the IP holder's claims, that can be used as evidence that is persuasive to a jury..."

    To jury in closing args: "It must be our IP, and many others agree... we've already licensed it to several, large, well-respected technology companies."

    Whether you agree with SCO or not (I don't), they're making a hell of an effort to control some key elements of open source software. We shouldn't laugh it off and expect them to go away... these guys are going for the kill... they're deadly serious. Their lawyers don't care whether they actually own any code or not. Wake up to this threat before it's too late.

  11. Re:Action Item: Boycotts by Herbmaster · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I honestly think that for every company that pays SCO for that 'license' should be boycotted by the user community

    This would not be productive. CA's minor contribution to SCO is not going to make the difference between SCO winning and losing their case. It might, however, make the difference between CA continuing to use, and sell, free of distraction, linux products to customers who might not feel comfortable using them otherwise. Which of these is better for the linux community?

    --
    I'm not a smorgasbord.
  12. Re:Misleading Headline by robslimo · · Score: 5, Insightful

    SCO sued International Business Machines Corp. [...] a year ago

    Misleading use of the word 'sued' also.

    I've seen this a lot, especially with regard to SCO's actions. Wouldn't the correct usage be SCO filed suit against IBM [...] a year ago?

    As stated in the Forbes article, it could be taken to mean that SCO successfully sued IBM... or maybe I'm not as hot at my native language as I thought.

  13. Re:Misleading Headline by DavidTC · · Score: 5, Insightful
    That's exactly right.

    CA went to the store and bought a computer. Someone threw three AOL disks in the box while they weren't looking.

    Now AOL's trying to claim they've been a customer for 135 days, because, after all, those were 45 day free trial CDs.

    Actually, it's even sillier than that. CA got Unixware licenses. SCO has just gone around saying they won't sue anyone who purchases Unixware licenses to cover their Linux intallations. At no point did CA see 'Linux license' on anything, even if they had checked the box carefully thy would have ended up with them.

    --
    If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
  14. Re:CA should have known better than to allow this by DavidTC · · Score: 5, Insightful

    CA ended up with UnixWare licenses, not Linux licenses. It's just that SCO has turned all UnixWare licenses into Linux licenses.

    --
    If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
  15. Re:Misleading Headline by Bull999999 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I would be like SCO throwing in a Linux license with every Happy Meal and claim that it sold a billion Linux licenses.

    --
    1f u c4n r34d th1s u r34lly n33d t0 g37 l41d
  16. This is NOT a Forbes article by Anonymous+Cowabunga · · Score: 3, Insightful

    A simple glance at the byline shows that it is a Reuters newswire article written by their tech columnist, Reed Stevenson, and bought/republished by Forbes. Thus I don't think it's an indication of any 'official' stance on Forbes' part. That being said, it's clear that the Reuters author didn't do his homework.