Slashdot Mirror
AutoZone Responds To SCO
loftis writes "Groklaw is reporting that AutoZone has responded to The SCO Group's Lawsuit. Here is a link to the Groklaw community's discussion where you can find all the filings in raw form. Here is a text copy of the filing without amendments. AutoZone has pretty much said to the court, SCO has to prove 1) they own the code, and 2) that Linux infringes. Since SCO is litigating these two issues in other cases, they ought to wait until those questions are answered. Or, they say, 'If we cannot wait, we need SCO to tell us what we are infringing upon with specificity.' Since we know how SCO will answer the second question, and the court likely will too, since they amended the filings from SCO v IBM and SCO v RedHat and SCO v Novell, it seems to me (IANAL) that they should get to wait."
Pep Boys is funding SCO with cash!
Shouldn't they just send over Jesse and the boys to do some mods on the SCO folks?
Someone really needs to start a live counter of SCOs legal costs..
This is taking forever, the longer SCO drags this out, the more companies will be afraid of using Linux. When does this cross the line of being a lawsuit, to being racketeering? Am I being unreasonable? When they first went to court, why didn't SCO just put all the cards on the table? Is it because they don't have any cards to show?
CVB
free ipod and free gmail!
have you ever gone to autozone? they keep you waiting for years before someone finally decides to help you. i think SCO saw this one coming
It's about time someone asked SCO "Stop crying like a spoiled brat and tell us what your exact complaint is" -A
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
The stock price is down almost 5% today on the AutoZone news. IBM is starting their full court press with the attorneys and one of their bigger investors (Baystar) is VERY unhappy with them.
Buy SCO stock (Nasdaq: SCOX), the time to short is now! You just know it's gonna drop further especially when Daimler comes out with their legal response.
So they don't trust SCO's word? What's this world coming to when a fine outfit like SCO can't be trusted?
We should get Jesse james to make a custom Linux oriented motorcycle on national TV. It'd help get us the "NASCAR vote" that this whole AutoZone thing might allow us access to.
Keep the faith, share the code
ask me! *raised hand*
"there are trillions even quadrillions of infringing lines in linux. all your atoms comprising our lines of code are belong to us. hence you clearly and specifically infringed on SCO's rights."
Sincerely,
Darryl
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
I'm not sure linux is held in any responsibility to SCO's actions. I mean, I think people understand the legal system enough to know that people sue for whatever reason they can sometimes: disregarding whether it is justified.
A lot of people scoff at the legal system, I don't think companies would avoid a product because of one companies actions. Now, if microsoft gives similar advances to, say, ten more companies -and they decide to sue, then we got a problem.
IANAL, but I don't see SCO, alone, damaging linux too much....
After pissing off a legion of auto-philes by suing Autozone, SCO has now set their legal sights on the organizations of the NRA, the KKK, and the NY Association of the Russian Mafia for infringing on intellectual property by using Linux in their daily operations.
What does AutoZone have to do with SCO? Does anyone have any background on SCO vs AutoZone?
This is the biggest pile of Bullshit that I've ever ever seen.
Poor Autozone, I was a NAPA guy, but now I think I am going to be buying more parts from AutoZone from now on.
I am glad they have some balls and not bow down to SCO.
SCO should die.
Die and burn in hell.
Lets just hope that SCO's stock prices bottom out before AutoZone has to deal with any significant financial burdens from the lawsuite, even thought SCO is obviously full of shit, this stuff can get expensive even when submitted to frivolous lawsuites like this one.
Any chance what their doing criminal in anyway?
I mean could it be something like knowingly defrauding the court system or something?
It would be nice to send these SCO bastards to jail for a while.
These lawsuits were stunts to distract from quarterly earnings in the first place, did anyone really expect anything new? Of course, they hinge on the IBM case and, of course, there really isn't anything there without determining what (if anything) infringes. Now had they been reasonable and sued for licensing violations alone, maybe there wouldn't ground for a stay.
The module SCO is talking about is the one implemented in the AutoZone system that make sure six different colors of shifter knobs are always in stock and the simple part you need for your car never is.
And it would be even cooler if you kept a live counter on the same page of the amount of money that board members, the Canopy Group, and SCO insiders have made by selling off SCO stock since this corporate kamakaze mission began...
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
"Yawn".
I don't care. Nope. Not even a little.
SCO has ceased to exist in my opinion. Based on the delay of AZ's response, I had assumed they to decided to pretend SCO doesn't exist, and to just ignore them.
Nope. (Places fingers in ears and slowly rocks back and forth chanting "blah blah blah i can't hear you blay blah blah" over and over)
The only interesting part of all of this? The amusing phrasing I've seen from the various briefs and filings and fnords and amendments and so on and so forth... "Hide the eight-ball"? I don't quite know the meaning of that in normal language, can someone elaborate on its specific legal-context meaning?
You, Sir, are an Anonymous Coward! Oh...
it seems to me (IANAL) that they should get to wait.
Is it just me, or does IANAL sound like a code in the personal ads?
Three IPs for the Linux kings under the sky,
Seven for IBM in their halls of stone,
Nine for SGI doomed to die,
One for the dark Darl on his dark throne
In the land of Utah where the shadows lie.
One IP to rule them all, one IP to find them,
One IP to sue them all and in the courtrooms bind them,
In the land of Utah where the shadows lie.
(Yes, this has also been posted once on Groklaw. No, this isn't a karma whore - I'm the guy who posted it there. And no, I don't necessarily think that SGI is doomed to die, though things haven't been looking good for them lately...)
Heh, I know this goes against everyone's opinion here and we'll both be modded down, but it needs to be said...
Groklaw offers up many legal "opinions", but most of these are full of bias and B.S. They have about as much grounding as the pundits PJ is always complaining about. It's extrememly hypocritical of Groklaw to constantly complain about the pundits and talking heads that ground their arguments in FUD when Groklaw does the exact same thing. PJ makes wild accusations all the time but people seem to forget quickly. PJ is neither a lawyer nor a programmer. She tends to offer about as much insight as Rob Enderle.
A protection racket model. You use our product and Rocko won't break your knees.
Fight Spammers!
The problem is that it seems pretty obvious SCO isn't intending to come out of this alive. This court case has doomed SCO. The unfortunate thing is, that's the point. This entire mess was begun as a stock pump-and-dump, and kept alive by a publically documented huge donation from a certain party interested in encouraging any group that publically hurts linux. In the former case, the lawsuit was an exit strategy for SCO; in the latter case, the lawsuit is a corporate suicide bomb strapped to SCO's back.
Of course SCO is going to die; the Canopy Group and MS are using SCO as the corporate equivilent of a human shield. You don't care whether your human shield survives.
It's time for a new section. It's time for an SCO section, ala Games or YRO. A section devoted entirely to SCO stories, because I (and I imagine a lot of other people) simply do not care about them anymore.
Yeah, I've got karma to spare.
that is a horribly complicated attention whoring scam by SCO? All this press coverage they're getting is, contrary to what you might think, only helping their sales. By simply dragging this case on and on, they're getting ludicrous amounts of free publicity. Well, almost free publicity.
Don't fret, AutoZone, it's all safe in a briefcase in Germany...
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
The value provided by GrokLaw is in that it is an excellent source for primary documents. In this case, the primary documents speak for themselves. PJ 's commentary, what that there is, is mainly there as a guide to help persons who might otherwise be blinded by the reams of legalese to interpret the primary documents.
As for PJs opinions, I believe the reason that they tend to be listened to and repeated are because they are (1) well argued and (2) usually argued in the context of specifically cited relevant law. If you disagree with an opinion stated by PJ and can show why the legal context she argues applies is incorrect, feel free to do so. This is how opinions work; PJs survive because no one has offered better counter-opinions.
and give Darryl boy his free oil change. i think he deserves atleast a discount for his year of whining.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Actually, when SCO stock hit $7.18, a bunch of them actually bought SCO stock. Not sure the "pump and dump" thing is playing out. Honestly, I think they are all just spoiled kiddies.
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
will you please tell us exactly so, and tell us what would be correct? After all, if the opinions are so uninformed, surely you would be able to provide some sort of rebuttal. Any at all.
Oh, what's that you say? You don't have any actual rebuttal to anything Groklaw has said? You don't have any more idea about law than they do? You're bringing this up not because you take actual issue with anything Groklaw has said, but because by trashing Groklaw you get to appear snarky and clever?
Either contribute to the discussion or don't. Groklaw has provided an opinion. If you can't refute this opinion, it stands. "Yeah, well, you don't know anything." is not a refutation.
Never in all my life have I had more people ask me "what is this linux thing, where can I get a copy". Those not intrested in running Linux are reccomending BSD, Sun, or SGI. Not a single person I know who now knows the name SCO is considering buying anything from them.
I just have to say how stupid the IANAL acronym is getting. Can we pretty much assume that anybody who is on Slashdot commenting on a legal case is not a lawyer?! Can we get some IAAL up in here?! And if not that, then cut out the damn IANAL.. We know YNAL!
Hax.
http://www.haxwell.org
Would it add more weight to the case against SCO if IBM, Autozone, Novell and other band together with a class action lawsuit due to SCO dragging this out? It's gotta be hurting investment (thus business) for everyone involved.
Life is not for the lazy.
Everyone knows Apple's doomed; industry analysts keep saying it....
Or, they say, 'If we cannot wait, we need SCO to tell us what we are infringing upon with specificity.' Since we know how SCO will answer the second question, and the court likely will too, since they amended the filings from SCO v IBM and SCO v RedHat and SCO v Novell, it seems to me (IANAL) that they should get to wait."
You mean how they'll answer based on the IBM case?
SCO: "Your honor, in order to list the lines with specificity, we need a copy of AutoZone's customer database, of their parts blueprints, and of all source involved with moving away from any SCO products."
May we never see th
When SCO originally sued AutoZone, I thought they were claiming that AZ copied SCO's libraries to their Linux environment to make porting of AZ's software possible. -- This was debunked by a former AZ employee, who confirmed that the application was cleanly ported to Linux, requiring no SCO code.
But, AZ's response seems to imply that not even that was clear from SCO's claim. They don't even know if they are talking about the kernel, pieces from SCO's OS, applications, etc.
Most of us who read Groklaw filter postings from Anonymous Cowards so we don't get as many "noise" postings. Its amazing how much better the quality of the posted comments are once you filter this drivel.
Oh, sorry.
BTW, the setting is under the preferences link on the left side of the page once you log in. Its right under their award for "Best News Site" from OSDir so its easy to find. But of course, if you don't log in, you would never see it.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
No lawyer will take a class action if there is no money to be made.
bun-fhuinneog agam!
She is, however, a paralegal. Doing legal research is her job, so I'd take her opinion over yours or Enderle's anyday. Note that I said opinion, if anyone wants legal advice, even PJ recommends you hire an attorney.
Get in the zone, Auto Zone.
"Hide the eight-ball"? I don't quite know the meaning of that in normal language, can someone elaborate on its specific legal-context meaning?
Somebody needs to make SCO give the judge back his "Magic 8-Ball" so he can a "reliable and informed" judgement on these court cases. God forbid the judge use his legal expertise and exprerience to decide these cases on merit or lack thereof.
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Seven for IBM in their halls of big iron,
</snip>
I think its funny how SCo told Autozone that they were no longer going to support their OpenServer installation and told Autozone they would have to upgrade(I use that term loosely) to System V. It seems as if Autozone was happy with their previous installation but was forced to look at another alternative as a result of SCo's actions. Sounds like a baby crying over spilled milk to me.
To anyone who saw Sunday's UserFriendly comic, I put forth this question: How much pr0n would you have to surf for in order to remain sane with all these d**n SCO lawsuit articles?
I have, for perhaps the last 8 months almost begun to wonder if by chance this company knew it was failing, and with its finaly resources perhaps SCO is trying to do the linux comunity a (covert) favor by actually
/shrug
1.) getting linux in the news so people know hear and talk about it, and
2.) Getting the GPL tested and legitimised in court, so that people who never knew about linux before hand will then think about actually implementing it in the future... in all seriousness a non-tech savy buisnessman would probably be VERY leery of using a product that was completely free, with zero strings attached.
But hey, maybe SCO really is as stupid as they appear.
Troll, Troll, go away and flame again some other day
HAL9000 Do you fly the Gauntlet?
Gruntlet
I've never used any of SCO's products, but from what I understand from friends who have been in the unfortuneate position of having to use them, Microsoft shouldn't have been worried about it anyway.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
IIRC - SCO thinks that AutoZone (in addition to using Linux generally) is using actual UnixWare OS libraries/ABIs to enable binary compatibility between its old UnixWare applications and its new Linux platform. They think that IBM (the vendor who migrated AutoZone to Linux) did the engineering to get AutoZone's UnixWare apps integrated to run on Linux by taking the short cut of actually stripping the libraries off the old UnixWare installation and putting them into the new Linux installation. If that is true, then it *really would* be a case of copyright infringement. But like most SCO claims, it is probably suspect.
See SCO run down their cash supply, and a big Linux-backing entity (IBM, Novell, other) to come forth and offer SCO cash... for Unix, SystemV, anything else they may have along those lines.
I have 1 million monkeys on a million year contract to make me a better sig.
Nahh they'll never take on the NRA...... Moses would just cause a local river to rush over SCO headquarters and obliterate them. Besides having the pillar of fire appearing at all the pretrial hearings would be pretty un-nerving for Darl......
So Long and Thanks for all the Fish.
>> How many AutoZone customers do you think have ever
>> heard of SCO? For that matter how many do you think would
>> care anyway?
> Ah, good point.I imagine their customers think "Linux" is
> some sort of disposable window cleaning towlet that keeps
> rain off their windshield!
Oh how sad that this is not a Fark Photoshop thread...
-j.
But how would the costs be measured?
Wrong. Groklaw's advice comes from a paralegal, whose job is legal research. PJ isn't a lawyer, but she's trained to read and interpret law and she has a lot of experience doing it. She's not worth $400 an hour, but she's better by training and experience than your average ./ poster.
Anyone who loves or hates any language, platform, or manufacturer, doesn't know what they're talking about.
If AutoZone wins this motion, anybody else SCO sues can just cite that, and their case will go in the queue after IBM/Novell/Red Hat. At that point, litigation against Linux users from SCO becomes an empty threat. You don't have to pay big legal fees to defend the case; you just have to have a lawyer file a motion citing AutoZone, and the case goes on hold for years, while three Fortune 1000 companies crush SCO in court.
There are some great lines in AutoZone's motion. "There is no reason for SCO to have been so obtuse in its pleading, unless SCO is intentionally trying to avoid identifying the nature and basis of its purported claims." "Rule 8 does not require the defendants in federal court lititgation to engage in such guessing games." "However, SCO's "hide-the-eight-ball" tactics in the IBM case leave AutoZone with little realistic belief that SCO will voluntarily identify the basis for its claims without this Court's intervention.".
Meanwhile, SCO stock is down to 7.05 today. There was a big runup last Thursday morning, probably due to SCO's stock buyback program. The overall effect is that the price is back to where it was a week ago. SCO is down about 60% since the beginning of the year.
Time is now against SCO. Nobody is going to pay them unless they win all those lawsuits. It looks like they'll run out of money first.
Something to think about: when SCO tanks, somebody will buy the "UNIX intellectual property". Who's likely to do that? Sun? Microsoft? Red Hat?
For every dollar SCO spends on lawsuits, the defendants are also pumping a dollar into their own legal fees. IBM, AutoZone, Red Hat, they all have to pay money to their lawyers as well. They won't run out of money before SCO does, but it will definitely hurt their businesses.
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
At time of this posting, SCOX is down forty cents at $7.05/share.
This sig no verb.
I'm glad to see that AutoZone is not just rolling over on this case. As others have already noted, SCO is not likely to survive all of this litigation intact and probably never really intended to.
With that in mind, I would say the latest round of high profile lawsuits against both corporate and government bodies is the intentional beginning of the endgame. I think that the legal team orchestrating all of this has decided that it's time to fall on the sword and end it all. So they start a round of suits they know they cannot win and cannot survive so that they can finally call this thing to a close.
Obviously, there will never be any proof that this is what is happening. But the fact that the U.S. legal and financial systems allow this level of abuse is the saddest revelation of this whole affair.
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
Cars like us.... butterflies fund us!
Start something, like a lawsuit against a really big player or writing an early version of something that eventually competes against the "Juggernaut From Redmond", sell out, cash out and buy a plot of land somewhere sunny. Like Barbados... (Not land there... The whole island.)
The stalling's been to give IBM more time to make Derle and co. an offer they are dying to get.
Unfortunately, IBM decided that they weren't playing that way. IBM's not interested. They told their legal department to hold fast onto their prey and sharpen their fangs and claws.
I bet Derle's real sorry now. Nothing to do but shift money, that should be going to his own lawyers, off-shore into a numbered account and wait for SCO to go bankrupt.
SCO will cease to exist and Derle will go to 'Club Fed.' for a few before taking up a life of ease somewhere...
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
As IBM has countered the various claims made by SCO, the case has become more dependent on the outcome of SCO v. Novell (e.g., Novell overriding SCO's attempt to pull IBM's license to distrbute AIX). The next thing that happens is IBM asks for a stay pending the outcome of Novell v. SCO and Novell shows that SCO doesn't actually own the base Unix copyrights. This leaves the only IP that SCO actually owns as the copyright to their pitifully small contributions that they made to "Unixware". They also are copyright holder to their contributions to Linux but, oh my, those were released under the GPL and so can't be "monetized."
You will note that this outcome does nothing to prevent IBM or Red Hat from continuing to pursue their claims against SCO. Novell ends up with clear title to the "Unix IP" and IBM and Red Hat get to carve up the carcass of SCO for the damages inflicted by Darl and Co. I'm guessing that Novell will ask for SCO to pay their legal fees before IBM and Red Hat chew up what's left.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.
Ben
I read the title as "SlashZone Auto Replies to..."
Put identity in the browser.
You would not want to be sued for malpractice and therefore would not want people to rely on your pseudo-legal advice.
P.S. "IANAL"
LIVE, Love, die
Or if you *actually* follow news instead of just following biased and innacurate article summaries on slashdot, BayStar wanted no such thing. Go read the actual article, don't worry, I won't tell anyone.
...studded leather outfit, tattoed and with a bad-attitude grimace on his face and straddling a chromed-out Harley chopper
BayStar wanted to pull their investment because they didn't think SCO was investing enough resources in the IP lawsuits, and wanted them to all but entirely ditch their Unix "business."
That's not why BayStar pulled their investment.
As far as the IP lawsuits, the spokesman merely said SCO's business model should be centered on IP licensing and enforcement--just like any other company that owns valuable IP.
On yeah and an SEC investigation countdown timer would be nice...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I hope I'm not the only one who's sick of hearing the word "specificity" being used everywhere now. It's gotten as bad as "synergy" and all forms thereof, or "serendipity" and all its loathsome forms.
You had me at "dicks fuck assholes".
...it seems to me (IANAL) that they should get to wait."
Of course they should. Its trivial. And they will get to wait, so long as the judge acts justly... I live in Utah and while most Utahns feel like the rest of the world does (i.e., that SCO is full of shit), I still worry that a Utah judge may side unfairly with the Utah company. This would be a complete shame and I don't think it will happen. However, you have to prepare for the worst...
WTF? This is awful! I am shaking with rage as I type!
Why would that be copyright infringement? If AutoZone had already purchased SCO's software then it wouldn't. AutoZone didn't sell or redistribute SCO's software. Instead it could be a licensing violation, or a contract dispute if AutoZone did violate their agreement with SCO.
Yellow leather on a crotch rocket?
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
Not to split hairs, but PJ (IMHO) is definitely worth $400 an hour.
Developing Retail Point-of-Sale Software
Also, although it involves Linux the AutoZone case doesn't really have a lot of impact on the SCO vs IBM case. If they nicked the libraries, they nicked the libraries: it's irrelevent which OS they re-used them with.
The converse may not apply, of course. If it's proven that SCO don't own the IP, then AutoZone may not have a case to answer even if they did use libraries from UnixWare.
Many readers are confused -- it's not an acromyn at all. It's just poorly punctuated, and should be read as "I, anal".