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SCO Prides Itself on Inspiring FUD
ronaldb64 writes "According to a recent press release they are "...honored to be named among the many influential companies that comprise the SD Times 100. We pride ourselves in the work we do to create world renowned Unix-based solutions designed by some of the most experienced and outstanding engineers in the industry," said Jeff Hunsaker, senior vice president and general manager, SCO's UNIX Division.
What is the reason for the SD Times nomination? "The company's legal assaults on IBM and Linux users dominated 2003's tech headlines and shook up the open-source community. No other IT topic inspires such fervent debate, fear, uncertainty and doubt.". I guess any press is good press these days for SCO. Congratulations..."
And perhaps we should thank bin Ladin for increasing America's national security. Cause I feel much safer now. And heck, he's made headlines more than SCO.
<insert witty linux comment here>
That in the first 3 sentences it states the "SCO the owner of UNIX" but the most interesting fact is at the bottom of the artice -- "Source: The SCO Group"
A bunch of Tech Stuff
The SD Times is intelligently embracing a controversy in order to attract attention and increase its brand value. Getting a story on Slashdot mean they hit the jackpot.
I doubt anyone at the site actually considers SCO to be a worthy company. Editors really should be more aware of this kind of manipulation.
... is where they spell your name right."
-- old showbiz saying
Welcome to the Turing Tarpit, where everything is possible but nothing interesting is easy.
>Few, if any, businessmen knew who SCO was 2 years ago, but now they have almost universal brand-name recognition.
just like al-Qaeda !
Woohoo! I got to slam SCO, Darl, and invoke Godwin in one post! Ahh, I'm done.
Isn't it amazing what a little market-droid spin can do so something like this?
SCO: "We are number four in the VARBusiness TOP 5 of ALL ENTERPRISE VENDORS! WE ARE NUMBER 4 of all!!!! WOOOOOT!!! (small print: VARBuisiness only surveyed 5 vendors in this category)"
VARBusiness ARC: "SCO should apply some of the money it's shelling out in legal fees in its suit against IBM and Linux users to its channel efforts. The company's ARC scores were a train wreck in the enterprise operating systems category. Who cares what line of code is buried inside some obscure Linux program that can trace its roots to IBM's Unix license dating back to the Partridge Family? SCO partners clearly don't appreciate the company's products."
See?? SEE??? You just CAN'T make this stuff up! Well, SCO can. But then again, it really seems as though a prerequisit for being hired there is borderline personality disorder, delusions of grandeur, or paranoid delusions.
"Our funds have never taken part in toxic or death spiral convertible financings of any sort" -BayStar's managing partne
Although FUD needs to be constantly and consistently fought in corporations by knowledgable IT employees, FUD is a legitimate marketing technique. It ~works~. Few, if any, businessmen knew who SCO was 2 years ago, but now they have almost universal brand-name recognition.
So, full marks for their marketing and communications strategy.
Murder works. Someone competing for the affections of the same girl as you? Someone competing against you in the workplace a little too successfully? A competitor gobbling up too much marketshare that is rightfully yours?
Off the bastard. Kill 'em dead.
Murder is by far the most effective way of dealing with unwanted competition and conflict, particularly if you are reasonably clever about it (it is an ugly, dirty little secret of our 'justic' system that most murders go unsolved, and most murderers thus get away with their crime).
By your logic, murder is a legitimate tool of competition.
I beg to differ. No amount of success justifies, much less legitimizes, a despicable methodology.
FUD and disinformation are unethical and despicable in the extreme, and their use is not legitimate, no matter how successful they are.
The courts would agree. It wasn't so long ago that IBM got seriously slapped down by the courts for exactly that sort of illegitimate, successful behavior.
SCO, Darl, and their sponsors (Microsoft and Sun Microsystems) should face similiar sanctions for engaging in this illegitimate, and quite possibly illegal, behavior.
(And lest you think defamation and libel are legal, check again. It may be hard to win convictions, but that doesn't make the act any less illegal, or any less illigetimate, and FUD, by its very definition, is libelous).
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Just curious :)
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
...you say as you submit yet another SCO story to Slashdot.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
* knock knock
Linus: Who is it?
Darl & Co: Goons
Linus: Who?
Darl & Co: Hired goons
Linus: Hired Goons?
Disclaimer: The intent of this post is not to compare Mr Torvalds and Mr Simpson, but to highlight the nature of Mr McBride's business.
...but this just irks me.
"...honored to be named among the many influential companies that comprise the SD Times 100.
"Comprise" is not the word you want. That would be "constitute." See Strunk & White's The Elements of Style.
I have discovered a truly marvelous
...SCO is in the real business of technology these days, this is no surprise. Read with me now:
1. There is technology for technology's sake (open source, true innovation)
2. There is "technology" for business sake (lowest common denominator ripoffs, more focus on marketing than R&D, specific focus on profit)
3. Then there is SCO (sue, sue, sue, sue, sue... ad nauseum and "Here is our repackaged version of our crap OS with open source stuff")
Which technologies will still be around 50-100 years from now? Undoubtedly those that originate in group 1.
Un-news
Um, "open source" -ne "Unix-based solutions".
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
For more than two decades, SCO has provided innovative UNIX solutions valued by customers for its reliability, stability and security.
I'm so sick of this. New SCO/Caldera != Old SCO/Tarantella/Santa Cruz. Why is it that the current SCO is able to keep giving the impression that they are a different company?
...I think it's about time that the "word" FUD dies off. It's used way too often when someone's propagandizing and there's no fear, uncertainty, or doubt involved. Second, what's the practical difference between uncertainty and doubt? We need them because we couldn't use FU or FD? Why can't we just instill fear rather than spreading FUD? It's not butter or anything. Of course, if you're not really making people afraid, you can't instill fear. FUD's good for that, since with the uncertainty and doubt part(s) of it, you don't need to.
It seems to me we have a "word" which is used too often and doesn't really mean anything.
As for SCO, it seems that the list isn't necessarily a good thing to be on. Influential people of the 20th century include everyone from, oh, Mother Teresa to Hitler.
Depends on how you measure it, really. I'd argue that you should measure SCOs by the reaction to FUD...
By this measure, SCO's FUD comes in at at least 100 SCOs. Microsoft, on the other hand, would typically come in somewhere between 60-90 SCOs (at least in my household).
"Great men are not always wise: neither do the aged understand judgement." Job 32:9
> The real question, though, is whether they will be able to translate this notoreity into $
I think the real question is whether or not it is OK to lie, cheat, and steal just because it's "good business." The idea that spreading FUD is acceptable because one can profit from doing so is exactly the philosophy of the SCO camp, and I for one don't buy it.
Next people will be claiming that anything "legal" is acceptable.