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FSF Subpoenaed by SCO
An anonymous reader writes "Bradley M. Kuhn on the FSF website: Late last year, we were subpoenaed by SCO as part of the ongoing dispute
between SCO and IBM. Today, we made that
subpoena available on our website. This is a broad subpoena that
effectively asks for every single document about the GPL and enforcement
of the GPL since 1999. They also demand every document and email that we
have exchanged with Linus Torvalds, IBM, and other players in the
community. In many cases, they are asking for information that is
confidential communication between us and our lawyers, or between us and
our contributors."
Why didn't they ask for internet histories and newsgroup postings made as well? This sounds like they're grasping for straws when they don't even know what straw to look for. It sounds like harassment more than a subpoena.
The Blaster Master Fighting for Truth, Justice, and Evil Pie since 1979
IANAL, but is this legal? Don't they have to somehow prove that the documents they're asking for have some relevance to their argument?
Furthermore, what exactly is their argument? Is it still that Linux contains SCO code? How would documents about "enforcement of the GPL" prove existence of SCO code?
OMG! Wau!
I don't think $30 is enough to make copies for what they need, more like $300 to $3000 would do it
Its pretty obvious what SCO's trying to do here. This had one of two objectives:
If FSF has nothing to hide, why don't they just bring out the evidence SCO asks for and then countersue the hell out of them?
If SCO is going after everything unix, why haven't they touched osX yet?
>I say you should download every mail list, usenet archive, and online discussion group, then print it all out on 10,000 pages. Throw in RFCs and source code to bulk it up a bit.
DON'T.
First of all, we can win this without being as low as SCO, and
Second, they'll use the volume of information returned as a reason to stall the proceedings so they can have their legal team "go over the evidence"
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
Shoot, they nearly asked for everything but the birth certificates of FSF members.
They are essentially asking for *anything* that might be related to the GPL, the companies that use it, people that write under it, enforcement, etc, including written communications, memo, documentation, etc.
No sig
besides letting the free software/open source community know what SCO is stooping to? maybe the FSF lawyers told them not to release the contents of the subpoena until they were certain of any legal actions they had to take.
agendas maybe. not all agendas are bad.
according the doc, they don't have to give the docs over, if they send some one to the deposition. So they can just send some one, and now SCO has to ask questions to get the info they want and not just go on a fishing exposition.
"lack of best practices in the Open Source community."
The ONLY organization who follows best practices as I can tell, proprietary or open-source, is GNU.
I mean, honestly, in how many businesses do you think lawyers review code written by internal employees to verify that the code they include is original. How might one validate that, anyway? If someone is copying from a private archive, it would be impossible to tell, because it's private.
Anyway, open-source in general is the best about this, because the source code is available for third-party examination. So, if you feel someone might be infringeing on you, no need for lawyers or subpeonas, just check the code from the website!
With proprietary software, if someone is infringing, you have to subpoena the source code just to verify it, and you wind up with significant amounts of egg on your face if you are wrong.
Engineering and the Ultimate
And what exactly does the FSF have to do with selective enforcement of the GPL on items they don't hold the copyright to?
Linus and the other kernel hackers have not assigned kernel copyrights to the FSF. Hence, they have no standing to enforce it one way or the other.
Someone on Groklaw put it something like this: I'm a landlord. I go into BusinessDepot and buy a stack of generic lease agreements. A tenant of mine is in a dispute with me, and blames BusinessDepot for "selectively" enforcing the generic lease agreement, and subpoenas them for all correspondence regarding that lease agreement.
The only reason we have the rights we have is that people just like us died to gain those rights. -- Cheerio Boy
Suing someone doesn't give you automatic Big-Brother rights. Especially if the stuff doesn't even remotely affect the suit.
- These characters were randomly selected.
The FSF just published a license, which Linus just happened to adopt for Linux. What do they have to do with the SCO lawsuit?
Yes, you're missing something. I think they meant "people who have contributed money to us," not "prople who have contributed code to FSF." I'm not sure if FSF has to disclose the former (IANAL, but I think it depends on their charitable organization status), but maybe they do.
the licensing fees for the postal service.
I prefer the word stamps, it's shorter...
Trouble is, SCOG doesn't seem to understand that the FSF doesn't enforce the GPL, except in cases where they own the copyright to the product offered under the license (e.g. GNU software such as GNU Emacs and gcc). They seem to think the FSF is some kind of GPL Police, which is not the case. It's up to the individual copyright holder to enforce his/her/its copyright.
This, of course, being only one of the many things SCOG doesn't understand about the GPL.
Someone you trust is one of us.
This is one of the things which separates Europeans from Americans.
I spent quite a bit of time in Ireland, for example. The reason why European countries tend to have fewer civil liberties is because their citizens honestly believe they don't need them. Americans were taught from the founding of their country to be suspicious of authority.
+++ATH0
If FSF has nothing to hide
That mentality really pisses me off. Just because YOU don't value privacy, and just because YOU don't value the confidentiality of business communications, doesn't mean NOBODY does.
Should nudists pass laws requiring everyone to be naked when the weather is nice?
Laws protecting privacy were created to benefit those of us who DO value it. If you don't value privacy, you can post all your information on the web for all I care. But don't expect me to.
Considering that the FSF often deals with legal matters, it is quite likely that some of these items ARE attorney-client type issues. So, do you think they should have to pay for someone's time to dig through every bit if e-mail and decide what is privileged and what isn't? Just because SCO is searching desparately for some kind of evidence.
Why? Is it awful when Microsoft is required to turn over internal memos and e-mail describing how they're going to exploit their monopoly position? If someone at SCO sent e-mail to Bill Gates asking for money to "fight the Linux blight", do you think IBM should be able to compel Microsoft to disclose that e-mail?
From the wording in the subpoena, I don't see why staff time couldn't be charged to the SCO lawyers, as long as they were reasonable rates (i.e. NOT like lawyers charging $1000/hr, just their usual salary). If not, then challenge the subpoena as being too much of a burden. At least, that's what the subpoena says:
It then goes on to say that you can object to it within 14 days, and in such a case the subpoena is blocked unless the court issues an order, and
The court "shall quash or modify the subpoena if it ... subjects a person to undue burden". If they still really really want the information, the court will require that reasonable compensation be made. That doesn't include "just copying costs" (although I'd think that "copying costs" would reasonably include wear & tear on the machine (cost of copier divided by expected lifetime), ink/toner, paper, and salary of the person doing the copying).
For someone like the FSF, formally objecting to a subpoena should be pretty easy and inexpensive (couple hundred bucks). All you have to do is object, you don't have to lay out a big legal argument, just make "a written objection", and if you claim that the subpoena is unreasonable on the face of it, and the court agrees, you can get attorney's fees and lost earnings back.
What if it doesn't eliminate you as a suspect? What if there is something that makes you even more suspicious - and yet, you are still completely unrelated to the crime - and you are taken to prison and, say, raped by an inmate?
We are paranoid about our government because it commands enormous resources that are under the purview of individuals that are sometimes not entirely trustworthy (compare to your concern about people being responsible enough to carry loaded guns). Our goverment hides and outright falsifies information about a myriad of things that could be enormously beneficial to its citizens and the world at large because it is beneficial to its somewhat shady, ill-defined, perhaps amoral goals.
Do you honestly believe any governmental system can be much different?
+++ATH0
Suing someone doesn't give you automatic Big-Brother rights
No, but hiring a lawyer does. You just have to make sure you have more lawyers than the other side does.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
I spent quite a bit of time in Ireland, for example. The reason why European countries tend to have fewer civil liberties is because their citizens honestly believe they don't need them.
...being less anal in exercising them. The purpose of rights isn't to stop the police in solving crimes and being an ass, it's to stop harrasment and fishing expeditions. As long as I feel that they're doing their job, I don't mind cooperating above and beyond what I'm required by law. In the US, there seems to be an innate hostility towards authority. If it's not required by law, it's almost "forbidden" to accomodate them anyway. The world will not end, your rights will not cease to exist, 1984 will not become true if you do.
Besides, the Patriot Act and the whole Guantanamo Bay thing makes me doubt your rights are that good, should you try to exercise them. Of course, rights don't apply to people that we suspect the rights don't apply to. Try figuring that one out. And after seeing the recent events in Iraq, ths US should shut the fuck up about their civil liberties(*). Or maybe you really don't understand how that looks to the rest of the world?
(*) not applicable to Iraqis, foreigners in general, allies, non-US citizens, muslims, suspected terrorists et al. Any more you want to piss off?
In the Cold War, we needed the US. 9/11 could have brought us together. But I dare say that I don't think the US and Europe has ever stood further apart since WWII. On a political level, it hasn't come about yet. Ask the people.
Ask them about how they feel about the US, about going to war over WMDs that don't exist (The EU thought so too, but we didn't start a war over a belief). Ask the people of your allies if they're proud to have helped you conquer Iraq so you can torture your prisoners like Saddam did.
The US is coming across as a "holier than thou" nation, that in the end is just another thug (admittingly, like most other nations...) Keep it up, and you'll come off looking as the bitch in "Cruel Intentions". I haven't seen a fraction of the humility I'd expect after getting caught with your pants down.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Do you honestly believe any governmental system can be much different?
Do you honestly believe all governmental systems are the same?
So you are saying that all governmental systems are the same? So the US and its poodles have replaced one "shady", "perhaps amoral" government in IRAQ with another one, that's no better?
Next you'll be saying that the torture and rape perpetrated by Sadam's thugs is being continued by the US.
You'll be saying that the US govt is the same as the Nazis with it's concentration camp in Guantanamo Bay - come on get with it, concentration camps are so last century.- ok I'm making your point here.
BUT just because the US is run by xenophobic, oil funded, religious extremists, doesn't mean the whole world is.
There are better forms of government than the system that the US (+poodles) is trying to force on the rest of the world. Many European democracies are more democratic and less ruled by money than the Land of the Free. Our governments still lie and we do have the odd bent copper, but in general we live in far less of a police state than the US.
I've had several dealings with the police and they've always been very friendly and polite even when I've been unloading computers from the back of a car at 3am. This is in stark contrast to what I hear about the US police who seem to aggressively harass people for such subversive activities as walking. Jay walking, wtf is that? If I want to cross the street and it looks safe I cross, seriously I don't understand. I've even heard of several accounts of Europeans being harassed by US police for walking on pavements in residential areas - you need a permit or a car or something.
So yes I do believe governmental systems can be different and furthermore they should be different.