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SCO Spreads Rumors About IBM Lawsuit
yeremein writes "SCO says it has found a new smoking gun in its battle with IBM. This 'bombshell' was not found in a court document; instead it came from a reporter's interview at SCOforum. The scoop? 'SCO alleges that since 2001, AIX has contained code for which IBM does not have a license. Moreover SCO claims to have found internal IBM e-mails in which IBMers acknowledge this shortcoming.' With the announcement comes a hefty boost in SCO's stock price." SCO is also going to bundle its worthless linux licenses with its Unix operating systems.
>SCO claims to have found internal IBM e-mails
>
>This is a form of espionage which is illegal >without a court order.
Umm, RTFA, dude:
SCO says it discovered the e-mails in a mountain of documents IBM produced in discovery related to SCO's lawsuit against IBM over the Linux operating system.
No RTFA. The emails were part of the discovery process with the current lawsuit.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Great article at Groklaw about this very thing. Note it's from a year ago.
This may not matter if the Novell-SCO litigation goes in Novell's favor. But here's the points:
1. Contrary to some above misinformed posters, SCO didn't have to commit espionage to get internal IBM e-mails. The discovery process in a lawsuit like this involves both sides turning over mountains of documents and e-mails. I'm sure this is where SCO found this information.
2. Novell claims they still own UNIX. Novell says that SCO only has a (revokable) license to license UNIX to others. Novell has already exercised their right to revoke SCO's UNIX-licensing powers as regards IBM, back when SCO claimed to be revoking IBM's license. Novell effectively said, "We run the show here, SCO, and IBM is legitimately licensed in our book."
The point then is that if Novell wins their SCO case, then this "smoking gun" is actually a wilted flower. Novell can provide IBM with a license for AIX, if they actually need one, and any damages IBM might owe could be paid to their buddy Novell, not SCO. (This part I'm less certain about, and depends on the extent to which Novell wins their case.)
Anyway, as others have pointed out, this doesn't affect Linux at all, and as I'm pointing out, it may not even affect IBM's use of UNIX. Nothing to see here... Move along...
Like Digital Freedoms? Then donate to EFF before they're gone.
Well, IBM unfortunately mentions some taken over features explicitly on their own website:
t ry .html
http://www-1.ibm.com/servers/aix/overview/indus
"About AIX 5L
[...]
This release also contains UNIX System 5 Release 4 (SVR4) standard components such as the SVR4 Print Subsystem.
"
If IBM indeed doesn't have a license for those, then I would doubt they would be allowed to include them. But in that context, IBM would also have been pretty stupid touting these features in public...
Stock price is based on a company's PERCEIVED value, not it's ACTUAL value. Sometimes perception is in line with reality; sometimes they're so far apart it's not even funny.
Perception is a function of human psychology; understand that and you'll have a better understanding of how people will react in a given situation.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
At first I was trying to figure out what Trademark law had to do with this. After a search or two, I found this info. Just an FYI for anyone who wants to know what the parent is talking about.
To the parent: thanks for the info! This may be the straw that breaks the camel's back. If the judge awards IBM damages for violation of the Lanham Act, IBM might just end up owning the Unix licensing business! (Through liquidation of assets during bankruptcy procedures, in case anyone's interested.)
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
It is in the process of being groklaw'd already.
... and furthermore
Unless the lawyers for the other side are incompetent, they will know more or less everything you might have to use against them well before trial. Either because it will be documents you are required to present to them, or because they'll have carefully crafted discovery requests and motions to figure out what you've got.
In this particular case, you'll find that IBM for instance have asked for summary judgement on some of SCO's claims because IBM claim they haven't produced any evidence. If successfull, those claims will never even reach trial. SCO's only way around that is to point out with specificity to the judge any shred of evidence they might have regarding those particular claims.
Which means that either IBM gets rid of the claims, or they get a detailed overview of what evidence SCO will be using to justify those claims during trial, allowing them to target the specific evidence in their further discovery and other preparations.
There is a healthly discussion on this over at Groklaw. After reading through the Montery contract it was SCO that was limited to only using IBMs work on platforms other than x86.
On top of that it says that both parties license extends beyond the end of the project, and is irrevocable.
"In regards to the AIX code, yes we do"
Umm, no we don't. Just because Project Monteray was focused on a 64-bit Unix doesn't mean that IBM was restricted by a license to keeping AIX on a single platform. A number of the licenses are buried in Groklaw's "Legal Docs" link. I could go look, but it would surprise me greatly if the license refered to a hardware platform rather than the use of Unix System V for general IBM development purposes of AIX.
By the way, Project Moneterey didn't die in negotiation. It actually produced tangible code that IBM simply didn't release.
Lastly, if you read the court filings by SCO you will discover that they could win a court case against IBM for contract violation(VERY doubtful) and still lose the war. Nothing in SCO's lawsuit with IBM has anything to do with SCO's property rights vis-a-vis Linux. They never filed a copyright claim against IBM(with regards to Linux), they dropped their trade-secret claim, and they have never filed any patent claims. In other words, every word uttered out of SCO's mouth with regards to IP violations in Linux is completely and absolutely FALSE.
But you don't have to believe me, just read the court filings, they're (almost) all there on Groklaw.
Sure information wants to be free, but how much are you willing to pay for the packaging?
Buzzz! Wrong. PPC = an implementation of IBM's Power architecture. AIX has run on the Power architecture since the late 80s. (I first used AIX on a Power RT system in 1990.)
Project Monterey was intended to port Unix to Intel/HP's Itanium processors. Project Montery actually ran for several years; it fell apart when IBM realized that the Itanium processors were (1) not going to arrive on time, and (2) weren't going to have the power that Intel predicted.
We call it art because we have names for the things we understand.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/ks?s=SCOX
56% of SCO's float is shorted. That's a very high number; indicating a very large number of people believe SCO is entirely full of sXXX. Further that float being so small indicates big buyers have sold SCO.
Correct. Project Monterey.
IBM backed out of the deal
Correct.
SCO claims IBM also backed out of their licensing agreement for SVR4 code.
Also correct - but that doesn't make the claim accurate.
AIX is now an SVR4 Unix and there is no licensing agreement for it.
INCORRECT. Read the Project Monterey contract - it says that either party may terminate the agreement, and if they do, that they keep the license: to wit:
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====