The SCO Boomerang and the Strength of Linux

karvind writes "PJ of Groklaw has written an insightful article on benefits flowing from SCO's litigation: GPL stands up in court, the community bonded more tightly than ever, encouraged increased support for FOSS and last but not the least heightened awareness of the benefits of using GNU/Linux systems. Article is also on Yahoo and NewsFactor."

Comments

GPL

[Lehk228]

The GPL was not "tested in court" the lawsuit was a contract dispute between SCO and IBM. Though i think it may have resulted in a few more PHB's hearing about linux and maybe being curious how it could save money to switch.

Re:GPL

[gvc]

I cannot parse your sentence. I think you are saying that SCO v. IBM does not test the GPL. It certainly does. IBM's eighth counterclaim says:

"124. SCO has infringed and is infringing IBM's copyrights by copying, modifying, sublicensing and/or distributing Linux products except as expressly provided under the GPL. SCO has taken copyrighted source code made available by IBM under the GPL, included that code in SCO's Linux products, and copied, modified, sublicensed and/or distributed those products other than as permitted under the GPL. SCO has no right -- and has never had any right - to copy, modify, sublicense and/or distribute the IBM copyrighted code except pursuant to the GPL."

Re:GPL

[Xformer]

Clearly an unwinnable argument, that I clearly remember SCO trying to use earlier in this whole mess. Their lawyers tried to proclaim the GPL as invalid, and that argument was tossed pretty quickly.

Therefore, the GPL was tested in court, and it stood rather well.

Re:GPL

[falconwolf]

AFAIK there is nothing to stop the owner of some code both relieasing under the GPL and simultaneously licensing it for commercial use for money. After all, why should the owner of some code not do as he/she wishes with it?

Which is what MySQL AB does, besides FOSS they also have a commercial license, which includes tech support. From much of what I've read recently in business that's the trend in software today, to sale commercial licenses to those who want support.

Falcon

Insightful?

[Anonymous Coward]

The references to being tested in court is for the part Pamela mentions about SCO wrapping themselves in the GPL flag in court against IBM charges of copyright infringement. Also, one of the other cases had an element of GPL in it iirc.

And in Germany, the GPL has been ruled on in two cases where the GPL was held to be enforceable. I believe Stu Cohen or Eben Moglen have used those two cases as examples of cases that are going to be used in international law as a basis for future decisions, and will probably be used for similar legal reasonings in court decisions to come in the US.

So the GPL has been tested in court, at least twice directly in German court, and at least twice indirectly or as part of preliminary arguments for pre-trial hearings in the US.

How the fuck you got modded up to +5 insightful when you're talking out of your ass is beyond me. 5 mod points for first post?

Microsoft AD reference

[nurb432]

No url, but here is the magazine and page #:

March 7 edition of Information Week ( print version ) Pages 30 and 31.

Entited "Adding up the costs of linux vs. windows? Be sure to add the intellectual property risks, too."

I have seen it elsewhere too, but that is the only hard refrence i can remember.

Re:There's a reason it wasn't tested in court

[mrhartwig]

Actually, no. IBM makes more money off services than either HW or SW. I didn't find their 2005 annual report quickly, but the trend toward services (vs. HW) has been going for several years now; here are the 2004 revenue numbers:

• Services: $42.6 B
  
• HW: $28.2 B
  
• SW: $14.3 B
  
• Financing: $ 2.8 B
  
• Other: $ 1.1 B
  

Adding that up, it looks like services top HW & SW combined.

I believe IBM's use of OSS to leverage their services business is quite relevant. I do suspect that the majority of their services don't have anything to do with OSS, but my (uninformed) opinion says the % is growing, and will continue to grow for a while.

Re:Bonded more tightly than ever, huh?

[B'Trey]

And if Microsoft had politely asked Trigdell to cease reverse engineering the network protocols, should he have done that too? At the time he started working on them, there was no replacement for a Windows server either. Trigdell reverse engineered the protocols, created Samba, and now we can have Windows and Linux servers running on the same network, working (almost) seamlessly together. Clean room reverse engineering is not only common, it's a key part of the methodology that allows Open Source software to work. Variations on that is how we get Linux to work with Windows, it's how we get Open Office to read Word documents, its how we make Open Source work with any closed software where the protocols are not open. McVoy has every right to kindly ask Trigdell to stop. So does Microsoft and any other company. But Trigdell has every right to ignore the request.

BK is sitting at a table and it threw the Open Source community a bone. Trigdell refused to gnaw on the leavings and decided to go to the kitchen and cook his own dinner instead. McVoy got all in a huff and took his bone back. And it's all Trigdell's fault for not being grateful for the scraps and having the gall to want a full meal instead.

Re:Bonded more tightly than ever, huh?

[B'Trey]

Also what hypocrisy is there from Linus? Has he said somewhere that reverse engineering the BK protocol is immoral and unethical? Has he said the opposite for the samba team? Where exactly is the hypocrisy?

Trigdell is the lead programmer for Samba. It's his baby. It started out as a hobby for him, something to play with, exactly the same way that he was playing with Bitkeeper. I don't know that this hobby would ever produce a replacement for Bitkeeper, but I don't know that it wouldn't either. But, to steal a line from MS, the freedom to innovate is vital. It's the very essence of Open Source.

And yes, Linus has slammed Trigdell directly for it. See here and here.