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SCO Amends Novell Complaint
rm69990 writes "According to Groklaw, SCO now seeks to amend their complaint against Novell. SCO says it 'seeks leave to file a Second Amended Complaint in significant part in consideration of the counterclaims that Novell asserted in its Answer and Counterclaims.' SCO now accuses Novell of infringing SCO's copyrights by distributing SUSE Linux, of breaching a non-compete clause between the two companies, and SCO is also asking for specific performance forcing Novell to turn over the Unix copyrights to SCO. So SCO is essentially admitting that Novell owns the copyrights at this point, but is saying that Novell breached the contract (that specifically excluded copyrights) by failing to transfer them to Santa Cruz."
The... both... sell... and... support... operating... systems. How can they NOT compete?
"When life gives you lemons, don't make lemonade. Make life take the lemons back!" -- Cave Johnson
It is amazing to me that SCO can continue this long without totally running out of lawyer money. I really wonder if some third parties are funding them under the table.
Tell me this -> How are they making a profit today?
No. I really want to know.
Isn't this over by now? The last time I saw a SCO article here, it seemed that even the judge was sick of their nonsense. Is there anyone still taken in by this charade?
How are they still getting away with this idiocy? If I was the judge I would throw those responsible in jail, and if any lawyer would bring the case up again(in court) I would throw them in jail. This is just shear stupidity.
SCO's back in the news. I've missed my SCO fix lately. This manouver looks pretty much as dumb as the ones in the past. I give them 3 weeks before they backpedal on the new, new ammended claims.
What's that ?
...YAWN.
v.m
I have a "Zero Policy" tolerance.
*/
Gar, the wheels of Justice grind slowly, they do.
In the words of Socrates - "I just drank what?"
Has Novell been stockpiling guns again?
Watch out, they have finally gone completely nuts and are going to start shooting!
Auron may be different, Cally, but on Earth it is considered ill-mannered to kill your friends while committing suicide.
"A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."
That's pretty off base, even for SCO.
I can't help it - I'm a 19D.
A Second Amendment complaint? Now they want to take my unix AND my guns!
From the complaint (via Groklaw): V. PRAYER FOR RELIEF
Wherefore, Plaintiff SCO prays this Court enter judgment for SCO and against Novell:
Although I doubt God will be listening, as he's upgrading his SUSE Linux...
GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
In Corporate America, criminals/conmen sue you .... oh wait!
bugger!
I fell asleep during American Government class. Are they asserting their right to bear arms? If so, this could get messy!
Any minute now, the Chewbacca Defense.
I remember having read something about a ceiling agreement they have with their legal company.
Namely that there was a maximum price they would have to pay for legal support, above that amount of money the costs were for the legal company.
Couldn't find a link to it on Google though.
This looked the most meaty and techy from TFA:
EXHIBIT B
Novell's unauthorized copying in its use and distribution of SuSE
Linux includes but is not limited to the appropriateion of the
following data structures and algorithms contained in or derived
from SCO's copyrighted material:
1. SuSE's implementation of the "Read/Copy/Update" algorithm
2. SuSE's implementation of NUMA Aware Locks
3. SuSE's implementation of the distributed lock manager
4. SuSE's implementation of reference counters
5. SuSE's implementation of asynchronous I/O
6. SuSE's implementation of the kmalloc data structure
7. SuSE's implementation of the console subsystem
8. SuSE's implementation of IRQs
9. SuSE's implementation of shared memory locking
10. SuSE's implementation of semaphores
11. SuSE's implementation of virtual memory
12. SuSE's implementation of IPC's
13. SuSE's implementation of load balancing
14. SuSE's implementation of PIDs
15. SuSE's implementation of numerous kernel internals and APIs
16. SuSE's implementation of ELF
17. SuSE's implementation of STREAMS
18. SuSE's implementation of dynamic linking
19. SuSE's implementation of kernel pre-emption
20. SuSE's implementation of memory mapping
21. SuSE's implementation of ESR
22. SuSE's implementation of buffer structures
23. SuSE's implementation of process blocking
24. SuSE's implementation of numerous header files
http://www.thebricktestament.com/the_law/when_to_
"So SCO is essentially admitting that Novell owns the copyrights at this point, but is saying that Novell breached the contract (that specifically excluded copyrights) by failing to transfer them to Santa Cruz."
I can see there collectively being a large amount of heads exploding after trying to make sense of that one. I'm thinking SCO has nothing to do with Santa Cruz and more to do with SChizOphrenia because they've seem to have lost touch with reality.
If big boobed women work at Hooters do one legged women work at IHOP?
The fact that this hasn't been laughed out of court yet makes me sad.
1. SuSE's implementation of the "Read/Copy/Update" algorithm
2. SuSE's implementation of NUMA Aware Locks
3. SuSE's implementation of the distributed lock manager
4. SuSE's implementation of reference counters
5. SuSE's implementation of asynchronous I/O
6. SuSE's implementation of the kmalloc data structure
Kmalloc? lwm.net/Articles/124374
Are theses guys on Dope?
SCOX is arguing that Novell has infringed on their copyrights with SuSe Linux. They've also argued that Novell has failed to properly transfer the copyrights to them. Two lines of argument, each in opposition to each other, are perfectly fine the the court system. I forget the name for this, but basically SCOX is offering judge Kimball two different ways to give them 'relief' for Novell's supposed wrongdoing.
SCOX has admitted nothing. The meaning of 'admit', to a court, is that one of the parties involved is giving up information to the court that the other side can't prove. If SCOX were 'to admit' a lack of copyrights in lawyerspeak their case would instantly disintegrate and the door would open to Lanham Act claims and all sorts of other nastiness. SCOX never, ever 'admits' to anything.
There are plenty of people with knowledge of this case - see groklaw.net for mind numbing detail, or go to the Yahoo SCOX board if you'd like rowdy commentary and a sad, funny little troll named backinfullforce.
I am very easy to get along with, but I don't have time to waste being nice to people who are being stupid. -Theo
Cases like this show the wisdom of the "Looser pays" philosophy of British common law.
In essence if you are in a lawsuit and the court rules against you then the other goy can ask the court to make you pay his lawyer. The courts usually accept those requests.
In the case of the fiasco sco has been carrying on, those rules would immediately double the cost to them. It also reduces the likelihood of someone settling a frivolous lawsuit.
SCO has also filed suite in contries that require you to support your original claim. Those casses are over. In Ostralia they are under warning to not try it again. (Public mischife is a crime)
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?
So now they admit they never owned the copyrights. Doesn't this just end the IBM thing. If Novell dismissed that issue, can the morphed case go on? I expcet IBM to file something new very quickly (Partial Summary Judgement) to start ripping SCO a new one. Here we go again!
I know Debian has "Virtual RMS", but I think SuSE is really going weird if they implement stuff like this. Weird syslog messages from SuSE boxes:
Jan 4 06:47:45 localhost esr: gunning some processesEric Raymond was seen around SCO advisors.
Does SCO even know what they're suing for?
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
The problem arises when Joe Shmo tries to sue Microsoft for stealing his idea and driving his company out of business and gets buried under a 100,000 dollar a day legal team, which he then has to pay for.
I think we definitely should have more protections in place against frivolous and groundless lawsuits, but I don't think that dumping all the legal costs on the loser is the way to go about it.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
If the Brits really had "looser pays" then the Spice Girls would have to pay for every case in Britain. I think you mean "loser pays."
When SCO loses, there won't be a company left to pay. Your system would make no difference to SCO.
I disagree with Senator McCain. I believe in torture. I believe that Darl, Yarro, BiFF, Anderer, the lawfirm of BSF, and the rest of the foul bunch should be chained naked together, repeatedly dunked in a barrel of ripe chum that's been brewing on the dock for the month of July, and fed to sharks with frikin' laser beams.
--
BMO
What does this mean? I stared at it like a piece of obfuscated Perl code for about 10 minutes...
"SCO says it 'seeks leave to file a Second Amended Complaint in significant part in consideration of the counterclaims that Novell asserted in its Answer and Counterclaims.' SCO now accuses Novell of infringing SCO's copyrights by distributing SUSE Linux, of breaching a non-compete clause between the two companies, and SCO is also asking for specific performance forcing Novell to turn over the Unix copyrights to SCO. So SCO is essentially admitting that Novell owns the copyrights at this point, but is saying that Novell breached the contract (that specifically excluded copyrights) by failing to transfer them to Santa Cruz."
(It) They are seeking something. What they are seeking is leave. (Most companies do business during business hours, however I guess SCO want to do this on their vacation time.) Or perhaps by 'leave' they mean permission? That seems more likely, so they are seeking permission for something from someone perhaps? What they are seeking permission to do is 'file' something. But from whom they are seeking permission and why such permission is needed remains unclear. It seems that the thing they want to 'file' is a 'Second Ammended Complaint'. We can assume this is an intrinsic because all the words are capitalised. So what was wrong with the first ammeded complaint, and indeed the one before that? Surely if it was ammended then they got the first draft wrong. And now they want to ammend it again? How careless. Perhaps a little more diligence and thoroughness in the first place would have avoided this? But what about this 'filing' affair? Why do they need permission? Can't they just write a file? Is the disk write protected, or do they need permission to get some paper to print it on? No wonder the legal system is in such disarray when permission is needed to even create a file. Anyway I digress, what about this 'Second Ammended Complaint'? Will there be a third and a fourth? What is the point of this game? Apparently a significant part of it (I don't know what counts as significant, and if it is already significnt why bother to mention it) is in 'consideration' (how nice of them, it's good to know SCO are a considerate company) _OF_ (now here we get really stuck, consideration relationship is FOR an entity not OF it, but let's assume this is a typo) the counterclaims. Whoooah! What counterclaims? Ok, so there were presumably counterclaims by Novell. So this is about a lawsuit that Novell are attacking SCO with? Are we even talking about the same case as the one where SCO attacked Novell in which these tit for tat exchanges all count as part of one great fight? Ah I see its a bit like LISP this legal code. Start at the rightmost end and start factoring backwards. So Novell created a Counterclaim and in it they asserted something SCO got pissy about? But only because Novell were pissy because of omething SCO asserted. OK, I get it now! Where have I seen this sort of thing before? Oh the yes 3rd Year infants playground that's where. Well, I hope whoever dishes out the permission doesn't grant it, because the whole thing is obviously a circus already and in need of a little more adult behaviour and less showing off with long words and clever talk. Don't these people have jobs to go to? Oh wait...
According to this article, SCO got another ten million from a private placement of stock with existing institutional investors. Since every rational assessment of the stock suggests that the ten million is not going to pay off on the stock market, it's reasonable to assume that these "investors" have some motive other than profiting from the stock directly.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
I believe one should crush your mortal enemy very slowly to wreak the most amount of pain on them. Don't put them out of their misery all too soon.
...Novell keeps the copywrite. Eh? Wot dat?
Copyright . It's the rights you have... sheesh.
Seeing as Novell Corp had engineers that created a linux distribution, then spawn it off to its own company (Caldera) then they go IPO and whammo lots of cash to buy SCO, then SCO somehow swallows Caldera and no more Linux. Then Novell shows back up and buys SuSe. So no matter how you look at this its still Novell's fault. And to the question about where does SCO get their money. Well I guess dumbasses like me that thought investing in Caldera was good for Linux. So basically Linux funded SCO's legal battles against Linux. Now why does noone ever point at Ray Noorda since it was his money that started all this shit to begin with?
I think Novell should file a Second Ammendment claim asking to bear (and use) arms in their case against SCO.
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
Wait... so SCO is suing about the copyrights, which they admit are owned by Novell, and weren't even part of the deal?
We can do stuff like that?
*ahem*
Mister Trump, if you're reading: You are a successful business man. I am not. Therefore, you owe me one billion dollars. A money order will be fine.
Those who believe the Internet is private,
find their privates are on the Internet.
I think you may find they did a deal with the lawyers such that there is a maximum cost to them, but i may be wrong on that
"Oh man, they must be crazy! The lawsuits make no sense at all!" Right? Wrong, scox is being crazy like a fox. What scox is doing makes perfect sense.
At this point, the entire point of the scam is keep delaying. Msft's army of shills are screaming the message: "People are being sued for using Linux - don't use Linux." Of course the msft influenced tech-pop-media is leaving out the details, but most of the public isn't interested in the details.
There is also a very powerful object lesson being sent to other companies: "if you contribute to Linux, you better be ready to spend $100MM to fight a msft backed nuisance lawsuit. And you better be squeaky clean, because the discovery will never stop." How many companies want to bother with that? "Screw it. I was going to donate this code to Linux, but it just isn't worth the trouble."
McBride rakes in an easy $1MM a year. Scox market cap goes from $6MM to $70MM. Life is good for the scox scammers. Scox execs can lie, cheat, and steal, all they want. The USA bogo-justice system isn't going to do anything about it.
I'd have invested those $10 million in Chewco Investments.
But that's just me.
Please stop stalking me, bro.
It would not immediatly double there cost.
It would double it when they lost.
And it's not like you can force a company/person to pay either. Though I guess you could apply it at every motion along the way and not let a company ile another motion until they pay for the last one that they lost, but it seams silly.
Also, is there a cap on how much the loser pays? I would hate to have to pay frivilous lawyers fees even if the case was frivilous.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
Who else is going to pay then? The person who had the case brought against them made real live costs. If the case wasn't valid they should not have had to make the costs. Such costs destroy small businesses.
Maybe the government should have to pay and the costs taken out of the politician's bonuses to try and encourage them not to build unjust legal systems.
Do your mean frivilous cases as to law as to "non-obvious" as to patents? That's easy to fix!
"So SCO is essentially admitting that Novell owns the copyrights at this point, but is saying that Novell breached the contract (that specifically excluded copyrights) by failing to transfer them to Santa Cruz." Ok, bare with me, I think I have worked out how to defeat Microsoft and then take over the world....
1 Get SCO to sue Microsoft from breach of copyright
2 Sue MS for breach of contract and get them to turn over the copyright to us
3 Get LOTS of money and domination in the software world 4 repeat steps 1-3 with other companies 5 Copyright the word "china"
6 Repeat the procedure and sue China for using the word "china" and demand all monies generated by China
7 Repeat steps 3 and 4 with all contries on the planet (noting that "french fries" could be an issue).
8 Stroke the white pussy cat and go "Ah Mr Bond" a few times
9 Shot Mr Bond, don't try anything fancy. Get a gun shot him, then empty a clip into him, reload and repeat empting the clip. Do it yourself and don't let any employee do it. Take the dead body and burn it, and then pass it through an industrial blender
10 Sit back and enjoy!
Jaj
Taking some liberties with Despair.com:
"Persistence: It's over, Man...let it go!"
How about "loser pays", but the amount is limited to the amount the loser spent. If you lose, it will cost only as much as you spent. There would have to be some ground rules for things like self-representation and lawyers who work on contingency. There would also have to be an on-going public record of actual costs.
It would sorta act as a resource balance in proceedings. If "big company" is sued by "Joe Schmoe" working with a single lawyer, they have every right to use a team of 30 lawyers, but should only expect to be reimbursed for the first one.
- Tony
In the UK (& much of the rest of Europe) the court awards payment to the winner, which may or may not be the full amount of the legal bills. There is also the right to appeal. So in order to get hit with frivilous costs, the awarding judge would have to not spot them and the appeals judge would have to ignore your complaint. If you're still ordered to pay the full amount at that point, the costs probably wern't frivilous.
I really don't know what else to do other than laugh. It's so funny it's pathetic.
The price is always right if someone else is paying.
SuSE begins with "S" just like SCO. Obviously Novell should be sued for taking it from SCO.
One ring to bind them - should probably have more fiber and less rings in their diet.
11. Profit!
You sure have to give them credit for sheer nads.
Why? SCO isn't aiming for public approval. McBride knows that he is "the most hated man in the industry". At this point, he's going to gamble long with the remnants of his hand, and that's hoping that he'll hit something, anything, where a judge might smack Novell.
The justice system doesn't require that a plaintiff be liked (and we don't have much of a mechanism to keep people from filing unfounded lawsuits).
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.
ELF again. Sheesh. How many times do we have to explain that to them?
They must not be into Dungeons & Dragons I guess.
Listen up..Elves come in a large variety of races, and each has its own nuances. They are here described in alphabetical order: Dargonesti, Dimernesti, Drow, Gray Elves, High Elves, Kagonesti, Qualinesti, Silvanesti, Valley Elves, Wild Elves, and Wood Elves.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
SCO still exists as a small office staffed completely with lawyers. Lawyers who had best leave my SUSE alone.
MadOgre.com
"In Ostralia they are under warning to not try it again."
Glad I live in the United States of Omerica then and am not a "Looser"!
tell utah we're revoking their statehood if they don't resolve this mess.. we'll take polygamy over this!
If IBM or Novell (or some trust composed of several heavy hitters) completely bought SCO out, all of this legal crap would go away. It's not too far-fetched, either. We could even see SCO's copyrighted UNIX code released under the GPL ... in the event that we actually wanted it ;-)
Maybe my suggestion is a year or two early; at the rate SCO is shrinking, its value will soon drop below the cost of defending its claims in court.
Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
That's not the problem really, the problem is expensive lawyers in general and their stranglehold on the entire system. Even with two law teams in an adversarial position it is still them against you when you look at it hard enough.
The US should just admit that the "law" is supposed to be for the people and be reasonable and just and understandable for the most part for anyone with any sort of normal English language comprehension. This "law" situation has gotten to be too complex and ill suited for "the people" because they are essentially locked out of the system and must needs hire (most of the time) an EXTREMELY expensive translator. That's all lawyers are, glorified translators who turn human speak into confusing and overly verbose law speak, then enjoy a "vendor lockin". Even "your" lawyer has a clear cut case of belonging to this conflict of interest scenario of maintaining the translator monopoly, along with the judge and the rest of the "legal system". Then you notice that there is no incentive whatsoever for them to make laws simpler or fairer or easier, or just "less" of them,nope, the opposite is true, and they rule in congress.
We have no over all "law" that would limit the growth industry of "more laws" and more complex laws on the books. We are already at the "millions of laws" state now, with no end in sight. This is obviously insane to anyone who isn't a lawyer, but they hold the cards now.
It's just a carved in stone racket now. Would we put up with plumbers who consciously and universally always add an extra quarter mile of plumbing to a house just because they could?
Would we put up with carpenters who used tens times the amount of wood needed for a project all the time, just so they could always charge more? Would we put up with auto mechanics who insisted on replacing your engine and transmission every time you needed an oil change? No we wouldn't, but we as a society put up with that crap from the politician/lawyers/lobbyist/judges law racket cartel.
Oh ya, they have an added bonus! They have armed mercenaries who do whatever they are told, usually involving you when you run afoul of one of their bosses rackets. Too bad the plumbers and carpenters and mechanics can't enjoy this level of the threat of violence to increase their profits and social standings in the "equal" society we are supposed to have.
I certainly would love to know if this ten million dollars started, one way or another, at Microsoft. I can't think of any other people with lots of money (with the possible exception of Sun) who would remotely benefit from continuous legal challenges to Linux.
At first I thought that ESR was a conspiracy nut. Then you realize that, no, Microsoft actually *is* as nasty as he claims.
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.
A brilliant plan to be sure... but why do I have to take off my shirt??
That was the theory three years ago, when IBM could have bought scox for $20MM. IBM wanted no part of it then, and after three years, and about $100MM spent by IBM, you can be absolutely certain that IBM wants no part of that scam company now.
When you buy scox, you buy lawsuits, lots of lawsuits. Scox has violated many companies, and many laws. Do you think IBM wants that? Do you think IBM wants all the ill will that comes with buying scox?
IBM's linux business is in the billions, the msft/scox nuisance lawsuit is hardly worth jeopordizing that.
Man in suit of armor walks in and hits SCO over the head with a dead chicken.
Dear Sir,
I would like to protest in the strongest possibe terms about your SCO sketch. I have been a village idiot all my life and your Darl Mc Bride character is giving village idiots everywhere a bad name.
Sincerely,
May contain traces of nut.
Made from the freshest electrons.
The two headquarters are within 10 miles of each other (Sco in Lindon, Utah and Novell in Provo, Utah)...why don't they just meet in the middle and duel it out man to man?
ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!
Seriously, if the judge doesn't throw the book at SCO (without taking it out of the bookcase) over this I'll be shocked.
This is on topic.
I think ibm has some agreement not to sue msft untill at least 2007. Also, with the present administration, the DoJ will take no action against msft. The scox-scam trials are set mid-2007. And when does Vista come out?
All the financing for this purely malicious lawsuit was provided by msft. Msft has cost IBM around $100MM in legal expenses, so far. Msft has also used this lawsuit in msft's smear campaign against Linux - which is a substantial part of IBM's business.
Msft has also used the scox-scam nuisance lawsuits to scare other companies from contributing to Linux. The message is crystal clear: "contribute to linux, and face a 5 year lawsuit nightmare that will cost you $100MM in legal fees, not to mention smearing your good name, and endless discovery."
Do msft actions seem to be in keeping with msft's agreement with the DoJ? I don't think so. The next administration may not think so either.
1) I sue my landlord for "Slander of Title" to the rental house.
2) I ask the judge to grant me title to the rental home as compensation for the landlord calling the house his property
3) Profit?
I am the unwilling control for my Origin.
The rights, that the people of the United States were to have, have been prempted. If you follow this link you will see that the marxists have won and the war is over. We lost. Read this to understand. http://www.conspiracyarchive.com/Commentary/Americ an_Communism.htm The spelling violation was an intentional protest at the violation of the rights of the citizens of the United States. If you are not happy with these changes to what this country was supposed to be, get out there and vote for change. The system can be better, but informed voters have to get out and vote and write to their elected leaders. Any other spelling errors are in error.
Not only that IBM didn't want every IP crooked company on the planet trying to sue it just so IBM would buy them out. One of the stranger twists of fate is that IBM really does own patents on just about everything having to do with computers. One of that patents it is claiming SCO infringed on is for a menu structure! There is an old story that Microsoft found out that IBM was infringing on like ten of it's patents. When they meet IBM brought in a list of 5,000 patents that Microsoft was infringing on. True or not the moral is you don't start an IP fight with IBM. IBM wants to make sure EVERYONE know that so they are going to slap SCO as hard as they can. Novell wants Unix back. Why? So it can make Linux an official Unix and gain mind-share in the Linux world.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
from lawman.com: sco fatal mistake?
Cheers!!
assert(expired(knowldege)); core dump
It's over. Before I got out of small business consulting I moved my last customer off of SCO at least 5 years ago. Not for any greater good, just because linux was better. When you've got a product nobody wants, you can't sue your way to success. IP lawsuits are the bain of this industry. I've been sued several times because companies wanted to keep me from working for myself or anybody else. I've always won but it has cost me a shitload of money and really made me hate the fuckers who sued me. That's why I no longer do consulting work - do a good job & they love you; finish the project and go to another company in the same industry and they want to turn your family out in the street. I'm sure they'll eventually go bankrupt, but the slime that put them there will still walk away with something and that's just wrong.
I am serious when I say this:
.38 shots to the head would be alright.
I think this is a legitimate example of a group of people who need to be wiped off the earth totally. I wouldn't shed a tear if someone were to brutally murder Darl McBride or one of his cronies.
I think something like a nail bomb or a few
This isn't a troll - this guy has totally attacked humanity and things that contributed countless and innumerable benefits to humanity and probably have saved lives, i.e. Linux and Open Source Software.
So obviously He must e a *BSD user.
I think it would be easier to just max out the amount per hour the loser would pay at something like $100 ($100 was just an arbitrary number, I don't know what would work or how much lawyers typically charge/hour). Then, if either side wants to buy a team of $1000/hr lawyers, fine, they can do that. But they will only be reimbursed at $100/hr.
I could see that. I'm completely in favor of giving the judge discretion on forcing one side to pay some legal costs, within rational limits, and not exceeding what they spent on the case...I think, especially in this case, SCO should be liable, not for Novell's legal costs, but for our legal costs.
As taxpayers, we're paying for their damn circus and I think they owe us for all the public money they've wasted on their stupid pump and dump scheme.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Even better : the looser pays whatever he put into his own offence/defence (with a standard minimum). That could cost companies like MS or the ??AA quite a heap of money, and would equal the playing-field somewhat.
I've allways thought it's funny that the law (of most countries) will send you to jail easily when you try to fight-it-out with un-equal weapons (for example : A gun against fists) but at the same time accepts it as a "normal" practice that one party has to make do with a single, some times pro-deo lawyer, while the other can (and does) put a building full of lawyers against it.
As you may know from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Book_of_One_Thous and_and_One_Nights Scheherazade needed to tell a new story every night to stay alive.
The difference is that SCO will going die quite soon and most people is going to rejoice when they are dead.
For a nice date: Call strftime(3C)!
Socialize it, the same way we do medicine and roads. Everyone uses the same system, and a corporation counts as one person.
Caldera was started by Ray Noorda after he left Novell, to flog Linux-for-business (he's long since disconnected from it). They acquired the UNIX business of Santa Cruz (mainly for the reseller channel?), and renamed themselves SCO Group. What was left of Santa Cruz became Tarantella, and has been bought up by Sun.
SCOG's run their business into the ground (their clients are fleeing in droves), and decided to misread the AT&T -> Novell -> Santa Cruz agreements to believe they own UNIX in toto, and that any code that touched the SysV codebase (as in IBM's RCU, NUMA, etc.) is theirs, despite lawyers from the preceding firms telling them they're full of it. They went after IBM, apparently expecting a quiet payoff/buyout, and got a countersuit instead. Now that they're facing the unblinking horde that is IBM's legal department, and the techies deconstructing their PR within minutes, their strategy seems to be reduced to delaying the inevitable.
Novell, meanwhile, decided that Linux was a Good Thing, also, and bought another Linux vendor, and seem to be making a reasonably successful go of it.
But if 'big company' (RIAA anyone) sues 'Joe Schmoe' (or 4000 John Doe's as they have) and the people can't reclaim the money then to be honest it would be cheaper to actually give them the 3 grand they ask for. Out of principle I would fight the bastards. Of course 'loser pays up to what THEY paid' would probably work that way as the companies would spend more.
There are problems with all the things mentioned - perhaps it should be a rule about if it is a person getting sued by a company and they win they are completely entitled to reclaim ANY expenditure (well within reason) from that company. That should stop companies suing all these people because they can. Perhaps if the court case is frivolous, and happens more then once the person / company sueing can be taken to court to reclaim the Police and Court times. I'm not sure how to solve if one person sues another... most of it depends on the circumstances. I think almost all laws should be flexible as almost every law I could think of a reason to break it. Speeding? Well your honour I was being chased down by this guy and was afraid for my life so tried to speed away. Murder? Well this guy came into my house, I caught him with a knife walking towards my son's room so I shot him. Of course there are times they are obviously guilty and should get the full extent of the law!
I had a friend who used to work in Halfords in the UK (they sell bikes and accessories basically), and he was the store manager. A guy tried to shoplift so my mate grabbed the guy and held him down until police arrived. The guy then sued my mate for assault (I think the exact wording in UK law is 'unwanted touches' are assault). In court the Magistrate (think that is a Justice of the Peace in the US) asked the shoplifter why he was sueing for assault, and the guy replied 'he shouldn't have fucking touched me'. The magistrate then replied 'No, you should have fucking stole from his shop' and did the guy for wasting court time, police time as well as anything else he could think of!
what a waste of everybodies time this joke of a company( SCO/Caldera/Canopy/whatever ) is. Can't wait til this is finally over.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Wow.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
SCO is hoping to use this vague wording to override the clear wording of the original contract. They're claiming that the conditional clause has been met and that all the copyrights should be transferred. Novell is going to argue that SCO doesn't need the copyright to exercise their rights "with respect to the acquisition of UNIX and UnixWare technologies". No doubt they're going to ask what technologies SCO is seeking to acquire and why they'd need the copyrights to do so. It's going to be up to the courts to decide this one.
I don't see how this can be read the way SCO wants to read it. SCO doesn't want the copyrights to acquire UNIX technology (which they did a decade ago); they want the copyrights to sue Linux users. This clause was put in so SCO could co-develop Monterey with IBM, so the historical context doesn't help SCO out either.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
Or you didn't have a good lawyer because you're poor.
Well, coming from one of the (majority of) nations with a loser pays system, that's not usually how it works. In fact it's not even how it usually works in the US.
In fact, that's even how it works in criminal trials here, where the state will reinburse the lawer of your choice according to the same set standards (with the difference that you won't have to pay even if you lose). Since there is no market for criminal defense attorneys paid outside the system that's in fact how "everyone" gets their defense, their access to a hot-shot lawer only limited by the lawyer's willingness to take the case.
Together with the fact that what would be handled as a civil suit in the US, i.e. compensation of victims of crime, is handled by the crimila court as part of the criminal proceedings, the absence of a jury, and no punitive damages (again we make it a criminal case), we end up with a system though strikingly similar to the US one in actual law behaves very differently when it comes to civil cases, as in, we don't have any to speak of.
Stefan Axelsson
Well then you'd be using the second amendment - the right to have bare arms!
I don't think violence is usually the answer. But every once in a while, I think a good, public beating is in order, followed by a loooong time in the public stocks (not the kind SCO likes).
The two headquarters are within 10 miles of each other (Sco in Lindon, Utah and Novell in Provo, Utah)
From Novell's Fast Facts page:
"Corporate headquarters are in Waltham, Mass., with key facilities located in Provo, Utah and Nürmberg, Germany."
I suppose the people at the Provo facility could duke it out with SCO mano a mano, but the Novell bigwigs are on the other side of the country now.
Looser than what? Don't you mean LOSER PAYS?
...and yes the spelling mistakes are on purpose.
Christ, that's obivously what he meant.
Come on now, you spelling/grammer pedant trolls add nothing to the conversations and your self-righteous, intellectually masturbatory corrections only take up screen real-estate.
Why, o why must the sky fall when I've learned to fly?
MSFT has nothing to do about it anymore. SCOX has long accepted the loss by now.
They've lost most of their customers and the rest is still migrating away, everyone knows by now they are never going to win.
But what do they have now? A lot of left over lawsuits from the time the issue was still very hot.
Now SCOX is just stalling, hoping everything dies out eventually and everyone forgets about the issue.
MS has (had) so many monopoly lawsuits on their hands which cause them to ease up on the Linux lawsuits FUD campain.
2 years have gone by sinds they lawsuits started.. the world has changed and SCO lost.. These are just a few legal remainders from the past boiling up just before some court deadline passes...
Nothing to see here.. move along..
Out of the corner of my eye that looked like they were filing a "Second Amendment Complaint" and I was like "huh?"
So do my eyes deceive me? If SCOx has admitted their original claims were wrong, why doesn't the Judge now rule in favor of Novell (because of the admission by Darling McBride) and have Novell bill SCOx for legal time & effort at full rate?
If SCOx wants to sue because of other circumstances, then that should be a separate suit and brought before the court. But put the D*st*rds out of business by paying court costs and legal fees because their original supposition(ing(s)) were wrong.
------------------
Watch Boston Legal. Billy Shatner finally found his calling as a lawyer with Mad-Cow disease! Truly worthy of SCOx!
Since when does SCO own anything UNIX besides licensing rights, which they get under contract FROM Novell, which is the company that actually owns the copyrights to UNIX and is supposed to receive 85% to 90% of the licensing fees SCO collects?
MeThinks Novell is going to squash SCO Real Soon Now(tm)
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
This ties in with them wanting Second Amendment relief. The right to bear arms, prayers to God... Yes, this is beginning to make sense...
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Didn't know they were still around!
get a group of linux purists together and take over SCO via stock buyout, with no one buying enough to raise the interest of the SEC, but gaining enough ownership overall to (a) get rid of McBride, (b) get SCO Group to drop its legal proceedings, and (c) may be dissolve the company. It might be worth it - even if it was a total loss, but then, some of it could be gained back by selling off whatever "assets" SCO Group has (desks, chairs, etc.); but that might be consumed by groups like IBM and Novell that want reimbursement. (Hmm....may be we should get IBM and Novell to help out too...)
Just something I've thought about...may be use the name and get rid of everything else (all employees, all assets, etc.).
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
Breakfast served all day!
Imagine this hilarious scenario...
Novell: You're right we breached contract, here is your money back, and you must cease and desist from selling (and licensing) your UNIX based software.
SCO: Well I guess that was a stupid move on our part. Not only do we not have a product to sell anymore, but now the public knows that we have no legal ground for all these lawsuits we filed.
1) Linux is a POSIX compliant operating system, that does not mean it is UNIX. Example Just because something has 4 wheels and an engine(s) does not mean it is a car. Unix in this sence refers to AT&T System V Based operating systems which the Linux kernel shares no code with. 2)Windows can also be made POSIX compliant, does that mean that Windows is UNIX? Should SCO then be able to say that Novell also owes them for when it sold Windows? (A few years ago :-))
3)Stallman did not create Linux, he created the GNU utilities it uses, however Linux refers to the Kernel developed and written by Linus Torvalds.
4)SCO has stated their problem is with the Linux Kernel, not other software included in the Linux Distributions.
Kosh: "Understanding is a 3 edged sword, your side, their side, the Truth."
A derailer is used on a multi-gear/multi-speed bicycle on the rear wheel. It is attached to the frame and moves the chain to the different gears when the rider twists the gear level on the handle bars.f f=1&safe=off&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla:en-U S:official&q=derailleur&spell=1&sa=N&tab=wi
Try:
http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&hs=WBu&c2co
or
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derailleur
Architectural plans are like computer source code with a couple of differences: You only compile once.
IBM could spin off a licensing company which could buy SCOX and, seeing it was out of profit-making opportunities, hang a 'gone fishing - back never' sign on the door.
Whatever assets of SCO's that anybody actually wants can be bought from a bankruptcy court.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
getting back the copyrights to the historic unix source would not make linux an official unix. to do that linux would have to be passed by the open group like all other official unicies are.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
> What amazes me is that the Judge in this case has
> never even once asked "can you show me any
> evidence that you actually own any of this
> intellectual property". You would think that would
> be the first thing to get settled no?
This case (SCO vs. Novell) is essentially
starting. In the run-up, the judge has already
stated twice that he does not think the copyrights
transferred (from Novell to SCO). SCO fully
disagreed. Now, without admitting anything, they
are requesting the judge to force Novell to assign
the copyrights to SCO. So the copyrights didn't
transfer, did they?
The case you are probably thinking of, SCO vs.
IBM, is about contractual violations. And the
first thing to get settled would never be about
"intellectual property". This is an obfuscatory
term much cherished by SCO and journos. If you
want to grasp what is going on, do not babble
about intellectual property, rather specify
patents, copyrights, trademarks, business secrets.
I suggest loser pays min(Plaintiff fees, Defendant fees).
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Novell contracted with SCO to manage the UNIX licensing, but did not transfer the ownership of the Copyrights.
The part of the agreement that said Novell kept the copyrights and other IP said something to the effect that the IP rights were not transferred EXCEPT as necessary for SCO/Caldera/whatever to enforce their rights under the contract. (The actual text was posted on (or linked from) groklaw a while back but I can't find it just now. If anybody knows a URL for it, or has the paragraph in question, please followup with it.)
As I read it, SCO counted on that exception to give them the Unix copyrights, or enough of them to back their anti-linux suits. Novell thought they still owned the copyrights, and said so. So now SCO is suing Novell for failing to perform on their contract by transfering enough copyrights to support their suits.
It's easy to see how the SCO execs could think they're in the right - especially back when they started. Now they have a tiger by the tail. At this point they HAVE to continue trying to enforce their interpretation, because the company (and their careers) will collapse if they give up. They'll be better off even if they lose.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Actually in the server market place Linux is eating in low and midrange Unix sales in a big. It's slowed the growth of Windows mainly due to people migrating from Unix to Linux instead of to Windows. (For a lot of Unix shops the power and price of commodity PC hardware is driving the migration not the OS.) The high end server market is where companies like IBM are still showing strong sales. SCO's bread and butter is the low, and mid-end market. Plus no company in their right mind is licencing Unix any more. They are using Linux, xBSD, or windows it's cheaper and easier. Add to that SCO's unix is getting pretty stale when people think Unix they think Solaris, AIX, and the like. These Unix OSes have been almost completely rewritten over the years.
Linux is directly competing with SCO's products, and pretty much kicking SCO's ass. The real question in the sco vs novell contract dispute is does SuSE~=Unix business.
IANALBIPOOGL (I am not a Lawyer, but I play one on GrokLaw.)
Your friend is VERY lucky! He could well have been done for assault and if he'd hurt the feller, battery too or aggravated assault. If the shoplifter was a kid or a first-timer then he'd be off with a warning or a suspended sentence while your friend could be in jail.
Furthermore. there is an increasing trend for perps who get hurt during a job (e.g. falling down stairs) to sue the owner of the premises - and win!
Otherwise sane systems which work fine in other countries would flop here...You don't understand how crazy our legal system is. It would become a tactical blackmail threat here..."Settle or we'll hire a zillion lawyers and make you pay all the legal costs!" Just look at how long the SCO case has drawn on, and they haven't put forth a single argument of merit yet.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
If you think about it's kinda of funny. Amoung other things SCO is suing over:
1)Slander of Title (Claiming Novell maliously claimed copyrights that SCO owned.)
2)That Novell failed to transfer copyrights per the APA.
3)That Novell is violating SCO's copyrights distributing Suse Linux. (Mainly by distributing code written by IBM.)
So if Novell failed to transfer copyrights per #2. How can they claim #1. Even more amusing how can they claim copyrights on code IBM wrote (in some cases has patents), and features that their version of Unix lacks. Not only that I don't see in the contract any where that would prevent Novell from asking for payment for transferring copyrights.
IANALBIPOOGL (I am not a Lawyer, but I play one on GrokLaw.)
Didn't these fuckwits SCO tried to claim that the GNU Public Licence was unconstitutional because it allegedly promotes communism? It's a good thing the judge threw that out.
Amendment 2 says that copyrights are excluded, "except for the copyrights and trademarks owned by Novell as of the date of the Agreement required for SCO to exercise its rights with respect to the acquisition of UNIX and UnixWare technologies."
SCO is hoping to use this vague wording to override the clear wording of the original contract. They're claiming that the conditional clause has been met and that all the copyrights should be transferred. Novell is going to argue that SCO doesn't need the copyright to exercise their rights "with respect to the acquisition of UNIX and UnixWare technologies".
What does it mean to "own" a technology? Does that not include the right to keep others from using it without entering agreements and paying to do so? Is that not EXACTLY what the copyright is, when it comes to cloning the code itself or making modified versions of it?
It's easy to see how SCO executives could read that line as giving them the copyrights necessary to support their suits. It's also easy to see how they could read the addition of that wording to the contract by the amendment to be EXACTLY clarifying this issue in their favor.
If you'd just paid Novell a few million to get them to sign such a contract "selling you the Unix business", or taken a high corporate office in a company that had done so, wouldn't YOU think that's what it meant?
Think about it: There's no reason for the words to be there unless they transfer SOME copyrights and trademarks. The only thing that's vuage is WHICH ones they transfer. If SCO is in a suit claiming it owns "UNIX technology" and somebody else is improperly using it without permission or payment, doesn't it imply that the copyrights to whatever parts they're claiming infringement on are "required for SCO to exercise its rights" by winning the suit?
IMHO somebody at Novell slipped up if they signed that amendment believing it didn't transfer copyrights - at least those necessary to support their suits - to SCO. (If they honestly believed that, a lot may depend on which side proposed the wording.)
Also IMHO, just to be safe, the maintainers of linux - and other open software - should be prepared for the courts to accept SCO's arguments on the copyright ownership issue and should stay squeaky-clean by avoiding inclusion of any code that was in UNIX prior to 9/19/1995 (or even 10/18/1966) or derived from such code, unless they can trace it to something that was clearly incorporated into UNIX from some other source or released publically some other way (such as the BSD settlement).
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
How about "loser pays", but the amount is limited to the amount the loser spent. If you lose, it will cost only as much as you spent.
You mean twice what the loser spent, right? Because loser anyway pays for his own lawyer. Your wording is kinda unclear.
The company started as S.u.S.U. Then was renamed SuSE and before Novell took over the name changed to SUSE. So Novell never owned SuSE. They owned SuSE.
Feedback from Novell after asking for the correct spelling due to some inconsistancies on the website:
Thanks for your message. The correct spelling is SUSE. We will get this updated.
Thanks,
Camille Hill
Novell Electronic Marketing Team
Hope that clears things up a bit.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Spelling:
Looser -> Loser (Unless you actually mean that the person who is less tight pays. I'm not sure how you would determine that.)
goy -> guy (I am assuming you don't actually mean goy, because sometimes Jewish people go to court too)
Ostralia -> Australia (While we may pronounce it "Ostralia", we actually spell it Australia)
mischife -> mischief (I love Olde Englishe too, but we do have a dictionary now)
meh
Are they even a business? It seems like this lawsuit has dragged on since the day I was born (1969). Yet, I never recall seeing an advertisement for an SCO product, nor seeing an SCO product on the shelf to buy, nor seeing anything with an SCO trademark used at any of the businesses I ever worked at. Where does the money come from for the lawyers? Don't these guys, y'know, WORK?
Umm...you're full of shit. Recent legal changes within the English (and Welsh) legal system following recommendation from the Law Lords have changed the system to allow 'reasonable force' up to and including manslaughter in extremis to prevent crime from occurring on your property.
-Nano.
Law is like programming. It requires nailing down all sorts of intricate little details, getting the syntax just right, and tweaking the niggly bits until everyone is satisfied.
As long as anything has two interpretations, you can bet that two sides on a dispute will argue about which interpretation is correct.
The main difference between programming and law is that programmers argue with a machine that can't change it's mind about the rules. There is no such predictable arbitrator for law.
Programmers remove bad code -- the law just keeps adding to the mudball without ever actually deleting the cruft. Imagine "debugging" a system when someone can bring up a (fixed) bug (case) from 10-15 years ago and actually have the courts/system accept the old bug as relevent to the current implementation...
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
"goy -> guy (I am assuming you don't actually mean goy, because sometimes Jewish people go to court too)"
Sometimes?
get a group of linux purists together and take over SCO via stock buyout, with no one buying enough to raise the interest of the SEC, but gaining enough ownership overall to
Except that doing so provides a financial incentive for other companies to go after Linux in the hopes that you'll do the same thing yet again.
This is one of those ideals that is hard, but must be held firmly to... like not bargaining with terrorists. As soon as you start doing it, you end up encouraging more of the same.
It might solve a short-term problem, but it will cause an even greater long term problem.
Life is too short to proofread.
Imagine this scenario.
You develope a new life saving device that electricaly stimulates muscles to take over breathing and heart functions that is sold at a resonable profit. Company X aserts a patten claim because they pattened a way of artificialy pumping blood and oxygen into a living creature when thier own facilities won't allow (CPR). CompanyX horasses you for years and smears your good name with your customer base. Finaly you decide to sue to cleasr the issue up.
You lawer makes a mistake on one of the forms/gets hit by a bus/is on the payroll of companyX/anyhtign out of your control and doesn't file the paperwork corectly or timely, you don't get a judgement against you but the case was dismised.
Effectivly you lost so you would now have to pay the companyX'a fees. Even though thier claim is frivilous.
"Loser pays" systems don't add any safeguards we don't already have. What needs to be odne is the proccess simplified so alot of the costs are pulled out. It apears that today, the idea of winning in court is whoever can bend enough of the legalities to fit thier needs. The art of right and wrong doesn't seem to come into play anymore. It is who has the most money, can convince someone thier worthy of a judgment, companyX is evil and should pay even if thier inocent, or who can manuuver the legal system the best.
Novell will be exhibiting and presenting at SCALE 4x. For a free exhibit hall pass use the promo code "free". Otherwise for 30% off use newsp when registering for a full access pass.
I'm reminded by the quotation
Unfortunately it's a quotation of Dan Qualyes but I guess even a blind hen... :-)
Stefan Axelsson
En reply to: get a group of linux purists together and take over SCO via stock buyout, with no one buying enough to raise the interest of the SEC, but gaining enough ownership overall to
Except that doing so provides a financial incentive for other companies to go after Linux in the hopes that you'll do the same thing yet again.
Unless you keep performing the hostile stock takeovers, and releasing all their IP to F/OSS while shutting down the company. It would send quite a message. Either all or none.
I would imagine there would be quite a nice group who would like to take over Microsoft in such a manner. If it were possible. (Balmer and Gates just hold too many shares.)
But it would certainly get rid of shell companies like SCO that do the legal work for them and make it a lot harder.
Otherwise, agreed.
Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't goin' away. - Elvis Presley (source: imdb.com)
Unless you keep performing the hostile stock takeovers, and releasing all their IP to F/OSS while shutting down the company. It would send quite a message.
Yes the message would be that you can make money.
Stock isn't free, and buying enough to win control of a company is going to raise the price.
What might work is buying enough stock in a company to file a minority shareholder lawsuit. Seems like you'd have a pretty good case that SCO is ignoring their responsibility to the shareholders in order to wage an all out war on Linux.
Life is too short to proofread.
Just to clarify for all those who ask about how much the luser pays.
the rates are set in advance according to a formula which includes, experience of lawyer (years at the bar) type of case and court level. I.e. Cheaper at RM and more money at Supream or Circuit.
When the desision is dificult in the actual case, That's when they turn down the legal fees claim.
The US system is broken. I'm not sure exactly how but you have more frivulos lawsuites than comonwealth contries and people tend to get paid off dispite "contributery negligence". I'e. If you were not invited onto my premises then your broken leg is not my concern.
--= Isn't it surprising how badly I spell ?