New Caldera Promised

An anonymous reader writes "SCO has announced their plans to release a new version of Caldera Linux by the end of the year. From the announcement: 'To provide extensive reliability and performance features, the Linux Kernel 2.5 codebase has been merged with recently developed additions to SCO's world leading UNIX core operating system. Already contained code owned by SCO is still included benefiting the stability and overall experience opposed to recent Linux kernel releases.' The question is, is anyone listening?"

Comments

Linux Kernel 2.5 codebase

[Iphtashu Fitz]

The current linux kernel is version 2.6.x. IIRC, the 2.5 branch was a development branch. Why would anybody want to use a linux distro based on an old developers version of the kernel?

Hmm....

[fuzzyfozzie]

caldera
n : a large crater caused by the violent explosion of a volcano that collapses into a depression
It somehow just seems so fitting...

That's quite silly

[mcc]

In some alternate universe where SCO had a case, they perhaps might wind up with copyright ownership of some small part of the linux kernel. But that wouldn't mean they own linux. SCO would own part of the Linux kernel, and all the other parts of the Linux kernel would be owned by a wide variety of other persons who wrote those parts of the kernel. SCO could wind up with ownership of part of the kernel, and say "all you other people, you don't have the right to distribute what we own". But then this raises the question of why SCO has the right to distribute Linux-- they don't, except under the terms of the GPL. And the GPL says that if you can't allow free relicensing and free use of a piece of GPLed software, you aren't allowed to distribtue it at all.

In other words if SCO had valid claims to copyright over part of the Linux kernel, and denied anyone the right to distribute that part of the Linux kernel except under propreitary terms, it would be illegal for ANYONE, INCLUDING SCO, to distribute Linux. But if SCO distributed even one copy of Linux anyway, then they'd lose the ability to deny anyone the rights to distribute Linux, because the GPL says that anyone SCO distributes to automatically has the right to redistribute the copy of Linux they got from SCO...

I wonder if SCO, when they distribute these new copies of Linux, is including and adhering to the requirements of the GPL. If not they're opening a floodgate of lawsuits from all the people who own copyrights to parts of Linux and have only granted ability to use them under the GPL. Either way just this press release might open up for some nasty slander of title lawsuits or at least extensions of the Lanham Act cases already filed against them by Redhat etc...

This is interesting, SCO has made a major misstep here. The only way they can keep this latest action from destroying them is if they know that they'll be bankrupt by the time anyone has the time to respond to it...

Re:Really?

[kfg]

. . .the pressrelease claims the lawsuit is nearing the end and they probably know they will lose.

I particularly like this following bit:

"SCO is eager to be the only future provider of Linux Systems for the enterprise market."

I'll just bet they are.

I really like their disclaimer where they, if they so choose, say it's all the communitys fault if they fail with their "new" endeavour.

Ah, well, but then that's a responsibilty I'm willing to shoulder:

"It's all your fault."

"Why, thank you."

KFG

Re:Question

[Aphrika]

Well, one description is here
 
A caldera is formed when a company ejects a large volume of magma, fire and crap, creating a huge void within itself. Consequently, it collapses under its own weight.
 
Oh, did I say company? I meant volcano.
 

That's because this IS A FAKE

[shaneh0]

For example:

- Remove the &id=24097 from the Querystring. The page still loads this press release. Releasedetail.cfm is nothing but a static page

- Now mess w/ the URL to generate a 404. You'll get this error:

> 404
> [...]
> because Bill Gates is a Jehovah's witness and so nothing can work on St. Swithin's day.

Not to mention the whole front page is reduced to linking to this single press release? The site has no navigation.

Re:Really?

[Helldesk Hound]

> It's a bet against all odds, but what have they got to lose?

SCO has nothing to lose.

It has already lost its reputation - and most of its cash reserves - and any chance of getting its user base back.

But aside from that, it is likely that this was a bogus press release - http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200606171 85813203 has information about it.

Practical Joke

[Ohreally_factor]

From this post at Groklaw:

Sorry, Guys And Gals!
Recently, on this site a fake anouncement of Caldera Open Linux X was found.

We thought it was obvious enough that it was fake. We had to learn it was not for all people reading it. So we took it down now. Apparently, also the DNS records are changed/deleted, so soon enough you won't get to this site using openlinux.org anyways.

We thought, it would not spread from Slashdot before we stop it (ie, this weekend). It was funny to follow people speculating and finding out about this site. Some people pointed out good reasons why this is hoax/parody, some bad or wrong reasons. Overall, we hope most people concluded it indeed was a parody.

Our submit to Slashdot concluded with "Is this real?" - sadly enough, Slashdot's editor wrote up a new text without any hints about this. We can't blame him, he maby was just in a hurry..

Nothing got hacked, it's just we got a previously used IP for this machine, so why not having some fun content on it? We apologize for any inconviences arised though! We didn't suspect it would be taken so serious. Some hints in the text proving this weren't read (talking about XML on a Server OS?), others were found but still taken serious. Please stop spreading this fake news, and if you know some sites who published it, please inform them to update their content. Thanks.

So, basically, Scuttlemonkey fucked up.