Slashdot Mirror
SCO Bankruptcy "Imminent, Inevitable"
mattaw writes "From analysis by Groklaw it seems that SCO may owe Novell nearly all the SCOSource licensing fees, and has been hiding the fact for 3 years. Imminent. Inevitable. Bankruptcy. Those are the words from Novell's lawyers. Perhaps the IBM/SCO case could close earlier than planned? Perhaps we can finally be rid of this specter once and for all?"
-GiH
But I feel bad for SCO's real employees. Like the software developers who actually worked to make a good product at one point in time.
Hopefully Novell and IBM can split the leftovers, I think it's owed to them.
You can't legislate goodness. Let each to his own destiny, by will of his freely made choices.
"Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb."
.... therefore almost nothing referenced here makes any sense to me. Someday lawyers will be forced to speak and write in NormalSpeak, preferably in English. Until such time, I am at the mercy of people like Cokie Roberts to explain these legal doings. Could /. maybe hire her to boil this down for us mortals?
.nosig
Because /. keeps posting it.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I just checked the stock ticker and SCOX has actually risen in price today! It started at about $1.15 a share and it's at $1.22 now, so while they may be in a world of trouble, Wall Street still amazingly thinks the stock has some value. I am amazed that this stock is still selling for over a dollar a share, but far be it from me to suggest that the stock market makes any sense.
I would be really disappointed if the Novell and IBM cases are finally resolved because SCO ran out of money. I would much rather see a final resolution on whether or not Linux has any sort of IP conflict with SCO. Bankruptcy skirts the issue. I would rather see a clean bill of health. Perhaps Microsoft now wants SCO to go bankrupt so that clean bill of health never comes.
I mean seriously. We've been hearing variations of the "OMG SCO is teh doomed!" now for so long my eyes just glaze over when I see another one.
Call me when Darl is in jail or flees the country.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
After all this time, money spent by IBM defending/pursuing, and all the defining issues raised, I don't want SCO dying before a precedent verdict is set. The best justice will be for SCO to spend itself bankrupt pursuing this frivolous lawsuit, its frivolous lawyers getting stiffed and wasting more time as creditors in bankruptcy court, and Linux proven free of the FUD SCO has produced as its flagship product. Either way, watching the speculators betting on SCO's stock rising on blackmail is fun, but satisfaction lies in proving the facts about how Linux is free.
--
make install -not war
"The Santa Cruz Operation" always sounded more like the name for a wise-guy scam than something you would name your company.
These. Are. Not. Sentences.
Basically, SCO has to pay Novell royalties whenever they license the Unix System V code, it's part of the original contract.
Novell is basically saying that SCO hasn't given them all the royalties SCO owes them.
"Perhaps we can finally be rid of this specter once and for all?"
Shouldn't it be "sphincter"?
SCO has been acting as if they had bought some sort of IP rights to SysV UNIX from Novell, and sold licenses based on those rights to Sun and Microsoft ("SVRX licenses").
Novell is now pointing at the actual text of the contract, which says that all SCO acquired was the right to act as an agent of Novell - basically, they can sell licenses in Novell's place, then hand over all the money to Novell. After that, Novell will return them 5% of the money as an agent fee.
It all seems pretty undisputable, from following Groklaw. As Novell claims SCO did its job badly so they won't even have to give them the 5% back, they're basically claiming that those cash infusions from Microsoft and Sun belong to Novell. And it's asking the judge to make haste, since this is simply their money, SCO is wasting it, and they'll soon be bankrupt.
I believe posters are recognized by their sig. So I made one.
SCO wanted to be bought by IBM. That would be a "good thing" for SCO. Their stock jumps and their executives all cash out more options.
IBM should crush SCO in court and be awarded whatever is left of the company as compensation.
If IBM gives up any money to SCO or SCO executives, IBM has lost and will be sued again over this same kind of crap.
- Didn't understand what they bought from Santa Cruz (i.e. they thought they "owned" Unix, when they really didn't).
- Didn't read the Santa Cruz - Novell APA, in which case they are morons for not reading the fine print in a multi-million dollar deal.
- Understood the APA, but were greedy/crooked enough to try to get away with 'converting' Novell's royalties.
After Novell smacks down SCO/Caldera into bankruptcy, I would bet to see a lawsuit from Caldera's investors against Sun (now owners of the old Tarantella/Santa Cruz) claiming that Tarantella/Santa Cruz mislead them and misrepresented the nature of what they were buying when Caldera bought the Unix assets.Alas, it's almost 100% certain that Darl will parlay this experience in the limelight into a cushy job at some other company when SCO's gone. Things are so screwed up...
I personally think Darl should get jail time. I consider him no better than Lay or Skilling.
My turnips listen for the soft cry of your love
SCO's quarterly financial reports say different. They state about $2 million in research and development costs for the last reported quarter. If we assume that to be mostly salaries, then that's about 50 developers. SCO also makes software releases regularly containing many new feature. And now, a moment of silence in mourning over SCO's imminent demise ...
that's long enough.
(EOM)
my pet machine
- Novell owns the copyrights and not SCO.
- SCO needs to give Novell a full accounting of unreported money it owes Novell for SVRX licenses.
- Novell wants to court to order SCO to comply with their contract, which gives all the royalties from SVRX to Novell.
- Novell has the right to waive SCO's claims on UNIX code. Including those against IBM.
- Novell wants the court to issue a "declaratory judgment" that Novell has the right to audit SCO's performance to make sure that it doesn't take any more of Novell's money.
- SCO needs to put all the money it "converted" (i.e., "stole") from those licenses into a constructive trust. (This is the one they're fussing about now. Sun and Microsoft gave SCO a bucket of cash to carry on the lawsuit against Linux under cover of a UNIX license. But SCO is supposed to give UNIX license money to Novell.)
- Number seven repeats number six and asks for the trust again. Eh, lawyers. Go figure.
- Number eight asks for the trust again, but adds punitive damages for swiping the money in the first place. Since SCO has already spent most of the cash, this is pretty much just adding insult to injury.
- Finally, Novell wants a complete accounting of all SVRX agreements or "other agreements relating to royalty bearing products." That's because SCO was claiming that the Sun and Microsoft agreements weren't "real" SVRX agreements, so SCO didn't owe Novell any money. Novell wants an accounting to make sure SCO isn't hiding any more ill-gotten gains.
So, yeah, the cash is a big deal and it's going to bankrupt SCO. Couldn't happen to a more deserving bunch of fellas. But read number four again. If Novell has it's way, the IBM case is gone too because SCO never had the right to sue in the first place.Of course, there are always IBM's counterclaims, but it's unlikely there will be anything left after Novell is done.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
Please have a look at their services too... looks fantastic.
the more miserable you are now, the funnier the story will be later
You should go through the list and add up the costs. It's not that great. For example, it's hard to imagine having more than one manager and one secretary per 10 developers. Hardware is dirt cheap (a few thousand per year at most). Electricity and office space likewise, at least compared to a developer's salary. Health insurance is a serious expense, but still only a fraction of the cost.
And if SCO is paying $1.5 million for coffee, the management should be fired tomorrow. A dollar or two per day per employee, that's it.
Trust me, $8 million per year buys a lot more than 10 developers.
I think. Therefore, I am not a stock broker.
If fate makes you a motorcycle, you become a motorcycle.
- Novell and SCO signed a countract where "certain rights" to UNIX (specifically System V, Release X - SVRX for short) were transferred to SCO.
- In exchange, SCO would give the royalties for SVRX (minus a 5% handling fee) to Novell.
- Novell claims that the "rights" transferred to SCO do not include the copyrights and that Novell still owns those copyrights. SCO claims that the contract does transfer the copyrights.
- SCO is suing IBM claiming that IBM's contributions to Linux infringe SCO's copyrights in UNIX.
- Since suing IBM for infringing SCO's copyrights doesn't make any sense if SCO doesn't even own those copyrights, SCO had to sue Novell as well for "slander of title" (i.e., claiming you own something you don't).
- Microsoft and Sun gave SCO a ton of cash, theoretically for UNIX licenses, but those with a suspicious turn of mind think it was to fund the anti-Linux lawsuit.
What's happened now is that Novell has gone to the court and said that, no matter who owns the copyrights, SCO owes us 95% of the SVRX royalties. But SCO didn't give us 95% of the money that Sun and Microsoft gave them. Worse still, SCO is spending money like water on the IBM suit. They're asking the court to set up a "constructive trust" to prevent SCO from spending any more of Novell's money. SCO is trying to tell the court that those deals weren't "really" SVRX licenses but something else. Unfortunately the documents available to the public have been so heavily editted that there's no way to tell what the Sun and Microsoft agreements actually say.It's kind of an end run around the basic issue (who owns the copyrights) but -- if the court finds in Novell's favor -- it will effectively bankrupt SCO and (possibly) bring this ridiculous lawsuit mercifully to an end. For those of us with with suspicious minds, it also has the feel of poetic justice in that the money Microsoft and Sun spent to kill Linux winds up going to a Linux distributor (Novell owns SUSE) to defend a major Linux contributor (IBM).
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
The difference is that the internal complexities of other professions rarely bite the common man in the ass the way the internal complexities of law do. The language of law should be open and accessible to all but the most mentally deficient. That is not as important with even the medical, electrical, plumbing or mechanic's professions.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Don't we already have that, the US Congress?
A witty saying proves nothing. Voltaire (1694-1778)
When the SCO fiasco is all wrapped up here's a number I'd like to see: How much money did all the lawyers involved earn apiece? There are hundreds involved, to be sure, but the Top Ten would be enough. Then I want to contemplate whether the fucked up Copyright laws in the U.S. make it all worthwhile. SCO's complaint was worthless from day 1 and it should have taken no more than 6 months to get it laughed out of court.
Ummmm...I'm the one who submits the vast majority of SCO news lately to Slashdot, and I didn't even bother submitting this. Novell has been saying this, either word for word or using different words, since they filed their counterclaims in July 2005. Novell said this directly in their motion for summary judgment a month or 2 ago. Novell is now just repeating itself in a second filing on the same motion (reply memorandum). I never thought I would tag something on Slashdot as slownewsday on the same day as Macworld....
Maybe we could hold a fund raiser and hire Hans Reiser.
Keep in mind that nobody was much interested in UNIX by this point. The original deal was between the original Santa Cruz Operation and Novell because Novell wanted out of the UNIX biz while Santa Cruz wanted some stuff so they could do a joint project with IBM. That project didn't pan out, so they renamed themselves Tarentella and sold the UNIX business to Caldera. Novell didn't much care who owned the business as long as they got their checks, which both Santa Cruz and Caldera sent them as per the contract.
Caldera didn't want the UNIX business either. They were a Linux business and thought they could convert SCO's UNIX distribution network to selling Linux instead. That didn't work out either; apparently the UNIX resellers didn't want to switch to Linux and Caldera was making more selling UNIX than distributing Linux. So they ditched Linux (and their CEO) and switched to concentrating on UNIX and changed their name to SCO for the name recognition.
But there was no scam -- at least with the UNIX royalties -- until the whole Linux shakedown started. Santa Cruz and Caldera sent Novell the checks and Novell pocketed the money. The Linux shakedown was just supposed to get IBM to buy them out, in which case it would have stayed business as usual. Things didn't hit the fan until after SCO tried to up the ante by threatening to sue Linux users over UNIX rights. And even then it took a while.
I'd have loved to have been in the Novell staff meeting when someone (I've always pictured a balding accountant with a slight paunch) looked up from his notes and said, "Hey, isn't SCO supposed to be giving most of the UNIX money to us?"
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
Then there are the current shareholders or, as they are called on the financial boards, the bagholders. They bought the stock before anybody notice the emperor was naked. The big players are in an awkward position. If they start to sell their large holdings in bulk it will create a run on the market as everyone tries to get out. They might as well hold on to them as not. Maybe a miracle will bail them out as they eye each other nervously hoping nobody else makes the first move.
Then there are the short sellers. These happy souls borrowed some shares and sold them off with a promise to buy them back later and return them. Short-selling can be risky because the stock might skyrocket and leave you stuck with a huge bill. Or there might be a "short squeeze" when a bunch of short sellers are forced to redeem their shares at whatever the current market rate might be, causing an artificial spike in price. But neither of these two occurrences have happened with SCO so they're just grinning and cheering for a bankruptcy. In which case they never have to pay back that loan. SCO is currently the most heavily shorted stock on the market.
===== Murphy's Law is recursive. =====
But would it run Linux?
Doesn't matter. itsatrap. or fud. or notfud. or whatever.
110100 1101000 1101000 1100110 0 1101111 1101000 1100011 1
SWM seeks new sig for a brief fling
In religious texts they have tried to tell stories, such as the Good Samaritan, which went through great lengths to make the reader actually experience the associated emotions and understand the concepts on an emotional and ethical level, yet these texts have been the subject of even fiercer debate than Clinton's infamous questioning of the definition of "sex".
In short, I'd say it's obvious that our current legal language is imprecise and not well-defined. If the supreme court can't unanimously agree on interpretations nobody else can be expected to.
There is hope that current and future research into neurolinguistics will allow us to fully understand exactly how language is comprehended by different people, and ultimately develop a system of communication that eliminates the possibility of misinterpretation and misunderstanding. If we manage to accomplish this, the supposed redeeming value of modern legalese will finally become a reality. Until then, we'll have people who genuinely disagree, people encountering new situations that weren't considered when the laws were originally conceived, and people who know damned well they're wrong but know they can win an argument without being right.
SWM seeks new sig for a brief fling