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Judge Rules That IBM Did Not Destroy Evidence
UnknowingFool writes "From the latest in the SCO saga, Judge Wells ruled today that IBM did not destroy evidence as SCO claims. During discovery, SCO claims it found an IBM executive memo that ordered its programmers to delete source code, and so it filed a motion to prevent IBM from destroying more evidence. The actuality of the memo was less nefarious. An IBM executive wanted to ensure that the Linux developers were sandboxed from AIX/Dynix. So he ordered them to remove local copies of any AIX code from their workstations so that there would not be a hint of taint. The source code still existed in CVMC and was not touched. Since the source code was still in CMVC, Judge Wells ruled IBM did not destroy it. Incredulously, SCO's Mark James requested that IBM tell SCO how to obtain the information. IBM's Todd Shaughnessy responded that all during discovery (when IBM gave SCO a server with their CMVC database) SCO never once said that they were unable to find that information from CMVC. Judge Wells asked IBM to help SCO out in any way he could."
Pwned!
Could anything happen at this point that even might help SCO? I really hope we get to move to the summary executions^Hjudgment phase here pretty soon...
But this is slashdot. A slashdoter who didn't build his own computer is like a Jedi who didn't build his own lightsaber!
C'mon, I want a do-over. And next time, I think IBM should have a handicap to keep it fair!
This is great news for Linux, but is there even an end in sight for this case? I know if its not done right it could unleash years of appeals as well. Any Lawyers in the house have any idea when this case will wrap up?
... Which way did they come in?
SCO had the memo that said the code was on the CMVC server. They were handed the CMVC server, and apparantly never looked or verified the contents of the memo before claiming it as evidence of deleted code. SCO was trying to pass yet another one over on the Judge, this is painfully idiotic.
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
I think Judge Wells sees what is going on and is giving SCO pretty much whatever they want, just to make sure they've got no grounds to appeal when he slaps them down (hopefully soon). Giving them all the rope they want to hang themselves with, as it were. Let's hope it works.
Fill in your four or five-letter word of wisdom here _ _ _ _ _.
From the latest in the SCO saga, Judge Wells ruled today that IBM did not destroy evidence as SCO claims.
So when can we expect the SEC investigation of SCO misconduct? I mean, they're all over Apple over some minor options backdating, the least they could do is deal with the huge pump-and-dump fraud going on in plain sight.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
"Please describe the scientific nature of the 'whammy'" - Agent Scully
so that there would not be a hint of taint.
Well that's not very exciting.
Mark James was certainly not incredulous. Judge Wells probably was. Anyone who reads about it, probably is.
Incredible: hard to believe. Incredulous: a person who finds something hard to believe.
I know I shouldn't be harping on about these kinds of things, but it's a common error and maybe someone will learn something.
Nostalgia's not what it used to be.
lemesee, um first buy a $299 license to use CMVC from me....
SCO will soon be bankrupt. That moves out Darl and co. and moves in the bankruptcy trustee. The trustee will not spend a penny more on litigation. The trustee and the creditors (Novell and IBM) will agree on terms and all the issues will be settled pretty much to IBM/Novell's satisfaction.
The issues probably can't raise their head ever again, no matter who is found to own the Unix copyrights. In particular, Novell is forestalled from raising them because it has argued against them in court and there's a rule about not saying contradictory things in two different courts. So, when it's over, it's over.
I want a ruling on how often SCO fabricated evidence.
That's good, because I really don't want to go anywhere near a programmer's taint.
Expect that regardless of 'how its done' or the outcome. The attorneys make more money that way.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Unfortunately the lawyers are now running SCO "till death do us part".
It would be far better for everyone if the judge just gave a summary judgement to IBM and told SCO to just commit suicide and be done with it.
So I can download Linux legally.
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
If you draw a straight line, my nose is a few feet from one.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Perhaps Forbes is some cryptic slang for False OR BS.
There's the BIG reel of rope, hung from a pipe. Judge Wells is holding up one end of the pipe and IBM's legal team is holding up the other.
The trial isn't over yet solely because there's still some rope left on the reel. The judge and IBM want SCO to unreel it all. That way, when SCO goes to the appeal judge(s) and claims they didn't let SCO unreel it all and see if it was all the same color, they can hold up the empty reel. Then the appeals judge(s) can laugh them out of the courtroom, rather than winding all the rope back on the reel and sending them back to Judge Wells' court to do it over. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
OK, law school teaches that there are two sides to everything and that you should be able to switch to arguing the other side before the professor calls on the next student. There wouldn't be trials if the facts were obvious, you have to hear both sides in detail, etc.
That said, there is a difference between vigorous advocacy and pig-headed dishonesty.
The question for professionals out there is, what does an attorney or a firm need to do in order to get sanctioned?
A followup question would be, if any of us ever winds up in court, can the attorney(s) on the other side get away with acting like the ones for SCO have?
Of course I realize that the answer is "it depends". What does it depend on, and where do typical judges draw the line?
I wish a judge would rule that SCO is a whining nuisance that should dry up and blow away. But that's just me. IANASCOfan
So when can we expect the SEC investigation of SCO misconduct?
SCO's crap, while it's obvious to us that it's a shakedown-gone-wrong turned pump-n-dump scheme, proving that is another matter. Put another way - what would the SEC hit them *for*, and what would the proof be? And could they prove fraud as opposed to incompetence?
While SCO has plausible deniability for the claims in court, SCO executives mad a lot of public statements (such as about finding numbers of lines of infringing code) that would tend to inflate their stock price, were demonstrably false, that that the SCO executives in question either knew were false, or should have known, had they done their due diligence before uttering them. There ought to be plenty of meat there.
I'd expect that the SEC and the shareholders are holding off pending the resolution of the suit. After that, if there's anything worth going after and/or anyone left standing on the SCO side, you might see some action.
Some SCO executives ended up with money in their pockets. Some shareholders ended up losing bundles. Don't be surprised if, once SCO v. IBM is over there's another one, leveling anything left of SCO and turning the execs into imprisoned paupers.
Meanwhile, if the banking regulators are on the ball, they'll be watching the assets of the people in question, to see if they start moving into out-of-country money-cleaning-and-storage operations. B-)
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Somebody just shoot the SCO folks in the face. At this point, the karma comes out about even.
Judge Wells asked IBM to help SCO out in any way he could."
How should we address "him"?
Mister?
Doctor?
Sir?
Lord?
Savior?
Hey, Meester?
What?
Cause it keep them buzy with a hopeless case, instead of them doing something bad to someone who can't suffer it.
I don't care if dragging this trial out is costing anyone a dime at this point, I'm more than happy to chip in to keep up such entertainment. This would make a great Thursday night sitcom or something; in fact, I'm going to go make some popcorn and come back and search Slash for 'SCO'. No TV tonight!
Goddamit, I want the 4.78 seconds that I spent trying to decipher this gibberish back buddy.
"You can't fight in here, this is the war room!"
Anyone care to guess when this will FINALLY be over?
Where will the party be held?
Could anything happen at this point that even might help SCO? It already happened, but SCO avoids. There is a new large market segment for system software maker and no competitors yet. Neither MS nor IBM, even Linux community does not guess ;-)
I tried to engage SCO to collaborate, but the company does not want to listen.
If they prefer to suicide, then ... good luck !
Has anyone noticed that there are some people getting really rich off of this? It's Darl and his cronnies that are making a fortune on this, and it's always been about this. It's like Vapourware...it's a great idea, but after millions of dollars, and nothing transpires it's just the top people who have made any money. They're going to run the company into the ground, and all of the investors will lose all of their money. Don't kid yourself, Darl and his buddies make sure that they are paid first before they give out any money for this court debacle that they know they will lose. Of course, that's just my 2 cents worth;-)
Freshman SCO: Uh, Professor, could I have an extension? I tried to download the assignment, but it said the file wasn't there for some weird reason.
Professor Wells: *sigh* Okay, fine. One extension, but don't make a habit of this.
Freshman SCO: Sure, sure. Thanks a lot. Oh, by the way, what server is the assignment on?
Next March 7th with four years into this absurd scam, and scox has not even proven that they own the code to begin with. In fact, all evidence indicates that scox does not own the code.
It would be like me putting my own toll-booth on the Brooklyn Bridge, and suing New York City because I don't like what they've done to my property aka "Central Park."
Yet, all these federal judges are taking scox's ridiculous claims seriously. And those judges are punishing ibm, novell, redhat, and the entire foss community; all based on nothing but the purely baseless accusations of known liars. Absolutely no credible evidence has been presented, in spite of the fact that the courts have demanded such evidence many times.
And still, the Lindon kangaroo courts allow scox to play their games.
Best $50M msft ever spent.
"Judge Wells asked IBM to help SCO out in any way he could."
Maybe this is why I'll never go to law school, but I'd probably respond to that at that point by placing a loaded gun on the table and tell them "Kill yourself. Now."
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
And Oolon Colluphid's next book:
Well, That About Wraps It Up For SCO
Incredulously, SCO's Mark James requested that IBM tell SCO how to obtain the information.
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
KeS
The counterclaims will be settled out of court with the trustee. IBM will get any declarations it needs.
The counterclaim we all care the most about is number ten that says that Linux does not infringe any Unix copyrights. They will find a way to remove all doubt about that one forever.
Actually, in terms of the FUD battle, IBM won a long time ago. Most of the people I talk to are astounded to hear that the case is still going on. Their decisions about using Linux are entirely unclouded by this case.
The only reason the lawyers and SCO are still fighting so hard is to make it look like they thought they had a real case. This case has been frivolous from the beginning. The lawyers are in danger of disbarment for misusing the legal system. Darl is in danger of some jail time for Lanham act violations among other things.
So, IBM will get everything it needs except, as you point out, its legal fees.
It's incredulous, but the poster used the word right:
Dear Sir,
I am sorry to inform you that the debt owed to you, a total of
0,02$,
cannot be payed.
This is due to some unforseen circumstances beyond our control: it turned out that other claims have been judged higher priority*.
Kind regards,
trustee SCO.
* I am sure you can understand that we had to pay the gentlemen also known as 'Darl' first.
...a CMVC licence....
"SCOdot not really news to nobody that cares"
This is the fourth story about SCO in less than two weeks I think. I mean we get it SCO sucks IBM is going to win. I know I can't be alone on this.
Don't you hate glorious self-promotion? Visit my Blog
But I thought SCO owned UNIX...
I guess I shouldn't be shocked by this. Yet another example of the courts siding with a big corporation against the little guy. Here SCO has clear evidence that IBM destroyed evidance and the Judge ignores it! I'm truely ashamed to live in a country run by corporations.
So Pepsi decides noone is allowed on the premises with a Coke can.
Then Coke accuses Pepsi of removing evidence, altho Pepsi gave Coke's lawyer all it's batch samples.
the only os with that hint of taint. i can't wait till sco has the real smell of taint, as they are flushed down the sewer of mediocrity to the water treatment plant of oblivion. yea
-=] M3 Heavy industries - Download Free Game Tools
Stop hitting yourself, stop hitting yourself!
You fucking loser.