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SCO Wanted To Gag Torvalds, Moglen

Posted by kdawson on from the can't-say-that dept.

An anonymous reader passes on word of court documents filed by IBM on Friday. The documents contain a copy of a letter, dated 2004, from SCO to IBM's lawyers stating that they tried to keep Linus Torvalds from making disparaging public statements about SCO, speculating erroneously that IBM was the principal funder of OSDL, where Torvalds worked at the time. Quoting: "The company also tried to silence Eben Moglen, the Columbia University professor who, until this month, was a director of the Free Software Foundation, and Eric Raymond, a controversial open-source advocate, saying they claimed to be IBM consultants."

23 of 168 comments (clear)

  1. Coincidence? by plover · · Score: 5, Funny
    So Darl wanted to silence Eric Raymond?

    Just goes to prove that nobody is 100% evil.

    --
    John
    1. Re:Coincidence? by davmoo · · Score: 4, Funny

      Trying to silence ESR? Isn't that like the proverbial unstopable rock hitting the unmoveable object? Silencing ESR would require the violation of at least 7 laws of physics :-)

      --
      I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
    2. Re:Coincidence? by mpe · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Trying to silence ESR? Isn't that like the proverbial unstopable rock hitting the unmoveable object? Silencing ESR would require the violation of at least 7 laws of physics :-)

      A pity SCO can't manage to gag themselves. That would keep just about everyone happy!

    3. Re:Coincidence? by It+doesn't+come+easy · · Score: 3, Funny

      On the contrary, SCO has been IBM's best witness...

      --
      The NSA: The only part of the US government that actually listens.
  2. As if by phalse+phace · · Score: 3, Interesting

    silencing them would make people hate/dislike SCO any less.

    1. Re:As if by networkBoy · · Score: 5, Funny

      Well, to be fair, if SCO could get ESR and RMS to sit quietly in a room together for any real length of time I would hate them a little less...

      --
      whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
  3. Alternate link to the same story by psaunders · · Score: 5, Informative

    Here.

    --
    Karma police, arrest this man. He talks in math. He buzzes like a fridge. He's like a detuned radio.
  4. No mention of PJ??? by rm69990 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Why is there no mention of them trying to gag PJ and Groklaw, considering she has covered the SCO case more than the other 3 combined and then multiplied by 100?

    http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200704281 9571717

    1. Re:No mention of PJ??? by only_human · · Score: 4, Informative
      It is mentioned in the linked article:

      SCO also sought to silence Groklaw, a website that follows cases involving open-source software.
    2. Re:No mention of PJ??? by rm69990 · · Score: 3, Funny

      Great, so the fraction of a percent of Slashdot readers who actually RTFA will know about it! :-P At least if it was in the summary the 3 or 4% of Slashdot readers who RTFS would know about it.

  5. Only 2 days late by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070429-sco- wanted-gag-order-for-linus-torvalds-groklaw-in-200 4.html

  6. SCO wanted to gag Groklaw too by only_human · · Score: 5, Interesting

    SCO Tried to Gag Groklaw in 2004

  7. Beating a Dead Horse by AchiIIe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Not sure what to tag this, maybe "beatingadeadhorse". How many more stories of SCO being {evil|stupid|malicious} do we need. The company is almost dead now, let them die alright. It'll be a history lesson for future companies.

    --
    Nature journal lied in Britannica vs Wikipedia Ask to retrac
    1. Re:Beating a Dead Horse by 0x0000 · · Score: 4, Interesting

      The company is almost dead now, let them die alright.

      Many of us have thought SCO was dead before - they aren't just Evil, they're The Undead. Regardless of what their losses are, and how many times they are rebuffed by the courts, Microsoft could still dump another couple hundred thousand on them to keep them walking - that's pocket change for Microsoft, and they may well do it just on the outside chance that they will cost someone one or two more Linux jobs.

      For my part, I won't be satisfied until the story says that the papers dissolving the corporation have been filed. Fwiw.

      --
      "The Internet is made of cats."
    2. Re:Beating a Dead Horse by mpe · · Score: 4, Funny

      Many of us have thought SCO was dead before - they aren't just Evil, they're The Undead.

      Presumably there is a headline somewhere along the lines of "SCO attemps to silence Buffy Summers"...

    3. Re:Beating a Dead Horse by gbobeck · · Score: 5, Insightful

      How many more stories of SCO being {evil|stupid|malicious} do we need.

      You must be new here.

      Ok, more seriously... IMHO, the real reason why SCO stories are covered so often here on /. is because SCO decided to mess with Linux and the GPL, thus pissing off a very large set of communities (including, but by no means limited to the Linux community, Open Source Developers...). Now, since there is a large number of people who care about the SCO case, there is a demand for articles concerning the case as well as anything related to it. Therefore, SCO stuff gets on the front page.

      The company is almost dead now, let them die alright

      (As of May 1, 2007) They aren't dead yet. Although, the dead collector will be around on Thursday...
      --
      Navicula hydraulica plena anguilarum est. Omnes castelli tuus nostri sunt. Ed elli avea del cul fatto trombetta.
  8. for a GNU dawn! for freedom! by elmartinos · · Score: 4, Funny

    What about Richard Stallman? According to this trustworthy news source he was attacked first.

    --
    Open Source Alternatives
  9. Wait.. by SQLz · · Score: 3, Funny

    SCO is accusing Linus of stealing all of their code, making crazy Iraqi information minister like comments to the press, and they tried to gag the people they are accusing from responding? SCO, please just crawl under a rock and die already.

    1. Re:Wait.. by goldstein · · Score: 5, Funny

      This is a serious insult. I'm sure that the former Iraqi Minister of Information will greatly resent being associated with SCO.

  10. Texas Law in Utah? by FFFish · · Score: 3, Funny

    Doesn't Texas Law ("Sir, he was too dumb to let live.") apply in Utah? It really shouldn't be so difficult to get rid of the SCO dipshits, ferchrissake.

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    Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
  11. Gag away by niceone · · Score: 3, Funny

    Gagging is ancient history. It's people duct taping my typing fingers I worry about.

    --
    ccalam - acoustic versions of new songs.
  12. Re:In case ol' boy doesn't show up by gbobeck · · Score: 4, Funny

    Heh. Ok, the license fee is, what, one share of SCO stock?

    Hey, if you wait long enough you may get the entire company as an added bonus after purchasing one license.
    --
    Navicula hydraulica plena anguilarum est. Omnes castelli tuus nostri sunt. Ed elli avea del cul fatto trombetta.
  13. Everyone is just copying from Groklaw by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

    Groklaw "broke" the news April 28 http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=200704281 9571717

    Since then all these "anonymous sources" just cite from PJ, without properly giving credit. The second paragraph in the groklaw article reads:

          It also wanted Linus Torvalds, Eben Moglen, and Eric Raymond to be prevented from commenting publicly about the litigation.