...SCO could buy a company valued at $10mil with 10% of SCO's total stock today. In a few months the SCO stock may well plummet back to April's levels again... in which case they will have bought a $10mil concern for the equivalent of $2mil.
Sounds like the plan AOL used to buy Time-Warner. Entirely possible, but I think most companies know to look out for this now.
Novell is certinly doing a lot better than SCO as a company, but they are still pretty despondant.
Q1 2003, Novell had about $843M in tangible assets. Yes, they are still sitting on their dragon's hoard of cash from NetWare 3. I wish my company were so despondant.
Safe from SCO does not mean safe from Novell.
I can envision scenarios where Novell uses its ownership of UNIX IP to hijack Linux, but none of them are very credible. One huge problem that Novell has had is developer support. Moving NetWare to a Linux platform will go a long way to remove that thorn. Sabotaging Linux down the road seems rather unlikely. But 5 years is two lifetimes in technology-land, so who knows?
Linux should still self-audit and remove all possible offending code and archetecture to prevent this from being a problem 5 years from now...
Linux (and the BSDs) should be doing this anyway and it should be ongoing.
Actually, subscribers may have noticed a previous Novell - SCO story in The Mysterious Future that was more standard Slashdot fare. This story was pulled before it went live. Then the story you're reading now was posted. I imaging it had something to do with Mr. Perens commentary, which is a Slashdot exclusive (I think).
These are all great points (I usually don't pimp ACs, but moderators take note!).
I think SCO's biggest mistake was showing its hand too early. SCO's "strategy" clearly involved using the UNIX source, patents, and copyrights as a blunt instrument to kill commertial Linux, and thereby inflate their UNIX products and licenses. Problem is, they didn't bother to check to see if they really had the patents and copyrights in their name (due diligence, I believe this is called).
Even if the original Novell-to-SCO agreements were to include the UNIX patents and copyrights, they were never transfered, leaving the ownership of UNIX IP open to question. If SCO had gone to Novell first and worked out the patent / copyright stuff, Novell may have just said "Oh, you're right, we'll go ahead and transfer ownership to you as per our agreement." But now that everyone knows what SCO intends to do with UNIX IP, Novell (soon to be a Linux vendor) is rather unlikely to give SCO anything without a fight.
It is probably of little (business) interest to them anyway.
Except that Novell is betting their future on Linux and OSS. Novell will be releasing NetWare 7 next year (hopefully) and they have stated that you will be able to choose the Linux or NetWare kernel at installation. Novell is working on migrating away from legacy NetWare and on to Linux for their services.
So it is indeed in Novell's business interest to ensure that:
1) Linux is not encumbered with IP issues
2) The reputation of Linux is not tarnished
...patents, and the fact they don't own any (Novell and Tarantella do I believe).
FWIW- A rep from Tarantella has come forward and said that they own no UNIX IP of any sort. But damned if I can find a link to it now. Help anyone?
That little bitty circle-R there seems to imply a copyright.
Well, in fairness, the circle-R is for registered trademark and needs to be included regardless of who owns that trademark. SCO has been better lately of attributing the UNIX trademark to The Open Group, but not before getting smacked for lack of attribution.
But there could be language in the contract that states that Novell must enforce copyright voliations. If SCO can't rely on Novell to pursue copyright infringments, then Novell may be in breach of contract. We really don't know.
Wow, that's a good point. Where's Ray Noorda in all of this? He's the guy that bought UNIX from AT&T while at Novell. I think he also sold it to SCO. Noorda's Canopy Group helped to fund Caldera (and Lineo)*. Surely he must have a pretty good handle on what SCO owns and what they don't. I wonder why he hasn't said anything either way. I guess he doesn't want to see his investment in Caldera go up in smoke, so he willing to play along with a little FUD. But many of Canopy's investments are with Linux companies, so that doesn't make sense either.
Since it's lose-lose for Canopy (and Noorda) I guess the only thing to do was to stay mum. After all, he's really only a VC now.
*Could have knocked me over with a feather to see TrollTech on Canopy's list as well...
Of course this address the "source code theft" issue. If Novell has the copyright, Novell must prosecute for copyright infringement.
After turning this over in my head a bit, I think you're right. SCO can go after IBM for breach of contract, but it would be Novell that would need to begin procedings to remove the code from Linux.
This assumes that the code in question is part of the SysV UNIX code that SCO bought from Novell. If it is something that SCO developed after the fact, it could be a different story. But since SCO has been begging Novell for the copyright to the SysV code, I can only assume that isn't the case.
That this didn't come out earlier, even as leaks, is suspicious.
Novell had several famous flame-outs when beating their chest about upcoming products. They finally put the hammer down and are now very quiet. Even as a CNE, it's difficult to find out about upcoming projects until they reach public beta status. Perhaps this culture has permeated Novell so well that they were able to keep this quiet as well?
One reason that they waited was to verify who owned what. All of those agreements happend 3 (4?) CEO's ago and most of the people who orchestrated the deal are probably long gone (on both sides).
Another is that the SCOX earnings call is today. So it's a timing thing to damage SCO's stock.
How the heck did SCO buy "Unix" without buying the copyrights?
From the SCO response: SCO® owns the contract rights to the UNIX® operating system. So it seems that SCO has the right to license the code to UNIX vendors (or other interested parties). But the patents and copyrights remain with Novell. This does make me curious about who would have a gripe about SysV code in Linux, though. I guess if SCO (and only SCO) has the rights to license SysV code, then it's SCO. It does seem to be an awkward agreement, though.
I think there are yet more layers to this madness waiting to be unpeeled.
"SCO continues to say that it owns
the UNIX System V patents, yet it must know that it does not. A simple
review of U.S. Patent Office records reveals that Novell owns those
patents.
"Importantly, and contrary to SCO's
assertions, SCO is not the owner of the UNIX copyrights. Not only
would a quick check of U.S. Copyright Office records reveal this fact,
but a review of the asset transfer agreement between Novell and SCO
confirms it."
Of course, this doesn't address the "source code theft" issues, but
hopefully this will shut SCO up about the UNIX IP issues.
If you think that ESR is "finally" getting things in gear, then you haven't seen his OSI Position Paper. The initial draft of this was released 4 days after the initial lawsuit.
Those of you who have read it awhile back may want to look again. A fair amount has changed in the past week or so.
Someday, when you're older, you'll understand that SF can be so much more than shit blowing up and latex masks. The problem is, the factory that churns this stuff out doesn't need to bother with things like a cohesive plot, quality acting, and reasonable dialog. As long as the garbage that comes out is successful, it will be more of the same. This is known as the "George Lucas theory".
FWIW, I was including ST:TOS in there as well. Has mainstream television ever seen a worse actor than William Shatner? Good lord. (And before you start, yes he was an absolute ham in his Twilight Zone episode(s?) as well. I didn't say they were all good:^).
As far as HBO goes, the other nets may have the same access to the studios, but they don't seem to be using it. While broadcast television is mired in reality-of-the-week programming (with a side-order of horrible sit-com), HBO continues to put out high-quality ongoing series (and they'd still be good if the boobs and *#&% were removed).
As an aside, I can't believe that my original comment hasn't been moderated back to the stone-age yet! I thought sure I would be branded a Troll (I'm not, I meant what I said.)
Amen. The raving fanboys on/. need to understand that SF on television has been in serious decline since the original Twilight Zone went off the air.
Babylon 5, Buffy, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Lexx. Lame plot hooks, shallow charaters, stunningly bad dialog. But at least the SFX are good!(?) I've really tried to give SF on TV a chance, but I've been disappointed time and again.
Then again, I though the first Matrix was pedestrian. Maybe my standards are too high.
Oh, and by the way, the best written shows on television are coming out of HBO. Period.
File server shoot-out? You're kidding, right?
on
What's Microsoft Up To?
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
That's so... 1996. This is one of the tactics Novell tried to use to keep corporations from replacing NetWare with NT. What Novell found out is that no one cared about file server performance. As long as the performance was "good enough" and Windows had more gizmos, they were screwed.
Of course, this is just one part of Microsoft's strategy against Linux and OSS. But I'm pretty sure that this salvo will fall on deaf ears.
No, no, no! For the love of God, keep MS locked in the basement!
They are capitalists, true believers, who are incapable of a compromise...
See? I don't think MS, IBM, and other patent-portfolio-rich companies will be any less enthusiastic about supporting software patents. Why shouldn't we (OSS supporters, or just people opposed to software patents) have a strong, unwavering, even rabid voice?
I thought Linux was a counterpoint to Minix? Linus couldn't afford a copy of Minix (or any commercial UNIX) so he wrote his own. Minix is microkernel, Linux is monolithic. Tannenbaum v Torvalds and all that.
I don't think "based on" is quite right. "Inspired by", maybe...
I can't find the reference but I heard that SCO doesn't own any patents.
When this mess first hit I poked around on the USPTO site. The only SCO patents I could find were related to Tarantella, and only a couple of those. Looked then like SCO really doesn't have much of a patent portfolio, but I may not have been searching most efficiently.
Certainly, MS's list of crimes is volumes long, but the fear of being sued because the product your using was written by 'shady individuals' as Balmer seems to be suggesting can have a real chilling effect.
SQL Server developers, "particularly those Microsoft customers who relied on Microsoft's assurances, failed to investigate them thoroughly, and knowingly continued to provide material steps in an Infringing Combination. These infringers, if any, may face treble damages for the entire three and one-half years the case was tied up in the courts. Microsoft is not a law firm. Relying on its advice should not constitute acting in good faith; which is the required defense to treble damages for failure to investigate and honor patents once on notice of their existence."
Microsoft is hardly lily-white when it comes to providing their customers with unencumbered products. IT decision makers need to know this.
Slashdot Mirror
Caldera refered to it as "ancient UNIX". It appears to have been pulled from SCOldera's web site, but it's available here. Available are:
5th Edition UNIX
6th Edition UNIX
7th Edition UNIX
Mini UNIX
UNIX System III
UNIX 32V
I've downloaded my copies!
...SCO could buy a company valued at $10mil with 10% of SCO's total stock today. In a few months the SCO stock may well plummet back to April's levels again ... in which case they will have bought a $10mil concern for the equivalent of $2mil.
Sounds like the plan AOL used to buy Time-Warner. Entirely possible, but I think most companies know to look out for this now.
Novell is certinly doing a lot better than SCO as a company, but they are still pretty despondant.
Q1 2003, Novell had about $843M in tangible assets. Yes, they are still sitting on their dragon's hoard of cash from NetWare 3. I wish my company were so despondant.
Safe from SCO does not mean safe from Novell.
I can envision scenarios where Novell uses its ownership of UNIX IP to hijack Linux, but none of them are very credible. One huge problem that Novell has had is developer support. Moving NetWare to a Linux platform will go a long way to remove that thorn. Sabotaging Linux down the road seems rather unlikely. But 5 years is two lifetimes in technology-land, so who knows?
Linux should still self-audit and remove all possible offending code and archetecture to prevent this from being a problem 5 years from now...
Linux (and the BSDs) should be doing this anyway and it should be ongoing.
Actually, subscribers may have noticed a previous Novell - SCO story in The Mysterious Future that was more standard Slashdot fare. This story was pulled before it went live. Then the story you're reading now was posted. I imaging it had something to do with Mr. Perens commentary, which is a Slashdot exclusive (I think).
These are all great points (I usually don't pimp ACs, but moderators take note!).
I think SCO's biggest mistake was showing its hand too early. SCO's "strategy" clearly involved using the UNIX source, patents, and copyrights as a blunt instrument to kill commertial Linux, and thereby inflate their UNIX products and licenses. Problem is, they didn't bother to check to see if they really had the patents and copyrights in their name (due diligence, I believe this is called).
Even if the original Novell-to-SCO agreements were to include the UNIX patents and copyrights, they were never transfered, leaving the ownership of UNIX IP open to question. If SCO had gone to Novell first and worked out the patent / copyright stuff, Novell may have just said "Oh, you're right, we'll go ahead and transfer ownership to you as per our agreement." But now that everyone knows what SCO intends to do with UNIX IP, Novell (soon to be a Linux vendor) is rather unlikely to give SCO anything without a fight.
Yet another brainless move by SCO.
It is probably of little (business) interest to them anyway.
Except that Novell is betting their future on Linux and OSS. Novell will be releasing NetWare 7 next year (hopefully) and they have stated that you will be able to choose the Linux or NetWare kernel at installation. Novell is working on migrating away from legacy NetWare and on to Linux for their services.
So it is indeed in Novell's business interest to ensure that:
1) Linux is not encumbered with IP issues
2) The reputation of Linux is not tarnished
Novell has a lot riding on this.
...patents, and the fact they don't own any (Novell and Tarantella do I believe).
FWIW- A rep from Tarantella has come forward and said that they own no UNIX IP of any sort. But damned if I can find a link to it now. Help anyone?
That little bitty circle-R there seems to imply a copyright.
Well, in fairness, the circle-R is for registered trademark and needs to be included regardless of who owns that trademark. SCO has been better lately of attributing the UNIX trademark to The Open Group, but not before getting smacked for lack of attribution.
But there could be language in the contract that states that Novell must enforce copyright voliations. If SCO can't rely on Novell to pursue copyright infringments, then Novell may be in breach of contract. We really don't know.
Wow, that's a good point. Where's Ray Noorda in all of this? He's the guy that bought UNIX from AT&T while at Novell. I think he also sold it to SCO. Noorda's Canopy Group helped to fund Caldera (and Lineo)*. Surely he must have a pretty good handle on what SCO owns and what they don't. I wonder why he hasn't said anything either way. I guess he doesn't want to see his investment in Caldera go up in smoke, so he willing to play along with a little FUD. But many of Canopy's investments are with Linux companies, so that doesn't make sense either.
Since it's lose-lose for Canopy (and Noorda) I guess the only thing to do was to stay mum. After all, he's really only a VC now.
*Could have knocked me over with a feather to see TrollTech on Canopy's list as well...
Of course this address the "source code theft" issue. If Novell has the copyright, Novell must prosecute for copyright infringement.
After turning this over in my head a bit, I think you're right. SCO can go after IBM for breach of contract, but it would be Novell that would need to begin procedings to remove the code from Linux.
This assumes that the code in question is part of the SysV UNIX code that SCO bought from Novell. If it is something that SCO developed after the fact, it could be a different story. But since SCO has been begging Novell for the copyright to the SysV code, I can only assume that isn't the case.
That this didn't come out earlier, even as leaks, is suspicious.
;)
Novell had several famous flame-outs when beating their chest about upcoming products. They finally put the hammer down and are now very quiet. Even as a CNE, it's difficult to find out about upcoming projects until they reach public beta status. Perhaps this culture has permeated Novell so well that they were able to keep this quiet as well?
One reason that they waited was to verify who owned what. All of those agreements happend 3 (4?) CEO's ago and most of the people who orchestrated the deal are probably long gone (on both sides).
Another is that the SCOX earnings call is today. So it's a timing thing to damage SCO's stock.
How the heck did SCO buy "Unix" without buying the copyrights?
From the SCO response: SCO® owns the contract rights to the UNIX® operating system. So it seems that SCO has the right to license the code to UNIX vendors (or other interested parties). But the patents and copyrights remain with Novell. This does make me curious about who would have a gripe about SysV code in Linux, though. I guess if SCO (and only SCO) has the rights to license SysV code, then it's SCO. It does seem to be an awkward agreement, though.
I think there are yet more layers to this madness waiting to be unpeeled.
I think you misspelled "lawyers"
Here is Novell's informative press release on the matter. A juicy excerpt:
"SCO continues to say that it owns the UNIX System V patents, yet it must know that it does not. A simple review of U.S. Patent Office records reveals that Novell owns those patents.
"Importantly, and contrary to SCO's assertions, SCO is not the owner of the UNIX copyrights. Not only would a quick check of U.S. Copyright Office records reveal this fact, but a review of the asset transfer agreement between Novell and SCO confirms it."
Of course, this doesn't address the "source code theft" issues, but hopefully this will shut SCO up about the UNIX IP issues.
Yup, time to tighten up my outbound firewall rules.
If you think that ESR is "finally" getting things in gear, then you haven't seen his OSI Position Paper. The initial draft of this was released 4 days after the initial lawsuit.
Those of you who have read it awhile back may want to look again. A fair amount has changed in the past week or so.
Someday, when you're older, you'll understand that SF can be so much more than shit blowing up and latex masks. The problem is, the factory that churns this stuff out doesn't need to bother with things like a cohesive plot, quality acting, and reasonable dialog. As long as the garbage that comes out is successful, it will be more of the same. This is known as the "George Lucas theory".
FWIW, I was including ST:TOS in there as well. Has mainstream television ever seen a worse actor than William Shatner? Good lord. (And before you start, yes he was an absolute ham in his Twilight Zone episode(s?) as well. I didn't say they were all good :^).
As far as HBO goes, the other nets may have the same access to the studios, but they don't seem to be using it. While broadcast television is mired in reality-of-the-week programming (with a side-order of horrible sit-com), HBO continues to put out high-quality ongoing series (and they'd still be good if the boobs and *#&% were removed).
As an aside, I can't believe that my original comment hasn't been moderated back to the stone-age yet! I thought sure I would be branded a Troll (I'm not, I meant what I said.)
Actually, of the shows I mentioned, Lexx is probably the one I come closest to liking. At least it tried to be fun.
Amen. The raving fanboys on /. need to understand that SF on television has been in serious decline since the original Twilight Zone went off the air.
Babylon 5, Buffy, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Lexx. Lame plot hooks, shallow charaters, stunningly bad dialog. But at least the SFX are good!(?) I've really tried to give SF on TV a chance, but I've been disappointed time and again.
Then again, I though the first Matrix was pedestrian. Maybe my standards are too high.
Oh, and by the way, the best written shows on television are coming out of HBO. Period.
That's so... 1996. This is one of the tactics Novell tried to use to keep corporations from replacing NetWare with NT. What Novell found out is that no one cared about file server performance. As long as the performance was "good enough" and Windows had more gizmos, they were screwed.
Of course, this is just one part of Microsoft's strategy against Linux and OSS. But I'm pretty sure that this salvo will fall on deaf ears.
Fine.
:^)
Free / Open Source Software Representation Ballot:
(*) Bruce Perens
(_) That Other Guy
OK, Bruce, that's one vote!
No, no, no! For the love of God, keep MS locked in the basement!
They are capitalists, true believers, who are incapable of a compromise...
See? I don't think MS, IBM, and other patent-portfolio-rich companies will be any less enthusiastic about supporting software patents. Why shouldn't we (OSS supporters, or just people opposed to software patents) have a strong, unwavering, even rabid voice?
I thought Linux was a counterpoint to Minix? Linus couldn't afford a copy of Minix (or any commercial UNIX) so he wrote his own. Minix is microkernel, Linux is monolithic. Tannenbaum v Torvalds and all that.
I don't think "based on" is quite right. "Inspired by", maybe...
I can't find the reference but I heard that SCO doesn't own any patents.
When this mess first hit I poked around on the USPTO site. The only SCO patents I could find were related to Tarantella, and only a couple of those. Looked then like SCO really doesn't have much of a patent portfolio, but I may not have been searching most efficiently.
I migrated my last NetWare 2.2 client late last year (still on the original 286 hardware). Surely someone is still running NW2.x somewhere!
Certainly, MS's list of crimes is volumes long, but the fear of being sued because the product your using was written by 'shady individuals' as Balmer seems to be suggesting can have a real chilling effect.
As chilling as this?:
SQL Server developers, "particularly those Microsoft customers who relied on Microsoft's assurances, failed to investigate them thoroughly, and knowingly continued to provide material steps in an Infringing Combination. These infringers, if any, may face treble damages for the entire three and one-half years the case was tied up in the courts. Microsoft is not a law firm. Relying on its advice should not constitute acting in good faith; which is the required defense to treble damages for failure to investigate and honor patents once on notice of their existence."
Microsoft is hardly lily-white when it comes to providing their customers with unencumbered products. IT decision makers need to know this.