"If company A is an IP holding company, there's nothing company B can do but pay whatever extortionate price: Company A has no product, and is therefore not infringing any of B's IP. B is pretty much hanging in the wind."
And this might explain why BayStar wants Darl out and for it to essentially (if not actually) drop it's Unix products and "concentrate" on the supposed IP holdings and litigation.
One of the cheif gripes of the Linux community (other than the initial claims that SCO owns Linux) is that both SCO Linux and Unix products used Open Source software, Apache for instance (as well as a host of other things). So if SCO has no product then your contention may be on spot, as far as not being in a position to fend off counter claims regarding what's in SCO Linux/Unix. If you don't have a product and just have a lot of IP patents then you may be correct.
However, BayStar may have ulterior motives behind their request for a refund - such as we've just mentioned. But it may be in a position to milk SCO for all it's worth and then bail out. The Bank of Canada is essentially clearing a path to bail out as well IMHO. Bottom line, considering the recent layoffs as well, is that SCO is most likely scrounging for cash. What like lawyers are cheap? They aren't getting any revenue from the license/extortion scheme, they aren't selling a product, they have been black listed by almost (if not all) developers (save those that may still work there - do they still employ any devs?)and essentially have not other revenue channels.
Let's face it. SCO could potentially drag this out for years. But they need money and aren't making any at the moment. They did get a reprieve via Baystar/PIPE/BOC but that appears to be teneous at best. I think that in 6 months SCO well start to exhibit Cheyne-Stokes breathing - aka the death rattle. The stock was down to around $6/share yesterday and dropping (check that, I just checked again and it's at $5.99/share and falling). Any takers on how long before SCO stock is hovering around the price it was before they started they fiasco? I thought not.
This should be a wake up call for F/OSS. Watch the code base and keep it clean (though most are already painfully aware of this). The big question is what the hell do we do about the USPTO. They are out of touch and really not geared for handling the wave of technology advancements to date and unable to keep up with the breakneck speed of development and changes. I mean for crying out loud they gave M$ a patent on an Apple - not as in MAC but as in fruit to eat. They claim it was a mistake but it begs the question - what else "don't" they get? And I wonder if SCO and friends are banking on the Judges and Juries in the same manner - hoping they don't "get it" in order to "educate" them the SCO way.
But of course they appear to be doing with the IP litigation what they did with their software business - that is to run it into the ground with a flaming wake of burned bridges behind them.
"But it's not going to get its money out without going to court, which could take a couple of years."
Very true IMHO. The downside for SCOX is that litigating with a former investor will take away any shroud that SCOX has any claims of merit or fact. Also, I'm sure BayStar has been eyeballing SCO stock for just such a trend. The minute it hits 20 consecutive days under Ten point Five will be the hold that BayStar will have over SCOX.
Consider. SCO rides under $10.50x20 days. BayStorm has at its perogative to yank its cash on demand. Now there's a nice hammer to hold over someones head! Cash out and consumer confidence goes to nil. Stock bottoms out, common share holder sell off... Done.
Or, one could use it as leverage. Buyout of certain assest and some planned liquidation. Buy some unix patents - M$ seems to be very interested in patents. And BayStar is a nice little front of M$ gaining leverage? Perhaps in an off hand way.
Monday will be telling. If SCOX's stock hits below $10.50 and if in deed BayStar has a solid 20 days and provable contract clauses then BayStar may be sitting in the drivers seats...
Dear Darl! Big business in a modern Capitalist society is a dirty dog eat dog business. Kinda funny, SCO looked to highjack Linux on claims of ownership of code, and may find themselves owned by their investors, our just raped by them.
I just finish testing 9.1. I was accepted as a beta tester starting with 8.0. Overall I was personally very pleased with SuSE's (excuse me - SUSE) latest efforts.
What surpised me the most was the stability of Beta 1. Try as I might I, and others, didn't bump into to anything kludgey to file a bug report. Others did, but the amount of bug reps filed were far less than I and others expected. In Beta 4 I did find but one in KDE and OO.o dealing with Styles and Windows Decorations. I filed my bug rep with the backtrace. Well about 2 days later the dev asked me to confirm what he suspected was the problem and sure enough it was patched/fixed - move along nothing to see here.
My test system is really mundane. A simple celery 800 on an older MSI board, on-board sound, and 133MHz memory. By most standards... Well old. What also delighted me to no end was the speed and robustness of the system. To put it plainly it was snappy and quick. 2.6 should be (what am I saying? IS) a great boost to Linux overall.
YaST has gotten a face lift, more over nice eye candy. KDE 3.2 is very nice, Gnome is working much better than it ever has on a SuSE distro. I guess having Ximian and Novell for support pays off. Installation was very nice as should be expected. I know I probably sound like a "fanboy", and to a point I am. But in all honesty SuSE has continued to make my desktop system very comfortable and a joy to use and learn.
The real nice thing is that it is by all accounts fairly enterprise ready by and large. I look forward to 9.2. It just keeps getting better. And Novell to date hasn't had any negative impact on it's development AFAICT. If anything I suspect that SuSE will get more support.
As far as X is concerned it uses the latest pre-release before XFree86 implemented its ever popular "advertising" clause. Discussions related to X.org implementation is that it's being seriously investigated as a replacement, providing that the XFree86 keeps it's present license - X.org's version 6.7.0 or later appears to be the likely candidate for 9.2, as other Linux distro's are likely to adopt this as well IMHO.
But I can't help but be very suspicious. I mean they did a similar thing when Apple was on the rocks. And many feel that move was simply to keep up a very niche company and its market in order to point to the fact that M$ had not be come an "absolute" monopoly.
Now we see M$ settle with Sun for 1.6 billion. Why? Could it be they there Karma in the courts may be running thin? Could it be that with all the negative press they are getting they are worried about "consumer confidence" and its impact on their market position?
Add the EU slam. Sure a meager ~613 million, but theirs that damn "api" thing that could pull some leveragable teeth out. Not to mention the fact that the EU said to offer a version without the media player embedded... And they said something to the effect that many similar things couldn't be done without crippling the OS... Like IE! If they could do it with the Media Player then why not the browser? They would rather not answer that question. Not to mention they said that under oath.
My first impression to the statement "or do you think they are embracing the Open Source movement?" Embracing the OSS movement..? HELL NO! Sure a knee jerk reaction but let's not forget the M$ axiom. The 3E's:
Embrace
Extended
Extinquish.
I can't help but think that this is indeed another "ploy" to look as though they want to play nice. Perhaps they're are being nice, but I'm not buying it. They have to do alot more than release some XML installer code to convince me of that... Playing nice that is.
Playing nice isn't "ever" a motive for M$ unless "they want something". So they used the CPL. Keeps them safe and makes them look magnanimous.
Let's not forget the twisted line of companys and affiliates that trace back to M$ regarding SCO. Let's not forget their recent rush to PATENT such things as the "virtual desktop pager". Let's not forget their statements about the GPL being "viral" and "un-American". If anything is viral it's M$' license, patents, copyrights. And more over their legal team, in which they often use as a very big hammer to pound the dissentors into submission or just simply mortally wound them and stand back to watch said company bleed and go fallow.
I'm sorry. I just can't get all warm and fuzzy about M$ just becuase they release a measly installer on Sourceforge. Looks nice (kinda) but is hollow as far as I'm concerns.
I am friends with a close relative of his. He usually ask for $10,000 to 8,000 for the license.
After the owner of the site contested this and start their efforts to make this null and void, they settled. The price was $6,000, of which the lawyers got $3,000 - or half.
I don't particularly agree with some of his tactics. However he does own the patent and to date, after 3 reviews, "NO" prior art has been found by the USPTO.
The address refering to the site owner is "misleading" directing one to Logan Heights... Not a very nice neighborhood. Unlike the actual neighborhood he lives at.
That's because all but one settled. And the one that started the defense fund - owned an chocolate company the distributed over the web - has also settled - the checks is not only in the mail - he's cashed it.
Trust me. He's been doing this for awhile and shows no sign of relenting.
The owner of PanIP house is most "definately" not in "South Logan" - It's in another part of town - try Del Mar. I happen to know the nephew of this guy. And though I don't agree with what he's doing I have to say the his patent shows how broken the patent systems is.
For what it's worth his particular patent is one of the most (if not the most relating to Network/Internet) cited patents of it's type. The list of big name companies that cite his patent is a few pages long. Also the date of the patent goes back to a very early stage in the internet - repeat "a very early" period. It specifically deals with e-commerce.
Once again, though I have seen the patent (larger binder - very large) and read it extensively - I am baffled by the manner in which the combination of patent specific jargon and legelese make patents of technology so dodgy. In all honesty his patent carries a lot of weight in the courts because it is put together in a form that "they" understand (they being the suits and judges combined).
Presently, it is in review - this is the 3rd or 4th time Mr L. (the owner) has submitted it for review - and the scarry part is each time it comes back it's stronger than before.
Oh, and just to drop another unpleasant bomb - the RIAA/MPAA are "VERY" interested in it.
I have probably said to much - but this is why everytime M$ goes for some hairbrain patent filing (e.g. "the virtual desktop pager" technology) I cringe - becuase they have a better than even chance of getting it - the guys at the patent office understand patent law - the lawyers that write this crap understand the patent law - and what the technology is and how it really works is secondary to the way the patent is "worded".
I'm depressed now by this. I have been asked to write a synopsis of his Patent in terms that lay people can understand. I looking at this I discovered how sweeping his patent is - in legal terms that is. Problem is it has little to do with the actual technology and all to do with law and patents. I have since backed away from this. But it isn't going to go away anytime soon or easily IMHO.... Hence my depression on the matter.
I don't think your being "trolly" here in the least! You giving an honest opinion - there's a deeper point to this.
Consider the cost of MSO Pro version, or the lesser end user version. My god $500+ dollars for a freaking Office Suite - get real here (not you, Bill and Co.). The base of many of the arguments, outside of being buggy and vunerable (and yes, Linux can be vunerable also, there devs are more concerned with finding them and fixing than worrying if there market share will suffer due to bad press).
I mean, even with a volume discount, outfitting a 1000 user base can be damned expensive - and then throw in the license 6 plan and we're talking some serious money. Before Word Perfect hit the skids there was a choice. And choice meant competitive pricing. Yes M$ office had many nicities back in the day. And yes it's very "feature" laiden. But again, how many people really use all those features anyway. And the macros - most secretaries and others don't really use, or for that matter need them.
Star Office is very reasonably priced for that matter and will suit the needs of a vast majority of the user base IMHO. So I have a limited budget and want to spend it as wisely as possible. Before Star Office and Open Office the.doc/.ppt/dot-etc,etc kept me hooked into M$ because of its ubiquity. Now enter Star/Open Office that can support these formats. It doesn't take an CPA to figure what the more fiscally prudent path is here. Even with the Student/teacher version at a considerably lower price than the Pro version - corporates can't opt for this, just end users.
Now we have competition back in the market place an that illustrious institution called "capitalism" can function once again as it should. I have no doubt that M$ can by all means create both a very nice, functional and "cost effective" product. But until of late - Why should they? They could charge whatever they wanted... What viable alternative was there. Now we are gaining a "choice" again and the ultimate winner here is the client.
ROFL, I'm not the one running an OS that bleeds like a sieve and needs to be patched every ~4.5 days with more buggy overpriced crap.
If anyone needs to get back to work it's any M$ sys admin - or are you one of those the still labor under the illusion the IIS is secure and can't understand what all this virus and worm bruhaha is all about.
"Our CIO s happy counting money again. He loves SUSE linux and open office. We had no issue with 500 users converting to linux it did take some time but we did it. If we can do it anyone can do it. Believe me our IT people are not smart since they were M$ engineers they freaked out when then didnt see ok cancel button on every screen. Now they love shell programming."
I'm beta testing SuSE 9.1 right now. If they thought the switch to Linux was a scary only to discover the freedom of Linux they'll most likely like 9.1 even more. Beta 1 was one of the smoothest betas I've ever tested. Sure there were glitches and some kludgy behavior but no where near what I had expected from a beta - and this was beta one.
As far as OO.o is concerned I have not used a version of M$Word in a couple of years and now to my pleasure I send Office/Word users both presentation and text docs in Win formats and have yet to have any complaints. Even if one decides to stay with an M$Win platform on the desktop why in the world would you pay the price for M$ Office - even at the Student discount (of course for which no one has to verify their student/teacher status - mind games again). Seems only a few Pro Writers even have the slightest desire to use more the an Nth of the so called "features" M$ Office provides.
I have no conpunction what so ever for paying for software. Even though I have access to SuSE's latest and greatest OS ISOs I have always payed for the distro - I beleive in the company and hence support it with my wallet. M$ seems to think the way to better business is to stranglehold the clientele. This is the surest way to promote the competition... They just don't seem to get it and thank the powers that be they won't really ever get it. FOSS/Linux's best friend is for M$ to continue with business as usual.
"Umm... what makes you think that that is it's sole purpose? I tend to think that worms like this one are merely test runs. The virus writers are fine tuning their toolkits. Part of such tuning would be tests to determine the effectiveness of destructive payloads."
"There is an old maxim that states that one should never do anything for just one reason. That is to say that if you can only think of one reason to do something, it's probably not worth doing. I suspect a similar philosophy is at work here."
I would tend to agree! The latest series of worms (save a few copycat versions) has had somewhat specific behaviors. In and of themselves it would appear to be unrelated. For instance one bug spread extremely fast across the various networks but didn't do much damage to files or cause any "relative" impact on bandwidth per se. However as a proof of concept one might surmize that if I want to find away to get in and around as fast as possible in order to mitigate attempts to thwart its spread then perhaps I have found my method. This also seems to be apparent in other worms that we've seen. Dare I say they seemed specifically focused on only certain tasks and functions? I beleive so.
There were a series of articles/papers/discussions on the implications of a "Super Worm". One that would spread perhaps worldwide in a matter of a mere few minutes. Pair this with specific functionalities and I could do serveral things. But before I try some halfbaked attempt at this I would need to know that each specific bit of code performed as closely as possible to its design or why bother?
Why would one want to do this? Besides being some sociopath megalomaniac blackhatter striving for bragging rights or some place in the Blackhat hall of imfamy(spelling?). Perhaps I'm designing something for money and profit. Consider this. I spend time and expertise to "perfect" a commodity that could be used as a weapon, tool for blackmail or theft. What would happen to a economy that is so interdependent on Telecommunications and the Internet that if done right wouldn't come to a screeching halt. Not just a glorified DDoS but something that could hit on several critical levels in a coordinated fashion - Wiping data, clogging pipes, crashing systems and so called "fail safe" measures.
Now I get it perfected and put my wares on the block - going to the highest bidder. Who knows. Could just be I'm paranoid - and to some extent you would be right. Remember - "Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean that aren't out to get me", or us or them. Think about holding the major financial institutions hostage, or crippling the stock market and playing the shorts bigtime. There are a host of plausible scenarios. My dearest hope is that this is all just disjointed blackhat endevours. But what if it indeed does have some design behind it - then what?
A large amount of IT pros get this, but the suits..... I don't know and am not that confident that they would get it, let along even entertain the idea for the fact of the time and money that would have to spent to get a modicum of security and effeciency to combat the possibility. They generally have a record of reaction rather than prevention. As I stated. It is my belief that there may be a more concerted effort behind much of this and the suits won't do anything appreciable until it smacks their market share and bloody's their fiscal noses.
Let's just hope I'm dead wrong - It frightens me to think otherwise - I just can't dismiss it out of hand.
In some yet unrelated news. Bill Gates private Lear jet is down yet again for repairs. Rumor has that his new MSVoice command software is not functioning properly. Anonymous sources tell us that everytime the pilot would give the voice command for the automated take off mode the plane would dump all it's fuel, shut down the engines and the pilots digital HUD would crash causing the planes system to reboot into XP and start Windows Media Player with renditions of Richard Simmon's Rockin' to the oldies.
I received this post on the SuSE OT list. Seems Diebold is not just incompetent at making voting software - I'd worry if my banks ATM said "DIEBOLD" on it, and here's why:
Original post:
A Diebold ATM in Baker hall just crashed, and dropped to a Windows XP desktop.
Several intrepid students started Windows Media player, and it was playing a variety of music with a nice visualizer.
"YaST is nice and makes a great foundation for configuration. Are we talking YaST and/or YaST2? But SaX2, the X11 configuration tool, has been exceptional in my experience."
YaST (ver 1) is obsolete and no longer used. YaST2 is the "only" YaST that exists today (save those run fairly old versions of SuSE). If in a shell, when "yast" is called it is merely a symlink to/sbin/yast2, but in the ncurses form. Whereas calling "yast2" brings up a QT/gui version (unless in init 2 or 3).
In SCO's teleconference they repeatedly referred to the judges suggestion to "tone down" their public statements regarding the case.
Coincidently this helped SCO obfiscate answering more hardhitting questions by the press in said teleconference.
Figures, now that the popular press seems to be "getting" it at last the courts all but muzzle them - not that I expected a straight answer for Darl and Co. But being able to legitimately hide behind this is irksome all the same.
Mars lost its magnetosphere eons ago. This caused the solar wind to blow away and boil off it's atmosphere over a few million years (a relatively short time all things considered).
They have presently been doing research related to Earths fluxuations in its magnetosphere. At present the major indicators used to determine the stability (as we understand it) has been dropping. The speculation is that we are going to eventually have a poll flip (north becomes south and vice verse). In the interim their will be a period of time where holes (for lack of a better word) similar to those existing at the north and south poles that cause the Aurora Borialis will exist in multiples. In otherwords, during this period of time these will drift around the surface of the earth until the fields stablize. The results will be spectacular night sky showings in such unlikely places as Paris or Hong Kong or where have you - the downside is the exposure to solar radiation of people under these zones.
The magnetosphere is dependent on the internal heat generated by the Earths core and it's rotation. In Mars case it is speculated that its core went cold a very long time ago and this was the primary reason its magnetosphere failed and let the solar wind work away the atmosphere.
Well, maybe that's one of the motivations for this push. If TCPA is more about M$ keeping control of there market sector than it's officially designated use as a security method, then a mass switch to Linux on the desktop would surely put a crimp in the M$ focus and Redmonds grand design, of course which the official party line is that it's for security protocols.
One obvious thing this would do would be to break the dependency on M$ for support and hence a lucrative revenue source for M$. And likewise it takes M$' leverage points away. Kinda like the old mind over matter argument - IBM no longer minds M$ because MS doesn't matter anymore, at least to larger extent.
The other angle is a marketing statement. If one considers that Munich announced a systems wide switch to Linux, and now 19 German cities are making a concerted push to Linux as well. Add India, The Asian consortium (Japan, PRC, and Korea) developing their own, the U.S. Federal Court System switching to Linux, many large Wall Street firms switching to Linux, etc.., and IBM announcing the move to have their entire company using LOTD (Linux on the Desktop) and it sends a message to the rest of the enterprise and corporate sector that LOTD is going to happen in a very real way.
It also sends a message to the ISV/IHV/OEMs that a viable market in respects to supporting both programs, devices and device drivers is happening. Pair this with the host of developers in IBM that are going to focus on programs and support for LOTD at IBM and how that would translate to end-users and those that do business with IBM and one can see a substantial and potentially far reaching market play by Big Blue.
Unlike OS/2, where in IBM offered yet another proprietary product, one that brought forth many of the concerns we see people expressing in relation to M$ - that being lock ins, being relegated to the whims of a big business and the fact that IBM doesn't have to push Linux development solely by themselves and instead of trying to create a wave for vendors and customers to ride on. IBM only needs to ride the wave called Linux and in doing so lends credibility to its development and substancially creates a aire of support that is both seperate from IBM and at the same time IBM is perhaps the biggest player in this arena.
Look at the last six months, despite the SCO debacle, and we see Novell snatch up Ximian, then SUSE and all the while IBM is quitely sitting in the background while pulling a few choice strings. If we also consider Apple moving to the BSD based OS X and it's recent inclusion of XF86Free rendering base and we see the potential for more cross porting between Mac and Linux.
Step back and look at it from a bit of distance and we see, either by design or by happen stance, a concerted push away from Redmond in a manner that essentially, at least to some extent, negates M$' market leverage. Like I said - Mind over matter. I think the goal is to make M$ not matter, and a fair amount of people won't mind that in the least.
Well, first and foremost, of course, it's SCO. But they seem to have a partner in crime, so to speak.
The popular press. If not for the press' focus on hype over content the SCO fiasco would have fizzled quite some time ago.
I have yet to see a reporter consistantly ask the tough questions. Questions like:
"Mr. McBride. Would you care to give a reply regarding statements made by those in the Linux community, as well as other in well established business sectors about their position that they 'need to see what a SCO Unix license is paying for'?"
or,
"Would you care to make a statement regarding why your brother Kevin McBride represented SCO in court and not someone from Mr. Boies' firm, especially given the ~$9 million in legal fees SCO has paid for representation?"
Instead, we get headlines that revolve around the issues but never really focus on the heart of the matter - The Code?
IMHO the press coverage seems to take the ever popular "he said, she said" format. for example:
SCO Letter Demands Certification From Unix Customers
SCO Identifies Copyrighted Code in Linux
Long time to get to the real question: Show me the code=What the hell are you talking about?
If not for some sites like Groklaw would the popular press even really have a clue what the real issue is?
It was and is about the product (which SCO seems to think is an after thought to a business strategy).
To restate the real question in blunt everyday language:
To SCO
what the hell are you talking about?
What code?
When one refers to the base issue to this picture then it becomes clear. We all know that many are and have asked this question and the it's SCO that is perpetrating this scenario.
My problem is our illustrious fourth estate (aka the press) seems more than willing to participate as a player in this endevour, rather than being what they are really supposed to be - an observer and inquirer of facts and happenings. In otherwords, they don't want to find out what is really going on because they get so much more out of milking it - as long as it keeps a certain sensationalistic aire about it. Facts are dry and not all that exciting. Drama on the other hand... And that's what the popular press is all about because drama gathers more revenue than facts.
"Plank does not speak Spanish and does not listen to Latin music. More importantly, his computer did not even have KaZaA installed during the period when the investigation occurred."
If this is indeed true this could be a major oops for the RIAA. And with the next year being an election year if the timing is right, and the press negative for the RIAA and its croonies...? Perhaps some politicians may want to "distance" themselves from this issue and any affiliation of contribs as well.
Dear Mr. Anonymous Coward. What cave have you been residing in? No troll intended but in all honesty are you really that out of touch? Microsoft has nothing against Linux? Microsoft named Linux #2 on its list of potential threats to its revenue stream and market plan in their 10Q report. Number 1 was the down economy and it's effects on IT spending.
How can you say with a straight face that Microsoft has nothing against Linux. After calling Linux and the GPL a cancer, unAmerican, and just short of out and out a socialist product bent on destroying all things proprietary.
Please, for your sake and others please think about what your posting so as not to embarrass yourself.
Slashdot Mirror
"If company A is an IP holding company, there's nothing company B can do but pay whatever extortionate price: Company A has no product, and is therefore not infringing any of B's IP. B is pretty much hanging in the wind."
And this might explain why BayStar wants Darl out and for it to essentially (if not actually) drop it's Unix products and "concentrate" on the supposed IP holdings and litigation.
One of the cheif gripes of the Linux community (other than the initial claims that SCO owns Linux) is that both SCO Linux and Unix products used Open Source software, Apache for instance (as well as a host of other things). So if SCO has no product then your contention may be on spot, as far as not being in a position to fend off counter claims regarding what's in SCO Linux/Unix. If you don't have a product and just have a lot of IP patents then you may be correct.
However, BayStar may have ulterior motives behind their request for a refund - such as we've just mentioned. But it may be in a position to milk SCO for all it's worth and then bail out. The Bank of Canada is essentially clearing a path to bail out as well IMHO. Bottom line, considering the recent layoffs as well, is that SCO is most likely scrounging for cash. What like lawyers are cheap? They aren't getting any revenue from the license/extortion scheme, they aren't selling a product, they have been black listed by almost (if not all) developers (save those that may still work there - do they still employ any devs?)and essentially have not other revenue channels.
Let's face it. SCO could potentially drag this out for years. But they need money and aren't making any at the moment. They did get a reprieve via Baystar/PIPE/BOC but that appears to be teneous at best. I think that in 6 months SCO well start to exhibit Cheyne-Stokes breathing - aka the death rattle. The stock was down to around $6/share yesterday and dropping (check that, I just checked again and it's at $5.99/share and falling). Any takers on how long before SCO stock is hovering around the price it was before they started they fiasco? I thought not.
This should be a wake up call for F/OSS. Watch the code base and keep it clean (though most are already painfully aware of this). The big question is what the hell do we do about the USPTO. They are out of touch and really not geared for handling the wave of technology advancements to date and unable to keep up with the breakneck speed of development and changes. I mean for crying out loud they gave M$ a patent on an Apple - not as in MAC but as in fruit to eat. They claim it was a mistake but it begs the question - what else "don't" they get? And I wonder if SCO and friends are banking on the Judges and Juries in the same manner - hoping they don't "get it" in order to "educate" them the SCO way.
But of course they appear to be doing with the IP litigation what they did with their software business - that is to run it into the ground with a flaming wake of burned bridges behind them.
"But it's not going to get its money out without going to court, which could take a couple of years."
Very true IMHO. The downside for SCOX is that litigating with a former investor will take away any shroud that SCOX has any claims of merit or fact. Also, I'm sure BayStar has been eyeballing SCO stock for just such a trend. The minute it hits 20 consecutive days under Ten point Five will be the hold that BayStar will have over SCOX.
Consider. SCO rides under $10.50x20 days. BayStorm has at its perogative to yank its cash on demand. Now there's a nice hammer to hold over someones head! Cash out and consumer confidence goes to nil. Stock bottoms out, common share holder sell off... Done.
Or, one could use it as leverage. Buyout of certain assest and some planned liquidation. Buy some unix patents - M$ seems to be very interested in patents. And BayStar is a nice little front of M$ gaining leverage? Perhaps in an off hand way.
Monday will be telling. If SCOX's stock hits below $10.50 and if in deed BayStar has a solid 20 days and provable contract clauses then BayStar may be sitting in the drivers seats...
Dear Darl! Big business in a modern Capitalist society is a dirty dog eat dog business. Kinda funny, SCO looked to highjack Linux on claims of ownership of code, and may find themselves owned by their investors, our just raped by them.
Couldn't happen to a nicer group of suits. pfft!!
I just finish testing 9.1. I was accepted as a beta tester starting with 8.0. Overall I was personally very pleased with SuSE's (excuse me - SUSE) latest efforts.
What surpised me the most was the stability of Beta 1. Try as I might I, and others, didn't bump into to anything kludgey to file a bug report. Others did, but the amount of bug reps filed were far less than I and others expected. In Beta 4 I did find but one in KDE and OO.o dealing with Styles and Windows Decorations. I filed my bug rep with the backtrace. Well about 2 days later the dev asked me to confirm what he suspected was the problem and sure enough it was patched/fixed - move along nothing to see here.
My test system is really mundane. A simple celery 800 on an older MSI board, on-board sound, and 133MHz memory. By most standards... Well old. What also delighted me to no end was the speed and robustness of the system. To put it plainly it was snappy and quick. 2.6 should be (what am I saying? IS) a great boost to Linux overall.
YaST has gotten a face lift, more over nice eye candy. KDE 3.2 is very nice, Gnome is working much better than it ever has on a SuSE distro. I guess having Ximian and Novell for support pays off. Installation was very nice as should be expected. I know I probably sound like a "fanboy", and to a point I am. But in all honesty SuSE has continued to make my desktop system very comfortable and a joy to use and learn.
The real nice thing is that it is by all accounts fairly enterprise ready by and large. I look forward to 9.2. It just keeps getting better. And Novell to date hasn't had any negative impact on it's development AFAICT. If anything I suspect that SuSE will get more support.
As far as X is concerned it uses the latest pre-release before XFree86 implemented its ever popular "advertising" clause. Discussions related to X.org implementation is that it's being seriously investigated as a replacement, providing that the XFree86 keeps it's present license - X.org's version 6.7.0 or later appears to be the likely candidate for 9.2, as other Linux distro's are likely to adopt this as well IMHO.
But I can't help but be very suspicious. I mean they did a similar thing when Apple was on the rocks. And many feel that move was simply to keep up a very niche company and its market in order to point to the fact that M$ had not be come an "absolute" monopoly.
Now we see M$ settle with Sun for 1.6 billion. Why? Could it be they there Karma in the courts may be running thin? Could it be that with all the negative press they are getting they are worried about "consumer confidence" and its impact on their market position?
Add the EU slam. Sure a meager ~613 million, but theirs that damn "api" thing that could pull some leveragable teeth out. Not to mention the fact that the EU said to offer a version without the media player embedded... And they said something to the effect that many similar things couldn't be done without crippling the OS... Like IE! If they could do it with the Media Player then why not the browser? They would rather not answer that question. Not to mention they said that under oath.
My first impression to the statement "or do you think they are embracing the Open Source movement?" Embracing the OSS movement..? HELL NO! Sure a knee jerk reaction but let's not forget the M$ axiom. The 3E's:
Embrace
Extended
Extinquish.
I can't help but think that this is indeed another "ploy" to look as though they want to play nice. Perhaps they're are being nice, but I'm not buying it. They have to do alot more than release some XML installer code to convince me of that... Playing nice that is.
Playing nice isn't "ever" a motive for M$ unless "they want something". So they used the CPL. Keeps them safe and makes them look magnanimous.
Let's not forget the twisted line of companys and affiliates that trace back to M$ regarding SCO. Let's not forget their recent rush to PATENT such things as the "virtual desktop pager". Let's not forget their statements about the GPL being "viral" and "un-American". If anything is viral it's M$' license, patents, copyrights. And more over their legal team, in which they often use as a very big hammer to pound the dissentors into submission or just simply mortally wound them and stand back to watch said company bleed and go fallow.
I'm sorry. I just can't get all warm and fuzzy about M$ just becuase they release a measly installer on Sourceforge. Looks nice (kinda) but is hollow as far as I'm concerns.
Beware Redmondians bearing gifts.
I am friends with a close relative of his. He usually ask for $10,000 to 8,000 for the license.
After the owner of the site contested this and start their efforts to make this null and void, they settled. The price was $6,000, of which the lawyers got $3,000 - or half.
I don't particularly agree with some of his tactics. However he does own the patent and to date, after 3 reviews, "NO" prior art has been found by the USPTO.
The address refering to the site owner is "misleading" directing one to Logan Heights... Not a very nice neighborhood. Unlike the actual neighborhood he lives at.
That's because all but one settled. And the one that started the defense fund - owned an chocolate company the distributed over the web - has also settled - the checks is not only in the mail - he's cashed it.
Trust me. He's been doing this for awhile and shows no sign of relenting.
The owner of PanIP house is most "definately" not in "South Logan" - It's in another part of town - try Del Mar. I happen to know the nephew of this guy. And though I don't agree with what he's doing I have to say the his patent shows how broken the patent systems is.
For what it's worth his particular patent is one of the most (if not the most relating to Network/Internet) cited patents of it's type. The list of big name companies that cite his patent is a few pages long. Also the date of the patent goes back to a very early stage in the internet - repeat "a very early" period. It specifically deals with e-commerce.
Once again, though I have seen the patent (larger binder - very large) and read it extensively - I am baffled by the manner in which the combination of patent specific jargon and legelese make patents of technology so dodgy. In all honesty his patent carries a lot of weight in the courts because it is put together in a form that "they" understand (they being the suits and judges combined).
Presently, it is in review - this is the 3rd or 4th time Mr L. (the owner) has submitted it for review - and the scarry part is each time it comes back it's stronger than before.
Oh, and just to drop another unpleasant bomb - the RIAA/MPAA are "VERY" interested in it.
I have probably said to much - but this is why everytime M$ goes for some hairbrain patent filing (e.g. "the virtual desktop pager" technology) I cringe - becuase they have a better than even chance of getting it - the guys at the patent office understand patent law - the lawyers that write this crap understand the patent law - and what the technology is and how it really works is secondary to the way the patent is "worded".
I'm depressed now by this. I have been asked to write a synopsis of his Patent in terms that lay people can understand. I looking at this I discovered how sweeping his patent is - in legal terms that is. Problem is it has little to do with the actual technology and all to do with law and patents. I have since backed away from this. But it isn't going to go away anytime soon or easily IMHO.... Hence my depression on the matter.
I don't think your being "trolly" here in the least! You giving an honest opinion - there's a deeper point to this.
.doc/.ppt/dot-etc,etc kept me hooked into M$ because of its ubiquity. Now enter Star/Open Office that can support these formats. It doesn't take an CPA to figure what the more fiscally prudent path is here. Even with the Student/teacher version at a considerably lower price than the Pro version - corporates can't opt for this, just end users.
Consider the cost of MSO Pro version, or the lesser end user version. My god $500+ dollars for a freaking Office Suite - get real here (not you, Bill and Co.). The base of many of the arguments, outside of being buggy and vunerable (and yes, Linux can be vunerable also, there devs are more concerned with finding them and fixing than worrying if there market share will suffer due to bad press).
I mean, even with a volume discount, outfitting a 1000 user base can be damned expensive - and then throw in the license 6 plan and we're talking some serious money. Before Word Perfect hit the skids there was a choice. And choice meant competitive pricing. Yes M$ office had many nicities back in the day. And yes it's very "feature" laiden. But again, how many people really use all those features anyway. And the macros - most secretaries and others don't really use, or for that matter need them.
Star Office is very reasonably priced for that matter and will suit the needs of a vast majority of the user base IMHO. So I have a limited budget and want to spend it as wisely as possible. Before Star Office and Open Office the
Now we have competition back in the market place an that illustrious institution called "capitalism" can function once again as it should. I have no doubt that M$ can by all means create both a very nice, functional and "cost effective" product. But until of late - Why should they? They could charge whatever they wanted... What viable alternative was there. Now we are gaining a "choice" again and the ultimate winner here is the client.
ROFL, I'm not the one running an OS that bleeds like a sieve and needs to be patched every ~4.5 days with more buggy overpriced crap.
If anyone needs to get back to work it's any M$ sys admin - or are you one of those the still labor under the illusion the IIS is secure and can't understand what all this virus and worm bruhaha is all about.
Back under the bridge with ye... Troll!
"Our CIO s happy counting money again. He loves SUSE linux and open office. We had no issue with 500 users converting to linux it did take some time but we did it.
If we can do it anyone can do it. Believe me our IT people are not smart since they were M$ engineers they freaked out when then didnt see ok cancel button on every screen.
Now they love shell programming."
I'm beta testing SuSE 9.1 right now. If they thought the switch to Linux was a scary only to discover the freedom of Linux they'll most likely like 9.1 even more. Beta 1 was one of the smoothest betas I've ever tested. Sure there were glitches and some kludgy behavior but no where near what I had expected from a beta - and this was beta one.
As far as OO.o is concerned I have not used a version of M$Word in a couple of years and now to my pleasure I send Office/Word users both presentation and text docs in Win formats and have yet to have any complaints. Even if one decides to stay with an M$Win platform on the desktop why in the world would you pay the price for M$ Office - even at the Student discount (of course for which no one has to verify their student/teacher status - mind games again). Seems only a few Pro Writers even have the slightest desire to use more the an Nth of the so called "features" M$ Office provides.
I have no conpunction what so ever for paying for software. Even though I have access to SuSE's latest and greatest OS ISOs I have always payed for the distro - I beleive in the company and hence support it with my wallet. M$ seems to think the way to better business is to stranglehold the clientele. This is the surest way to promote the competition... They just don't seem to get it and thank the powers that be they won't really ever get it. FOSS/Linux's best friend is for M$ to continue with business as usual.
"Umm... what makes you think that that is it's sole purpose? I tend to think that worms like this one are merely test runs. The virus writers are fine tuning their toolkits. Part of such tuning would be tests to determine the effectiveness of destructive payloads."
"There is an old maxim that states that one should never do anything for just one reason. That is to say that if you can only think of one reason to do something, it's probably not worth doing. I suspect a similar philosophy is at work here."
I would tend to agree! The latest series of worms (save a few copycat versions) has had somewhat specific behaviors. In and of themselves it would appear to be unrelated. For instance one bug spread extremely fast across the various networks but didn't do much damage to files or cause any "relative" impact on bandwidth per se. However as a proof of concept one might surmize that if I want to find away to get in and around as fast as possible in order to mitigate attempts to thwart its spread then perhaps I have found my method. This also seems to be apparent in other worms that we've seen. Dare I say they seemed specifically focused on only certain tasks and functions? I beleive so.
There were a series of articles/papers/discussions on the implications of a "Super Worm". One that would spread perhaps worldwide in a matter of a mere few minutes. Pair this with specific functionalities and I could do serveral things. But before I try some halfbaked attempt at this I would need to know that each specific bit of code performed as closely as possible to its design or why bother?
Why would one want to do this? Besides being some sociopath megalomaniac blackhatter striving for bragging rights or some place in the Blackhat hall of imfamy(spelling?). Perhaps I'm designing something for money and profit. Consider this. I spend time and expertise to "perfect" a commodity that could be used as a weapon, tool for blackmail or theft. What would happen to a economy that is so interdependent on Telecommunications and the Internet that if done right wouldn't come to a screeching halt. Not just a glorified DDoS but something that could hit on several critical levels in a coordinated fashion - Wiping data, clogging pipes, crashing systems and so called "fail safe" measures.
Now I get it perfected and put my wares on the block - going to the highest bidder. Who knows. Could just be I'm paranoid - and to some extent you would be right. Remember - "Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean that aren't out to get me", or us or them. Think about holding the major financial institutions hostage, or crippling the stock market and playing the shorts bigtime. There are a host of plausible scenarios. My dearest hope is that this is all just disjointed blackhat endevours. But what if it indeed does have some design behind it - then what?
A large amount of IT pros get this, but the suits..... I don't know and am not that confident that they would get it, let along even entertain the idea for the fact of the time and money that would have to spent to get a modicum of security and effeciency to combat the possibility. They generally have a record of reaction rather than prevention. As I stated. It is my belief that there may be a more concerted effort behind much of this and the suits won't do anything appreciable until it smacks their market share and bloody's their fiscal noses.
Let's just hope I'm dead wrong - It frightens me to think otherwise - I just can't dismiss it out of hand.
In some yet unrelated news. Bill Gates private Lear jet is down yet again for repairs. Rumor has that his new MSVoice command software is not functioning properly. Anonymous sources tell us that everytime the pilot would give the voice command for the automated take off mode the plane would dump all it's fuel, shut down the engines and the pilots digital HUD would crash causing the planes system to reboot into XP and start Windows Media Player with renditions of Richard Simmon's Rockin' to the oldies.
Mr Gates was unavailable for comment.
P.S. Try not to /. this site too hard guys. :)
I received this post on the SuSE OT list. Seems Diebold is not just incompetent at making voting software - I'd worry if my banks ATM said "DIEBOLD" on it, and here's why:
? folder_id=3 334
/
Original post:
A Diebold ATM in Baker hall just crashed, and dropped to a Windows XP
desktop.
Several intrepid students started Windows Media player, and it was playing
a variety of music with a nice visualizer.
So much for security...
Photos:
http://www.coed.org/photodb/folder.tcl
Movies (with audio):
http://yogi.pdl.cmu.edu/~cgeisser/photos
But on the bright side you can listen to some nice music.
How do these guys stay in business?
"YaST is nice and makes a great foundation for configuration. Are we talking YaST and/or YaST2? But SaX2, the X11 configuration tool, has been exceptional in my experience."
/sbin/yast2, but in the ncurses form. Whereas calling "yast2" brings up a QT/gui version (unless in init 2 or 3).
YaST (ver 1) is obsolete and no longer used. YaST2 is the "only" YaST that exists today (save those run fairly old versions of SuSE). If in a shell, when "yast" is called it is merely a symlink to
Cheers
That just made my day. Then again...! Hmmmm. Hits a little too close to plausible to me.
In SCO's teleconference they repeatedly referred to the judges suggestion to "tone down" their public statements regarding the case.
Coincidently this helped SCO obfiscate answering more hardhitting questions by the press in said teleconference.
Figures, now that the popular press seems to be "getting" it at last the courts all but muzzle them - not that I expected a straight answer for Darl and Co. But being able to legitimately hide behind this is irksome all the same.
Mars lost its magnetosphere eons ago. This caused the solar wind to blow away and boil off it's atmosphere over a few million years (a relatively short time all things considered).
They have presently been doing research related to Earths fluxuations in its magnetosphere. At present the major indicators used to determine the stability (as we understand it) has been dropping. The speculation is that we are going to eventually have a poll flip (north becomes south and vice verse). In the interim their will be a period of time where holes (for lack of a better word) similar to those existing at the north and south poles that cause the Aurora Borialis will exist in multiples. In otherwords, during this period of time these will drift around the surface of the earth until the fields stablize. The results will be spectacular night sky showings in such unlikely places as Paris or Hong Kong or where have you - the downside is the exposure to solar radiation of people under these zones.
The magnetosphere is dependent on the internal heat generated by the Earths core and it's rotation. In Mars case it is speculated that its core went cold a very long time ago and this was the primary reason its magnetosphere failed and let the solar wind work away the atmosphere.
*.ogg?
Well, maybe that's one of the motivations for this push. If TCPA is more about M$ keeping control of there market sector than it's officially designated use as a security method, then a mass switch to Linux on the desktop would surely put a crimp in the M$ focus and Redmonds grand design, of course which the official party line is that it's for security protocols.
One obvious thing this would do would be to break the dependency on M$ for support and hence a lucrative revenue source for M$. And likewise it takes M$' leverage points away. Kinda like the old mind over matter argument - IBM no longer minds M$ because MS doesn't matter anymore, at least to larger extent.
The other angle is a marketing statement. If one considers that Munich announced a systems wide switch to Linux, and now 19 German cities are making a concerted push to Linux as well. Add India, The Asian consortium (Japan, PRC, and Korea) developing their own, the U.S. Federal Court System switching to Linux, many large Wall Street firms switching to Linux, etc.., and IBM announcing the move to have their entire company using LOTD (Linux on the Desktop) and it sends a message to the rest of the enterprise and corporate sector that LOTD is going to happen in a very real way.
It also sends a message to the ISV/IHV/OEMs that a viable market in respects to supporting both programs, devices and device drivers is happening. Pair this with the host of developers in IBM that are going to focus on programs and support for LOTD at IBM and how that would translate to end-users and those that do business with IBM and one can see a substantial and potentially far reaching market play by Big Blue.
Unlike OS/2, where in IBM offered yet another proprietary product, one that brought forth many of the concerns we see people expressing in relation to M$ - that being lock ins, being relegated to the whims of a big business and the fact that IBM doesn't have to push Linux development solely by themselves and instead of trying to create a wave for vendors and customers to ride on. IBM only needs to ride the wave called Linux and in doing so lends credibility to its development and substancially creates a aire of support that is both seperate from IBM and at the same time IBM is perhaps the biggest player in this arena.
Look at the last six months, despite the SCO debacle, and we see Novell snatch up Ximian, then SUSE and all the while IBM is quitely sitting in the background while pulling a few choice strings. If we also consider Apple moving to the BSD based OS X and it's recent inclusion of XF86Free rendering base and we see the potential for more cross porting between Mac and Linux.
Step back and look at it from a bit of distance and we see, either by design or by happen stance, a concerted push away from Redmond in a manner that essentially, at least to some extent, negates M$' market leverage. Like I said - Mind over matter. I think the goal is to make M$ not matter, and a fair amount of people won't mind that in the least.
Well, first and foremost, of course, it's SCO. But they seem to have a partner in crime, so to speak.
The popular press. If not for the press' focus on hype over content the SCO fiasco would have fizzled quite some time ago.
I have yet to see a reporter consistantly ask the tough questions. Questions like:
"Mr. McBride. Would you care to give a reply regarding statements made by those in the Linux community, as well as other in well established business sectors about their position that they 'need to see what a SCO Unix license is paying for'?"
or,
"Would you care to make a statement regarding why your brother Kevin McBride represented SCO in court and not someone from Mr. Boies' firm, especially given the ~$9 million in legal fees SCO has paid for representation?"
Instead, we get headlines that revolve around the issues but never really focus on the heart of the matter - The Code?
IMHO the press coverage seems to take the ever popular "he said, she said" format. for example:
SCO Position Under Fire
SCO Group Launches Broadside Against GPL
SCO Loses First Legal Round in Linux Battle
Open-Source Legal Experts Dismiss SCO's Copyright Claims
Denial-of-Service Attack Knocks SCO Group Offline
Some Security Experts Doubt SCO Was Attacked
SCO Dismisses Importance of Early Court Loss
SCO Letter Demands Certification From Unix Customers
SCO Identifies Copyrighted Code in Linux
Long time to get to the real question:
Show me the code=What the hell are you talking about?
If not for some sites like Groklaw would the popular press even really have a clue what the real issue is?
It was and is about the product (which SCO seems to think is an after thought to a business strategy).
To restate the real question in blunt everyday language:
To SCO
what the hell are you talking about?
What code?
When one refers to the base issue to this picture then it becomes clear. We all know that many are and have asked this question and the it's SCO that is perpetrating this scenario.
My problem is our illustrious fourth estate (aka the press) seems more than willing to participate as a player in this endevour, rather than being what they are really supposed to be - an observer and inquirer of facts and happenings. In otherwords, they don't want to find out what is really going on because they get so much more out of milking it - as long as it keeps a certain sensationalistic aire about it. Facts are dry and not all that exciting. Drama on the other hand... And that's what the popular press is all about because drama gathers more revenue than facts.
Avoid using it at all costs.
"Plank does not speak Spanish and does not listen to Latin music. More importantly, his computer did not even have KaZaA installed during the period when the investigation occurred."
If this is indeed true this could be a major oops for the RIAA. And with the next year being an election year if the timing is right, and the press negative for the RIAA and its croonies...? Perhaps some politicians may want to "distance" themselves from this issue and any affiliation of contribs as well.
But then again....!
Dear Mr. Anonymous Coward. What cave have you been residing in? No troll intended but in all honesty are you really that out of touch? Microsoft has nothing against Linux? Microsoft named Linux #2 on its list of potential threats to its revenue stream and market plan in their 10Q report. Number 1 was the down economy and it's effects on IT spending.
How can you say with a straight face that Microsoft has nothing against Linux. After calling Linux and the GPL a cancer, unAmerican, and just short of out and out a socialist product bent on destroying all things proprietary.
Please, for your sake and others please think about what your posting so as not to embarrass yourself.