SCO has copies of source code from all its licensees.
I posted a while ago that the Sequent code seemed like the most likely place for SCO to have a legitimate claim, but that supposition rested on 2 points:
A) That the Sequent code did not come under the umbrella of IBM's licenses when IBM purchased them (I'm sure IBM will argue that the code now falls under their licenses)
B) That their are no upstream rights to the NUMA and RCU code prior to Sequent's implementation. (Fortunately, it appears there *are* upstream rights that would take precedence over SCO's "intellectual property" claims -- in that the algorithms and technologies were first published by Paul McKenney in a generalized, i.e. non-Unix, context)
So, I don't think SCO has a leg to stand on here either, but IBM *may* have to present a different defense for the code originated at Sequent than for its AIX code.
No, SCO is not talking about copyrights. Copyright infringement does not show up in any of their court claims (yet), nor does it show up in the press release.
They are taking about "derivative works". Their claim is that IBM's contract with ATT required IBM to treat any derivative works with the same level of confidentiality that is required for the licensed System V code. In other words, this is a claim that IBM violated its contract with ATT/Novell/SCO.
Under what legal theory SCO extends that into 'ownership' of the intellectual property, no one seems to know. The theory is that there is System V code supplied by other vendors in the Linux kernal, but SCO hasn't really identified what "Intellectual Property" it's licensing in their new license.
Wilson sold *all* his shares. From what I hear, he may be one of the pro-Linux guys at SCO. This may just be his attempt to cash out his options, Opinder Bawa - like, before getting the hell out of the company.
Especially given this rather prescient quote from Halloween I:
"[Linux is the] only Unix OS to gain market share. Linux is on track to eventually own the x86 UNIX market and has been the only UNIX version to gain net Server OS market share in recent years. I believe that Linux -- moreso than NT -- will be the biggest threat to SCO in the near future."
Ah, you forget who is in control of Uncle Sam these days.
The current administration *loves* shelling out money to its corporate benefactors. And I'm sure the Canopy Group has been a happy donator to the Republican and Bush causes.
I just tried calling and was told that the licensing program is still ongoing. Then they asked my company name. I told them I was an end-user. They just asked for my name and phone at that point and said a sales rep. would get back to me.
I feel kind of used and soiled. I just know they are going to come out with a statistic now about how over 500 end-users have called "expressing interest" in the licensing agreement, and my call will be part of that statistic.
You're right that it's a license, not a contract. I read Moglen's LU essay on the differences about an hour after I wrote that and thought "D'oh".
However most of the points I make are still correct, including the use of the term licensee, since there is no implicit acceptance of the license until the software is distributed. Therefore, the analogy of "paying" for the right to distribute the GPL'd software by following its terms is still good.
And, of course, I agree with you on the crafting of the GPL and that it will hold up in court for that reason.
Sorry, but I think Bruce is wrong on this one. When I hear it from Eben, then I'll believe it.
In the meantime, here is the beginning of section 5:
". You are not required to accept this License, since you have not signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the Program or its derivative works."
My reading of this is that: if the corporate entity has GPL'd software, the issue of whether it has agreed to the license doesn't come up unless they are externally distributing it. So as long as they are not distributing the GPL'd code and even if they buy the SCO license, they can't be in breach of the GPL because the conditions requiring its acceptance never arose.
SCO on the other hand is clearly in breach. But not the licensee.
Having read the article, I disagree with the author's comment that the GPL is a "social contract." I've read it, I'm sure a number of you have too. It's not a long document. I'd post it here, but I don't want to look like a Karma-Ho.
Anyway, it *is* a document with teeth. Let's say you're an author, and a publishing company wants to publish your book. You have the copyrights. They cannot publish it without your permission. So you sell them the right to publish it for an advance of $40,000 and maybe a buck a book for every copy sold after the advance is paid off.
Now, in the case of the GPL, instead of paying with cash or a portion of the profits from distribution, you pay by agreeing to certain terms and taking certain actions. For instance, if you distribute the software, you must include a copy of the GPL and a copy of the source code. If you modify the software and then distribute it, then you must do the same thing. That's your payement. It is required. If you don't take those actions (make the payment) then you can be sued for copyright violation. Outside of those conditions, you can do with it what you want for your own personal use and not worry about it.
There isn't anything "nebulous" about the GPL, despite Blake Stowell's FUD. And it's not a social contract; it's a contract, pure, and simple, and legally enforcable.
I can't wait to see this get tested in court. SCO will get their asses laughed out of court.
Judge: Let me get this straight. You say code that you own was relesed under GPL by another company.
SCO: Yes, that's right.
Judge: And then you released it under GPL yourself -- but not really because you didn't know the code was in there.
SCO: Yes, your honor. That's correct.
Judge: You never read the code, even though it was freely available, and you were publishing and distributing it.
SCO: That's right, your honor.
Judge: (snickers) Get the fuck out of here. All claims resolved in IBM's favor.
No, the corporate entity counts as a single licensee and is allowed to distribute within the entity. Only external distribution would cause the GPL to kick in.
Unfortunately, I'm looking through the GPL now, and I don't see any language explicitly defining a corporate entity as the same as a single licensee. However, that is the stand that the FSF and Eben Moglen have taken in the articles and interviews I've read. This is important because it allows corporations to modify the code without making it generally available if they choose not to do so.
I think it's an experiment to see how far SCO can push "IP" as a legal concept. Even if they lose, other companies might win if SCO manages to set a precedent for any novel interpretions regarding Intellectual Property.
Unfortunately, the GPL doesn't hold anyway in the case of non-distribution. Therefore, the purchasers of the license are not under any legal liability from the GPL. Sure it's an abrogation of the spirit of the GPL, but not the lettter.
Of course, why anyone would *pay* to limit their rights to use the software, I have no idea. I know there are people who pay to have things reamed up their asses once in a while, but they seem to enjoy it. But I don't see how a corporation could find this licensing extortion fun at all.
Oh well, maybe I'm just naive. I mean, you should have seen the expression on my face the first time I heard about a Prince Albert.
It was down to about $8.50 at 2:00pm. Someone keeps tape painting the stock at the end of the day. I'm serious. You always see a rise in the stock after 4:00pm. I wish we could find out who's doing it. I guess I'd like to know why too. It seems kind of pointless, but maybe I'm missing something.
Well, we are talking about who gets treatment when, because those laws only cover emergency treatment. People who are poor and don't have health insurance can't afford preventative, proactive treatment and therefore often won't seek treatment until they are very sick.
Which in turn leads to a breeding ground of disease. No one wants that, and anyone who thinks the solution is rounding up all the illegal immigrants and sending them back to where they came from is being irrational.
So is saying that they will be given treatment, in emergency situations, because it does nothing to prevent emergency situations from occurring.
No, but I believe diseases grow in poverty. There is a practical dimension to this, which is that if we want to keep disease low we need to make sure that the poor have access to the same sanitation and health facilities as the rich and the middle-class. Otherwise, we will all suffer when a mass outbreak of cholera or drug-resistant tuberculosis comes, as it naturally will, if we don't take precautions to prevent it.
And like it or not, one of the best preventions is guaranteeing a proactive rather than reactive standard of health care. People who can't afford health care are not going to pay for it; they can't afford to. They will only go to the doctor or hospital when they are already sick or injured. In other words, they will only seek health care reactively.
So if we want a proactive system of health care ot protect the wider community, we have to pay for it. And that means providing some sort of state-sponsored proactive health care. So you see, it's not about your money being used to take care of some illegal immigrant; it's about your money being used to take care of you and the wider society by preventing the situations that can lead to massive health care crises for everyone.
That's interesting. I knew it was in place before Napoleon, but didn't realize that it was *that* long before.
Still, I thought standardization of the language wasn't undertaken until Napoleon. Was it part of the Academie's original mandate? Or was it added later?
Slashdot Mirror
SCO has copies of source code from all its licensees.
I posted a while ago that the Sequent code seemed like the most likely place for SCO to have a legitimate claim, but that supposition rested on 2 points:
A) That the Sequent code did not come under the umbrella of IBM's licenses when IBM purchased them (I'm sure IBM will argue that the code now falls under their licenses)
B) That their are no upstream rights to the NUMA and RCU code prior to Sequent's implementation. (Fortunately, it appears there *are* upstream rights that would take precedence over SCO's "intellectual property" claims -- in that the algorithms and technologies were first published by Paul McKenney in a generalized, i.e. non-Unix, context)
So, I don't think SCO has a leg to stand on here either, but IBM *may* have to present a different defense for the code originated at Sequent than for its AIX code.
No, SCO is not talking about copyrights. Copyright infringement does not show up in any of their court claims (yet), nor does it show up in the press release.
They are taking about "derivative works". Their claim is that IBM's contract with ATT required IBM to treat any derivative works with the same level of confidentiality that is required for the licensed System V code. In other words, this is a claim that IBM violated its contract with ATT/Novell/SCO.
Under what legal theory SCO extends that into 'ownership' of the intellectual property, no one seems to know. The theory is that there is System V code supplied by other vendors in the Linux kernal, but SCO hasn't really identified what "Intellectual Property" it's licensing in their new license.
Wilson sold *all* his shares. From what I hear, he may be one of the pro-Linux guys at SCO. This may just be his attempt to cash out his options, Opinder Bawa - like, before getting the hell out of the company.
Especially given this rather prescient quote from Halloween I:
"[Linux is the] only Unix OS to gain market share. Linux is on track to eventually own the x86 UNIX market and has been the only UNIX version to gain net Server OS market share in recent years. I believe that Linux -- moreso than NT -- will be the biggest threat to SCO in the near future."
Ah, you forget who is in control of Uncle Sam these days.
The current administration *loves* shelling out money to its corporate benefactors. And I'm sure the Canopy Group has been a happy donator to the Republican and Bush causes.
I just found this really hilarious quote on one of SCO's early press releases (http://ir.sco.com/ReleaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=41
"Caldera and 'Unifying UNIX with Linux for Business' are trademarks or registered trademarks of Caldera Systems Inc."
Not only were they putting Unix code into Linux, but they fucking TRADEMARKED it!!!
Does anyone have any Ace Bandages? I need to wrap something around my torso before I bust my gut laughing.
I just tried calling and was told that the licensing program is still ongoing. Then they asked my company name. I told them I was an end-user. They just asked for my name and phone at that point and said a sales rep. would get back to me.
I feel kind of used and soiled. I just know they are going to come out with a statistic now about how over 500 end-users have called "expressing interest" in the licensing agreement, and my call will be part of that statistic.
I think I'll go shower.
You're right that it's a license, not a contract. I read Moglen's LU essay on the differences about an hour after I wrote that and thought "D'oh".
However most of the points I make are still correct, including the use of the term licensee, since there is no implicit acceptance of the license until the software is distributed. Therefore, the analogy of "paying" for the right to distribute the GPL'd software by following its terms is still good.
And, of course, I agree with you on the crafting of the GPL and that it will hold up in court for that reason.
Sorry, but I think Bruce is wrong on this one. When I hear it from Eben, then I'll believe it.
In the meantime, here is the beginning of section 5:
". You are not required to accept this License, since you have not signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the Program or its derivative works."
My reading of this is that: if the corporate entity has GPL'd software, the issue of whether it has agreed to the license doesn't come up unless they are externally distributing it. So as long as they are not distributing the GPL'd code and even if they buy the SCO license, they can't be in breach of the GPL because the conditions requiring its acceptance never arose.
SCO on the other hand is clearly in breach. But not the licensee.
Having read the article, I disagree with the author's comment that the GPL is a "social contract." I've read it, I'm sure a number of you have too. It's not a long document. I'd post it here, but I don't want to look like a Karma-Ho.
Anyway, it *is* a document with teeth. Let's say you're an author, and a publishing company wants to publish your book. You have the copyrights. They cannot publish it without your permission. So you sell them the right to publish it for an advance of $40,000 and maybe a buck a book for every copy sold after the advance is paid off.
Now, in the case of the GPL, instead of paying with cash or a portion of the profits from distribution, you pay by agreeing to certain terms and taking certain actions. For instance, if you distribute the software, you must include a copy of the GPL and a copy of the source code. If you modify the software and then distribute it, then you must do the same thing. That's your payement. It is required. If you don't take those actions (make the payment) then you can be sued for copyright violation. Outside of those conditions, you can do with it what you want for your own personal use and not worry about it.
There isn't anything "nebulous" about the GPL, despite Blake Stowell's FUD. And it's not a social contract; it's a contract, pure, and simple, and legally enforcable.
I can't wait to see this get tested in court. SCO will get their asses laughed out of court.
Judge: Let me get this straight. You say code that you own was relesed under GPL by another company.
SCO: Yes, that's right.
Judge: And then you released it under GPL yourself -- but not really because you didn't know the code was in there.
SCO: Yes, your honor. That's correct.
Judge: You never read the code, even though it was freely available, and you were publishing and distributing it.
SCO: That's right, your honor.
Judge: (snickers) Get the fuck out of here. All claims resolved in IBM's favor.
They're also setting themselves up for random audits by SCO. That's part of the new SCO "license". So I agree, it's a *very* stupid move.
No, the corporate entity counts as a single licensee and is allowed to distribute within the entity. Only external distribution would cause the GPL to kick in.
Unfortunately, I'm looking through the GPL now, and I don't see any language explicitly defining a corporate entity as the same as a single licensee. However, that is the stand that the FSF and Eben Moglen have taken in the articles and interviews I've read. This is important because it allows corporations to modify the code without making it generally available if they choose not to do so.
I think it's an experiment to see how far SCO can push "IP" as a legal concept. Even if they lose, other companies might win if SCO manages to set a precedent for any novel interpretions regarding Intellectual Property.
Do they? I hope so, but I'm not sure.
Is there a copy of the Server license anywhere on the net? I haven't found one, though there is a copy of the workstation license at LWN.
No, it's not true and you are right. SCO can be sued for selling the license and thereby violating the copyright terms of the other contributors.
The licensees (if any) are not violating the GPL; they are just being stupid.
Clarification: SCO, on the other hand, *can* be sued for copyright violation in abrogation of the GPL. Just not the licensees.
I agree with the spirit of what you are saying.
Unfortunately, the GPL doesn't hold anyway in the case of non-distribution. Therefore, the purchasers of the license are not under any legal liability from the GPL. Sure it's an abrogation of the spirit of the GPL, but not the lettter.
Of course, why anyone would *pay* to limit their rights to use the software, I have no idea. I know there are people who pay to have things reamed up their asses once in a while, but they seem to enjoy it. But I don't see how a corporation could find this licensing extortion fun at all.
Oh well, maybe I'm just naive. I mean, you should have seen the expression on my face the first time I heard about a Prince Albert.
That's so immature. It warms the cockles of my black, bitter, and evil heart.
Actually, I think it's probably the Canopy Group that bought it. Or maybe one of their companies.
Are any of the Canopy Group companies in the Fortune 500?
Darl: Ralph, will you buy one of our licenses?
Ralph Yarro: Why? I don't run any your crappy operating systems.
Darl: No, Ralph, the Linux IP license.
Ralph: I don't run that either. We're all MS here.
Darl: For the suit, Ralph. Remember: The Suit?
I need to tell other companies that someone has bought a license.
Ralph: Oh. Oh, yeah. Right. OK, put me down for one. How much is it?
Darl: $699
Ralph: Corporate Discount?
Darl: OK. 50%.
Ralph: Done. Now get out of here. One of my wives is on the phone.
It was down to about $8.50 at 2:00pm. Someone keeps tape painting the stock at the end of the day. I'm serious. You always see a rise in the stock after 4:00pm. I wish we could find out who's doing it. I guess I'd like to know why too. It seems kind of pointless, but maybe I'm missing something.
An undisclosed Fortune 500 company paid an undisclosed amount for an undisclosed number of licenses for undisclosed code in the Linux kernel.
Is anyone else skeptical? Or is it just me?
Well, we are talking about who gets treatment when, because those laws only cover emergency treatment. People who are poor and don't have health insurance can't afford preventative, proactive treatment and therefore often won't seek treatment until they are very sick.
Which in turn leads to a breeding ground of disease. No one wants that, and anyone who thinks the solution is rounding up all the illegal immigrants and sending them back to where they came from is being irrational.
So is saying that they will be given treatment, in emergency situations, because it does nothing to prevent emergency situations from occurring.
No, but I believe diseases grow in poverty. There is a practical dimension to this, which is that if we want to keep disease low we need to make sure that the poor have access to the same sanitation and health facilities as the rich and the middle-class. Otherwise, we will all suffer when a mass outbreak of cholera or drug-resistant tuberculosis comes, as it naturally will, if we don't take precautions to prevent it.
And like it or not, one of the best preventions is guaranteeing a proactive rather than reactive standard of health care. People who can't afford health care are not going to pay for it; they can't afford to. They will only go to the doctor or hospital when they are already sick or injured. In other words, they will only seek health care reactively.
So if we want a proactive system of health care ot protect the wider community, we have to pay for it. And that means providing some sort of state-sponsored proactive health care. So you see, it's not about your money being used to take care of some illegal immigrant; it's about your money being used to take care of you and the wider society by preventing the situations that can lead to massive health care crises for everyone.
I do not know how many times I have to tell people this.
They do not work. They just make your hand smaller.
That's interesting. I knew it was in place before Napoleon, but didn't realize that it was *that* long before.
Still, I thought standardization of the language wasn't undertaken until Napoleon. Was it part of the Academie's original mandate? Or was it added later?