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A Heads Up to the Media
Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 08:29 AM EST

Guess how many people went to hear Darl McBride's keynote address at CDXPO? No, really. Guess.

According to Todd Weiss of ComputerWorld, there were only 80 people. Count them. 80. Bill Gates had thousands at Comdex, with an overflow room.

I'll bet Jupitermedia Corp. was surprised and disappointed. I don't need to bet or guess. They said they were "a little disappointed in the turnout for the keynote speeches." Here they invited the most hated executive in the IT world, probably thinking it would boost attendance, and it flopped.

See, that's why it's always better to stick to your principles. If you have any. That way, even if things go south, at least you still have your self-respect. Nobody in the IT world takes Darl seriously. No, wait. 80 people are at least curious. That should tell the press something vitally important about SCO's claims. We know what he is talking about, and we dismiss him.

Here's a bit more detail on the show:

"Meanwhile, a keynote speech at CD Expo Tuesday night by Darl McBride, president and CEO of The SCO Group Inc., drew only about 80 attendees. . . . . At least one exhibitor pulled out before the show was to end today.

"An executive with Siemens Enterprise Networks who spoke on condition of anonymity confirmed that the company sent its booth staff home Tuesday night and removed its equipment from the CD Expo floor yesterday. . . .

"Siemens was by no means alone with unfulfilled expectations. 'It's much smaller than I anticipated,' said one, who asked that his name and company be withheld. Another vendor said show organizers had perhaps overplayed the potential crowd at the Jupitermedia show."

This poses a dilemma for Groklaw. We have about 400,000 hits a week now. Do I do a transcript of the speech and spread it far and wide? Or let it sink under the water, never to be seen again? Votes?

I didn't just bring up the keynote speech to be mean, however. Not that I don't feel like being mean, now and again, when it comes to SCO. Rather, I mention it because it relates to another key bit of news this week, namely SCO announcing to the press that they "had to" hire bodyguards to protect their executives from "death threats" allegedly coming from the Linux community.

Huh? Death threats from a community that has never been known to harm a flea and are being criticized for not even being aggressive enough in business to charge money for their work (SCO measures testosterone in dollar signs), which they want to freely share with the world because they are such nice people? Puh-lease.

I waited to write about it, because I was interested to see how the mainstream media would react to what seemed to me to be likely a PR prank. Of course, I was not disappointed in my expectations. Some in the press covered it straight-faced, as they always do when Darl says anything.

If they were covering Jesus Christ's trial, it'd be: "A spokesman for Pontius Pilate informed the Jerusalem News that the accused threatened to overthrow the government and replace it with his own kingdom. 'We took a strong stand, because the threat was both broad and deep,' said Marcus Spartacus, from Pilate's office. 'The sedition laws are clear and will be enforced vigorously.'" A lot of the story gets missed, you see, when you only quote spokespeople for one side. Even if you get quotes from both sides, it's still not the complete story. Reporting is where you find out, when possible, who is telling the truth by digging for facts, not just scribbling down quotes. Otherwise, you could just miss the story of the century. I know you know that. Just a friendly reminder.

And I was too angry to write, also, without ... well, without wanting to threaten somebody. Only kidding. Don't hire more security, Darl. It's a joke, kiddo. A little hyperbole. But I did need time to calm down.

SCO's Darl McBride told the Salt Lake Tribune that he hired protection for SCO executives. And of course he was telling the press all about it, claiming they received email and phone threats from the community. I believe that's exactly what I'd do too, if I received a credible death threat: I'd tell everyone in the media all about it, including what hotel I was staying in with my bodyguards.

The home town paper, of course, wrote about it. But so did Bloomberg News. In fact, the SLT story appears to have been taken from the Bloomberg News story in large part, or vice versa. According to the first report from Jonathan Berr of Bloomberg News, whom you may remember from the SCO teleconference Tuesday (he's one of the reporters they allowed to ask questions), the local police were asked about it, but they knew nothing about any so-called threats:

"Local police were unaware of any threats against SCO, said Captain Cody Cullimore of the Pleasant Grove Police Department, which patrols Lindon."

I thought it was great that Berr bothered to contact the police. That is what a good journalist should do. But why wasn't this significant piece of the story not being reported by anyone else? I contacted Mr. Berr, to ask him for a link so I could point you to the story, which I had received only in an email, and he sent me another email instead, with an edited story, which by then, the next day, had been updated, and the local police were no longer in the article. Instead there was this paragraph:

"Blake Stowell, an SCO spokesman, declined to say what specific security measures a private security contractor is taking or when they began. Hackers have tried to shut down the company's Web site four times since March, he said. The company has notified the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation about the threats. No arrests have been made, Stowell said."

The first Bloomberg News story, and the SLT, said three attacks. Now, one day later, it's four. I only remember them mentioning two in public before, and one of them for sure is in dispute as to whether it ever really happened. What's going on here?

Bruce Perens says he doesn't believe the latest threats story either:

"Reaction Tuesday from the open-source community to SCO's security concerns was a mixture of disbelief and scorn.

"'I just don't buy it,' said Bruce Perens, a Berkeley, Calif.-based Linux developer and open source advocate. 'This is just an effort to discredit the open-source community.

"'If there were real threats, the police would be there instead of husky fellows with radio tubes in their heads,' he said."

With SCOSpeak, you have to be careful. By putting the "death threats" and the web server "attacks" in the same paragraph, and then saying that the FBI had been notified, it sounds like Stowell means they notified the FBI about the "death threats", but I believe he may have meant the server "attacks" instead. That would be logical, don't you think? If you had a death threat, would you call the FBI or the local police? If you did call the FBI, what would they tell you to do, if the threat was credible? Call the local police or hire bodyguards yourself? Which would have jurisdiction anyway, the local police or the FBI? On the other hand, the FBI does have jurisdiction over server attacks, if the dollar loss meets the threshold. You just have to watch those SCOfolk real close, don't you? It's like talking with a car salesman.

While we can't know for sure what is going on, without more facts, which SCO is eternally short of, what might a reasonable and fair explanation be? I see two ways to look at it.

First, if I were a starry-eyed 7-year-old who had yet to grow the first cynical bone in her body, and I believed every single word of SCOSpeak emanating from Utah, I'd probably guess that they got some hotly worded email or phone calls from some tipsy teenagers, maybe. It looks like it wasn't even that much. EWeek has this illuminating tidbit:

"McBride, who was accompanied by a pair of security guards because of reports that his speech might be disrupted by protesters, said that as SCO's CEO, his loyalties are to the company's stockholders, customers and employees, not the Linux community."

Excuse me, but as a 7-year-old, I still believe that peaceful protests are part of what the US Constitution legally allows for and that it doesn't reflect evil intent on the part of those wishing to express their views. But... um... there were no protesters, were there? There was barely an audience, let alone anyone interested enough to protest. So how credible was the "threat"?

But if I were an adult who had been following this story closely and had read Dan Lyons' Forbes article about his experience with SCO's honesty or lack thereof, I think I'd look at it differently, more like this: I might notice that not long ago, the "always fair and balanced" Rob Enderle wrote about the Linux community with disdain, as he is wont to do, and he predicted that the community's "zealotry" would lead it to go too far and do damage to their cause.

When I read that, I immediately started worrying this might be a prediction, one with maybe a plan of fulfillment behind it, that maybe he had some inside information. OK, I'm not a starry-eyed 7-year-old any more. That really was my first thought -- that SCO might try to tarnish the Linux community's reputation deliberately by some stunt they would blame on the community.

I was worried enough that I contacted a few in the community to share my concern that there might be some kind of PR setup to try to make the community look bad. I thought they might stage an "attack" on their servers or something, but whether that or something new, I felt sure something would follow. Then I waited for the other shoe to drop. Is it possible it just did? From the SLT account:

"'With the personal threats to our lives we have had to rachet up security both for our company and for certain individuals,' McBride said. Sontag stressed that most in the open-source community, while understandably upset with SCO's Linux claims, are reasonable in their conduct.

    "'However, there are some elements who have an almost religious zealousness about Linux,' he added. 'In some ways, that can be scary for anyone opposing their positions.'

Religious zealotry, eh? Sound like someone you know? By the way, before we dump Enderle out of the car and continue on our journey here, may I inquire why a site that calls itself LinuxInsider regularly publishes his anti-Linux hate pieces, and other negative articles, including the report about the bodyguards, of course, minus the detail that the local police knew of no threats? I am not providing a link, because they might do it for the same reason that CDXPO may have invited Darl to speak, in which case the fewer hits his articles receive, the less likely anyone will be motivated to print his rants.

Getting back to the alleged "attacks" on SCO's servers. I don't know anything about two new alleged attacks, but I believe if they had occurred, the community would likely have noticed. Netcraft keeps track of such things. For that matter, are we being asked to believe that there have been four such events and the FBI can't find even one guilty party? I have more confidence in their abilities than that.

The only "attack" I was personally aware of was the highly publicized "attack" in August. This one, not to put too fine a point on it, smelled mighty fishy. When the August "attack" allegedly began, the one that lasted for days and kept business hours, Utah time, I called SCO's ISP the first day, when the first news of an attack surfaced on the internet, and I asked to speak with tech support.

"Say," I said, after identifying myself to the guy on duty, "I hear SCO is being attacked." "What?" he said, incredulously. "Who told you something like that?" I said I had read it on the internet and I was calling just to verify. Then he started laughing.

Laughing.

He told me that he wasn't really allowed to talk about a customer specifically one way or another. But he was already laughing, so I pressed a little. "Can I at least assume from your reaction that whoever made the statement that SCO is experiencing an attack is all wet?" After a pause, he said, "You could say that."

So, while I am not a programmer and am not qualified to judge the technical issues, I do know that this guy was not acting like he was busy handling anything like an attack or had any knowledge of any attack prior to my phone call. And, if it were happening, he would have been the first to know. Cf. this article.

The next day, two different individuals called SCO and asked if there was an attack, and both were told no, that SCO had taken themselves down to do an update of the web site and were having trouble getting back up. Later, a third individual reported the same thing. Here is what Netcraft said about the "attack" at the time:

"The SCO site was up for a few hours during business hours in Utah, but has since failed again. Many news sites carried the story that Eric Raymond had spoken to a group responsible for a Distributed Denial of Service attack on the www.sco.com site and that they agreed to stop. However it appears that this may have been a hoax, or they subsequently changed their minds, or another person decided to continue the attack."

Maybe a hoax, and if so, one that has been perpetuated ad nauseum in the press as being a fact, and has even entered history by being included as a fact in SCO's SEC filings. But it was never proven to be a fact, folks. Just an allegation by SCO. Trustworthy SCO. Who always tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

There is another element. On September 1, it was announced that SCO had been fined in Germany for material on its web site that violated the injunction against them. (Scroll down the page for an English translation, those of you who don't read German.) It's been reported SCO's German web site was hosted from Utah, and they certainly did have to do some changes to their web site during the same general time period in question. Is it not possible that they took the web site down to bring themselves into compliance with the German court's order, which included a fine, and then had trouble getting back up again, just as their employees told us? Do you, in your heart of hearts, think that might be possible?

No one but SCO, so far, knows the truth, and I make no accusations, because I don't want to act the way they do. My point is this: if the mainstream press reports as true anything these people say, I believe they could be used to build a case against the Linux community. There is a lot at stake. The press has been improving in their coverage of SCO, and we appreciate it, so this is just a heads up.

I find it hard, if not impossible, to believe SCO's story. I just can't, and after Darl's keynote speech, I trust him like I trust cancer. Why he is trying to paint the Linux community as thieves, pirates, and now thugs is beyond a decent mind's comprehension. It isn't the Linux community he should worry about. A defiled conscience is a much more realistic fear.

Or maybe the danger they face is that SCOfolk will stab themselves all over with the many pains the Scriptures warn is the result when you fall in love with money. Here's Darl's story:

"'This started off as a contract dispute with IBM, then we discovered [alleged SCO-owned Unix code] within Linux,' McBride said. 'Now we have a firestorm of controversy and anger from many in the Linux community.'"

It's not anger, exactly. It's moral outrage at what we are witnessing. We are not the liars, thieves, thugs, pirates or attackers. The truth is that all the undeserved, verified threats have come from SCO and their new partner, David Boies. The Linux community has shown remarkable restraint, especially when you consider it's their creative work, their IP, if you will, that Darl is trying to rip off. Here is one reaction to the teleconference from Joe Barr and Chris Preimesberger on Newsforge:

"SCO is going to attack the 1994 AT&T/BSD settlement. That's a very interesting item that the few favored analysts (and only a select few journalists) who were allowed to ask questions failed to pick up on. Here's our take on why SCO is embarking on this new course of action:

"SCO has steadfastly refused to get specific about infringement of its IP. That's probably not because they are coy, but rather because they can't. The few snippets of code it dared to make public already have been laughed off the stage and quite thoroughly debunked. With both IBM and Red Hat now demanding in court that SCO show its cards, the company came to realization that it was either at the end of the trail or that it had to broaden its horizons.

"They've chosen the latter."

The fact that their code samples were laughed off the stage didn't stop SCO from using the same examples as "proof" of infringement in recent media interviews and public appearances, including on the Linux Show, which aired the Town Hall meeting of Q & A after Darl's speech, where they again used the SGI code as an instance of 'infringing" code -- even saying that it was admitted that it was such. That's not a true and complete picture. Period.

So why do they say the things they do? Well, I'm not God, so I will have to just guess. My impression is that they anticipate that the Red Hat case, in particular, is unlikely to go their way when the judge rules on their Motion to Dismiss, any day now, and they want to open a second front, as something to distract from a possible negative decision. It's easy to be awful with copyright law, and they perhaps also figure they'll get a quick infusion of cash and PR benefit from a take-down or some other mean-spirited nonsense. As Bill Claybrook was quoted as saying, "Boies sees that the more lawsuits, the more chance of making money." That's a likely problem when a lawyer is also the plaintiff.

They also are raising an issue they may hope will survive the international laughter and outrage -- and the judge in Utah -- when in discovery in the IBM case, they have nothing meaningful to show for their claims. So they open a second issue, which will also take time to resolve:

"'They knocked on one door and didn't get any money, and now they're moving to the next door,' said Phil Albert, a partner at intellectual property law firm Townsend and Townsend and Crew LLP, in San Francisco. 'Part of their strategy may be that it doesn't really matter if they have any copyright claim.'

"Proving a copyright claim is difficult, and SCO will need to overcome major hurdles to do so, legal experts said. But the fear of litigation alone may force a defendant company into a settlement, which would set an example that could push other Linux-using companies to pay SCO the license fees it has been seeking from end users, they say."

Meanwhile, they are making money, they say. They very much would like the SCOShow to continue, naturally.

Here is the actual explanation behind it all, in my opinion:

"The SCO Group Inc.'s Chief Executive Officer, Darl McBride, enlisted the help of the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) to bolster his arguments against the open source GPL (GNU General Public License) and Linux during a keynote address at the CD Expo conference here in Las Vegas.

"Citing WIPO data, McBride said that the value of the worldwide software market would approach $229 billion by 2007, and that it was being threatened by the ideas behind the Free Software Foundation's GPL, the software license that governs Linux.

"'The world, especially here in America, is shifting to one that is an information society,' McBride said. 'In the future, is that $229 billion in software still going to be there? Or in the case of the Free Software Foundation's goal, is proprietary software going to go away?'"

Money is such a pesky thing, isn't it? By the way, Ransom Love has now told us why he sold all his shares of SCO stock. It wasn't ethics. It was money. He did it because he was sure SCO would lose the IBM case:

"Q: What did you think when SCO filed the lawsuit against IBM?

"LOVE: I wasn't surprised about the lawsuit against IBM because there were longstanding issues we weren't able to resolve with IBM. But I lived through the Microsoft suit at Caldera (in which Caldera sued Microsoft over the DOS operating system), and those things take on a life of their own. They consume a business. When it first came out my biggest concern--we had done work to get SCO to a position where it was profitable, then they got themselves embroiled in this major lawsuit, and I just new it was going to go south. That's when we--my wife and I--sold our shares.

"Q: Presumably, you think Linux still has a chance, given your new post at Progeny?

"LOVE: Absolutely. I think a lot of this stuff will take its course. For example, I'm almost certain that Novell has existing rights for using Unix products, so they may very well be indemnified. When they sold Unix to SCO, they kept a lot of stuff themselves. That could provide a buffer between SCO and the industry. It'll be fun to watch what happens."

One final detail from the Love interview. Guess how this whole sad lawsuit business got started? He says Caldera was discussing "what we can do through UnitedLinux to indemnify people who had used both Unix and Linux. Apparently, Darl took that in a little different direction than we intended."

The point of this article is this: I fear the SCO team plan on painting the Linux community as having a lunatic fringe, one that can't be trusted, that poses a security risk that must be stopped, so they can fulfill their dream of destroying the GPL and succeed in their "land grab" and get paid on every copy of Linux ever sold. And they insist that "Linux is Not Free" precisely because if it's free, they don't get their payment. So if you bump into Darl on the street, tip your hat politely and go on your way. It's the best strategy. IBM is going to wipe up the floor with them, I expect. Red Hat too. Just be patient.

And you media people: We hope you don't let yourselves be used. There is a lot at stake here, and we are relying on you to do your job. That means reporting as a fact only facts that you have verified and know to be factual. Journalism 101. Cynicism is actually useful in a reporter. It's how you end up winning awards for investigative reporting. Yup. That's a hint.

UPDATE I checked with Web Knight, who does criminal law, and he tells me that even if you called the FBI, while under certain circumstances they would have jurisdiction, the local police would normally be informed and involved also. Here's what he tells me: "The FBI has some statutory jurisdiction and some discretionary authority. They certainly help with local drug cases. They have jurisdiction of kidnapping. They have labs and resources that many local authorities don't. Much might depend on what was threatened. Certainly local police would have to be brought in on it. I am sure that under one task force or another they can get involved."


  


A Heads Up to the Media | 418 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
Transcript the speech, but...
Authored by: Ruidh on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 10:56 AM EST
...just put it in the quote database.

Heh, heh, heh.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: jmc on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:06 AM EST

I see the SCO Website has got Darl's mush on it with the headline about "no free lunch or free Linux" and a link a page supposedly with his speech which isn't available until next weekend.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Speeches
Authored by: jerryg on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:09 AM EST
I vote for making sure that every word that Darl and Company expresses in public
be recorded and remembered as examples of corporate greed that they represent

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • Speeches - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 05:19 AM EST
A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:11 AM EST
This must definetly be your best piece (so far), PJ - simply
brilliant! Come to think of it: That idea about "hired
e-hitmen" being behind the alleged DDOS attacks wasn't too
far off, after all...

-r ;-) *hate it when I pat myself on the shoulder*

[ Reply to This | # ]

Audience Census
Authored by: arch_dude on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:18 AM EST
If you were one of the 80 people, please reply to this post. We would sincerely
like to hear your viewpoint on the presentation, and we would like your
evaluation of the makeup of the audience.

Were 70 of the 80 GROKLAW-reading SCO-skeptics? :-)

Thanks.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: BC on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:19 AM EST
Does the speech contain anything new?
Contradict any past positions in a new way?

If not, I agree, archive it in case we need and let it collect the dust it so
richly deserves.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Clifton Hyatt on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:26 AM EST

WOW

That's why her comments are at the top of the page, lol.

...honesty can be brutal, at needs.

[ Reply to This | # ]

PJ:
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:28 AM EST
First, I love the site. You're doing a true service to the OSS community, and
if there was some sort of high profile award handed out for this sort of thing,
I think you should get it.

Second: small correction: flee, as in run away, is different from flea, as in
small critter that bites. ;-)

[ Reply to This | # ]

About reporting and reporters...
Authored by: jmccorm on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:31 AM EST
I think you've hit the nail on the head, and it also explains the popularity of
your site. Reporters today (American, more than British) are caught up in the
he-said she-said game. "Bob says A, but Joe says B." A or B?
"Fred says A+C as a possibility." Informative only at the 10,000
foot level and nothing that a high school student can't put together. Its like
they're using puppets to tell a story.

I think we appreciate your site, PJ, because you dig down and find out the
details yourself, and comment on them and explain them. You really do something
different than the tech media. You're not a quote collector. The tech media is
really missing out on this kind of journalism. That, and it is entertaining,
too. Go figure?

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:33 AM EST
"Death threats from a community that has never been known to harm a flee..."

Heh. You know, sweetness and light haven't always existed within the OSS community.

[ Reply to This | # ]

My Vote!
Authored by: roxyb on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:03 PM EST
This poses a dilemma for Groklaw. We have about 400,000 hits a week now. Do I do a transcript of the speech and spread it far and wide? Or let it sink under the water, never to be seen again? Votes?

In my opinion, we need to address all (or as much as humanly possible) of the FUD that Darl (and associates, at SCO or otherwise) spreads far and wide. If we don't address this speech, we may loose an opportunity to correct it or miss a journalist (or other non-techie) that is looking for facts based upon a certain speech or article.

I would vote very strongly for putting his speech up and address (for the n-th time) the lies and contradictions that are probably inside it.

Roland Buresund

---
--
I'm Still Standing...

[ Reply to This | # ]

Death Threats...
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:15 PM EST
1. I really do enjoy reading the stuff here at Groklaw. It's been very
educational.

2. I wouldn't waste the space printing his keynote speech. Keep it around for
stupid quotes as I'm sure there are a few and leave it at that.

3. With regards to the death threats. Given the amount of reading SCO execs do,
I'm sure Darl just woke up two or three of the MIT staff who ran grep on his
E-mail files looking for death, die and so forth. Finding several instances, but
never thinking to view them in context, they figured these were threats and
hired some bodyguards. Well, at least a few bouncers from the Salt Lake area a
picking up a few extra bucks.

Keep up the good work...

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • I vote... - Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:44 PM EST
When the lawyer is also the plaintiff
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:21 PM EST
"Boies sees that the more lawsuits, the more chance of making money." That's a likely problem when a lawyer is also the plaintiff.

Apparently, Heise was caught in a somewhat similar situation in Miami earlier this year - click here for details.

[ Reply to This | # ]

80 attendees?
Authored by: ijramirez on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:23 PM EST
Well, maybe they had 80 attendees but the interesting part would be to know how
many were not SCO employees. I am sure Darly brought with him a cadre of people,
including his body guards. It is also standard procedure that when attendance
is low to any event, the organizers stuff them with their own staff so that they
look populated.

Do the math and am sure the real attendee figure is significantly below 80. ..
How pathetic.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: SteveS on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:28 PM EST
This is why I had previously suggested the thought of creating an article or "Press Release" if you will, that contains facts. A clear story with a balanced, sane approach, and submit it to NPR. PJ, in this commentary makes the glaring point that most of the stories written are one sided – Could it be because this is what reporters are hearing about? Could it be our fault, because we are acting like old men (and women) sitting on the front porch, complaining to ourselves about the happenings of the world around us? We are preaching to the converted here. This site is great and an excellent place to go and get our heads on straight. But it is NOT the place to be for the average reporter who loves to get his stories off the news wires - (how many times do you see the same stories repeated almost verbatim on deferent sites or papers?).

While this is BIG news to you and me, It hardly makes a wrinkle in the space-time continuum. The average Joe could care less what he uses in his computer The same can be said for the average reporter as well. - He doesn't equate flipping on a switch with freedom - Until it's gone.

I would like to attempt to put together such an article, but could use some assistance. How about the theme first - Should this be a human interest story? (to combat the bad mouthing OSS has gotten from McB and Co) Should it "stick to the facts Ma'am," should it be a combo of both?

This doesn't even have to be a completed story - they love to see well presented ideas as too.

NPR Site
Thoughts?

Steve S.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:28 PM EST
Enough rope to hang themselves.
Since SCO is going to be hung with their own PR the more words from dear Darl
the better.

[ Reply to This | # ]

To reply, or not to reply...
Authored by: PJP on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:29 PM EST
On the question of what to do about the speech, I would suggest that if it
contains anything at all which is new, or is expressed differently, then treat
it like any other and disect it in public.

However, if, as I suspect, it is just a re-hash of the same old stuff, then
there seems to be little point in paying it any particular attention, other than
to note that the text is available in the archives.

BTW, have you thought of contacting the police department you mentioned directly
and asking if they have any information on the suposed death threats ? That way
there would be a definate item to list about their lies rather than simply
rumor.

In a similar vein, anyone know who provides the Internet service to SCO ? and
know anyone who works there who can confirm/deny the DoS attack? if anyone would
have evidence one way or the other, its their ISP.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: maxhrk on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:31 PM EST
sorry for a bit of off-topic. if we are over with sco or something, maybe we can
shift focus on microsoft or other thing to defuse FUD. :)

Here gives a interesting evilish history of Microsoft:
<a
href="http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/showthread.php?s=&thread
id=107590">http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/showthread.php?s=&am
p;threadid=107590</a>

I will try collect more info if you want to, PJ.



Friend,
Richard M.

---

Sincerely,
Richard M.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Linux insider == joke
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:36 PM EST
Linux insider edits my posts there on a regular basis. No foul language, no
accusitory lies, yet they still edit. I once said "don't believe anything
that comes out of Rob Enderle's mouth because he has close ties to MS and a
vendetta againt IBM for being fired". That whole section was removed.
I've posted a rant how it's counter productive to have Microsoft such a major
advertisor (espically when those ads are Windows services for UNIX, something
geared at switiching linux users to windows) and the rant was cut down to
"Windows services on UNIX?". I've posted "please disreguard
my previous post as it was edited by linux insider and is not accurate of my
views". That didn't make it on their board either. I think a boycott is
in place of linux insider because they are fronting as a legit linux news site,
when in reality they spread more FUD than SCO. If you post _anything_ even
remotely critical of them they will remove it. If not a boycott, I think at
least an open letter to their editors is in place.

[ Reply to This | # ]

An award for investigative reporting to PJ!
Authored by: Nick on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:40 PM EST
"That means reporting as a fact only facts that you have verified and know to be factual. Journalism 101. Cynicism is actually useful in a reporter. It's how you end up winning awards for investigative reporting. Yup. That's a hint."

Indeed. And although I suppose reporting prejudices will prevent the owner and main writer of a web site from getting a Pulitzer prize, I think PJ deserves one anyway. I haven't seen any acredited reporters do even 1/10th the work and insight into the SCO mess as PJ. If these articles on Groklaw were showing up in the New York Times instead, you can be assured that Pulitzers would follow. This is precisely the sort of excellent investigative journalism that you speak of. Bravo on this article.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:43 PM EST
[X]

I've checked the box that says that votes for printing the CDXPO speech, even if it means that it will get 600 times the audience here at Groklaw than it did in mere real life. It's important for the world to see Darl McBride's treachery and cynicism.

While it would be substantially more work to do so, perhaps the speech could be printed with annotations contributed by the community. While I find ESR's commentary on the Holloween documents a little incendiary, they do the job -- they help remind you what is really being said behind the weasel words [no offense intended toward weasels.]

Finally, on the larger subject of threats -- I think that Darl McBride is projecting his own feelings onto his opposition. He's the one who is threatening, he is the one who is stealing.

Thad Beier

[ Reply to This | # ]

Whether to Post Darl stuff at Groklaw?
Authored by: mac586 on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:47 PM EST
I understand PJ's point about limiting the audience for Darl, but what he says
as a matter of public record is valuable to Groklaw and others interested in
telling the whole story, TRUTHFULLY. His words are always counterbalanced with
a healthy dose of the truth here.

If the speech needs to be transcribed, I will be more than happy to contribute.
Lets post it, dissect it, and expose the truth.

Might as well be consistent. Besides, the Groklaw community is adept in such
matters.

[ Reply to This | # ]

MacArthur Grant?
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 12:54 PM EST

I don't know when they start collecting names for the annual MacArthur Grants,
but I hope someone on the nominating commitee notices this site and mentions PJ
there.

The public service rendered here should be rewarded.

[ Reply to This | # ]

My Vote - be positive
Authored by: John Douglas on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 01:05 PM EST
I suggest you put up the transcript as members only, collect all the comments
and then put it up as a commented article.

Advantages:

1) Groklaw is not being seen to be selective - it should address everything
2) Each paragraph/section followed by a GROKLAW analysis - noone can therefore
only get DB's version
3) It will be seen as THE reasoned community response
4) It will show the strength (as in talents) of the community

PJ - if yours is the only link available to the keynote speech, lets make it
definative.


---
As a Safety Critcal/Firmware Engineer, everything I do is automatically
incorrect until proven otherwise. (The one aspect of my work that my wife
understands).

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: mdchaney on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 01:09 PM EST
Might as well post the Darl speech, might be something in there that IBM's or
Red Hat's lawyers can use.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: AllanKim on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 01:11 PM EST
As a former full-time journalist I'd say that skepticism, not cynicism, is the
more useful trait in a reporter.

Cynical: "Believing or showing the belief that people are motivated
chiefly by base or selfish concerns; skeptical of the motives of others."
(Darl oozes this, among many other traits.)

Skeptical: "Marked by or given to doubt; questioning."

It's possible to be cynical without being sufficiently skeptical. That's
what's killing the mainstream media. But skepticism is a virtue, and it's the
trait that breathes vitality into this board.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: JLombard on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 01:21 PM EST
Nagging in the back of Daryl's head may just be the fear of retribution by the
SCO Stockholders not clever enough to bail out before the inevitable collapse of
the SCO House of Cards.

Jim

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Nick Bridge on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 01:32 PM EST
My vote - don't help with the propaganda.

If the majority decision is to post the transcript, then at a minimum split it
with critique and facts.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Voting
Authored by: Anonymous Coward on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:01 PM EST
Post the transcript. Their are two sides to every case. Most of what happens on
Groklaw is an attempt to cover both sides (even though it get harder and harder
when one side seemingly is not making any sense).

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Nivuahc on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:05 PM EST
If the speech can be transcribed from audio then we must do it.

Especially if SCO plans on putting a transcription up in a week.

It's important that an actual transcript exist instead of a 'cleaned and polished SCO-only transcript' that people will go to. If you want reporters to research the facts then it's important that we, as a community, make those facts available.

I have no faith, whatsoever, in SCO presenting the exact transcript of the speech. Why would it take a week to put something like that up when you and I know that it was written before Darl had a chance to utter a single word?

Then, once the 'official' transcript is up, we can compare it to the actual transcript.

And, as a final note, PJ you are the tops! If I ever won the lottery rest assured that I would put whatever money I could into making sure that the world noticed who you are and what you are doing. Because what you are doing is not being done by anyone else. You're watching out for me, for my fellow geeks, and the freedoms that we take for granted. I bet when you started all of this you never imagined that you'd be considered a 'freedom fighter'. But that's exactly what you are.

Thank you... from the bottom of my heart... Thank you.

---
Yeah, I finally created an account. You might recognise me from my old nickname though: 'Anonymous'.

[ Reply to This | # ]

The ol' pump 'n dump
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:18 PM EST
I wouldn't be suprised if SCO was the next Enron. It seems they've sone a lot
to pump their stock as high as possible, and will be dumping it shortly. They
don't seem to have any plans past this law suit; and have made so many enemies
during all this no matter what the outcome of the case, they will have too many
enemies to ever make it in the market place. I don't know why the justice
department hasn't stepped in yet to hold SCO accountable for their actions.
Trying to force select users to pay 700 dollars while there is pending
litigation is questionable at the very least.

[ Reply to This | # ]

I vote to transcribe and post
Authored by: Tsu Dho Nimh on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:19 PM EST
I vote for transcribing it, posting it, and doing the usual autopsy.

[ Reply to This | # ]

$50 billion in damages?
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:33 PM EST
Acording to The Salt Lake Tribune, SCO now seeks up to $50 billion in damages.

In March, SCO sued IBM in federal court over alleged contract violations stemming from purported incorporation of the Utah company's Unix OS into the latest versions of Linux. SCO seeks up to $50 billion in damages.

Greedy...

[ Reply to This | # ]

Compromise: new project
Authored by: overshoot on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:33 PM EST
The speech really didn't have anything new, so it hardly deserves billing as such. As many have pointed out, though, it's an important part of the record so it should be in the database.

New Project Proposal

This does bring up a potentially very useful new members-only project, though. I'd call it an "OpFor" type project in that it will require some of us to try to honestly represent SCO's position. Doing that fairly is, obviously, not going to be easy.

The basic idea is that we would put together a point-counterpoint summary in the spirit of the motions tables, but on a larger scale. Left column is SCO's POV, with links to supporting cites. Right column is IBM, world, and dog likewise.

Obviously, this would have to be an ongoing project and quite worthless unless we get a lot of continuing work donated.

Comments?

[ Reply to This | # ]

A quick (but rambling) thank-you (mostly OT)
Authored by: jrw on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:47 PM EST
PJ (and all)

Sorry about the mostly OT post, but I feel the need to say this. I've been
lurking here for a while now, contributed just a couple of quick throw away
'jokes' and in fact I think I may be an addict...

The above article suggests that some people are scared of the effect of free
software on the software industry, and that the world is becoming more and more
information sensitive. Computers are really just the tools to help us to get
the data, so in that respect the software they run isn't really the point.
Internet Explorer or Opera both serve the same purpose. But I really don't
want microsoft/sco/governments/anybody to control the data I get, and when it
starts to look as though search engines are starting to become little more than
corporate advertising tools I think that's a serious issue. I want the
information available to me to be as complete as possible because I believe that
to be the crux of any true democracy.

Anyway, why the post?

Well, I'm a poor sad engineer who uses windows/Ada/Unix/allsorts in my daily
work and (lowers head in shame) my home machines run Windows as I really only
play games. (okay, apart from the sparc:) But this whole saga, as played out
here, has encouraged me, and now there's a Linux partition on this machine,
I'm reading this in Opera, and yesterday I downloaded Open Office. I just
don't think I can happily sit back and let something as important as our
freedom be eroded and consumed by corporate leeches and not do any damn thing
about it anymore. A small step perhaps, but a beginning for me nevertheless.

I believe strongly in the principles of open source. I think it's really
important. It's hard to apply it to my work as that's largely defence and
classified, but heh, when the world becomes a nicer place and people who would
take what's not theirs, work out that actually, there might be a better way,
then maybe, just maybe that will change.

The value of this site is all about information: information isn't just about
'facts', it's about the context, veracity, and timeliness of those facts.
That's why when an alleged journalist simply publishes the PR of a single side
of an argument without doing any research it is so reprehensible. And
ultimately, it's a direct assault on our freedom. This site represents exactly
the correct response to that kind of attack: measured, thoughtful, and fair -
everything the attackers are not. And I just wanted to say thank-you to all of
the community, but especially PJ, for being there and doing such an excellent
job of protecting something of far far greater value than any piece of software
can ever have: our freedom.

jrw

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: bobh on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 02:58 PM EST
I don't think most of the reporters have a clue how bad they look in front of the more technically-inclined of their readership. For those in the computer trade press, this episode is a sort of watershed event, one that is opening the eyes of 50 or 60 per cent of the readership to just how superficial and lame a lot of the trade press coverage of most issues really is.

To date, most of the trade press has treated Darl McBride and SCO the way mainstream news outlets treated the Raelians when they announced they had cloned a human. With practically every serious scientist in the field saying, "Can't be" and "no way," reporters were printing every golden word that dropped from that crazy woman's mouth.

In hindsight, the lack of skepticism was incredible. For two weeks, we were all treated to the spectacle of supposedly intelligent reporters getting totally snowed by a clever hoax.

And so it is here. McBride, Sontag, Stowell, and Heise have made claims that were printed that should not even pass the smell test of anyone with common sense. For months, people who rely on the trade press to keep them informed about these events have been led to believe that SCO is some sort of industry power that has the Big Guys quaking in their boots, when in fact it's just a matter of time before SCO is squashed like a bug.

The incident with the IBM subpoenas was very telling. The news that IBM had subpoenaed Baystar, Yankee Group. et. al. appeared on the web site of the courts in Utah on October 31. Not one reporter who has been covering this event knew about it. Court docket? What's that? Dan Lyons of Forbes found out about it from someone here. As soon as he wrote about it, SCO quickly ginned up its own subpoenas, put out a press release about them, and got 90% of the reporters to write the story as if SCO had moved first.

The readerships are not being served by this. They are in fact being misled. People who are getting their news about this story from the likes of ZDNet are getting a steady stream of SCO press releases, and virtually nothing else. Whether this is incomptence, laziness, or something else almost doesn't matter, because the effect will be the same. The readerships will lose faith in the publications when the truth finally comes out that this whole thing was a scam.

I can't fault SCO for playing the press like a harp; that's their job. What's amazing is that so many reporters are letting them do it.

In case any of you reporters have gotten this far, right now there's another interesting thing on the court docket. None of you have written about it. Instead, Darl has you writing about his nonsensical claims about a non-compete with Novell. (Did I say it was nonsense? You don't know whether to believe me, do you? But you believed Darl, and you printed it. Ask yourself why, because he lied to you, and he fooled you, and you fooled your readers, and you shouldn't let him do that to you one more time.)

Anyway, there's an interesting hearing coming up in the IBM case, on December 5. Instead of waiting for Darl McBride to tell you what it all means, or to send up a flurry of press releases about suing Steven Spielberg and the estate of Walt Disney on the day it happens, why not familiarize yourself with the subject, so that he can't fool you anymore. Everything you need to do that is right on this site. All the court filings are on display. You don't need to be a lawyer to read these things and tell which way the wind is blowing. Anyone with a little brains and common sense can see what's coming. The story you're not writing is the one that's going on quietly in the court. It's not a secret. It's all right here. And it's a very different story than the one you'll hear from Darl McBride. Which is the only story that too many of you have been telling your readers.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Vote
Authored by: phrostie on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 03:03 PM EST
i understand not giving him media/visability. the point
was made when no one(80 people) showed up, but this bunch
has a habit of tearing things apart all the way down to
their basic molicules and atoms.

i would have to vote yes. post it


BTW, is there really a BS molecule

---
=====
phrostie
Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of DOS
and danced the skies on Linux silvered wings.
http://www.freelists.org/webpage/cad-linux

[ Reply to This | # ]

No
Authored by: sela on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 03:04 PM EST

As I said below, I tend to believe LinuxInsider is NOT "web-shill for
anti-Linux propaganda". They're a legit news site - they're just
incompetent , like so many others in the media.

If you'll read their other stories, instead of just reading what you find on
SCO in google news, you'll realise that.

Being too much of a conspiracy theorist, and blaming too many people as being
"MS pen for hire" doen't really contribute to our credability as a
community.

[ Reply to This | # ]

An old law truism?
Authored by: darthaggie on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 03:14 PM EST
Isn't it a truism that the lawyer who represents himself in court has a fool for
a client? now that Boies & Company are also stock holders, it maybe so!

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 03:43 PM EST

There is an interesting editorial on www.linuxtoday.com, LinuxToday editor's note

Dark Magic (Darl Magic?)

The scale of SCO's misdirection is both grand and subtle. It is grand in that they are trying to fool a lot of people at once and it is subtle because it seems to be wheels within wheels. Complicated, sometimes illogical, but always designed to direct people away from the truth, the core of their arguments: is there SCO code inside Linux?

There is also some comments about how SCO is driven by money...

[ Reply to This | # ]

SCO latest rant Charles
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 03:57 PM EST
If it's a slow news day, put it up and use your pen to tear it down.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Thomas Downing on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 04:13 PM EST
I vote very strongly in favor of putting the address up here with a commentary. (PJ, I voluteer to transcribe a portion. Also to submit commentary.)

I just listened to the address. Darl does make some very strong claims; stronger than some of his previous statements. But the reason it should go up is that he was not at all shy about telling flagrant lies. These, and the misrepresentations and slated statements should not go unanswered.

Towards the end, he just went off into the blue, basically predicting the end of western civilization as we know it if SCO looses. Now that's just hyperbole on my part, but listen your self; then ask just how 'hyberbolic' I was. Leaving Darl's economic, politcal and philisophical ranting aside, here were a few plums of the many.

'SCO is the leader in UNIX innovation.

'SCO is equal to UNIX'

SCO/Caldera was not losing money prior to the IBM lawsuit

IBM threatened to do all it could to destroy SCO if they released the UnixWare runtime libraries - why? because it would implicate Linux as a copyright violator

The copyright violations are 'clear-cut'

There will be a copyright case 'in the near-term'. The 'linux RTU license' was not a SCO idea, it was a request from linux end users

The linux RTU is available now

SCO has shown nearly a million lines of infringing code to anyone who asked.

IBM is the one who is putting the GPL at risk - SCO does not have a problem with the GPL, does not want to destroy it. SCO is happy that IBM put the GPL on the table.

The primary reason that CEO's like linux is that it is free

When you have zero-price software, the quality and service go way down.

If software is free, there is no incentive to inovate
Linksys and now Cisco are in trouble beause their code 'got accidentally tangled up in the GPL.'

Says Redhat said 'there's not going to be any more free Linux'.

The reason that IBM is deposing investors/analysts is to keep SCO from getting IBM in the courtroom.

I won't comment on these as the problems are well known to all Groklaw readers. Well, I will comment on the last three.

What may not be known to all Groklaw readers is just what the Linksys thing is all about. Linksys sells some wireless access points that run Linux and Busybox. This is hardly 'getting accidentally tangled up'.

Redhat didn't say anything of the sort. They announced they would no longer be selling consumer versions of their distribution. Redhat distributions still remain, and will always remain, available for free in the manner required by, and under the terms of, the GPL.

I don't understand this at all. Say what???

---
Thomas Downing
Principal Member Technical Staff
IPC Information Systems, Inc.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Worst Linux Coverage
Authored by: Alex on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 04:45 PM EST

I think we should give some kind of sarcastic award (Tus'x Hiney? The Rotten
Penguin Egg?) for the worst Linux coverage of the year. We can announce it with
a press release and maybe get some good coverage of Groklaw, the issues, and the
idiots.

I'll even design a suitably ugly award.

Nominations?

Alex



---
Destroying SCO one bozon at a time

[ Reply to This | # ]

Streaming audio available from SCO
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 04:48 PM EST
There's No Free Lunch... or Free Linux And guess what format it's in? WMV (windows media player).

[ Reply to This | # ]

I don't doubt that there was some sort of threat
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 04:54 PM EST
remember folks that there are a LOT of people in the world who are part of 'the
opensource movement', 99.99% of who have never released a single line of code
(and probably 90% of who don't know the difference between C and C++). among
those people there are a lot of hotheads and I think it's very likly that
SOMEONE sent a nasty e-mail.

however this is like saying that Texans are evil people becouse JFK was shot in
Dallas. Or saying that Docters are all incopetent becouse there is such a thing
as medical malpractice. If you list any sufficiantly large group of people you
will find some nutcase in them.

as for the keynote, go ahead and publish it, with commentary pointing out where
he contridicts himself and the SCO court filings, and also where he is wrong.
try and seperate the two so it will be obvious to any reporters who read it
where he isn't being consistant with himself and where we disagree with him (if
we don't they may look at something where he is contradicting himself and
dismiss it as our disagreement)

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Nivuahc on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:04 PM EST
PJ I have it transcribed up to the 26 minute mark if you want it. At least it's a start. I don't think I can take much more of that didiot.

---
Yeah, I finally created an account. You might recognise me from my old nickname though: 'Anonymous'.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: talamacus on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:05 PM EST
PJ, great story as ever. However, there's a really important point that I think
you've missed about SCO attacking the 1984 ATT/Berkeley ruling.

This isn't a second front for SCO, it's the only option they have left to win
the IBM case.

The IBM case is looking increasingly shaky, and Boies et al must know it. The
major problem is that too much of the code was dumped effectively into the
public domain by the 1984 ruling.

However, if SCO can attack that, then the IBM case (and all their other threats)
suddenly take on a very new light, because SCO seem to be attempting to rewrite
the history of UNIX (SysV). If the effect of the 1984 ruling is altered, SCO
could potentially find themselves in a position to actually control UNIX
derivatives.

Quite how SCO can and will go about this, I have no idea. Your legal system is
even more complex than ours (England), and that's saying something! Still, even
if it's only in the mind of the popular press, attacking the ATT ruling could
easily pump those SCO stocks to previously unimagined levels.

-- talamacus.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Adding Darl's Speech to Groklaw?
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:07 PM EST
If you want Groklaw to cover the 'SCO Scoop', the speech should be posted
here. In a second section Darl's speech should be dissected and factual
evidence should put after each paragraph of SCO speak. So people can decide for
their own who is right and who is wrong.

Not posting Darl's speech might help Darl and company claiming that Groklaw
beeing selective when it comes to present 'important evidence' (seen from
SCO's point of view) about the case.

So show Darl's speech to the world and also show to the world what is wrong
with Darl's latest performance. And publishing it even before SCO's own
website does will be the icing of the cake.

Publishing Darl's speech is the right approach to fortify Groklaw's
credibility. IMHO.

Enjoy!

[ Reply to This | # ]

Insider Trading
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:24 PM EST
Now that Boies & friends are shareholders, how come that they are not
listed as insiders? They probably know even more than McBride. Is this
legal?

[ Reply to This | # ]

History shows "SCO = UNIX". Discuss.
Authored by: anwaya on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:25 PM EST
An extract from the keynote:

<slide>
1969 - UNIX is invented at AT&T Bell Labs
1993 - Novell acquires UNIX System Laboratories and all IP rights
1995 - SCO acquires UNIX IP and UnixWare from Novell
2001 - SCO and Caldera international merge, ultimately becoming the SCO Group

SCO = UNIX
</slide>

"So SCO is equal to UNIX, and that tie-in got even stronger in 1995. If
you look at the history of UNIX, it was invented at AT&T Bell Labs in the
late '60's. I worked at Novell for eight years and in 1993, we purchased UNIX
from AT&T Bell Labs - actually, it was from a division they had there called
USL, UNIX System Laboratories. At that point in time Ray Noorda had a vision of
taking UNIX and marrying it with Netware and going out and competing with
Microsoft. After Ray Noorda retired from the company, new management came in to
the company, and took a different approach which led to the sale of the UNIX
assets to the Santa Cruz Operation.

"So now you have Santa Cruz Operation which is already a leader for Unix
on Intel solutions that acquires the underlying property rights to all of UNIX,
and that happened in 1995. in 2001, SCO, Santa Cruz Operation, sold those assets
to Caldera, which was a company that was actually spun out of Novell, and an
interesting side note, I was actually approached in 1994 by some employees who
wanted to leave Novell and go do a startup like Caldera, i introduced them to
Ray Noorda. Ray Noorda funded Caldera, and so my ties to this company go back
nearly 10 years. So in the end the UNIX property ends up getting sold into
Caldera, and that's basically the history. Quick history lesson."

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:27 PM EST
WTF?????? What does PJs humorous reference to the Bible have to do with you
taking a left turn into religious bigotry. If you were joking say so. If
not...int eh words of a brilliant UK Gameshow host "You are the weakest
link....goodbye!"

BigTex
A dyslexic Agnostic Insomniac - I stay awake all night wondering if there is a
dog

[ Reply to This | # ]

There were DDoS attacks
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 05:56 PM EST
I work at Tarantella (old SCO) and we inherited a class B network from SCO. It
was shutdown for a while earlier this year.

[ Reply to This | # ]

The Wall Street Journal
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 06:14 PM EST
An article of about equal flavor to the Forbes articles ran in
The Wall Street Journal's Technology Section on 18 Nov
03.

SCO to Sue a Major User of Linux by David Bank.

The article was published in the South East edition may be
available on line but since the author of this posting does
not have a WSJ account verification and a linkage will
have to be by another.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 06:18 PM EST
I think each time Darl makes unsubstantiated claims they need to be rebutted.
The more times they are heard with out rebuttal the more likely they are to be
accepted.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Hey. Chill Guys.
Authored by: jaydee on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 06:37 PM EST
Remember what we're here for.

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • Hey. Chill Guys. - Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 08:51 PM EST
A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: tazer on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 06:37 PM EST
IANAL

If a death threat were issued to Darl & Co, I would imagine it would have to
be a public record, to some degree. Not that all facts of the complaint would
be released to the public, but the fact that a complaint was filed should at
least be traceable. Now, I am not a paralegal either, so my research skills are
lacking, but the issuer of the 'death threat' would definately be guilty of
'Terroristic threat', under Utah Code Section 76-5-107.

(Edited for brevity)
76-5-107. Terroristic threat -- Penalty.
(1) A person commits a terroristic threat if he threatens to commit any
offense involving bodily injury, death, or substantial property damage, and:

(b) he acts with intent to:

(iii) place a person in fear of imminent serious bodily injury, substantial
bodily injury, or death;

According to 76-5-107, this is a Class B Misdemeanor, which is punishible
according to 76-3-204:

(2) In the case of a class B misdemeanor, for a term not exceeding six months;


So, here we have:
The heads of SCO claiming that they issued 'Terroristic threats'.
The Boies law firm is a SCO partner, with which they do regular business.
And a crew of bodyguards.

I'm sure the Boies firm doesn't specialize in Utah misdemeanor law and may in
fact specialize in civil matters. But wouldn't you think with a huge lawfirm
like that on the payroll, you'd get some legal advice from them? What was the
legal advice given? We can only speculate, but I would hate to think they were
told to just hire bodyguards and forget about it.

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Netcraft
Authored by: Beekster on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:05 PM EST
Checking http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/graph?site=www.sco.com reveals that
sco.com switched from SCO UNIX & Netscape to Linux & Apache within the
month of August. Teething troubles with their conversion, or DDOS attack, who
knows.

So, do they have the right to use Linux & Apache? :)

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • Netcraft - Authored by: jaydee on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:12 PM EST
    • Netcraft - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 12:11 AM EST
Media Resources
Authored by: jaydee on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:06 PM EST
Perhaps we can develop a set of basic media resources that can explain the
basics of the case in terms that anyone can understand. Such things as:

Unix family tree / History
SCO History
Linux (code) History
Statements made by SCO Officers with debunking arguments
Case timeline and basics of arguments
Etc.

I know that most of this is available if you look for it, but its is probably
better to package it up and send it out.


Sorry to post twice on this but I think this case has more to do with creating
FUD than saving SCO.

The best way to get rid of Fear is to reduce the Uncertainty and Doubt.

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A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: grouch on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:06 PM EST
IMO, Darl's speech should be answered here on Groklaw. Likely it will appear on
SCO's website or some other place where it will not undergo the critical
analysis it should receive. If the transcript is posted on Groklaw, perhaps with
a suitable intro by PJ including noting that 80 people were at least curious
enough to attend, no doubt the able regulars of Groklaw will dissect it and give
rebuttals for any FUD within.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Rupert Goodwins' comments on ZDNet UK
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:23 PM EST
This is one author who gets it.

How to Score SCO legal games by Repurt Goodwins.

http://comment.zdnet.co.uk/rupertgoodwins/0,39020691,39118030-2,00.htm

One may also note that he refers to Gorklaw and in a case
of circular postings his article is noted here.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Techies v press
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 07:35 PM EST
One thing I believe strongly is that the more knowledgeable people, the less
seriously they tend to take SCO.

For example: Knowledgeable people know about
1. USL v BSD
2. What the definition of derivative works is
3. Why SCO's GPL arguments are bizarre (to put it mildly, e.g. copyright
pre-empts GPL, or US constitution does same)
4. What is in the court filings (e.g. SCO being unable to identify a single
trade secret that IBM is alleged to have misappropriated)
5. Open Group, UNIX history
6. SCO contradicting themselves
etc.

A lot of groklaw readers are extremely knowledgeable, yet still follow closely.
Why? Well in my case, initially there was a certain moral outrage about them
trying to grab control of other people's work all the while protesting about
protecting IP. In my case, that has largely subsided as I don't expect them to
prevail... however there is a certain fascination in watching the train wreck
(you just gotta look!), as well as a real awe inspiring beauty in the language
and argument that IBM is using in their court filings.

Now the thing that really shocks me is the tech press is not even bothering to
ask basic questions. I don't expect them to necessarily have the in depth
knowledge of people like Harlan, but some things should be obvious things to ask
about?

Like:

- SCO claims to control IBM's code by their definition of "derivative
work". What is the legal definition of derivative work? Does it match
SCO? (Hint: IBM calls SCO's definition frivilous)

- SCO says they are not engaged in a pump'n'dump because the executives
haven't sold that much of the total insider held stock. What about each
executive's stock holdings as compared to that executive's previous holdings
(Hint: Canopy holds most of the insider held stock, if you compare however each
individuals current holdings to their sales, you get a very different pictures
once you stop worrying about Canopy)?

- Has SCO benefited from the massive increase in their stock price (Hint: SCO
got $50m for selling 3 million shares to BayStar/RBC. If SCO had sold 3 million
shares prior to the lawsuit, how much money wuld they have got?)

- SCO says they will attack BSD. How credible is that? (Hint: There is a court
settlement already between SCO's predecessors and the BSDs)




Or to put it another way:

SCO is making huge claims about the value and extent of their IP.

- How much did they pay for that IP? How much do they value it as on their
books? How realistic that huge expansive rights could be obtained for the price
that SCO paid?

- One interpretation of SCO's huge expansive claims is that they are true or
have some basis in reality.
BIG QUESTION FOR JOURNALISTS: Are there any other possible interpretations
(Hint: See IBM counterclaims, or Red Hat law suit).




[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media - blacklight
Authored by: Anonymous Coward on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 08:03 PM EST
The first. The second alternative would result in a multi million courtcase
where you need to defend against a multi billion claim for damages.

[ Reply to This | # ]

SCO/Caldera finances
Authored by: phrostie on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 08:13 PM EST
in the eweek article: http://www.eweek.com/
article2/0,4149,1394502,00.asp

they say:

SCO President and CEO Darl McBride, in earlier interviews,
has maintained that the company has a legitimate claim and
is simply defending its intellectual property. SCO was
months away from running out of money when he came on
board in 2001. Today, McBride said the company has $60
million in cash.

but i thought i remember reading that when Ransom Love
left Caldera it was breaking even.

which was it?

---
=====
phrostie
Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of DOS
and danced the skies on Linux silvered wings.
http://www.freelists.org/webpage/cad-linux

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media - Vote AYE!
Authored by: WhiteFang on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 08:47 PM EST
220 comments in 12 hours.

My read indicates the 'AYEs' have it.

Post the transcript for members only and let everyone tear it apart paragraph by
paragraph. Release is as a Groklaw Community Response.

I'd love to see someone issue it on the PR newswire. It would almost certainly
appear at the front of Yahoo financial page for SCOX. Wouldn't _that_ be a
facer!

Oh - and my vote is to post it as well.

:D

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 09:32 PM EST
Hey PJ! So you are hanging up the paralegal hat and putting on the journalist
hat. It fits you well!


I look forward to reading each of your postings. It is refreshing to see someone
digging out the facts and piecing them together in an entertaining and
informative style. This is what you would expect in a journalist (and rarely
find).


It feels like you have a book in there somewhere.

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media - KEEP TO THE FACTS
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 10:00 PM EST

Please I ask this forum to be careful.

Not that I am a legal eagle.

But I do know that when the time comes, this forum
may be used within the court case.

Some of the best course of action is to say nothing
or to only point to what has been said.

Though I have enoyed this forum and now understand
better what is at stake here the community should
refrain from anything indicating hostility.

And let's be honest.

NO ONE WORKS FOR FREE.

So stop talking about "corporate greed".

The CSO business model failed and they are
as far as we can tell behaving in a way
that we as a community think is greedy.

Anything more could and might be used
in the court proceedings.

This forum should have clear principles
and should focus on replying to what CSO
tries to push into the media's mouth.

I would like to see the articles that
have been published properly quoted
here and then replied to by the Linux
community.

This would give this site a more clear
purpose than emotional cathartic writting.

Please do not get me wrong. I like the little
bits of humor and wit. It is very amusing.

But maybe that should be put into a editorial
section of the site. Something that can be
"clearly opinion" as to position.

Getting this clear NOW will make things more
clear later. And provide an invaluable service
to IBM when they take this to trial.

Yes? Maybe I am wrong. But time will tell.

I do know that telling a lie long enough and then
responding emotionally to it only gives it
more emotion that will become "truth".

Stick to the facts and use references.

I want more humor and wit, in an editorial section.

Thanks
Greg

[ Reply to This | # ]

Copyright issue with the transcript?
Authored by: arch_dude on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 10:05 PM EST
Can we legally publish a transcript of Daryl's talk?

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 10:31 PM EST
PJ, since SCO wants to reopen the ATT v. BSDi case, I thought these links might
be helpful.

http://www.tuhs.org/archive_sites.html

This has a copy of the Caldera BSD license for Unix V1 to 7 and 32V. All of the
mirror sites have a pdf document called "Caldera-license.pdf".

http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/who/dmr/bsdi/bsdisuit.html

Has some documents relevent to the ATT V, BSDi case.

[ Reply to This | # ]

You know what's amusing...
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 10:46 PM EST
I was going to download the video so I could at least write my own commentary,
only to find that it reqires Microsoft Media PLayer 9 to play. It's a streaming
file with an mss:// url. I guess he doesn't want the linux users to watch.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Waste Management
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:45 PM EST
I have started wondering if Darl has an image consultant, or has been watching
too many episodes of a particular HBO series


He starts off with: Pay up, or I'll burn your server farm down

Followed by: Pay up, or Linus will get the patent bullet

Followed by: Pay up, or my Boies will be round

And now he's supposedly got of a bunch of toughs watching over him.


Now I'll leave the legal stuff aside for a minute, and I'll leave aside any
comment on his actual actions - but it sure looks to me like he's intentionally
or not, ended up presenting a particular image.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Darl says
Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, November 22 2003 @ 11:53 PM EST
According to McBride, "obviously Linux owes its heritage to UNIX, but not
its code. We would not, nor will not, make such a claim."

from http://www.linuxjournal.com/article.php?sid=6293

Posted on Wednesday, August 28, 2002 by Jeff Gerhardt

Can someone enter this in the quotes database as well as a
reference to the article? It is older than Jan 1, 2003 but
it has a few interesting comments. I can't find the quote
in the database. I don't know how to enter one. And I
can't find an email address for PJ.

It is interesting to note that this article PREDATES
the lawsuit by 9 months or so.

[ Reply to This | # ]

  • Darl says - Authored by: PJ on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 01:45 AM EST
  • Darl says - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 01:51 AM EST
OT: The more things change, the more they stay the same
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 12:39 AM EST
It's been two months since Groklaw collectively authored its Open Letter in reply to the Open Letter from Darl McBride of September 9th.

A lot has happened in the last two months, and recently we've been hearing some more FUD about suing end users of Linux.

Open Letter to Darl McBride

For those who've joined Groklaw's readership in the last two months, I strongly encourage you to read this letter. And those who were here when it was written might enjoy reading it again as well.

After all the SCOspeak I've been reading lately, it's refreshing to read this clear and honest summary of the community's position. Unsurprisingly, everything that was said in the letter is still true today. =P

[ Reply to This | # ]

The Open Source Town Hall Meeting
Authored by: Trepalium on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 02:07 AM EST
I have a transcript of the Town Hall event if anyone's interested.... I'll post it in reply to myself if anyone's interested. I'm not sure I correctly guessed at who was speaking all the time, but there's some interesting things Sontag says, especially when he seems to forget his own retoric for a few moments.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Publish the transcription plus annotations
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 02:23 AM EST

The title pretty much says it all.

If it's not too long (I have no idea how long ol' Darl yammered on), it might be nice to see the entire speech printed in its entirety followed by a section where it is dissected line by line. Sort of like:

``Hello. I'm Darl McBride...

blah blah blah

Thank you.''

Follow the text with some of PJ's witty commentary followed by a section where each of McBride's claims, statements of fantasy (Oops! I'm editorializing.), etc. are analyzed and/or refuted complete with footnotes and links to other web pages that provide evidence contrary to the SCO party line.

This would be very similar to what we already get in a GROKLAW article but let's be complete. The possible downside is it could get sort of long and might turn some off. Thoughts?

--
Rick

[ Reply to This | # ]

Fundamental Question I Think...
Authored by: jkondis on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 04:43 AM EST
I've been trying to follow this case the best that I can. I believe strongly
in the value of GPL/Linux and open source for the long term value to the world.
(The "free software is bad for the economy" rants are pure BS.)

Anyway, from what I've seen so far, any case SCO might have could be a
combination of the following:

1) Code was taken from SCO-owned source code and directly imported into Linux,
by IBM, at a time when IBM was actively contributing to Linux. Here, copied
includes copying and obfuscating, or simply transcribing. This is the most
obvious.

2) Code from AIX was transferred to Linux by IBM, but the code was from IBM's
contribution to AIX, not from SCO originally. Hence, Darl's emphasis on having
*control* over derivative works, though not necessarily ownership. I.e., you
can contribute to AIX, but any contribution you make to AIX can *not* now be
included in anything else such as Linux.

3) Code from BSD (BSD-Lite) was copied into Linux, either directly or indirectly
by way of SCO-owned Unix source. And for some strange reason, Darl thinks he
owns BSD as well.

4) Code wasn't really copied from an offensive source, but SCO claims to own
the very *concept* of Unix, in any form whatsoever (at least under a broad
enough definition so as to include Linux).

The only defensible position would be #1, IMHO. I don't think #s 2-4 would
survive, again, IMHO. Now, a lot has been made of the 6-line
"spinlock.h" file, (hopefully the name is correct) which according
to others' analyses simply directs the compiler to flag an error if a certain
kind of processor code is being compiled. But I can't help but ask, so, is
this SCO-owned code? If so, is it a file SCO uniquely owns the copyright to?

I have to wonder, have any of the knowledgeable people here determined for
themselves as a point of fact that there is no SCO-owned (not
"SCO-controlled" per se) code in Linux versions beyond 2.4? (#1
above) At least, not enough to warrant a contract dispute or copyright claims?
The devil's advocate in me wonders if the SCO FUD enterprise scam is as bad and
baseless as it looks.

I don't want anyone to swear on any Bibles or graves or anything. I just want
to hear from people who may have done the objective analyses to some degree of
completeness. I think the "DNA Analyses" are indistinguishable from
bullcrap. A jury is going to want to see the actual infringing code.

Any takers? And, please, don't flame me too badly. My skin burns easily.
;-)

[Please accept my apologies if this has been already discussed; I don't mean to
beat the horse if it's dead. I've been scanning the many contributions and
have not seen the simple answer that I'm looking for. Maybe I just haven't
looked long enough or in the right way?]

[ Reply to This | # ]

What are "control rights?"
Authored by: fb on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 07:49 AM EST

It just occurred to me to wonder. This is a phrase that has come up often. Presumably it's a term for some power that SCO is supposed to have over SVR4-and-derivative distribution.

Someone please correct me if this is wrong, but isn't this a vague colloquial term -- that is, not a well-defined legal term -- and meant to confuse?

SCO uses the term "IP" to cloud the issue of what they actually own. Are "control rights" like that? A term meant to obscure what they actually are entitled to control?

[ Reply to This | # ]

SCO's excuses
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 08:43 AM EST
Yesterday I was looking at the motions to compel discovery, the SCO responses,
and the related motions (like Enlargement of Time one).

What surprised me, was the number of different excuses that SCO has given for
not answering IBM questions.

Off the top of my head, these include (I may have missed some)

1. We have answered using Rule 33(d)
2. The answers are peculiarly within IBM's knowledge
3. It's burdensome to answer
4. It's premature to answer the questions
5. IBM's motion to compel is not correctly formatted, so they can't make us
answer these questions
6. IBM's motion to compel is correctly formatted, but they questions are not
right, because we are talking about methods and ways of doing things, not lines
of code
7. IBM's questions is moot, we've already answered in our supplemental
responses
8. IBM is only asking questions because they haven't answered our questions

Did I miss any?

Is this kind of dodging at all usual?

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 12:42 PM EST

By the way, Ransom Love has now told us why he sold all his shares of SCO stock. It wasn't ethics. It was money. He did it because he was sure SCO would lose the IBM case:

I read this a bit different:
Ransom Love made an argument based on economics, he never claimed he didn't have more.

I've noticed these businessfolks never make any moral arguments. They avoid it, as if it meant "wussy" or "troublemaker" or any of the likes. Too bad for them, as you do tend to end up with people similar to yourself. But anyway.
An argument not made does not mean he's hiding skeletons.

[ Reply to This | # ]

Intensely Desirous of SCO's Demise
Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 01:56 PM EST
Now why on Earth would I contemplate any kind of criminal attack on Darl or any
SCO officer when that would deprive me of the far greater joy of watching Darl
& co-conspirators get theirs from Da Judge?

[ Reply to This | # ]

A Heads Up to the Media
Authored by: SkArcher on Sunday, November 23 2003 @ 05:14 PM EST
This should be put on full display, it is essential for several reasons

  • Whatever anyones personal opinions on Darl and his views, his speech is a facet in this case. If you don't belive in freedom of speech for those whose opinions you despise, then you do not belive in it at all.
  • If the speech is buried, we do not know and cannot addequately deconstruct the FUD that Darl is spreading.
  • Darls speech may have bearing on our understanding of his actions.
  • Without knowing what Darl has said we cannot understand how he is misleading others, and therefore cannot make best progress in countering his claims.

    Please post it, information on the enemy is always welcome.

    [ Reply to This | # ]

  • A Heads Up to the Media
    Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, November 24 2003 @ 01:16 AM EST
    ...But I lived through the Microsoft suit at Caldera (in which Caldera sued Microsoft over the DOS operating system),

    Ummm... Maybe I'm getting old, but wasn't that suit originally filed by Digital Research over DRDOS, which (eventually) was bought by Caldera? If I remember correctly, then this would mean that there's MORE lying or Bad Reporting going on....

    When will it end? December 5 can't come fast enough...

    [ Reply to This | # ]

    A Heads Up to the Media
    Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, November 24 2003 @ 08:52 AM EST
    Yeah only 80 people, but you didn't mention that there
    were only 81 people at the show.

    [ Reply to This | # ]

    Plan A fails, on to Plan B
    Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, November 24 2003 @ 11:30 AM EST
    Having drawn a blank on finding infringing code in the weapons of mass
    destruction, McBride will now focus our attention on bringing democracy to the
    1994 AT&T/BSD settlement.

    Whoops! Sorry, it's sort of hard to keep one presidential fabrication separated
    from another these days. In any case, McBride seems to be reading the
    newspapers.

    [ Reply to This | # ]

    A Heads Up to the Media
    Authored by: Anonymous on Monday, November 24 2003 @ 12:49 PM EST
    I think an awful lot has been made about Darl's comments to the media about
    hiring security. In particular the article repeatedly asked, "Why don't
    the local PD know?"

    If I were being threatened, here are the two basic scenarios I would follow:
    1) if I knew who, or thought I could find out who, had threatened me, I would
    report this to the local police.
    2) if I did not know who had threatened me, and didn't think I could find out,
    I would not bother reporting this to the local police.

    In <b>both</b> cases I would beef up my own personal security. If I
    had the money, this would mean hiring bodyguards.

    That the local police don't know about a threat is irrelevant, I think.

    To me it is entirely possible that threats could have occurred, and will occur
    as time goes on. The Linux community is very large now, and not all of the
    members are people you'd want to be neighbours with. That's just how things
    go in a large population. It doesn't take a lot of digging to find people in
    the Linux community that are not just crazy about the issues, but actually
    crazy. C'est la vie.

    Pierre

    [ Reply to This | # ]

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