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| The Morning After the Poison Pill |
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Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 02:55 PM EDT
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The media continues to react to yesterday's 3rd quarter teleconference, and they are almost unanimous. Everyone (with two exceptions) understood it as loss, gloom and doom. Here, for your enjoyment is a bouquet of snips from the reports to add to yesterday's collection. Without a doubt, Motley Fool wins for style ("a management team that's put this company into a stumbling, deathlike trance"). The creativity award goes to CBSMarketwatch for finding a way to report SCO's results as positive news, as Forbes did yesterday. Imagine if you only got your news from those two. Why, you'd probably go out and buy SCO stock or something.
Also, just so you know, SCO has announced a city-to-city tour. The tour will run from September 22 through October 7, visiting 12 cities across North America. "Qualified attendees will receive sample copies of all SCO products through NFR kits, as well as other valuable giveaways. The seminars are free and will visit Minneapolis, MN; Montreal, QC; Vancouver, BC; Irvine, CA; Sherman Oaks, CA; Chicago, IL; Dallas, TX; Toronto, ON; Atlanta, GA; New York, NY; Orlando, FL; and Boston, MA."
Motley Fool:
SCO Slides Again
After dodging a bullet from BayStar -- which forced SCO's hand a few months
back because it thinks the firm's only real asset is its long-shot legal
claims -- management seems to be fearing for its future. A "shareholder
rights" plan was also unveiled today, typical in that it seeks to prevent
anyone from taking control of 15% of the firm without running the offer
through the board. Of course, as is so often the case, the plan looks more
like job protection for a management team that's put this company into a
stumbling, deathlike trance.
TheStreet.com:
SCO Group Swings to a Loss
SCO, which hired high-profile attorney David Boies to lead its Linux legal battle, saw its cash balance fall to nearly $16 million on July 31, from $64.4 million on Oct. 31. Cash plus available-for-sale securities, however, experienced a smaller decrease, to $43 million on July 31, from $61.3 million on April 31.
[p. 2] Initially, after SCO sued IBM, the company's stock was viewed as a lottery ticket on the Linux lawsuits. But investors have taken a dimmer view of that ticket in recent months. The stock is off more than 80% from its 52-week high, while the short interest has been hovering around 50% of the float since mid-May, according to Nasdaq.
123Jump.com:
The SCO Group, Inc. (SCOX: chart) said after the bell Tuesday that it swung to a quarterly loss from a year-earlier profit, due to a decline in revenue. The Lindon, Utah-based owner of the UNIX operating system reported a net loss of $7.4 million for its fiscal third quarter, against a profit of $3.1 million a year ago. The company said that it had third-quarter net income applicable to common shareholders of $7.5 million, or 38 cents per share, which includes a one-time contribution of capital of $15.5 million related to a repurchase of convertible stock. Quarterly revenue tumbled to $11.2 million from $20.1 million, largely due to a decrease in SCOsource licensing revenue.
The stock dipped 3.31% on Tuesday to $3.80. SCO shares inched up 5 cents to $3.85 in after-market trade.
Internetnews.com:
Unix vendor SCO Group (Quote, Chart), in the midst of copyright infringement lawsuits over parts of Linux, reported a net loss of $7.4 million for its fiscal third quarter on lowered revenues and higher legal fees. The results more than reversed its profit of $3.1 million during the same, year-ago quarter. . . .
SCO attributed its lackluster quarterly performance partially due to a lack or revenue from its SCOsource licensing program, which was formed to license SCO's Unix intellectual property. The program, which licenses its Unix System V source code, is also aimed in part at taking in fees from Linux users on parts of the operating system code that it claims copyright.
CRN:
As the high cost of litigation takes its toll, The SCO Group has instituted a $31 million cap on legal fees to be spent over the duration of its pending legal action and has enacted a shareholder rights plan to protect investors from any hostile takeover attempt.
During a conference call Tuesday, SCO CEO Darl McBride disclosed that the company spent almost $8 million of the $11 million in revenue generated during its third fiscal quarter of 2004 on legal fees, a "high-water mark" in litigation costs since the embattled Unix company filed suit against IBM in the spring of 2003.
To date, SCO, Lindon, Utah, has spent roughly $15 million in legal fees to fight intellectual property claims it has brought against IBM and Novell.
InformationWeek.com:
Tuesday, SCO reported a third-quarter loss of $7.4 million on revenue of $11.2 million. That's a sharp contrast to a year ago, when the company reported a profit of $3.1 million on revenue of $20.1 million.
The drop was primarily due to a decrease in SCOsource licensing revenue--from $7.3 million a year ago to $678,000. SCO sells SCOsource licenses to protect Linux users from legal action in the event SCO wins its intellectual-property lawsuit against IBM. SCO claims that IBM used SCO-owned Unix V source code without SCO's permission. . . .
Company execs anticipate fourth-quarter revenue of about $10 million but some restructuring and downsizing as well that will cost the company money in the short term.
CBSMarketwatch:
SCO (SCOX: news, chart, profile), which provides Unix and open-source Linux operating systems to small and midsize businesses, rose 1.3 percent after it reported third-quarter earnings of 38 cents per share on sales of $11.2 million. It said it expected fourth-quarter sales of $10 million to $12 million.
The Lindon, Utah-based company added that it adopted a shareholder rights plan designed to deter a hostile takeover.
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:31 PM EDT |
| Mourning from NZ. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Buddha Joe on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:35 PM EDT |
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The only stupid question is the one never asked[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: overshoot on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:36 PM EDT |
| OK, feline puns too. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Buddha Joe on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:36 PM EDT |
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The only stupid question is the one never asked[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: snorpus on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:37 PM EDT |
SCO (SCOX: news, chart, profile), which provides Unix and
open-source Linux operating systems to small and midsize businesses, rose 1.3
percent after it reported third-quarter earnings of 38 cents per share on sales
of $11.2 million.
Where does the $0.38/share
earnings come from? Is that the result of one-time gains (extraordinary items)
stemming from BayStar? And the $3.7 million loss is from continuing
operations?
And why would CBSMarketwatch be the only one to report it this
way? What am I missing? ---
73/88 de KQ3T ---
Montani Semper Liberi [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:38 PM EDT |
I normally post using my name but cannot do so for the following.
“My name is GA and I am a Groklaw addict.” I have been intrigued by IBM’s
strategy on the SCO legal case, especially as to the motions they file and when.
For that reason, I contacted some old friends in Armonk for a cup of coffee.
While I had to buy the coffee, they did alert me to something that astounded
even me.
IBM has put several of their internal OR staff on the SCO lawsuits. The team is
based in Somers but includes people from the Research group in Yorktown Heights.
This team has applied some of their analytical tools to the lawsuits with what
appear to be excellent results.
The most far-out project is a business and legal strategy model that explicitly
considers the cost of alternatives. Conceptually, they have used decision
analysis in a new way. They have a probabilistic decision tree that models the
entire series of issues in great detail. Among the capabilities of the model
are:
1. It has the ability to decide which motion to file and when. Since the model
considers conditional probabilities, the model can tell IBM whether it is better
to file Motion A first or Motion B first so as to maximize the impact on both
the courts and on SCO.
2. The model includes timing considerations. In other words, the model can tell
IBM how long they should wait before filing various documents. This applies not
only to documents requested during discovery but also the timing of the motions.
(Not too close together but also not too many that might trigger delays.)
3. The model permits actions to be identified which will change probabilities.
4. The model is linked to a mathematical programming optimizer (using integer
programming) that helps make “the best decisions” and identifies the shadow cost
of alternatives.
5. There are similar models for all of the SCO lawsuits against other companies
but not in as much detail. Nevertheless, the models are linked together so IBM
can determine the impact of various other events.
Given my interest in the details and my background, it was arranged for me to
meet with some members of the team this morning. The security on this thing was
worse than my trips to some of the advanced weapons labs during the Cold War.
But their demo left me speechless. (That will be hard to believe for those of
you who know me.)
1. Since understanding the alternatives is difficult for anyone (I am told the
human mind can handle at most six factors at one time), the outputs of the model
are visual and color coded, with both the shade and the brightness proportional
to priorities and various measures of goodness.
2. As you can imagine, this model is multidimensional, making it hard to grasp
at one time. IBM has therefore projected the “decision tree” onto a holograph
so people can walk around it and see the entire output from various
perspectives.
3. When I asked about SCO’s earnings conference call last night and how soon
that would be included, they told me they had the cash balances and cash flow
required for SCO’s legal fees modeled since the beginning. The information from
the 8-K and the SEC filings were incorporated within five minutes of
announcement. It took a few more minutes for the team to compare the reported
results to their internal projections.
4. I asked about the effect of the SCO poison pill (their stockholder rights
program), announced at the same time. My host smiled and told me that had been
considered. From IBM’s analysis, it made involuntary bankruptcy of SCO almost
certain since the pill effectively cut off some sources of future funding for
SCO.
5. In passing, I asked about the brevity of the Joan Thomas affidavit.
Apparently a decision was made not to list other SCO logic failings in the
Thomas affidavit since that might be used by SCO as a counter at a later time.
In other words, SCO could answer each of the items listed and say, “Even if this
is not all the problems with giving us the needed information, this must have
been a list of the more important issues and since we have answered those, any
remaining issues would be minor.” It was interesting to see this decision on a
holograph; even I could understand it.
IBM’s decision analysis is not perfect. They have not found find a way to model
SCO stupidity so that it can be reproduced on order. The example they gave me
was SCO’s decision to file against DCC without knowing they no longer used the
product. The team really would like to be able to reproduce this stupidity when
needed.
At this time, the IBM team is, like us, trying to decide the significance of the
two Utah hearings scheduled for the same time. They understand the possible
implications (high probability that it is good for both IBM and Novell) but do
not know what the judge is thinking.
GA (for this posting)
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| Authored by: tangomike on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:39 PM EDT |
-
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The SCO Group - Auto-retro-phrenology in action!
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: overshoot on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:43 PM EDT |
| How can Canopy, Darl, Yarro, and the other insiders "monetize" the poison pill?
That "plan" has triggers that I've never heard of in other poison-pill plans,
such as someone even talking about a takeover. That leads me to suspect
that it's there to enable the insiders to cash out the Company's remaining
assets before the creditors arrive in force. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:47 PM EDT |
and just go, go away.
Please.
I can't wait to hear the spin
that Darla, SCumtag, et al, put on this whole story in their "from-prison"
interviews...*
What a fiaSCO, what a SCam. I have learned so much from
this whole thing, much of it bad. It is disheartening that such bogus claims
could have had the effects that I have seen. I really hope that, besides IBM
shoving this whole thing so far down SCO's throat that SCO's toenails turn Big
Blue, we see some criminal prosecution of these rip-off artists who engineered
the whole thing. This includes micro$oft, and their back-channel financial
support of an attack on Linux, which I believe is one of the gestures of a dying
company.
It's been a sad, educating comment on the state of our Nation
and how it is in decline to some degree from the likes of all the Bravo Sierra
we have seen demonstrated throughout this whole case. The only good part is that
IBM has talented enough lawyers that they will prevail, and rightly
so.
Thank you, IBM, for fighting the good fight, and doing it oh so
well.
epiph
--------
*One can always hope... Heck,
while I'm at it, I hope they give adjoining cells to Didiot, Endarl, Lyings, and
other such shillish insiders. I wonder how much money those "journalists" and
"analysts" profited from pushing this stock SCam? I'd bet they did...[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Nick_UK on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:51 PM EDT |
A "shareholder rights" plan was also unveiled today,
typical in that it
seeks to prevent anyone from taking
control of 15% of the firm without running
the offer
through the board. Of course, as is so often the case, the
plan
looks more like job protection for a management team
that's put this company
into a stumbling, deathlike
trance.
So obvious in the light of
day now. Good report.
Nick [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 03:56 PM EDT |
Hum
the post from GA (grolaw addit) was deleted?
To much info in it, i think
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:01 PM EDT |
what !? no appropos "gloom-n-doom" from Maureen O'Gara?
with such pithy reporting (cref: http://www.linuxworld.com/story/
46147.htm) as:
"so BayStar must have dropped a few tranquillizers because SCO
said Wednesday" ... "So it seems that tempest in a teapot is
over" ..."BayStar
had a burr under its saddle" ... "He basically told them to go suck an
egg"
I had REALLY hoped for some additional insight from *my* favorite analytical
giant (but wait, there are so many!), so i could better decide whether to trade
in two, or just one, children's college tuition accounts to buy SCO stock ...
ROTFLMAO![ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:06 PM EDT |
Hmmm....I was just reading a post from a regular Groklawer who posted a
fascinating story about IBM using some kind of mathematical model for the
lawsuit with SCO.
It was simply a very intriguing piece. I finished reading it and then did a
refresh and now the story and its' links have disappeared.
This was the first time I had seen this happen.
I understand if it was deemed too HOT to handle but I found it an interesting
read nonetheless.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: John M. Horn on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:09 PM EDT |
The "Poison Pill" plan adopted by SCO, if I understand such plans
correctly, is usually intended to shield the company management from a walk down
the unemployment line. This was adopted in typical Darl McBride style, that is,
in utter disregard to his fiduciary duties to the company's shareholders.
That said, I must voice my suspicion that the company's shareholders are likely
to be predominantly a collection of individuals, investments groups and
companies with a vested interest in the demise of Linux and Open Source. This
was not always the case but any shares purchased in the last eighteen months or
so were almost certainly either purchased by the sadly ignorant or he/she/it
with an anti-FOSS agenda.
Considering these things, Darl McBride probably feels that he has little or no
fiduciary duty to his shareholders as they largely invested in the stock to
serve their hidden agendas instead of for profit.
If this is the case, the "Poison Pill" plan can really be little more
than a poorly concealed attempt to prolong the management team's freedom from
prosecution as well as the unemployment line because it certainly serves no
purpose to the stockholders. The bright light on Darl's horizon is the word
'DELAY' illuminated in red neon...
John Horn
s/arl/ick/
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:28 PM EDT |
| Forbes manages to do it again - and how's that for timing?
They even quote,
you guesed it, our mate Rob E.
Here.
cheers
-andy
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| Authored by: dmscvc123 on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:37 PM EDT |
I thought anything that would affect the rights of shareholders had to be voted
on for any public company. It seems quite off that SCO could secretly change the
rights of shareholders and have the cutoff date be the day before they announced
it. Even if it was legal to do the plan itself, would waiting three weeks to
announce it be too long?[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:39 PM EDT |
Which fool(s) spent $7.3 million on SCOSource licenses a
year ago? [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 04:41 PM EDT |
| "Qualified attendees will receive sample copies of all SCO products through
NCR kits, as well as other valuable giveaways." Like Small Litigation
Kit - which contains the valuable SCO’s IP; patented "Common SCO’s Business
Methods and Application" - make money the easy way and loss weigh in a sleep...
Oh.. and a free copy of Microsoft’s "Get the Facts.." :-) [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: ray08 on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 05:07 PM EDT |
"SCO's profit turns to loss as Q3 revenue tumbles
All is well"
Is that sarcasm??
---
Caldera is toast! And Groklaw is the toaster! (with toast level set to BURN)[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 05:12 PM EDT |
"123Jump.com:
The SCO Group, Inc. (SCOX: chart) said after the bell
Tuesday that it swung to a quarterly loss from a year-earlier profit, due to a
decline in revenue. The Lindon, Utah-based owner of the UNIX operating
system [my emphasis] reported a net loss of $7.4 million for its fiscal
third quarter, ..."
Nice how they just assume SCO's ownership of UNIX
despite all the counterclaims.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 05:19 PM EDT |
So all of us who have donated to the Open Source cause should get one of these
kits as attestable evidence of GPL copyright infringement against us...
RJ[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 05:53 PM EDT |
A point I haven't seen raised here is that SCOX is 46% held by insiders;
therefore it would be almost impossible to stage a hostile takeover. You'd have
to buy 93% of the float to take control. This is one more reason that the
poison pill seems poorly motivated.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: AllanKim on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 06:39 PM EDT |
I found this post from atul666 on the Yahoo! SCOX boards
Didja see the bit about "shareholders of record"? You're only
a shareholder of record if the shares are in your name, not the name of the
brokerage, so ordinary retail investors are screwed, as usual. Canopy's covered,
of course, and I'd assume Baystar is covered too.
They call this scam a
"Shareholder Rights Plan". And they say nobody reads Orwell
anymore.
So if I'm reading this correctly, the average investor,
whose shares are in "street name," gets nothing, and got no chance to share in
the "poison pill" Junior Series A Preferred rights.
Check the SEC filings for
more info ... it's interesting to study the toxicology of this particular poison
pill.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: mossc on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 07:04 PM EDT |
So I was pondering the info from the phone conference yesterday. Still trying
to understand the implications of the 31 million "cap" of legal
expenses.
Is this a way to lock up the funds for the lawyers if TSG loses the lawsuits?
Ensuring that the Management, Board, and Lawyers (including a hatch and a
McBride) get all cash out of the company even if they lose all counterclaims
against IBM?
If they came to the conclusion that they were going to lose sooner rather than
later I can see Darl/Yarro and friends setting up:
1. stock repurchase plan - insiders only
2. poison pill - to maintain control sap money, grant golden parachutes.
3. tie up every remaining dollar in the legal fees.
That way if(WHEN) IBM wins they get nothing.
Are the Boise Lawyers first in line before any legal settlement?
What control does Yarro/Canopy have over assets before paying off IBM in the
case of a big loss. Even paying legal fees for this FiaSCO.
Are these three things a way for the principals to take all cash out of the
company and salt their own fields for any conquering legal team? I can see
McBride thinking that if he is going to lose he is going to make sure nobody
gets anything out of the company.
BTW, I am also wondering if the limit on the 31 Million includes defense in
criminal/civil proceedings for the Board, and Officers of the company?
Be real interesting to see that agreement.
My impression is that things have gotten a lot harder to game in the corporate
world since Sarbanes-Oxley but I dont know if all provisions are in effect.
Chuck[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: pmk on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 07:15 PM EDT |
Looks like their meetings are restricted to partners and customers, and the
agenda doesn't have a Q&A session.
But it sure would be fun to go to my local meeting with my Gentoo Linux
sweatshirt on and hand out free Linux installation CD-ROMs.[ Reply to This | # ]
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- SCO's coming to town! - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 07:30 PM EDT
- Dallas people - Authored by: Matt C on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 08:51 PM EDT
- Atlanta - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 09:49 PM EDT
- Minneapolis - Authored by: rmorrish on Thursday, September 02 2004 @ 10:48 AM EDT
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 07:49 PM EDT |
I was thinking that the anti-takeover measures might not be for IBM. If Canopy
has such a big share of SCO, maybe Canopy becomes the "hostile" and
gives them an excuse to put the plan into action to do something to the stock.
Nah. I'll stick with the simplest explanation - It's just sound bytes to
destract from the news that the company's stock is going down the crapper. Um
yeah, must be a pricing error that will be fixed soon. Pay no attention to the
golden parachutes.
Of course, maybe there is a side effect after all. Maybe they also think that
once IBM chomps them in half in court (the copyright counterclaim alone might do
it), that IBM is likely to get a controlling share of the company. (And it will
probably only cost 1/100 cent per share from anyone but novelty collectors) Or
maybe a "you're honor, if there's no cash left, we'll just take a
controlling share of the company. Oh that's ok, we'll pay the electric bill
until we're ready to disolve the corporation ourselves." And if that
happens, I bet whoever's left holding the bag errr I mean heads the company at
that point will be instructed by the shareholders to file a malpractice lawsuit
against their attorney. With pro-bono legal representation courtesy of the
largest shareholder, IBM.
To head this off, they will need to dilute the controlling interest sufficiently
to keep Canopy on top. Of course, it won't do anything to stop shareholder
lawsuits for fraud, breach of fiduciary duty, yadda yadda (don't tell me IBM
didn't buy at least one share at the top so they could ride it down and sue as a
shareholder!), but Darl is supposed to go down with the SCO ship alone, not take
any outside co-conspirators with him.
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| Authored by: davidwr_ on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 08:59 PM EDT |
It might be fun to get the local Linux user's/developer's group out to picket
the road show.
Be sure to check your local laws on picketing in hotels and conference centers.
Invite the media, it will be fun!!!
Especially if Darl opens his mouth for the cameras - ohhh boy![ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 09:06 PM EDT |
Would this trigger the Poison Pill?
Notice of intention to commence, a tender or exchange offer upon consummation of
which I would beneficially own 15% or more of the Company's common stock.
I intend to commence a tender or exchange offer upon consummation of which I
would own 15% or more of the company's common stock.
Assumptions:
1. Date of commencement is projected to begin when sufficient funds are
available to own at least 15% of the Company's common stock.
2. Current stock closing price of approximately $ 3.67 on 1 September 2004 will
continue or accelerate the recent overall downward trends, losing approximately
3% per day.
3. Monthly savings toward the tender or exchange offer are estimated to average
$20 per month.
4. That the stock will somehow continue to be listed or available for sale until
this tender or exchange offer can be consummated.
5. That I will live long enough or my mind will be preserved in a fashion that
permits me legal rights to enter into tender and exchange offers.
This plan depends on analysis of future conditions, forward looking statements
and conditions which may not be fulfilled resulting in failure to inititate or
complete the offer.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: jim Reiter on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 09:16 PM EDT |
| With McBS in the management who needs a poison pill? [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Dave23 on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 09:44 PM EDT |
From what I'm gathering, SCO management is busy attempting to subordinate their
exposure to any possible legal dollar judgements (if/when the axe falls), and
unsubordinate their liabilities to Canopy and their lawyers (while also limiting
them). Good-faith employees will be out on the unemployment line; shareholders
will be out in the cold; and the aim is to make all other creditors,
particularly judgement creditors, get almost nothing on the dollar.
This tells me that SCOG management expect that the end is nigh.
So who is going to be the knight that rides forth and attempts to pierce the
Canopy corporate veil? Or prevent the SCOG lawyers from walking off with the
last assets as 'fees'? Will anyone even bother?
---
Gawker[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: tangomike on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 11:15 PM EDT |
Not only am I not a lawyer, I can barely spell stock market. Still, this 'poison
pill' thingy looks like another TSCOG scam. I expect the next sign to be
executive(s) bailing to pursue other opportunities , personal reasons, and
similar executroid lingo.
One or more of these guys disappearing will be the bell for the final round.
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The SCO Group - Auto-retro-phrenology in action!
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| Authored by: Latesigner on Wednesday, September 01 2004 @ 11:23 PM EDT |
The full article is here :
http://business.newsforge.com/business/04/09/01/1853228.shtml?tid=85
but this comment is priceless :
Now, let's look at this strategy objectively for a moment. SCO Group, which
makes no bones about the fact that it is in the litigation business, is going
out, being proactive, and trying to sell itself to new and current customers.
Excuse me? What company in its right mind is going to book valuable corporate
time at a live infomercial for SCO Group, an organization that thinks nothing of
turning around and suing its own customers? Would you want to become a new
customer? [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, September 02 2004 @ 12:25 AM EDT |
| The program, which licenses its Unix System V source
code,
That statement presumes that SCOX owns Unix Sysem V. Novell and the
APA say they do not. SCOX is authorized to sell Unix licenses, but does not own
it. Realtors(r) are authorized to sell houses, but they don't own them. They
have a contract to act as the owner's exclusive sales agent; no more, no less. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Stoppenheimer on Thursday, September 02 2004 @ 12:46 AM EDT |
I have never seen a company so noisy about its lawsuit(s). A city-to-city promo
tour?? Give me a break.
SCO has been jumping up and down yelping for almost two years, and IBM has been
perfectly, utterly silent. IBM, it seems, goes well out of its way to play by
the rules. I've heard stories of how slowly decisions are made at IBM because
everything goes through the lawyers. I believe that this is how they've stayed
in business. Keeping the law on their side (I know there were times when it
definitely wasn't, but they complied in the end, right?). I'm also pretty sure
that's how nimble little Micro-Soft pantsed them in the 80's. Because they're
now so careful, I find it almost incoceivable that a person could pin something
on IBM when it comes to code. IBM's behavior has been almost inanimate. They
know what's going on, and know that the system is ultimately on their side.
Which is why they've been doing this lawsuit completely by the book. It's like
litigating against a machine. On that count alone, I would be horrified to be
pitted against IBM in a court of law.
It's like Darl is rocking a vending machine trying to get a free bag of Doritos.
Eventually, the darn thing is just going to fall on him.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, September 02 2004 @ 03:12 AM EDT |
They wouldn't be Canopy shares would they?
That'd be an interesting way for newSCO to have used its cash.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: muswell100 on Thursday, September 02 2004 @ 03:12 AM EDT |
So 'Qualified Attendees' will get some SCO 'freebies'? I didn't think such
things (free as in beer) existed in SCO's world? Makes you wonder who may
qualify for such an honour. Hmmm... wonder if they're giving away anything on
disk? I'm getting a little bored with all my usual AOL coffee-coasters...[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, September 02 2004 @ 05:08 PM EDT |
"deathlike trance" is right! Problem is there in this trance dreaming
of controling the "linux" world and there stock holders are not
dreaming. There going to loose there shirts. There money is quite real and like
a "fool and his money" soon to be gone I am afraid. IBM is just about
to squish them like a bug! [ Reply to This | # ]
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