|
|
| Ah! The Joys of Answering SCO's FUD |
 |
|
Wednesday, May 17 2006 @ 11:54 PM EDT
|
You know how things look very different at 3 AM than they do later in the cold light of dawn?
I think that must be the explanation for poor "Paul Murphy" -- né Rudy de Haas, author of "The Unix Guide to Defenestration," who has been known to be critical of IBM and who once tried to assert in public, ADTI-like, that Linux was a derivative of Minix, until Linus, Minix author Andrew Tanenbaum, Eric Raymond and others shut their mouths -- posting at 3:22 AM an article on "The Joys of SCO." It probably seemed like a good idea at the time. There are two other possible explanations I can imagine:
1. he wants lots of hits so he can show his boss (and advertisers) that he is a popular blogger, which I don't believe is the case; or
2. maybe he's actually a SCOfolk guy, and this is a way to send a message to IBM, with plausible deniability that it comes from SCO, and see if, when they run it up the flagpole, anybody salutes. The message? "Please settle. If you buy our Unix "rights" from us, you can claim victory, release it for Linux use, and we still get some of your money." If that's SCO's message, here's IBM's probable answer: Hahahahaha.
I hope you don't click on his article, because I'd hate to mislead his boss. And with his background, I think he already has to know that what he wrote in this article is downright silly. So why bother to "educate" him? But for the rest of you, who may have read it already and have questions, I'll untie his knotted shoelaces.
Here is his article, in colored text, with my educational additions and fact corrections interspersed:
SCO's basic case started out simple.
Hardly. Here's their first complaint. They wrote this in summary: 4. As set forth in more detail below, IBM has breached its own obligations to SCO, induced and encouraged others to breach their obligations to SCO, interfered with SCO’s business, and engaged in unfair competition with SCO, including by
a) misusing and misappropriating SCO’s proprietary software; b) inducing, encouraging, and enabling others to misuse and misappropriate SCO’s proprietary software; and c) incorporating (and inducing, encouraging, and enabling others to incorporate) SCO’s proprietary software into open source software offerings. SCO charged IBM with unfair competition, of deliberately trying to destroy the Unix market. Take a look, please, at
recent Unix marketshare figures and you'll find IBM is still very much in the Unix business itself, (and note an upward trend was very evident in early 2004, so if destroying the market for Unix was IBM's game plan, it surely failed), so SCO's theory would require IBM to have deliberately planned to cut off its nose to spite its face. Not that logic was ever much in evidence in SCO's case.
In public, SCO executives said IBM has misappropriated a mountain of System V code and plugged it wholesale into Linux -- so much code that if you tried to take it out, you could barely use Linux any more. In the complaint, SCO claimed this: 96. Again, “IBM’s AIX contributions” consisted of the improper extraction, use, and dissemination of SCO’S UNIX source code and libraries, and unauthorized misuse of UNIX methods, concepts, and know-how. As you can see, "methods and concepts" -- whatever that means -- first poked its head over the battlement in SCO's initial complaint. May I please turn your attention to the February 1, 1985 Side Letter Agreement between AT&T and IBM, clarifying the parties understanding regarding methods and concepts language in the Software Agreement of that same date, February 1, 1985: This letter states understandings between our companies relating to the referenced agreements and amends certain sections in such agreements concerning SOFTWARE PRODUCTS subject to the referenced Software Agreement....7.06(a) LICENSEE agrees that it shall hold SOFTWARE PRODUCTS subject to this Agreement in confidence for AT&T. LICENSEE further agrees that it shall not make any disclosure of such SOFTWARE PRODUCTS to anyone, except to employees of LICENSEE to whom such disclosure is necessary to the use for which rights are granted hereunder. LICENSEE shall appropriately notify each employee to whom any such disclosure is made that such disclosure is made in confidence and shall be kept in confidence by such employee. Nothing in this agreement shall prevent LICENSEE from developing or marketing products or services employing ideas, concepts, know-how or techniques relating to data processing embodied in SOFTWARE PRODUCTS subject to this Agreement, provided that LICENSEE shall not copy any code from such SOFTWARE PRODUCTS into any such product or in connection with any such service and employees of LICENSEE shall not refer to the physical documents and materials comprising SOFTWARE PRODUCTS subject to this Agreement when they are developing any such products or service or providing any such service. If information relating to a SOFTWARE PRODUCT subject to this Agreement at any time becomes available without restriction to the general public by acts not attributable to LICENSEE or its employees, LICENSEE's obligations under this section shall not apply to such information after such time. SCO also claimed in its complaint that IBM was guilty of trade secrets violations, only to later drop that cause of action. And it accused IBM of misappropriating Project Monterey "proprietary information", later finding out from Judge Kimball that the statute of limitations to complain about that contract ran out long ago. The initial March 2003 complaint had four causes of action: misappropriation of trade secrets, unfair competition, interference with contract, and breach of contract. This case was never simple, unless "Stick 'em up" is your idea of simple.
SCO said that IBM had infringed on the terms of its AT&T source code licenses for Unix by allowing derivative works to enter the public domain via Linux, that they had drawn the problem to IBM's attention as part of the license renewal process, and that IBM had refused to recognize the problem or alter its behavior.
Sigh. Linux is not in the public domain. It never has been. It's all copyrighted code belonging to the good-hearted volunteers who wrote it and released it to the world under the GPL license, which you violate to your legal detriment, as SCO is about to find out the hard way. IBM refused to pay SCO off to go away is the way I heard it. Here's how IBM described SCO's strategy way back in August of 2003 in IBM's Amended Counterclaims. It may give Mr. "Murphy" some insight into IBM's refusal to do a deal: I. SCO's Scheme
50. SCO devised a scheme to profit from the Unix assets that it acquired from Original SCO, though those assets were in no way developed by SCO. Although most, if not all, of the AT&T Unix technology that SCO purports to own is generally known, available without restriction to the general public or readily ascertainable by proper means, SCO undertook to create fear, uncertainty and doubt in the marketplace in regard to SCO's rights in and to that technology.
51. Recognizing that there is little value in its Unix rights, SCO did not limit its scheme to that technology. Rather, SCO devised and executed a plan to create the false perception that SCO holds rights to Unix that permit it to control not only all Unix technology, but also Linux -- including those aspects generated through the independent hard work and creativity of thousands of other developers and long distributed by SCO itself under the GPL.
52. SCO undertook to carry out its scheme by, among other things, (a) bringing baseless legal claims against IBM and threatening to sue other companies and individuals, (b) conducting a far-reaching publicity campaign to create the false and/or unsubstantiated impression that SCO has rights to Unix and Linux that it does not have and that IBM and others have violated SCO's rights and (c) otherwise seeking to condition the market to believe that SCO has rights to Unix and Linux that it does not have and cannot properly enforce. Get it? IBM doesn't think SCO's Unix "rights" have any value, even if it has any, and that its claims are baseless and that's why IBM is not interested in buying them off. Period. In response SCO terminated the contract,
Nope. SCO sued and gave notice that it was going to terminate the contract on the same day, March 6, 2003, in violation, IBM pointed out, of the contract term that required SCO to first give IBM 100 days to fix any alleged breach. Here's the day it sued, and here's the letter [PDF] SCO sent to IBM. Note the dates. What does that tell you about SCO's motive? Its desire to resolve the issue without litigation?
thereby forcing IBM to stop selling AIX and other Unix derived products, and asked a court first to enforce that order and secondly to consider fair compensation.
Based on what?
I see two daydreams here. On planet earth, please find me a lawyer (other than the ones paid to represent SCO) who thinks the court will do this. For one thing, Novell ix-nayed the "termination," based on Amendment X's terms and Section 4.16(b) of the Asset Purchase Agreement between Novell and original SCO dated September 19, 1995. Novell directed SCO to "waive any purported right SCO may claim to terminate IBM's licenses enumerated in Amendment X or to revoke any rights thereunder, including any purported rights to terminate asserted in SCO's letter of March 6, 2003 to IBM". And Novell claims it retained copyrights on Unix and that they were never transferred to SCO, so on what basis would a court enforce a termination based on copyrights that are in dispute?
At the time this looked like a negotiating tactic: using the court to get IBM's senior people to pay attention to an internal problem. To my astonishment, however, IBM choose to deny SCO's claim, embarking on a costly, and high risk, legal process rather than settlement negotiations. This tells us how much Mr. "Murphy" knows about the law. I have little doubt that his astonishment was shared by SCO executives and their die-hard financial supporters too. Nevertheless, anyone who knows anything about the law knows that giving in to dubious claims has a way of putting a sign on your back that says, "Sue me please. I have tons of money, and you just might get some." Look at Blackberry. Did settling solve RIM's legal problems? So IBM turned out not to be such an easy mark after all. Go figure. It's called the School of Hard Knocks.
I don't pretend to understand American civil law,
Heh heh. Is that so?
...but it seems to me that the basic SCO claim is an absolute no brainer: one line of AT&T code in Linux makes the case
It wouldn't prove damages, however. As David Marriott stated at the last hearing, paraphrasing, if SCO's business failed in 2000, let's say, a donation of code in 2005 can't be the reason. One line of code would likely be viewed as de minimis anyway, even if there was any such line of code. It might even be viewed as fair use. It could have been put there by someone other than IBM. Like a SCO employee, for example, with his boss's knowledge and approval. We know there were such contributions. Or it could be standards-derived or the only way to do something right or revealed in a book on Unix years before. Or IBM can prove the code is its own property and that its contracts allow it to donate any code it wishes. There are lots of possibilities. What isn't possible is for SCO to win billions based on one line of code. So it just isn't true to say that one line of code makes SCO's case. ...and the original 390 port done in Germany and released through SuSe was chock full of things that seem to have benefited rather directly from work done under the AT&T shelter by engineers from Sun, NCR, Motorola, and AT&T when the BSD/SysV union that gave rise to Solaris was co-developed for PowerPC. This appears to be Mr. "Murphy's" personal theory. First of all, Caldera joined with SuSE to release code as UnitedLinux, under the GPL, I might add, in April of 2003, a month after the SCO v. IBM lawsuit began. (If you don't know what 390 means, here are some resources to get you started. And please note that Gregory Blepp was with SuSE back in the early UnitedLinux days.)
If your contract says you can do something, you can do it. That is what IBM says. As for engineers from Sun, NCR, and Motorola, SCO doesn't represent their interests. Anyway, BSD code is free to be used. Solaris is now Open Sourced, so any "methods and concepts" in Solaris are now free to be used by the world and its uncle. Long before, though, the code was out there, methods and concepts with it. In any case, Sun isn't suing IBM, not that they might not enjoy it, or might not have been cheering SCO on back in 2003. But if they were trying to help SCO, then they'd never have Open Sourced Solaris, because it let the dogs out. Oops. Forevah. This doesn't even point out that Amendment X and the $echo newsletters clarified that IBM (and Sequent) had the right to do whatever it wished with methods and concepts.
Unfortunately IBM's decision to circle the wagons led to a rapid escalation in claims on both sides.
Actually, it led to a steady diminution in SCO's claims, which is hardly unfortunate from IBM's point of view. The numbers went up, but the heart of the SCO case shrank. First, they scrupulously avoided suing for copyright infringement, despite the claims to the media, other than for continuing to distribute AIX after the "termination," which Novell overturned [PDF], by the way, immediately (Novell overruled [PDF] SCO's "termination" of Sequent regarding Dynix also). Judge Dale Kimball looked at SCO's copyright evidence and was "astonished" at its lack (an issue that came up only because SCO brought a motion to dismiss IBM's Tenth Counterclaim, seeking a judgment that it had not violated SCO's copyrights by its Linux activities). SCO also dropped its initial trade secrets claims. Then it dropped its "the GPL is unconstitutional" nonsense. And when you look at the tiny little list of SCO's claims regarding allegedly misused materials as filed by the final deadline in December, there is so little to it, the magistrate judge asked the SCO lawyer at the last hearing, "Is this all you've got?" Eventually, IBM dropped some patent counterclaims, because SCO has so little money, it wasn't worth the cost to pursue them legally and IBM was interested in getting the case to trial. In short, this case just keeps getting smaller and smaller. But what is he saying, in the overview? That SCO seriously miscalculated. Thus SCO hired a well known east coast law firm on contingency plus fees and expenses, and the subsequent filings raised the stakes considerably by alleging that IBM's senior management was complicit in this process, issuing uninformed commentaries on Unix history, and then demanding licensing fees from the general Linux community in a rather naive attempt to establish a fair market value for the formerly protected code and ideas. SCO hired Boies, Schiller in January of 2003 long before all the above happened. It sued IBM in March. It "terminated" AIX 100 days after that March 6 notice. "Murphy" has it backwards. Well. Heh heh. What can I say?
Those mistakes allowed IBM to rally the Linux community against SCO, empowered anti-SCO sites like groklaw, and created an intensely negative emotional atmosphere in which hardly anyone noticed that IBM's actual legal strategy consists of a large red herring (the dynix file system code; something SCO's lawyers bought hook, line, and sinker) coupled with alternately stonewalling, nitpicking, and drowning SCO in paper.
IBM didn't rally anything or anybody. This lie has been kept in the air for a long time. Neither did Boies Schiller. IBM didn't need to rally "the Linux community". Darl McBride did that single-handedly with his trash talk and public threats. Blake Stowell and Chris Sontag and SCO-Microsoft's media buddies helped, I guess. And may they be fully rewarded. When SCO sent letters to commercial users of Linux, warning them that they could be liable for IP infringement if they continued to use Linux, I think SCO knew they'd get the attention of the Linux community. And they did. IBM didn't have to lift a finger. Groklaw wasn't established as an anti-SCO site, for that matter. I just cover the news about the case, explaining what is happening, and what has been happening is that SCO has been falling downstairs in slow motion, hitting its head on every step. It's not my fault SCO never had a case that anyone but folks like Mr. "Murphy" thought had legs. SCO's doom was so utterly predictable, just knowing, as I did, how the GPL works and how honorable Linus is as a person, that I called the first article I wrote about SCO that exactly. It was not the first Groklaw article, though. And Groklaw's power doesn't come from SCO. They have pulled every underhanded trick in the book to undermine Groklaw and destroy its earned reputation for fairness and honesty, as far as I'm concerned. Their inability to succeed in that ignoble mission in no way resulted from a lack of trying. Now, about Dynix. It wasn't IBM that brought Dynix into this picture. It was on May 29, 2003 that SCO sent a letter to Sequent, purporting to "terminate" its right to distribute Dynix, which you can read about in this letter from Novell to SCO dated February of 2004 [PDF], the first step in Novell's process of overturning that "termination." And if you read SCO's July 2003 amended complaint, you will find it was SCO that brought it up there too, adding Dynix claims. The 6 claims of action in this complaint were "Breach of IBM Software Agreement," "Breach of Sequent Software Agreement," and "Breach of IBM Sublicensing Agreement," "Unfair Competition," "Interference with Contract," and "Misappropriation of Trade Secrets." As for drowning people in paper, if you track the SCO v IBM case and read all the filings, you will find out for yourself just who has been stonewalling, nitpicking and drowning whom in paper. Take stonewalling. As IBM's attorney, David Marriott, asked the magistrate judge at the last hearing in April, when does SCO have to finally tell IBM what this case is about? It's been three years, and we still don't know what code SCO is even talking about. Talk about stonewalling skills. I know of no other case in history where the plaintiff filed a claim, went through all of discovery over an agonizing three years, and never once told the defendant what it allegedly had done wrong with specificity.
Four years later some clarity is emerging.
Three, actually. But heaven only knows, it *feels* like four.
SCO's lawyers are responding to IBM's strategy by broadening their case from code to the ideas embedded in that code.
That's not what they just told the judge at the April hearing. They told her that methods and concepts were always in SCO's case. And I'm sure they wouldn't lie to the judge. And I already showed you SCO's first complaint, which spoke about method and concepts. I think it would be more accurate to say that SCO started out charging all kinds of wild things, and it has now been reduced to methods and concepts.
At the nit picking level, for example, if there are four equally good ways to handle a high/low switch and IBM's original code used the same one AT&T did, it may be reasonable to believe that the guy who nominally wrote the code asked the AIX maintainer in the next cubicle how AT&T handled it. At the more general level there may be a number of reasonable ways to do kernel table management, but if only the one invented at AT&T and uniquely embedded in the licensed AT&T code appears in IBM's product and results in other significant simplifications that also appear in the kernel, then the balance of probability falls on SCO's side. Indeed if SCO can find even a couple of compelling examples like this, particularly at the level of significant design and coding optimizations, the likelihood of independent invention starts to approach zero.
Here's the thing about court cases. Likelihoods and the balance of probabilities and reasonable guesses don't cut the mustard. That's only useful for message boards and silly blogs. You have to actually prove your claim with specificity in a court of law. And that, for poor SCO, is their dilemma. They made claims it appears they can't actually prove. If Mr. "Murphy" wishes to call that "clarity," we can agree on at least that one point. And here's the thing about AIX. It's IBM's homegrown code, which their contract (see Amendment X) lets them use any way they wish. If, for example, IBM coded JFS first and then put it in AIX and later donated it to Linux too, what is there to stop them?
The trap for IBM here is that SCO can argue that copying at the level of design ideas indicates management complicity because, at the very least, the product development managers would have had to sign off on both design and code. And if the court buys the argument, this means that IBM's loss will be far more consequential than was ever contemplated in the original filings.
I don't think so. If you take a look at Groklaw's new Unix methods and concepts database, you will find that there is already overwhelming evidence that Unix methods and concepts were let out of the barn a long time ago. And the contract states that no confidentiality is required once it is revealed by someone else. SCO's argument seems simply dead in the water, even if IBM doesn't win its current motion to limit SCO's claims and toss most of them clean overboard.
Speaking personally I see SCO as the aggrieved party here - but I think their real complaint today should be as much against their own lawyers as against IBM.
Ah. Here's a new theme: that it's all Boies Schiller's fault. I've been expecting this for some time. I notice he never mentions them by name, which is odd, unless he's worried about being sued for libel. I think SCO agreed not to ever sue them, in the engagement agreement, the one that capped the legal fees in October of 2004, which certainly showed foresight on Boies Schiller's part. The worst SCO can do is arbitrate. However, Lamlaw certainly thinks that they should never have brought this case in the first place. What I think is that Boies Schiller did not seem to have understood the GPL at the beginning, as I repeatedly tried to tell them, as you can see by my words way back in October of 2003. If they had listened to me, I feel sure they would have proceeded -- if at all -- in different ways. Here's what SCO wrote about the GPL in its first complaint: The General Public License
77. Related to the development of the open source software development movement in the computing world, an organization was founded by former MIT professor Richard Stallman entitled “GNU.”
78. The primary purpose of the GNU organization is to create free software based on valuable commercial software. The primary operating system advanced by GNU is Linux.
79. In order to assure that the Linux operating system (and other software) would remain free of charge and not-for-profit, GNU created a licensing agreement entitled the General Public License (“GPL”).
80. Any software licensed under the GPL (including Linux) must, by its terms, not be held proprietary or confidential, and may not be claimed by any party as a trade secret or copyright property.
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Stallman was never an MIT professor, that he has nothing to do with Open Source but rather with Free Software, that the GNU Project had no goals of using proprietary anything but instead writes everything from scratch, as Darl McBride later acknowledged, or that the GPL in no way means the code must be free of charge or not-for-profit (ask Red Hat or just look it up in the GPL FAQ, which clearly says you can charge for the code, just not for the license). I expect Boies Schiller wishes it never penned those words but then again, lawyers are not tech experts. SCO is the tech expert. As Caldera, they sold software under the GPL for years, so you'd expect them to be able to explain the GPL to their lawyers, who would naturally have every reason to believe the client. The GPL is the MVP of the SCO litigation, in my view, and it's such a deep problem for SCO that even if it could "win" on any level, IBM's counterclaims are going to cost SCO so much money in damages that it will likely wipe away anything SCO could win in any alternate universe I can think of.
The basic case, however, was and is a no brainer, and should have been settled without the damage to SCO's reputation and ability to do business we've seen so far. Thus the bottom line is simple: if SCO survives long enough to make it in court, IBM will lose.
My brain tells me the opposite, noting as it carefully does that so far, SCO is losing everything that matters, in court and out, including its reputation, but not because of anything IBM or Boies Schiller did. It lost its reputation by making dubious claims and acting like a bully about it. Nobody respects a bully. It was Darl McBride who said he didn't care what the Linux community thought of him. What he cared about, he told us, was the shareholders. SCO can hardly boo hoo now that it has a bad reputation in the tech community. The arguments Mr. "Murphy" makes here are not supportive of his conclusion.
As I've said before, there is a natural basis for a settlement here under which SCO would drop the case and IBM would pay SCO to release all of its remaining rights in Unix code to the public -allowing IBM to leave the field in triumph after having achieved something of value to the Linux community.
Here's the apparent offer. Settle, with IBM paying SCO to release its "rights" in Unix code. Here's the answer: SCO doesn't have anything anybody wants, even if it could demonstrate it had the "rights" it claims. We didn't even start to discuss Novell's claim that it holds the copyrights to Unix, not SCO, or Novell's claim that SCO has no legal right to sue anybody in the UnitedLinux deal, or any licensee of anyone in the UL deal, an assertion which is currently being brought to Europe for arbitration. I notice Mr. "Murphy" doesn't write about Novell at all. I wonder what that might signify? Here's the deeper answer: there is nothing in System V that the Linux community wants. It's the other way around. Look at SCO's current product. It's their old, weather-beaten code juiced up with FOSS to make it marketable. Take out the FOSS, and nobody new wants it. Actually, thanks to SCO's remarkably offensive litigious behavior, nobody in the US wants it, period, from all I can discern from SCO's SEC filings. They are digging like mad in places like China and Russia and South America, trying to find some business where nobody knows them or their ways, and hoping that some cell phone-spamming software will turn their fortunes around. We certainly wish them all the luck in the world with that.
Most people, of course, deny SCO has a case and see no value in open sourcing the AT&T product set. What might that tell you? Now, if you're in that camp, let me ask you two questions: first, from whom are you getting your information? and, secondly, if you think open sourcing AT&T's code now would produce no change in Linux or any other major Unix variant, I'd guess that you'd be right; but have you considered that you're making SCO's case for them?
A cluebat for Mr. "Murphy": Linux doesn't need UNIX code. You may have observed how little the Linux community cared when Sun announced it was open sourcing Solaris. The methods and concepts were released to the world already, from all I can see. They teach them in schools. And by the way, for you GPL-challenged types, when Caldera released UnitedLinux, which it did *after* it sued IBM, it released all the code it is suing over into the wild, the methods and concepts and the code. And the thing about the GPL is this: it's like losing your virginity. Once you decide to release your code under the GPL, it can never go back to being closed source again. Their lawyers on the UL project should have told them that. Except that, of course, they knew that already, being back then a Linux company. See, this is why I always say I want to be an analyst when I grow up. So what's the takeaway? Mr. "Murphy" has been urging IBM to settle since 2003. IBM apparently doesn't listen to him. SCO thought IBM would settle, and it lost that bet. And do I smell the odor of a client unhappy with its lawyer floating in the air?
1 SCO's final complaint lists 9 causes of action, but it's repetitive (2 Interference with Contract causes of action listed, for example), and a copyright infringement claim, related to continued AIX distribution, was added, replacing the dropped Misappropriation of Trade Secrets cause of action.
2 Kimball: "Viewed against the backdrop of SCO's plethora of public statements concerning IBM's and others' infringement of SCO's purported copyrights to the UNIX software, it is astonishing that SCO has not offered any competent evidence to create a disputed fact regarding whether IBM has infringed SCO's alleged copyrights through IBM's Linux activities."
|
|
|
|
| Authored by: darkonc on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:03 AM EDT |
| Just in case PJ makes a miss take. ---
Powerful, committed communication.
Touching the jewel within each person and bringing it to life.. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- tht --> that - Authored by: _Arthur on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:22 AM EDT
- tht --> that - Authored by: PJ on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:20 PM EDT
- Replace IBM with SCO in this sentence... - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:23 AM EDT
- and we still don't know what code IBM is even talking about. - Authored by: Nivuahc on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:27 AM EDT
- Corrections thread. - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:39 AM EDT
- A minor nit in the argument - Authored by: inode_buddha on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:44 AM EDT
- It's amazing... - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:47 AM EDT
- they way -> the way - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:53 AM EDT
- PJ got her argument inside out :-) - Authored by: ankylosaurus on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:56 AM EDT
- cut the mustard => cut the muster - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:02 AM EDT
- broken quote... - Authored by: darkonc on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:13 AM EDT
- Balance of probabilities - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 02:24 AM EDT
- Ambiguous sentence - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 02:41 AM EDT
- Worth pointing out? - Authored by: mpconmy on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:30 AM EDT
- Correct tons tread. - Authored by: Wol on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:49 AM EDT
- MVP? - Authored by: Cyberdog on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:01 AM EDT
- MVP? - Authored by: ine on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:48 AM EDT
- MVP? - Authored by: nuthead on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:50 AM EDT
- MVP? - Authored by: SilverWave on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:30 PM EDT
- MVP? - Authored by: PJ on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:48 PM EDT
- Correct tons tread. - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:31 AM EDT
- nee is feminine - Authored by: jplatt39 on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:46 AM EDT
- Broken Link - Authored by: Steve Martin on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:48 AM EDT
- Broken Link - Authored by: PJ on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:56 PM EDT
- Contradiction - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:54 AM EDT
- Correct tons tread. - Authored by: walth on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 09:23 AM EDT
| |
| Authored by: darkonc on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:05 AM EDT |
| I never really know what to say in these thread heads, so I just say something
irrelevant. ---
Powerful, committed communication. Touching the jewel
within each person and bringing it to life.. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- LOPSA - League Of Professional System Administrators - Authored by: emperor on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:21 AM EDT
- OT - Late - but before the order - Hearing on Motion to Strike - IBM v SCO - Authored by: webster on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:04 AM EDT
- Sun Tzu Was a Sissy - Authored by: Totosplatz on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:12 AM EDT
- "GPL is viral" - M$ Internet Explorer Program Manager - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:31 AM EDT
- How best to read the other side of the argument? - Authored by: schaste on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:08 AM EDT
- Baseball Fans: Frivilous Lawsuit Night! - Authored by: long_hair_smelly on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:22 AM EDT
- Anti-trust actionable - Authored by: jesse on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:57 AM EDT
- SCO Forum 2006 - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 11:45 AM EDT
- /.:UK Government Wants Private Encryption Keys - Authored by: Winter on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:21 PM EDT
- PlayStation 3 complete with Blu-Ray Player to cost £425 in the UK - Authored by: Brian S. on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:06 PM EDT
- Off Topic - Linux copyright/trademark use?? - Authored by: Duster on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:06 PM EDT
- Reply to Legal Effect of the $echo Newsletters - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:39 PM EDT
- OT-SCO announces SCO Forum 2006. . . - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:57 PM EDT
- Symantec sues Microsoft - Authored by: SpaceLifeForm on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:49 PM EDT
- The GPL is viral - Authored by: brian-from-fl on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:27 PM EDT
- More Mobile Stuff: OMA and SyncML - Authored by: Brian S. on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:03 PM EDT
- Microsoft counter sues Lucent over patents - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:24 PM EDT
- "The good news is that Gordon Moore's Second Law is finally coming into effect. " - Authored by: Brian S. on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:33 PM EDT
- Off Topic: Some refreshing honesty from SCO - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 12:27 AM EDT
- The EPO has a web about computer implemented inventions - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 03:41 AM EDT
- Amazon's 1-Click Patent - Authored by: nerd6 on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 06:05 AM EDT
- A day late and a dollar short - Authored by: Jude on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 08:56 AM EDT
- Off Topic - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 09:01 AM EDT
| |
| Authored by: inode_buddha on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:10 AM EDT |
Once again somebody confuses "freely available" with "public
domain". Or is it the case that they desire it to be public domain?
---
-inode_buddha
Copyright info in bio
"When we speak of free software,
we are referring to freedom, not price"
-- Richard M. Stallman[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: darkonc on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:24 AM EDT |
| 'If you hadn't denied my claim that you are a thief, I wouldn't have forced you
to beat me up in defense of my honor.'
---
Powerful, committed
communication. Touching the jewel within each person and bringing it to life.. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: bigbert on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:30 AM EDT |
"No-brainer" - yep, that sounds like SCO to me, all right!
FUDsters 0, PJ 1000 and still batting! Way to go, girl! Thanks for that, it was
really funny!
Tee hee hee!
---
LnxRlz![ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: AllParadox on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:38 AM EDT |
Mr. De Haas takes considerable risk by exposing himself this way.
He apparently earns his income through consultation. Other people hire him,
temporarily, to help them, because he knows what they do not.
His customer retention depends on his appearance of competence.
So far, so good. This is true for all consutants, including outside attorneys.
(When it comes to in-house attorneys, the company soon learns if you can do the
job, and the reality replaces the appearance.)
Posting a blog that is incorrect in so many ways, on such a public forum,
exposes a very serious vulnerability.
There is that which we know, that which we do not know, and that which we know
that ain't so.
That last condition, borrowed from the Cracker-barrel philosophers of the
1800's, is a problem.
When Mr. De Haas makes so many errors, he shows that there is a great deal that
he believes that is not correct. (I gratuitously assume that he is honestly
incorrect, instead of acting as a paid shill.)
If he has gotten all of this publicly available information wrong, how much has
he screwed up for his customers, where many of the details he uses are not
publicly available?
If I were still practicing law, and still selling consultations, I would not
have created most of the Groklaw posts that I have.
Not because I think they were all wrong, they weren't. Rather, because it would
have been too easy for competitors to misconstrue individual sentences and steal
my customers.
Now his blog is public, and he must deal with it. It has been posted on the
internet. Even if he erases it, it will not go away.
I have a lot of sympathy for the guy. He has some very dark days ahead.
---
PJ deletes insult posts, not differences of opinion.
AllParadox; retired lawyer and chief Groklaw iconoclast. No legal opinions,
just my opinion.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: kawabago on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:48 AM EDT |
I want some!
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:54 AM EDT |
I do think that folks have a right to write pseudonymously -- PJ herself can
attest that public attention does sometimes have a downside. I don't think
it's appropriate to reveal the true identity behind a pseudonym, even if the
pseudonymous writing is biased or incorrect.
PJ, you may want to consider how you would feel about someone connecting
your real-world identity with a pseudonymous online identity before doing so
to others.
Thanks for your hard work, as always.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:26 AM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: tknarr on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:36 AM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: PJ on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 02:10 AM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:20 AM EDT
- Assuming the worst - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:41 AM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:08 AM EDT
- On Assuming the Worst? - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:55 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: k12linux on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 02:30 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 02:38 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Dark on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:33 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:20 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Toon Moene on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:28 PM EDT
- Assuming the worst makes for more drama :) - Authored by: greyhat on Saturday, May 20 2006 @ 06:50 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Sunday, May 21 2006 @ 11:41 PM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:34 AM EDT
- On pseudonyms - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:36 PM EDT
- On pseudonymity - Authored by: tangomike on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:13 PM EDT
- Paul aka Rudy - Authored by: The Mad Hatter r on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:41 PM EDT
| |
| Authored by: CypherOz on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:57 AM EDT |
Well done!! I have just read this over lunch (Australia). What a hoot! Me
thinks Murphy is missing a brain.
---
The GPL is enduring, not viral[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:04 AM EDT |
"SCO would drop the
case"
Ok, so
SCOG drops it's case and IBM's counterclaims then
proceed with nothing to stop
them... Good Move SCOG!
Something tells me after the trouble SCOG tried
to
cause, IBM is NOT going to drop the counterclaims just so
someone else can
come along and try and cause the same
damage.
RASs [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- I'm bugged - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:09 PM EDT
| |
| Authored by: stevem on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:13 AM EDT |
I just love that cutting incisivness. Reading the small bits of nonsence sliced
off, exposing the core of naked FUD.
One of your better ones Pamela. :-)
- SteveM
Does this make me a fanbois?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Zarkov on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:11 AM EDT |
[i].... if you think open sourcing AT&T's code now would produce no
change
in Linux or any other major Unix variant, I'd guess that you'd be right;
but
have you considered that you're making SCO's case for them?[/i]
If I open
source my grandfathers childhood finger paintings - since they were
done before
I was born and I dont understand what they mean - does that give me
the right to
claim ownership of all art masterpieces created since 1918?
I guess not... but
the AT&T leagacy code is just that... a legacy of past
history, and only
incidental to the existence of other things, (only one of
which is Linux), that
have survived beyond it...[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:20 AM EDT |
> I'll untie his knotted shoelaces.
*sniggers*[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Wol on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:54 AM EDT |
I'm sure you don't need me to point out that Stallman was never an
MIT professor, that he has nothing to do with Open Source but rather with Free
Software,
Actually, as I understood it, Stallman STILL IS a MIT
Professor, and it was his appointment as one that enabled him to start the
FSF!
The story I know is that he was granted a tenured Professorship
(some sort of prize) which provided a basic income - enough to live on but not
much more - and thus freed from the need to earn a living RMS then set about
founding the FSF and starting GNU.
If that's not true, where on earth did
that meme come from?
Cheers,
Wol [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Norm47 on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:12 AM EDT |
PJ,
I will never tire of your command of the subtleties and humor of the my beloved
English language.
And Groklaw's power doesn't come from SCO. They have pulled every underhanded
trick in the book to undermine Groklaw and destroy its earned reputation for
fairness and honesty, as far as I'm concerned. Their inability to succeed in
that ignoble mission in no way resulted from a lack of trying.
So succinctly put. You go girl!
Norm
---
Norm
Mildura, The Wintersun City
Australia[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: jig on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:33 AM EDT |
"Once you decide to release your code under the GPL, it can never go back
to being closed source again."
that's not worded perfectly. once you publish specific code under the gpl, you
can't unpublish or further restrict that specific code if others use it
following the gpl. but, as long as you have the permission of everyone who has
contributed to the code (which might just be you), you can take that code and
move it in and out of close source/open source projects all you want.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- wha? - Authored by: belzecue on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:42 AM EDT
- wha? - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:18 AM EDT
- wha? - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:46 AM EDT
- How is that any different..... - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:39 AM EDT
- wha? - Authored by: GLJason on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:23 PM EDT
- try this on for size - Authored by: jig on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 03:50 AM EDT
| |
| Authored by: nerd6 on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:18 AM EDT |
I have been reading Paul Murphy's blog recently and he has been writing some
pretty decent articles about Unix and related subjects... so this ridiculous
piece of FUD surprised me quite a bit. Kind of like finding a worm in a nice
crisp apple.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:32 AM EDT |
BS:
The primary operating system advanced by GNU is Linux.
Well, i thought it is still Hurd, anyone enlightened those stupid lawyers?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Keyboard warning - Authored by: troll on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:41 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: arthurpaliden on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:30 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:50 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:16 AM EDT
- Warranty? - Authored by: NetArch on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:57 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: nuthead on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 11:13 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 11:27 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: BassSinger on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:12 PM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: red floyd on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:56 PM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:21 PM EDT
- SCO Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: rsteinmetz70112 on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:57 PM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer. - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 12:01 AM EDT
- Microsoft Linux, a no brainer - cannot worsens monopoly standing. nt - Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 12:03 AM EDT
- I think they were trying to say - Authored by: qu1j0t3 on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:45 PM EDT
| |
| Authored by: Chris Lingard on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:35 AM EDT |
This type of statement is common with journalists who know nothing about
computing. But it is ridiculous.
If you cut and pasted a line or a
paragraph from a great book into the middle of your own writing would this
transform your work?
But AT&T code was released by Caldera, it is
public. And it was taught in Universities; the Universities themselves made
many of the contributions.
Code is not some sort of shrink wrapped
magic that is created in large corporations. A single programmer, or better a
small team can quickly design and code a program. And whilst coding the design,
you do not take a break to look for some ancient code to paste in.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:36 AM EDT |
| What makes you think that? [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: sacs on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:54 AM EDT |
"...and how honorable Linus is as a person"
PJ, that made
my evening. This guy Linus is a phenonomonen the likes of which the world has
seldom seen. Right (or wrong e.g. Tannenbaum) he has stuck to his guns regarding
freedom and the philosophy that is Linux. That take big brass
ones!
Linus - rock on dude!
(caveat: I have 20 years Unix
sysadmin experience and I love Linux. Draw your own conclusions.)[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:23 AM EDT |
Just a thought.
A couple of times now PJ has quoted judge Wells' "Is this all you've
got?" as though it was made as a statement of incredulity. I wonder if
this is appropriate. From the transcript it could just as easily have been a
straightforward question intended to nail down the limits of SCO's claims. The
answer's either yes or no, and if no then the judge could easily ask "What
else is there?", and so move the proceedings to conculsion either way. I'm
sure judge Wells' interest is in moving the case along.
Is there any evidence as to what the judge ment when asking "Is this all
you've got?" Absent tone of voice I would err on the side of
straightforward question, but then I'm not at all familiar with the courtroom.
Maybe judges never ask questions like that.
Considering the ambiguity I'd be reluctant to quote the judge as if she made an
incredulous statement. I'm sure she'd be unhappy if her words were
misconstrued.
Maybe somebody who was there can help out. IIRC the eyewitness reports mention
the quote, but are not explicit regarding the judge's attitude.
Regards,
Karl O. Pinc kopnospamatmeme.com[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:49 AM EDT |
M$ has really got the FUD machine going.
I wonder how they list those expenses. Is
there a FUD catgory in accounting?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: gvc on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:55 AM EDT |
| PJ says: SCO sued and terminated the contract
I don't think so. SCO
repudiated the contract, and purports to have terminated it, but as I read it,
SCO did not follow any valid termination process so it is still in
effect.
SCO also repudiated their GPL license for SCO Linux. Their
repudiation of that license is equally bogus.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:03 AM EDT |
if there are four equally good ways to handle a high/low switch and
IBM's original code used the same one AT&T did, it may be reasonable to
believe that the guy who nominally wrote the code asked the AIX maintainer in
the next cubicle how AT&T handled it.
From this, I gather
than there can be only 4 OSes *ever*, the fifth will mathematically infringe on
one of the 4 "good" ones that came before it.
This is exactly what happens with
patents. Such obvious things get patented that, when you try to find a way to do
something, you just *have* to end up into a patented one, whether or not you
knew about the patent or the method.
It is strictly forbidden to invent things
that were already invented. New business models galore.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:24 AM EDT |
PJ wrote:
> Ah. Here's a new theme: that it's all Boies Schiller's fault. I've been
expecting this for some time.
and
>And do I smell the odor of a client unhappy with its lawyer floating in the
air?
This seems like a great time for me to offer up my favorite ending to this tale,
it goes like this: Boies Schiller sues Microsoft (and SCO) for failing to reveal
Microsoft's involvment in SCO's attacks on Linux and IBM, claiming that it
would not have taken the case had it (BS) known. Boies Schilller (in the guise
of defending the public against Microsoft's rapacious behavior) makes the case
that Microsoft's behavior constitutes a violation of the anti-trust settlement.
Boies Schiller walks away with a large settlement.
Peter Yellman[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: seraph_jeffery on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:24 AM EDT |
| Here's a website: http://www.osdata.com/oses/linux.htm
that has been up for years, and still claims that Linux is a derivative of
Minix. It states, "Linus received permission to use MINIX as the
foundation for his own efforts. MINIX was a small version of UNIX created by
Andrew S. Tanenbaum to provide college students with a working version of UNIX
with no AT&T owned source code. Linus opened a web site on his university
student account and started posting free copies of his source code. During the
early days of the project, Linus was posting updated versions several times a
day, which directly contradicted the commercial approach of only releasing new
versions on an infrequent basis after extensive testing. With the help of a
growing number of volunteers (literally tens of thousands), Linus quickly
replaced all of MINIX with new all new source code." Maybe one of you out
there with tact and skill could explain to him how it REALLY happened. That
would be nice. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:41 AM EDT |
The one matter I take issue with in the above is the reference to the $echo
newsletters as clarifying “that IBM (and Sequent) had the right to do whatever
it wished with methods and concepts”. From a technical perspective the
newsletter, especially the one in August support exactly the opposite on methods
and concept claims re Dynix, although they may ultimately be significant in
reducing or eliminating any damages arising out of the breach.
(In the case of AIX, IBM has the side letter dated contemporaneously with the
original IBM/AT&T agreements which, in my view absolves IBM from any claims
regarding misuse of methods and concepts in AIX that were not taken from Dynix
or regarding misuse of methods and concepts in SVRX where there is no verbatim
SVRX code being misused. Thus IBM never needs to rely on anything in the
newsletters in respect of the foregoing.)
A close reading of the August $echo newsletter discloses that it is not itself
an amending contract, but only an announcement that AT&T had prior thereto
made various changes in its existing contracts with licensees. It is very
difficult to interpret each of the changes in isolation; they are, I think, to
be interpreted as a package; i.e. you cannot take one of the changes and ignore
the rest. They are, only if taken together, a “deal”.
Some might argue that the changes that the August newsletter describes are some
sort of unilateral contract binding on AT&T. However, at least one of the
announced changes to the standard licensing arrangements is clearly not in the
licensee’s interests; i.e. that to S5.03 of the standard Sublicense Agreement
which appears to refer to an increase the rate of interest on late payment of
royalties due by the licensees to AT&T. So if the various changes were a
package deal, to make that package contractually binding on AT&T as regards
a particular licensee, there would have to be an acceptance of it by that
licensee--the necessary conditions for unilateral contract, even if it were to
be recognized under local law cannot be satisfied. (I know the change in that
interest rate is for most licensees a trivial matter and therefore most
licensees would be acting irrationally if they did not accept the deal, still I
think as a technical matter there has to be some evidence of acceptance.)
Moreover, the change to S2.01 of the standard Software Agreement is nowhere
explicitly set out. The August newsletter only describes what AT&T intended
by making the change. Without the exact wording of the change, it is hard to
see how there can be any effective contractual amendment. Futhermore, the
newsletter does not explicitly say that the words being added to S2.01 are being
added to clarify AT&T’s interpretation of the original Soft ware Agreement,
as testified to by Otis Wilson, that AT&T had no claim to licensee developed
SW, but rather that the words are being added to “assure licensees that AT&T
will claim no ownership in the software that they developed” This implies that
if the words are not added, in AT&T’s view it would have had such claim.
If an acceptance by Sequent of the changes described in the August newsletter is
required to make the changes binding on AT&T there is no evidence on the
record that there has been any such explicit acceptance. In fact the available
record such as it is, is exactly to the contrary: i.e. the later Substitution
Agreement between Sequent and AT&T by not referencing the change referred in
the August newsletter is evidence that Sequent had not agreed to it.
Some people I think have taken the position that the changes in the August
newsletter are binding by way of estoppel either directly or through some sort
of course of subsequent conduct. It appears to me there might be some evidence
of the necessary detrimental reliance that IBM could rely on in the case of the
Dynix code: The RCU patent (#5442758) was issued in 1995 with Sequent as
assignee shortly before Novell sold out to Old SCO, on an patent application
filed in 1993, the year in which Novell acquired AT&T's Unix technology.
h++p://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&am
p;u=/netahtml/search-bool.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=ptxt&a
mp;s1=5442758.WKU.&OS=PN/5442758&RS=PN/5442758
Now, it is my understanding that as a general rule, it is, or was in the past,
inadvisable for a person to publicly disclose his invention before applying for
a patent. Accordingly until the application was filed in 1993, the nature of the
RCU technology embodied in the patent was probably not in the public domain.
The fact that none of AT&T, Novell and Old SCO made any claim to the RCU
patent or to rights in the technology that such patent embodies as falling
within the definition of SOFTWARE PRODUCT pursuant to section 2.01 of the
Sequent Software Agreement is conduct consistent with what AT&T said were
the changes to its licensees' rights in the August $echo newsletter.
The fact that none of AT&T, Novell and Old Sco made any claim that the
disclosure of the technology involved in the patent application was a breach of
section 7.06(a) of the Sequent Software Agreement is consistent with a view that
such application, or the resulting patent, was not a breach of that section
(despite the inclusion in the section of the words, “(including methods or
concepts utilized therein)” because it was not SOFTWARE PRODUCT and therefor it
was not subject to section 7.06(a)in the first place.
How strong these persuasive these facts are from a legal perspective is
anybody's quess.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Benanov on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 09:59 AM EDT |
That made my morning, PJ. :)
ROTFLWTIME
---
That popping sound you hear is just a paradigm shifting without a clutch.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: gbl on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:17 AM EDT |
| I just watched an (old?) interview with Lawrence Lessig on Sun's news site (I
can't give a URL -- the company that manage the site for Sun hide everything
away behind vast URLs seemingly consisting of random letters and
numbers.)
Lawrence was describing Googles book digitisation project and
explaining the objections from authors and publishers.
During the interview
Lawrence pointed out that of the 32 million books published in the US, 10% were
now in the public domain and 10% were still in print. That leaves 80% or 25.6
MILLION books that still in copyright but not available to buy directly from the
copyright owners or their agents.
It gets even worse. There is no simple
way to discover who currently owns the copyright of a book that is not in print.
These books have fallen into a copyright blackhole, not making anybody any
money and mostly unavailable to the public.
If the publishers get their way
and get an extended copyright even more books will be lost in the
blackhole.
Surely it is time to change copyright law so that a
published work must remain in print at a reasonable price else the
copyright lapses or reverts to the author. Unpublished works would continue to
be protected as now.
---
If you love some code, set it free. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:32 AM EDT |
ISTR that it was SCO who literally burried IBM in actual paper. Not to mention
that SCO has burried the court in "paper" with rambling overlength
motions. Didn't IBM provide TSG with discovery in machine-readable form (some
of which SCO's technology wasn't current enough to be able to read?)???
Even if we look at the relative volume (using "paper" figuratively),
SCO asked... nay, DEMANDED all that information from IBM, so blaming IBM for
delivering what was asserted as required discovery is just ludicrous.
...D[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Carla Schroder on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:43 AM EDT |
I have often suspected that Paul Murphy is a pseudonym for
several writers, given the wildly uneven tone and quality
of his columns. Mostly he comes across as an old Unix guy
who is not thrilled by the upstart Linux, and feels
compelled to defend Unix's honor. Other times Linux is teh
hawt, and back again.
Regardless of whatever opinions he puts forth, he's
always good-natured. Never flames or badmouths anyone. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: rand on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:51 AM EDT |
"...they had drawn the problem to IBM's attention as part of the
license renewal process..."
Where does he think "license
renewal" comes into the process?
IBM had (has!) a fully-paid, perpetual,
irrevokable license.
---
The wise man is not embarrassed or angered by
lies, only disappointed. (IANAL and so forth and so on) [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: UglyGreenTroll on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 10:56 AM EDT |
If the modern skepticism movement had a credo, it would go something
like:
I'll consider any fantastic claim you wish to make, but I
won't believe it if you can't back it up with good
evidence.
That's the question that "Paul Murphy" manages to
completely avoid in his article - whether there is any good evidence for SCO's
claims. Murphy jumps to the conclusion that there must be, without citing a
single specific fact to back it up.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: sscherin on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 11:09 AM EDT |
SCO said that IBM had infringed on the terms of its AT&T source code
licenses for Unix by allowing derivative works to enter the public domain via
Linux, that they had drawn the problem to IBM's attention as part of the
license renewal process, and that IBM had refused to recognize the
problem or alter its behavior.
Someone tell me why IBM would be
renewing a perpetual, irrevocable and fully paid license?
I think this poor guy
got his facts wrong again.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 11:32 AM EDT |
PJ, I'm really disappointed. I was really interested in seeing what you had to
say on the "renewal talks" for BIM's "irrevokable perpetual
license." How often are such licenses renewed? How does one determine when
they need to be renewed? How long can they be renewed for, and how does one tell
whether they've BEEN renewed?
Us simple logic jockeys are truly baffled: it will take a legal mind to unravel
this.
And you left it ravelled. For shame!
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Ease up - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:19 PM EDT
- The Unanswered FUD - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:57 PM EDT
- The Unanswered FUD - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:57 PM EDT
- The Unanswered FUD - Authored by: PJ on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 07:11 PM EDT
| |
| Authored by: lightsail on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 12:46 PM EDT |
I have tried to directly reply to “Legal Effect of the $echo Newsletters” and it
fails. So here is my Reply:
The $echo newsletter is just one facet of the IBM legal strategy that tSCOg has
to overcome. Here are some of the others obstacles to tSCOg winning this case:
Shipping Linux for years and contributing code that contains M & C from Unix
Release of Unix source code.
Novell’s dispute of copyright transfer.
Novell’s contention that they still control SysV licensing.
What code was actually owned by AT&T?
Public disclosure of Unix trade secrets over the years.
Methods and concepts that were adopted, not originated, by Unix.
Dynix was based first on BSD, then migrated to SysV.
BSD settlement.
Failure to mitigate infringement
Lanham Act violations
Lack of documentation that Old SCO transferred copyrights
Possibility of GPL code in Openserver LKP code
---
Open source is in the public interest![ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Yossarian on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:12 PM EDT |
> Unfortunately IBM's decision to circle the wagons led
>to a rapid escalation in claims on both sides. [PM]
Like in the story about the kid who came home with a bloody nose.
His mother asked "what happened?"
The answer was:
"Everything started when Johny hit me back."
>Thus the bottom line is simple: if SCO survives long
>enough to make it in court, IBM will lose. [PM]
That shows us SCO strategy. The idea is to get the case to
a jury and convince the jury that 1+1=3. And you know
something, *IF* the case will reach a jury, this strategy
may be successful.
>Their lawyers on the UL project should have told them that. [PJ]
My guess is that SCO had thought that Novell would join
them. The refusal of Novell to commit suicide caught SCO
off-guard and SCO has no resources left to deal with that
suprise second front in France.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: rp$eeley on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:20 PM EDT |
PJ- Using responses to this fellow's FUD to explain so many things for us 'in a
nutshell' as it were, is pure genius on your part and much appreciated. Thank
you very much!
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:43 PM EDT |
While SCO's tactics are laughable, there is an idea in this article I agree
with. IBM should buy the UNIX rights. Not that IBM is the great
benevolent OZ or anything, but someone is going to own them, and I'd much
rather it be someone with a vested interest in UNIX/Linux succeeding. After all,
anyone is better than SCO owning them. Well anyone but Microsoft. That's my
real fear. If IBM doesn't buy out the UNIX rights, Microsoft might. And
we can only guess what they'd do with them.
I'll take the lesser of 1200
evils, IBM.
Tachyon
Note: This might be crazy, but I've
thought for years now that somone should form a not-for-profit to raise money
and buy UNIX and release it to Open Source (GPL).
I know I would donate
some money to that.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 01:55 PM EDT |
"At the nit picking level, for example, if there are four equally good ways
to handle a high/low switch and IBM's original code used the same one AT&T
did, ... Indeed if SCO can find even a couple of compelling examples like this,
particularly at the level of significant design and coding optimizations, the
likelihood of independent invention starts to approach zero."
Suppose that Linux and Unix do a hundred things. Suppose also that there are
four ways to do each thing. The probability of Linux doing any given thing the
same way as Unix is therefore p=0.25. Crank open the old stats book and start
with m choose n; then a quick calculation (using Python as a calculator) and we
have: yes, it's a virtual certainty that Linux and Unix will do at least two
things the same way. In fact, there is a 97% probability that they will do
between 18 and 35 things the same way.
PJ is absolutely right, picking this guy's FUD apart is fun.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:12 PM EDT |
In order to strive for correctness, with regards to the section:
'...and the
original 390 port done in Germany and released through SuSe was chock full of
things that seem to have benefited rather directly from work done under the
AT&T shelter by engineers from Sun, NCR, Motorola, and AT&T when the
BSD/SysV union that gave rise to Solaris was co-developed for PowerPC.'
You
incorrectly replied: 'This appears to be Mr. "Murphy's" personal
theory'.
The first two aspects are correct:
IBM s/390 port came from
Germany, but was not the only one. See: the history section at
http://linas.org/linux/i370.html on the TWO ports!
Also, note the
year: 1998 which appears to predate SCO and IBM get together.
SUSE did
release a distro supporting it.
The last part is rather vague and unclear
yet can be considered accurate depending on the definitions of certain words.
Linux along with many others did directly benefit from the work done by
AT&T. But the problem is what are the benefits: the C language, the POSIX
standard, the BSD license, any code under the BSD license and the many people
who learnt and used Unix.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Burger on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 03:15 PM EDT |
Murphy said:
"Indeed if SCO can find even a couple of compelling examples like this,
particularly at the level of significant design and coding optimizations, the
likelihood of independent invention starts to approach zero."
You would think they already had told us - now that they have had all the AIX
code for a considerable time!
Oh - specific code references - nah
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: rsteinmetz70112 on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 04:55 PM EDT |
My reading of the agreements is a little different than a sweeping permission
for IBM and Sequent to do whatever they wish with Unix methods and concepts.
IBM had explicit permission to use methods and concepts in their products and
services, provided they didn't copy the code.
If that permission is given, then it must mean that some things are not
permitted. We know one, using code from SOFTWARE PRODUCT, that is also explicit.
The explicit permission to use methods an concepts is also limited to use in
IBM's products and services, that seems to imply that IBM couldn't use the
methods in other peoples products (like Linux).
The claim stated like that is not very strong, but it still seems an argument
could be made along those lines. IBM certainly has many other defenses and
SOCG's definition of SOFTWARE PRODUCT to include all of AIX and Dynix is
laughable.
It may be that software methods and concepts are not even protectable, or the
everything IBM contributed to Linux was already disclosed. All that remains to
be seen and ruled on by the court.
---
Rsteinmetz - IANAL therefore my opinions are illegal.
"I could be wrong now, but I don't think so."
Randy Newman - The Title Theme from Monk
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Kalak on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 05:27 PM EDT |
In that quick trip down memory lane, I went back and noticed that SuSE filed for
arbitration on April 10, and here we are May 18 with no answer from SCO that we
know of (30 days to respond).
So is this business days and I'm early, or are we missing something to that
saga? we've gotten used to the slow track of the courts, so the arbitration may
miss us if we don't keep an eye out. ;)
---
Kalak: I am, and always will be, an idiot.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 06:07 PM EDT |
It never fails to amaze me, the kind of shallow, often outright incorrect,
reporting and analysis you will find in the 'mainstream' tech press, and ZDNet
specifically. I stopped paying much attention to ZDNet years ago, exactly
because of no-nothings like this cat, spouting off at the mouth on ZDNet's site.
That, and all the obnoxious ads on ZDNet properties. Does anyone still pay
attention to Ziff-Davis pubs?
How do these guys stay in business? I guess there are a lot of people out there
who just don't yet know that you can't trust the opinions of ZDNet
'journalists'.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:02 PM EDT |
You missed his biggest howler:
SCO said that IBM had
infringed on the terms of its AT&T source code licenses for Unix by allowing
derivative works to enter the public domain via Linux, that they had drawn the
problem to IBM's attention as part of the license renewal process, and
that IBM had refused to recognize the problem or alter its
behavior.
IBM's license is perpetual, irrevocable, and
does not require renewal.
I think that this "renewal" idea is a
recurring meme, that seems to come out in many pro-SCO articles. I wonder if
these articles are being fed by some commmon source.
He is another
example of the renewal meme also by Paul Murphy:
http://www.technewsworld.co
m/story/31932.html (By the way, this article from 2003 is nearly the same as
his most recent article.)
Notice, that he attributes the renewal meme
as coming from SCO!
The story as told by SCO is
that Caldera decided to look at its 30,000 or so Unix licensees -- inherited
through a $100 million deal with Novell in 1995 -- as possible sources of
renewal revenue and found, among other companies, IBM and Microsoft. Microsoft
promptly renewed its license upon request; IBM refused, and the resulting
negotiations quickly stalled.
But, I'm pretty
sure that I've seen the renewal meme in at least one of Daniel Lyons' articles
in Forbes, and possibly in a Maureen O'Gara article too. (Can anybody
confirm?)
Quatermass
IANAL IMHO etc[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: jcjodoin on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:14 PM EDT |
All,
I did some digging around on the ZDNet site and found the
editor in charge (at least the contact listed) for
editorial issues for ZDNet.
The email is: Dan.Farber (at) cnet.com
He is listed as: Senior Vice President-ZDNet
The important quote to cite from the ZDNet / CNet corporate
site is the following:
"One of CNET Networks' core values is integrity. We promise that our
coverage will be fair, accurate, and ethical. For us to succeed, users must be
able to trust our news, product ratings, and technical recommendations to be
unbiased and based on fact and careful analysis."
Of course, many would argue and cite that Paul Murphy's
article is not:
a) Fair,
b) Accurate,
c) Unbiased,
d) Based on Fact,
e) Carefully Analyzed,
f) ALL OF THE ABOVE.
I sent an email, please do more of the same if you so
desire.
Your mileage may vary.
jeffrey
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: GLJason on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:28 PM EDT |
| Murphy completely ignores all of the ridiculous statements and posturing done by
SCO early on. Claims of "mountains of code" copied line-by-line into Linux, and
they can't come up with any examples when IBM's 10th counterclaim was almost
decided. Didn't judge Kimball find that "astonishing"? Those outlandish claims
really did away with any credibility they tried to attain.
Also, claiming
$5 billion in damages for something you paid $100 million for is not
that bright. If you take into account that only around $6 million was for
the technology (about $60 million was for "goodwill" which they squandered
and the rest was the value of Santa Cruz's distribution channel), that's even
more ridiculous.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Quila on Thursday, May 18 2006 @ 08:35 PM EDT |
When you don't want a hit for someone, just Google it, say you want it from
cache, and post the Google Cache URL.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 07:34 AM EDT |
> once gpl code is included in a project, if that project
> is distributed, it MUST have a gpl license. Prove that
> last sentance wrong.
Eaxctly so. And if proprietary code is included in the project it can't be
distributed at all, or at least under conditions someone else defines. Just as
viral. Prove that sentence wrong...[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 07:39 AM EDT |
SCO's version of the SCOsource licensing
scheme:
http://www.sco.com/scosource/ipprotectionfaq.html
Emph
asis added (n.b. Darl has said the same thing too)
1.Why
did SCO create the Intellectual Property (IP) License?
Many customers
are concerned about using Linux since they have become aware of the allegations
that Linux is an unauthorized derivative work of the UNIX® operating system.
These customers received unauthorized copies of SCO intellectual property and
many are running critical business applications on Linux. Customers have come
to SCO asking what they can do to respect and help protect the rights of the SCO
intellectual property in Linux. SCO has created the Intellectual Property
License in response to these customers
needs.
Paul Murphy's
version:
and then demanding licensing fees from the
general Linux community in a rather naive attempt to establish a fair market
value for the formerly protected code and ideas.
Truth will out?
Quatermass
IANAL IMHO
etc.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: billyskank on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 08:04 AM EDT |
Quote:
At the nit picking level, for example, if there are
four equally good ways to handle a high/low switch and IBM's original code used
the same one AT&T did, it may be reasonable to believe that the guy who
nominally wrote the code asked the AIX maintainer in the next cubicle how
AT&T handled it.
If there were only four ways to do
something, it would be even more reasonable to believe that two people
hit on the same method without ever having copied each other. This is not
copyright infringement. He's trying to make copyright seem like patents (just
as SCO are, it seems to me).
---
It's not the software that's
free; it's you. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: jbeadle on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 11:40 AM EDT |
Heh...
-jb
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Friday, May 19 2006 @ 11:35 PM EDT |
When I first read this on ZDNET I had to take it with a grain of salt given the
site and author. It became a very large grain real fast. His comments are all
twisted around just like the SCOG we know, with no mention of Novell anywhere.
It comes out the week of filings with the court in the Novell case.
For the past three years SCOG has been attempting to beat IBM with an very old
contract that SCOG got from Novell via Tarantella. Novell on the other hand at
first beat SCOG over the head with the APA.
Now Novell is using the UL agreement to really get most of SCOG's new claims
tossed out using arbitration. If Novell wins the arbitration, about all that
would be left is the slander of title and the counter claims of Novell. That in
itself would be a very nasty blow to SCOG. It also might just push SCOG over a
cliff.
With IBM not scheduled for trial until '07, it is possible for Judge K to rule
on who owns what in Novell v SCOG before then. It boils down to contracts.
Novell wins that and guts SCOG v IBM right there, most of what is left is IBM's
counter claims.
When Daryl first spoke about contracts he was talking about the AT&T
contract with IBM. I don't think that the contracts that Novell could use
against SCOG ever crossed his mind. Let alone what AT&T's intent was with
regards to those contracts, $Echo and such.
Could the Novell counter claims from last summer been bait? To get SCOG to amend
the original complaint adding charges that would invoke the arbitration clause
of the United Linux contract? SCOG/B/S hit that one hard and now are going to
get creamed because of it.
Yep, Daryl you sure were right! It is all about contracts. Daryl's only problem
is the contracts in play are not the ones he was thinking about.
You can always count on ZDNET to give you all of the story and this one has a
SCOG spin on it.
where i work the computers are so
human when they make a mistake
they blame the computer.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Wesley_Parish on Saturday, May 20 2006 @ 07:47 AM EDT |
This is an idea I argued in the TUHS list; make of it
what you
will:
Several comments spring to mind:
One - due to
licensing others' source code under various
proprietary licenses and suchlike,
closed-source
proprietary software development is a
minefield waiting
for
the unwary;
Two - open-source development is self-administering as
far
as "contributions"
goes, and we generally don't need people to go
through on
a similar "find the
haystack -in-the-needle" search for others'
IPR;
Three - there is usually a group of people willing to do
this sort of work -
voluntarily - as the Groklaw example shows us, so it's
often more an inertia
thingee than anything more serious.
And
last but hardly least, given the rise of the law-suit
residual company,
etc, opening the source of such orphaned systems may
become a necessity,
because law-suits such as the SCO example, will succeed if
the law in general
is kept ignorant of computer history, etc. In that case,
opening the OSF1
source tree would pay dividends in peace of
mind.
So
that's my idea - the more orphaned code is kept
locked away and
proprietary, the greater the possibility
for law suit residual
companies to congregate
around it and extort money from productive
companies. IBM
and Novell should join forces on this matter and release
everything UNIX System V Release XYZ in their hands under
the GPL - and while
they're at it, buying SGI and Irix and
releasing that under the GPL for people
who still run SGI
workstations and servers, would serve to keep that out of
the hands of potential malefactors like the law suit
residual company The SCO
Group that was Caldera, once a
proud member of the Linux commercial
community.
Just my 0.02c worth.
---
finagement: The
Vampire's veins and Pacific torturers stretching back through his own season.
Well, cutting like a child on one of these states of view, I duck [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: _Arthur on Saturday, May 20 2006 @ 12:33 PM EDT |
In his recent ZDnet blog post:
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Murphy/?p=597
He fuds that
1) From now on Macs will be made of cheapo components
2) A French security researcher somehow stated that:
"To be able to carry out the privilege escalation scheme, the attacker
needs to
be able to write to Programmed I/O ports from userspace. As far as I know
this is not possible on architectures other than x86."
Therefore MacOSX is insecure from now on, sayz Rudi.
_Arthur[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Saturday, May 20 2006 @ 06:15 PM EDT |
"I don't pretend to understand American civil law, but it
seems to me that the basic SCO claim is an absolute no brainer: one line of
AT&T code in Linux makes the case [...]"
No
kidding ;-) Hey, all he needs to do is read Groklaw (which he spells with
lowercase "g", BTW) and certain things about law and especially about lines of
code will be clearer.
SCO's lawyers are responding to IBM's
strategy by broadening their case from code to the ideas embedded in that
code.
Oh, stop! Please stop! I cannot keep laughing like
this ;-) Broadening, year right. Broadening would mean that not only are
they nailing IBM for "lines of code" (or one :-), but they have more too. Paul
should really read Groklaw a bit more... [ Reply to This | # ]
|
|
|
|
|
