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| Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript |
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Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:22 AM EST
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Here is a transcript of Tuesday's teleconference with Darl McBride, David Boies, and Robert Bench. UPDATE SCO now is providing an mp3 here.
Questions from: Andy Schopick (Nutmeg Securities), Jonathan Berr (Bloomberg News), David Bank (Wall St. Journal), Scott Phillips (Merrill Lynch), Brian Skiba (Deutsche Bank), David Politis, Paula Rooney (CRN), Larry Greenemeier (Information Week Magazine), Larry Sullivan (Capital International), Matt Whipp (Dennis Publishing). Dion Cornett (Decatur Jones) also was recognized for a question, but there was a problem with the phone line and the question could not be heard.
This was a group effort, and I wish to thank everyone: especially Markus Baertschi, who made it all possible, and Nick, LHJ, eamacnaghten, Fruny, Thad Beier, James, PM, freeio, Clifton Hyatt, Scriptwriter, mickeym, Jude, elrond_2003, Bill Sharrock, mac586, radicimo, and mflaster. It's fun when there is a group, and it sure goes faster. Our turn-around time on this project was exceptional. Thanks, everyone. Let's do this again some time.
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Introductory Remarks by Darl McBride
McBride: . . .rights and related intellectual property. On a related note, in connection with our recent 50 million dollar private equity placement completed on October 16, we will provide our law firms with 400,000 shares of SCO common stock and 1 million dollars in cash. This consideration will result in a charge to earnings of approximately 8.9 million dollars in our 4th quarter that ended October 31,
2003. This 8.9 million dollar charge is comprised of a non-cash expense of 7.9 million related to the issuance of the 400,000 shares I mentioned, and a cash expense of 1 million dollars.
I would like to add that I am very pleased to have Mr. Boies and his law firm, and his colleagues join us as significant share holders in SCO. Also in connection with the October 16th private placement, we will record a non-cash charge in Q4 that is the result of an accounting treatment known as Beneficial Conversion Feature. As you may recall we set the conversion price for the October offering at $16.93 per share which was the 5 day average of SCO shares prior to that offering. On the day we actually closed the transaction the closing price of SCO was $19.89, so the intrinsic value of the difference between the conversion price and the closing price will result in a non-cash charge to our Q4 earnings of 8.7 million dollars.
Importantly, we are reaffirming today, our prior guidance, and expect revenue for the 4th quarter to be in the range of 22 to 25 million. Uh, with the exception of the above noted earnings charges connected with our October equity offering, we expect that our operating expenses for the 4th quarter will be similar to the previous quarter.
We are in the middle of our annual financial audit, which should be completed in the next several weeks. We look forward to providing you with full details on our fiscal 4th quarter and year-end results during our teleconference scheduled for December 8th.
Finally, I'd like to comment on the additional copyright issues we referenced in our press release. For the last several months, we have consistently stated and maintained that our System V code [clears throat] is in Linux. We have been careful and responsible in the manner in which we have addressed these issues with the software industry, with Linux end users, and with members of the open-source community. The claims that SCO has are both broad and deep. These claims touch not, just not IBM, but other vendors as well. They also touch certain industry consortia, and corporate Linux end users. Our claims are not trivial. The violations of our intellectual property are not easily repaired. As we have stated over the last several months, it is our intention to vigorously protect and enforce SCO's intellectual property, our System V source
code, and our copyrights. We are now fully prepared to do that. As a result of our October private placement, we have a significant war chest to fund this effort. As a result of the expanded scope of representation of Boies, Schiller & Flexner and their associated firms, we have more than ample legal talent and resource for this effort.
So at this point, we would be glad to take any questions that you have for
myself, or David, or for Bob Bench, our CFO.
Moderator: As this time, if you'd like to register your site for a question, simply touch star and 1 on your touch tone phone. To withdraw that queston at any time, press the pound key. Once again, if you'd like to ask a question, simply press star and one on your touch tone phone. We'll take a moment for our first questioner to queue. We'll take our first question from Dion Tornett [sic]of Decatur Jones. Go ahead, sir. Your line is open. . . .
McBride: Go ahead, Dion.
Moderator: Mr. Tornett? Are you online?
McBride: Sounds like he's not there.
Moderator: Ok, we'll take our next question from Andy Schopick from Nutmeg
Securities. Go ahead sir.
Schopick: Thank you. Gentlemen, what I would like to understand is what was, and
where did, the impetus for this agreement originate ? Secondarily, if I may, do I
understand that the payments to your attorneys are in addition to their regular
and normal hourly billings and not tied to any ultimate outcome of this
litigation?
Bob Bench: Maybe I can take that, Darl ?
Darl McBride: Yeah, go ahead Bob.
Bench: Our agreement there with the law firms is contingent in nature. We entered
into that agreement in February of this year. It includes the payment of 20% fee
on proceeds from events related to the protection of SCO's intellectual
property rights.
Schopick: Yes. However, this most recent announcement, if I understand it correctly,
does provide for a million dollars in cash and the issuance of 400,000 shares of
SCO stock. That doesn't seem to be contingent upon anything.
Bench: The contingency in those events as we've disclosed previously include
settlements, judgments, certain licensing fees, and the sale of the company,
during the pendancy of litigation or through settlement and can include
events
such as the equity event that just occurred.
Schopick: Can? Or does ?
Bench: Err, you know, the future issues with this agreement have not yet been
memorialized but they include events such as these, if and when they occur, and
as you can recognize, a contingency agreement such as this, that is
far-reaching, has many future events that may or may not occur and we really
consider this much like a partnership as we move forward to protect SCO's
intellectual property, and we would expect future events not dissimilar to come
into place and we will, we will reach agreement on those as they, as they come
about.
Schopick: Will there be a million dollar cash payment that will be recorded on your
profit and loss, on your income statement, to reflect this agreement ?
Bench: Yes, that will recorded on, in our Q4 as stated in our press release.
Schopick: So it is not contingent ?
Bench: That event has already con . . . has already occurred, so it was contingent.
Schopick: And the issuance of the 400.000 shares was also tied to prior
contingencies ?
Bench: That's right.
Schopick: OK. Thank you.
Moderator: Our next question will come from Jonathan Berr, from Bloomberg News. Go ahead
please.
Berr: Oh, hi. Mister . . . Darl?
McBride: Yes.
Berr: OK, I... I was wondering if you could sort of give an update on
where your li-, you know, the sales of the licenses are coming from and Linux
users, how that's going along, and also for Mister
Boies could you tell me how often your firm accepts fees or does business in a
way that you do business with SCO? Is this unusual for your firm or not?
McBride: I'll take the first one there, David. We have been off meeting
for the last several months with large corporate linux end users. The
pipeline is very healthy there. We have done additional signups for
linux end-user licenses. We haven't published those at this point. We
have a number of folks that are in the evaluation process, and we definitely
have a lot of interest in what's going on there.
Berr: Can you give me any num-, any more specific numbers?
McBride: We're not publishing those at this point in time. We are, are
going through the process of, and, you know, at this time we are not coming out
with additional numbers.
Berr: OK, and Mister Boies, can you answer the other question?
Boies: Sure. I, I think the summary answer would be that this is not usual
but it is not unique either. The firm has a variety of ways it bills.
Sometimes we bill on a normal, standard hourly basis; I would say that
that is a minority of what we bill. We also bill sometimes with an
engagement fee at the beginning of a representation, followed by normal
hourly fees. Sometimes we do it strictly on a contingency fee basis,
and then sometimes we do it on some mixture.
Berr: Gentlemen, there's been suspicion, you know, from linux users,
that you guys are being funded, this litigation is being funded by Microsoft, or that you have been coordinating with Microsoft. I was wondering if Darl
or Mister Boies would either care to address that?
Boies: I have not had any conversation, nor, in so far as I know, and I
think I would know, has anybody from my firm had any conversation, either with
Microsoft, or with Microsoft representatives. This has been entirely litigation that we have undertaken on behalf of SCO. and, obviously, the recent equity transaction, Dollar Series A Preferred
transaction, is something that as I think Darl indicated, will provide
adequate financing for the litigation without looking to any other
companies.
Berr: OK.
McBride: SCO's perspective: We're one hundred percent driving our
strategy here, uh, there is no connection with Microsoft on this. It, it is a
favorite topic of the open source community. People love talking about this,
because there are natural interests here. Anybody who owns an operating system
that thinks it shouldn't be for free, uh, would naturally fall on this side of
the table that SCO is on. So it is not just Microsoft, it is Wind River
Systems, it's Sun Microsystems, essentially anybody who thinks that their
valuable intellectual property in an operating system should have a price tag on
it naturally lines up with SCO on this.
Berr: OK, that's all I have.
Moderator: Yeah, our next question will come from David Bank with Wall
Street Journal. Go ahead, sir.
David Bank: Hi, two kind of related questions: First, back to
the first question, if the payment that you've just recorded was a
contingency, what was the settlement or event or something that
triggered the contingency, and if it's rather for something going
forward and you talk about a big expansion of the effort, what do you
mean by the big expansion? What are you doing next?
Darl McBride: Yeah, let me take on the expansion side of this, David.
When we came out with the agreement with David's firm earlier this
year, in the, I believe the February/January time frame, we talked about
protecting SCO's intellectual property, that basically turned into a
scope that was very focused around IBM and the contract issues that we
had with IBM and the related parties. We are on a very good course
with that scope, we're set to be in a Utah federal court room for a
jury trial about 17 months from now, April 2005 is when that will be
heard, we're very pleased with the progress there, we're going through
discovery, we're deposing witnesses, we like the course that that is on
and David can speak more about where we are on the litigation side, but
overall from a company standpoint we feel very good about that. Along
the way, over the last several months, once we had the copyright issue
resolved where fully we had clarity around the copyright ownership on
UNIX and System V source code, we've gone in, we've done a deep dive
into Linux, we've compared the source code of Linux with UNIX every which
way but Tuesday, we've come out with a number of violations that relate
to those copyrights and what you're seeing now is a memorialization of
David's firm getting on board to go out and really enforce and protect
our copyrights as it relates to the Linux operating system, so that's
where we are now, getting David on board to go after this. This is not
going to be something that is going to be measured in years, we do have
copyrights out there now that are being broken, we have a situation with
other settlement agreements with respect to the BSD case from a few
years ago where we do have a legal settlement, we're in strong shape to
go out and start enforcing these now and this is really what David and
his team are going to be expanding their focus around.
David Bank: Uh huh. So the funds that you are providing them
and the shares are for this expanded effort going forward? Am I just
not understanding what contingency . . .
Darl McBride: We view this is an overall partnership here, David, as we look at the
Boies firm. When we signed them up early on, our market cap was I think
down around $17 million dollars, and we said we're going to go out and
enforce our intellectual property, and as the company is successful
along the way, there are going to be contingent events that happen. And
if we have a license fee, as we succeed then the Boies firm will
succeed. As we have success in the courtroom, the Boies firm will also
share in that success. As we have an ability to bring money into the
company in this particular case by putting consideration into David's
hands we are now fully stocked to go after this next wave of
enforcement issues.
David Bank: OK, am I just not understanding the technical
meaning of 'contingency'? I thought that came after some kind of
settlement came in. This sounds like it's before. So maybe I'm not
understanding what 'contingency' means.
Darl McBride: Well, I think we did have, I guess what I'm focusing on here is we've had some
successful events occur. We've had some licensing events occur and
we've shared that with David. We've had some successful events to get
some money in here, we've shared that with David. That's going to help
us go out and fight this next battle, OK? So we've went out and said
we're setting up for the long haul here, we've raised $50 million, we
didn't raise $50 million to get CD interest sitting over in the bank. We've brought this money in . . . now in this case we're able to --
David's coming in at a partnership level, he's coming in, he's taking
stock for the most part, he's coming in with his firm and we're going
after this in a very strong partnership way, so we couldn't be more
pleased with getting him on board with this strong partnership arrangement.
David Bank: OK.
David Boies: David Bank, this is David Boies.
David Bank: Hi.
David Boies: How ya doing?
David Bank: Good.
David Boies: I think the key thing as Darl is saying is the
contingency is not simply a contingency with a final resolution. There
are a series of contingent events, some of which have already occurred,
which is why you have the stock and cash being paid, and we've agreed to
take a obviously very substantial portion of what we would otherwise
receive in the form of stock because we have confidence in where the
company is going.
David Bank: OK. OK.
Moderator: Thank you, our next question will come from Scott Phillips, from
Merrill Lynch. Go ahead, your line is open.
Scott Phillips: Ah, thanks. This question is for Mr. Boies. I wonder
if you could bring us up to speed as to where we're at in terms of... I guess
litigating and forcing the violation ? One would expect that we probably name
a marquee defendant, maybe perhaps a Fortune-class company, who has a good
deal of this Linux code in place and has not paid any licensing fees on to SCO,
to move the case forward. Where are we along these lines and what, as investors,
should we be looking for going forward here?
David Boies: Well, I think that your anticipation is exactly right. Which is
that one of the things we will be looking to do is to identify a defendant that
we believe will illustrate the nature of the problem. I don't want to try to
identify that defendant on this call, for obvious reasons. But I think that
you're exactly right, that that is an additional aspect of what will be happening.
Now we're gonna continue to rigorously prosecute the existing litigation
against IBM, but you will be seeing in the near term, and
again I don't want to get into the specifics of the identification of the
defendant or the specifics of the timing, but you will be seeing the
identification of a significant user that has not paid license fees and is in
fact using the proprietary and copyrighted material.
Scott Phillips: I appreciate the fact that you don't want to announce who might be on
the short list . . .
Boies: We don't want them to duck the subpoena! [laughs]
Phillips: [laughs] Right, exactly. But you know,help, for the benefit of investors and the people on this call, conceptually are we thinking in
terms of months, quarters, years? You know, what should we be thinking of in
terms of when we could expect some motion along these lines . . .?
Boies: [interrupts] Well, I think you'd certainly be seeing that within the next 90 days.
Philips: Ok. Alright, well, that's gonna be interesting. Thank you very much. Good
luck.
McBride
Boies: Thank you.
McBride: Next?
Moderator: And our next question will come from Brian Skiba with Deutsche Bank.
Go ahead.
Brian Skiba: OK, great. yeah, just following up on actually the last call there,
the last question, you guys approached about 1,500 companies earlier on this
year and, you know, notified them that there may be some kind of an issue or a
problem here. Would be right in assuming that those 1,500 would be the same kind
of class of company that you would be looking at in terms of the next steps to
pursue a remedy on this?
Darl McBride: That is the right starting point, Brian. We will start there.
That's not going to be the ending point, but clearly large customers that have, that are using a lot of Linux machines inside of their environment would be the
starting point for us.
Skiba: And, just in terms of, you know, in the event that those large customers
also happen to be Hewlett-Packard customers, and Hewlett-Packard has, you know, stated that
they're going to provide an indemnity to customers under certain situations.
How do you see that playing out there in the, you know, will you be approaching
directly the customer or Hewlett-Packard? How will that work?
McBride: Right. You know, HP is a good partner of ours as it relates to our UNIX
offerings. We tried to work things out with them, to clean up the Linux problems
that we see out in the marketplace. The issue is, it was going to be on the
order of hundreds of millions of dollars to get a cleanup program in place, and
I believe the financial decision on the HP side was, you know, they can write a lot of
indemnification or they can cover a lot of expenses, be it through license fees
that they're approached with from their customers or whether it's through litigation. I
don't know yet from HP's perspective whether they want their customers to send
them over an invoice that they would then pay on, or whether they are going to
prefer that the HP Linux end user receives a lawsuit and then they follow up on
that. So, that would be an HP question, but I was told it was going to be one of
those two areas.
Skiba: And one last thing Darl, is the RTU license fee, in the event that you're
going after these companies, is this a $1.400, $700, $200 type of fee per server?
What kind of number are you --
McBride: We're talking on the order of $700 to $1,400. We have extended the $700, the
$699 number, through the end of this calendar year, and as we continue to work
through these issues, that's the kind of price we're still targeting. But
there is an accelerated where it eventually kicks up to $1,399.
Skiba: OK. Thank you.
McBride: Yup.
Moderator: Our next question will come from David Politis.
Darl: Hi David.
Moderator: Just one second please . . .there.
David Politis: Bob, I have a question for you specifically to start off.
Will you clarify again the contingency relationship with Boies, Flexner, Boies,
Schiller, I'm sorry.. It's 20% based upon three different events occurring. Is
that correct?
Bench: Thanks, David. There may be a number of events but some of those events
that are specific would be any settlements, judgments, license fees, the sale of
the company. And as I mentioned there may be future events which have not yet
been memorialized but that will come about in the future. And that’s why I said
that this, uh, this has to be an agreement that is somewhat flexible for those
future events that may or may not occur.
David Politis: Understand that. And then, in connection with that, then, if my math is correct, 20% of 50 million dollars comes out to about 10 Million
dollars, is that right?
Darl: Ah, yes.
David Politis: Yes. So does this nearly 10 million dollar contingent payment, is
that tied back into the 50 million dollars that was announced here back in
October, as far as a private placement?
Bench: I think that and and all of the benefits that have been derived and some
of the other contingencies. But yes, that's certainly an event.
David Politis: OK. And then, a totally different question and this can be either
for you, Darl, or you, David, I’m curious to know, given the announcements of last
week, does your preliminary research suggest that any previous owner of the UNIX
IP, the contracts, the copyrights, gave permission to anyone as far as
modification of UNIX code or derivation of UNIX code into LINUX, specifically,
for example, Linus Torvalds?
Darl McBride: I was with you until you said specifically Linus Torvalds. So, are you asking
if Linus has rights to make modifications?
David Politis: I’m asking a couple of things. First of all, does your research
suggest that any of the previous owners of the UNIX…
Darl McBride: [interrupts] The answer to that one is simply NO. Like in the case of Novell.
When SCO bought the property from Novell, there was non-compete language in
there that would preempt Novell from competing against the core offerings of
SCO. UNIX is a core offering of SCO. Linux is a knock-off of UNIX. There
couldn’t be a more straight reading of a non-compete issue. When the Novell
SuSE deal is complete, we will take the appropriate measures to enforce that
non-compete at that point in time.
David Politis: And this same thing, to your understanding, traces back to
AT&T when they had it as their UNIX Systems Laboratory?
Darl McBride: The same issue went from ATT to Novell. However, we do hold the
exclusive ownership rights on those and there is a non-compete in place along
the way to protect that.
David Politis: So, then, to extend your answer, would it also make sense to
suggest that you do not believe that Mr. Torvalds had any permission to actually
modify or to make a derivative work?
Darl McBride: No, we don’t get any contract reading on that whatsoever.
David Politis: OK. All right, Thanks, Darl.
Moderator: Our next question will come from Paula Rooney with CRN, go ahead
please.
Paula Rooney: Thanks. Darl, I think you just answered my question, but um, so
it's decided that you will be suing Novell, or have you already started
submitting that paperwork?
Darl McBride: I don't think it, I don't know that it necessarily
turns into a lawsuit, uh, it depends on how Novell responds. Um, our, our view
on it is that there is nothing to respond to yet because their transaction is
not complete. When their transaction is complete, I guess it's not even a given
that they will be violating a non-compete. I guess they could, um, choose to
not, um, put a competitive, um product in the marketplace, meaning Linux.
Um, but, to the extent that they complete the transaction, and they do what they
say they are gonna do in terms of taking SUSE in, going out and competing
with us, um, then yes, we'll take the appropriate measures and see how they
respond.
Paula Rooney: And um, how many lawsuits do you have now? And against which
vendors? I think we've got IBM, Red Hat...
Darl McBride: We have one lawsuit, out there right now, it's against IBM.
Paula Rooney: And what is the status of the Red Hat issue?
Darl McBride: The Red Hat issue is currently with a Delaware judge, and
we're, we're waiting right now for some, some, some feedback from her, as I
understand it.
Paula Rooney: Okay. Now Novell currently does sell Linux product in the
marketplace, why not just move now?
Darl McBride: Ah, ah, you know they don't do a Linux distribution. They
have Linux-related products, that's much different than, again you have to go
back to the contract reading which is competing against the core products of
SCO's business. When you do a Linux distribution you are directly in the middle
of the crosshairs of SCO's core product.
Paula Rooney: Um-hmm, but you will be going after Novell, given that
there is no settlement on a non-compete, purely a non-compete issue?
Darl McBride: All I'm saying is that we have a non-compete protection
in our contract with Novell, and so to the extent that we have to enforce those
once the acquisition is complete over there, then we will be prepared to do
that.
Paula Rooney: Okay, thank you.
Moderator: Our next question will come from Larry Greenmeier with Information Week
Magazine. Go ahead, please.
Larry: I just wanted to confirm the 400,000 shares that SCO is giving to the
Boies law firm. What percentage, then, will Boies own of SCO, as a whole?
Darl McBride: Oh gosh. Bob, can you do a quick, ah, calculation on that against our
fully-diluted?
Robert Bench: Ah, yeah, it's about 2.. 2 to 3 percent.
Larry: Does the Boies firm have ownership in any other software companies, or is
this a, a unique arrangement, based on upon the, the, you know, law firm -
client uh, relationship that's ... that's in place?
Boies: I, I don't think, umm, individual partners obviously have a lot of
individual investments. The firm does not have this kind of
investment in any other software company in this category. There would
be internet companies, um, companies providing various internet
services, um, that we have and do represent, where we would have
an interest in the company either directly or through options
or warrants.
Larry: Ok, so it's not unique in terms of technology companies paying
lawyers in, in stock?
Boies:Right. Uh, er, um, ... I think it is ... I think it is, um, um, that is a true
statement. Ah, um, and I think the implication of your question, which is that
this is primarily something that happens with technology companies is correct.
It is not ... it is not, um, exclusive to technology companies, but that's
where it happens most often.
Larry: All right, thank you.
Moderator: Our next question comes from Harry [sic] Sullivan with Capital [International]. Go ahead please.
Sullivan: Yes, Larry Sullivan. Couple of questions. One, if the company is
sold, what is the mechanism that pays the Boies law firm the additional 20%. Do
you issue new shares? That's the first question.
The second question is, the Linux community is saying that they want to take the
code out of Linux, and as you go through the IBM lawsuit, if you have to
disclose the elements that are part of Unix that have been contributed into
Linux, won't the Linux community just simply rewrite that? So what is the mechanism
to disclose that code without losing your confidentiality?
And then the third question regards the legal milestones. You talked about some
events. You talked about within 90 days identifying a defendent to illustrate
the infringement. You talked about a, the legal case beginning in April of 2005. Can
you just sort of walk us through all the milestones that we should put on our
calendar to monitor, to gauge the success of the process?
Bench: Maybe, Darl, I could take the 1st question.
McBride: OK.
Bench: In a sale of the company there could be proceeds, Larry, from several
ways. That could be stock of a new company, if they use stock to acquire this
company, or a cash transaction. And the Boies firms would determine which method
of consideration at that point in time. So a fairly simple methodology there.
McBride: (crosstalk) . . . other questions. We have gone through and
shown the Linux community a bunch of code. We sat down in August and we shared
with them the derivative works code that was out there and one sample file that
was out there on a direct copyright infringement. The Linux community has said
they have removed the copyright-infringed file. That was a very small number of
the infringements we see out there, which will address the coming up version of
the 2.6 kernel. It doesn't address the fact that the 2.4 kernel is out there
today. Companies are copying, sharing, spreading that around. That,
essentially, is not cleaned up, it is still out there as an issue. But more
importantly, what we are announcing today is a substantial number of copyright
issues that relate to a settlement agreement that is already in place around the
BSD settlement from the 1994 time frame. As we move forward, we will be
outlining those issues.
From a time line standpoint, one thing that you can expect to see from us, Larry,
this is again separate from the IBM issues and the contract issues there -- by
the way, we have shared the code in question there with IBM under the litigation
event - they know what we're talking about over there. On the copyright front,
expect us to be showing this to the end-use customers as we go forward as one
event, and then also the, as David mentioned, you know, the set of customers that we
will follow up on, in the time frame that David talked about.
Sullivan: OK, so is the endgame here that you will end up having to disclose
everything that's included in Linux, you would hopefully get a very large
payment from IBM, and then all of that infringing code would be remedied by the
Linux community as they rewrite it, and then, thereafter there would be no
claim? I guess I'm not understanding...
McBride: Yeah, as far as the claims go. You know, the sample code that we trotted out, not the sample,
the one little file that we trotted out in August, we would agree that that was
one that you could clean up easy, you could take it out. It's hard to take it
out of versions that are out there now being spread around inside of
organizations. That's a separate issue. But what we're talking about now are
two sets of issues that are both broad and deep in terms of how substantial they
touch and affect Linux. The one set of issues has to do with IBM's contract
and derivative works. That is on a fuse for about a year and a half, and during
that period of time then we will have some legal, something on a legal
paper we can point to and everybody can say, OK that's how it turned out. If it
turns out the way SCO is saying, the ability to yank a million lines of code,
roughly, out of a five million-line kernel that's there today is substantial.
When you take out the SMP, when you take out NUMA, when you take out RCU,
you're talking not about hardened, unbreakable Linux. You're not talking
about Linux that will run in an enterprise if you take all of that code out. So
that's going to be a fundamental question they would have to ask at that point
in time. Do we want to turn the clock back? Do we want to turn Linux back to
where it was in the 90's? Or do we want to keep going, and pay some kind of an
ongoing royalty fee to SCO.
In the short term, coming up over the next weeks and months, we are looking at
these copyright issues that are touching end users. The GPL forces the
copyright issues down on the end-user. And in that particular case, we will be
showing code that is not easily remedied. And over the coming weeks here, you
will see us outlining that, spelling that out, and then we'll see where they
want to go from there.
Sullivan: OK, thank you very much.
McBride Right. (Whispering.)
Moderator: Our next question comes from Matt Whipp with Dennis Publishing.
Whipp: Hi, there. Just a quick question about the Linux invoicing. A month ago, I
was talking to Blake and he said that SCO stopped invoicing commercial end users
of Linux because he was very satisfied with the way things are going. He still
seems to be satisfied with the way things are going, so can you sort of explain
why you are bringing the legal firm in to making sure these things go a bit
better?
McBride: Yeah. I think we never really did issue an invoicing plan. I know there
was talk of that. What we have done instead of just sending out mass invoices, I
mean the real issue with sending out mass invoices where you don't know exactly
what everybody is using is, you know, you run the risk of not getting the
invoice correct. We don't want to take that risk. So what we're doing instead
is we are following up with companies on a one-on-one basis. We're going
through their issues, we're working with them, and then based on that, we'll issue
an invoice to them more individually and tailor-made. To the extent we go through these one-on-one issues with customers, and they choose to say I'd rather have a court
hearing on this, so we can see if your issues hold up in a courtroom, then
that's where the partnership we are announcing today with David kicks into
gear, we hand those over to David, he takes that side of it and then we go down
the litigation path.
Whipp: OK but not . . .so, I mean would you say something has changed in the amount
of people are coming forward? Or? What is the the reason
for this new policy, is really my question?
McBride: Well, the issue right now is, we've said if you go back to what we
talked about in July, we were going to give people a period of time to license
up. We have had some people license. Then we said we're going to move them into
a litigation phase, so it is license or litigate, and what we're announcing
today is that phase.
Whipp: OK, so this was kind of a scheduled thing all along?
McBride: Yes.
Whipp: OK. thanks.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
McBride: Ok, I believe that was the last call. Well, thanks to you for joining us here
today. I guess just to summarize, we really do have two legal fronts here. One
is the contract issue for IBM. You can set your clock for April 11th, 2005 on
that issue. Uh, we feel good with the progress that's being made there. The
second front has to do with copyright infringement issues at the end-user level
that are tied into the use of Linux. That time frame for resolution, you can
measure that in months and quarters... not in years. We've brought on the
Boies firm to help us go out with that. SCO is extremely pleased with the
value that it has received from David Boies and his team. We look forward to our
continued partnership with him as we move forward to this important phase of
resolving our IP ownership issues of UNIX that we have vis-a-vis the Linux
operating environment.
Thank you for joining us today.
|
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| Authored by: LHJ on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:28 AM EST |
Nice, PJ. I see you added the Dion Cornett dropped call.
Do we
have a recording of Blake Stowell's intro and the safe
harbor passage? It's
a good thing to track those and see what
they're warning about, although it
probably closely follows
warnings in their SEC filings.
I won't be
able to check in until tomorrow night. I'll grab
everything you come up
with. Please keep it simple and easy to
apply, and I'll greatly appreciate
it.
Oh yeah. I should advertise for missing conference calls and
more volunteers. I would really like to get audio or transcript for
SCO's
March 7 call. Many people must have listened; I see
slashdot threads about
it. Anyone have something saved? June
6 is also missing in action. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:30 AM EST |
I was just listening to the stream from sco.com of Darl's keynote speech.
He uses some Goebbels-like propaganda tactics of dispelling myths or urban
legends:
For instance he says it's a myth that SCO wants to destroy the GPL. It's
really all IBM's fault. They put the GPL in the line of fire, not SCO (who is
violating the GPL). Naturally, free has only an economic meaning, so liberty is
just a myth unless there is a price attached. IBM makes a billion a year
protecting their IP. Free models don't work, and IBM is giving SCO's OS away
for free (of course IBM has a thousand people working on Linux right now and SCO
doesn't).
I must stop listening now <slams head on keyboard> [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: James on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:38 AM EST |
Looks good, just the two minor mistakes in my work is all I see wrong.
In the opening, 2nd paragraph:
remove the question marks from "?Beneficial Conversion Feature.?"
And finally, in the conclusion paragraph:
"visa vi (sp?)" needs to be changed to "vis-a-vis"
Good work ladies and gentleman, keep kicking tail PJ :)[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: whoever57 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:08 AM EST |
Darl claims that the SCOForum examples showed copied code.
Remember how just after the examples were de-bunked, SCO claimed that they were
merely examples of how SCO could detect obfuscated copying and they weren't
actually claiming violations of *that* code.
Now Darl is back to claiming that the examples really showed violating code.
What I don't get about this is: why don't the press and analysts know this?
Don't they do any research? Why don't they ask the hard questions? This whole
fiasco has really destroyed any faith I might have had in trade press and
analysts.
---
-----
For a few laughs, see "Simon's Comic Online Source" at
http://scosource.com/index.html[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: error27 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:39 AM EST |
Basically the phone call was designed to distract investors from how expensive
Boies's firm is. I was particularly impressed by Schopick's question.
Bench basically says they're playing it by ear when it comes to paying Boies's
firm. This emphasizes again that winning is not a likely outcome of the
lawsuit.
Even without winning SCO stands to gain in the short term just by being involved
in the suit, and Boies wants a peice of that.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Oninoshiko on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:43 AM EST |
I've been following this and wanted to run this by you (all).
Would
the blantent ignoring of Novell's right to waive SCOG's rights agenst IBM a
volation of contract?
Could that mean that the "non-compition" agreemnt
would be void (it appears that they might have a case if they win SCO vs
IBM and Novell finishes buying SuSE and they contenue distributing
x86 binaries (all other platforms sould be OK)).
If SCOG did void that
contract would that mean that ownership of sysV would revert back to
Novell?
just some odd thoughts that I thought i would like to run past
people (some of who might be an attorney)
Oninoshiko[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: djf on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:49 AM EST |
Individual issues separated by '----' and prefaced by what
section they appear in...
----
In Darl's Intro...
of Boies, Schiller & Flexner and their associated firms, we have more
then ample legaltalent and resource for this effort.
This should be "more than ample legal talent".
Note, two corrections there.
----
In Andy Schopick...
Bench: Our agreement there with the law firm is contingent in
I believe he uses the plural and says "with the law firms is"
----
In Any Schopick...
issuance of 400.000 shares of SCO stock... That doesn't seem to be
[...]
And the issuance of the 400.000 shares is also tied to prior
Fix ,/. convention to match the rest of document. Since
this is taking place in US, I'd say use "400,000".
----
In Scott Phillips...
violation ? One would expect that we probably name a [marquee?]
I believe the word is indeed marquee.
----
In Brian Skiba...
Darl McBride: That is the right starting point, Brian. We
will start there. That's not going to be the ending point,
but clearly large customers that have, they're using a lot
of Linux machines inside of their environment would be the
starting point for us.
I hear this as "large customers that have, that are using".
Seems to make more sense grammatically, also.
----
In Brian Skiba...
we're still targeting, but there is an accellerated rate. It
eventually kicks up to $1399.
Spelling correction: accelerated
----
In David Politis...
David Politis: [I] understand that. And then, in
connection with that, then. If my math is correct 20% of
50 million dollars comes up about 10 Million dollars, is
that right? Darl: Ah, yes. David Politis: Yes. So does
this nearly 10 million dollar contingent payment, is that
tied back into the 50 million dollars that was announced
here back in October, as far as a private placement.
This inline back and forth between different speakers should
be separated out as it is in the rest of the document.
----
In David Politis...
Darl: Thanks, David. There may be a number of events but
some of those events that are specific would be any
settlements, judgments, license
AND
Darl: I think that and and all of the benefits that have
been derived and some of the other contingencies. But yes,
that certainly [is] an event.
Even though the question is initially addressed to Darl, the
voice here sorta sounds more like Boise. I think Darl
eventually starts speaking after these two comments, but
what do others think?
----
In David Politis...
David Politis: And this same thing, to your understanding,
traces back to AT&T when they had it (under their???) UNIX
System Laboratory?
Change to: "[garbled - under their?]'
----
In Paula Rooney...
Paula Rooney: And um, how many lawsuits do you have now?
And I guess which vendors? I think we've got IBM, Red
Hat...
This is "have now? And against which"...
----
In Larry Greenmeier...
Larry: Ok, so it's not unique in terms of, ah, of technology
companies, ah paying lawyers in, in stock...
I hear this as "ah paying Boies in"...
----
In Larry Sullivan...
Moderator: Our next question comes from Larry Sullivan at
Capital International. Go ahead please.
Should read "from Harry [sic] Sullivan with Capital"
Note two corrections there.
----
In Larry Sullivan...
Boies: Maybe, Darl, I could take the 1st question.
AND
Boies: In a sale of the company there could be proceeds,
Larry, from several ways. That could be stock of a new
company, if they use stock to acquire this company, or a
cash transaction. And the Boies firm would determine which
method of consideration at that point in time. So a fairly
simple methodology there.
Could the speaker be Bench on these?
----
In Larry Sullivan...
with IBM under the litigation event - they know what we're talking
about there. On the copyright front, expect us to be showing this to
I think this should be "what we're talking about over there"...
----
In Larry Sullivan...
want to turn Linux back to where it was in the 90's? Or do we want to
keep going, and pay some kind of a ongoing royalty fee to SCO.
Should be "kind of an ongoing"
----
In Matt Whipp...
with the way things are going. He still seems to be satisfied with the
way things are going, so can you sort of explain why you are bringing
the legal firm into [unclear] these things go a bit better.
I think this should be [garbled: making sure?]...
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:36 AM EST |
| Do we really have to wait "17 months" for this to start, let alone end,
in court?
Much as I love reading PJ's (and others) take on things here, I don't
think I can stomach this for that much longer.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:36 AM EST |
The main problem being that everything that's been said is actually expertly
manipulating members of the press who appeared to be completely dumbfounded by
the whole process. Baer - 'Are you funded by Microsoft?'...WTF?
Is there no member of the trade press capable of asking questions along the
lines of 'You've stated in the past that you have a document that outlines all
the infringing code. When do you plan to supply this to IBM in accordance with
court documents?'
Come on journalists. Start to bloody research.
D[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Scriptwriter on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:57 AM EST |
| In Brian Skiba:
What kihd of number are you
should of course
be
What kind of number are you
Over here in Seattle it's
the dead of night, the wind is blowing and it's driving a hard rain . . .
perfect backdrop for this sort of thing. :) [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:04 AM EST |
Sorry to post this again (and again off topic) but might be worth further
study:
Some very early study:
1. The industry leaders found TV Linux Alliance, standardize the APIs on Linux
Notice the contact person: Blake Stowell
http://www.jeaninemarie.com/ReplayExternal/company/pressreleases/pressr061201.ht
m
2. Microsoft stumbling in TV set-top market
http://www.cedmagazine.com/ced/2001/1201/id2.htm#3
3. MicroSoft co-founder Allen plays in the same game (is he a true ms renegade,
or working with MS to grab the set-top market). This is where Digeo comes in.
http://www.forbes.com/2002/04/01/0401moxi.html
4. SCO sends 6 subpoenas, 5 known right away, 6th revealed later as an
"insignificant" Linux set-top maker Digeo.
Just about everyone talks about Linus, Stewart and Richard.
5. Stowell says he doesn't know what the subpoenas are about (look at #1)
6. The receivers say they either didn't receive yet or that the subpoenas are
for documents, exept Digeo, who, like Stowell, say they don't know what the
subpoena is about.
7. Remember: the set-top market is potentially huge (45 million boxes in US
alone). No Linux or expensive Linux would result in all the competition whiped
out in one blow.
8. Before joining Lineo, Stowell was supposed to have left to join MS and popps
up in Lineo and TV Linux Alliance.
9. Stowell joins Caldera (SCO) BEFORE McBride.
I made some conclusions, but would like to see what the others would find and
not feed any ideas to them + I don't have much time to study this.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:07 AM EST |
Anyone else get the feeling that SCO (the UNIX and systems business) is now
totally irrelevant to the legal business?
SCO now exists purely as a means to attract investment in a new business
consisting of randomly suing various rich targets until one victim makes a big
legal mistake or decides that paying DaneGeld is cheaper than paying lawyers.
This is beinging to feel like those trademark cases in Germany where a lawyer
sued over a possible trademark violation even when the lawyer had no financial
or contractual relationship with the actual trademark holder.
Could we be looking at a case invented by Boise&Co and handed to SCO with
the message, "Here's a way to make lots of money. You sue IBM, hire us,
talk bull for a year or so and we all make lots of money from stupid investors
before bailing out at the court room door."[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Scriptwriter on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:08 AM EST |
| again in Skiba:
but I was told it was going to be one of those two
areas.
should be
but I suppose it's going to be one of
those two areas. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: shaun on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:31 AM EST |
I have a speculation here. What kind of company is most likely to have a lot of
Linux servers online but is unlikely to have the funding to run a long legal
battle? Add to that such a legal action could cost the company several
customers? Well IMHO it would be a web hosting company. Say RackShack in Texas
which uses all Linux based web servers. a mixture of Colbalt and Plesk. (I used
to work for them.) Now I'm not saying it will be RackShack but it certainly
makes a lot of sense for SCO to go ater a company like that.
--Shaun[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: maxhrk on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:45 AM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: mac586 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:28 AM EST
- Next target: Google? - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:40 AM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Jude on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:11 AM EST
- High Profile Internet Company with THOUSANDS of Linux Servers ... - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:10 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:16 AM EST |
"McBride: Right. You know, HP is a good partner of ours as it relates to
our UNIX offerings. We tried to work things out with them, to clean up the Linux
problems that we see out in the marketplace. The issue is, it was going to be on
the order of hundreds of millions of dollars to get a cleanup program in
place"
Their best partners are still distributing Linux. And they don't bother.
Strange? If above statement is true HP should know something about the
infringement, but the only thing they do is indemification. If they knew more or
where convinced that sco has a valid claim the proberly whould do more. Also
point is dat SCO doesn't go after people distributing linux. They know that if
people stop using linux they don't switch to SCO unix but proberly windows.
Ciao
J[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: eric76 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:56 AM EST |
Suppose for the sake of argument that the court really did find that 20% of the
code in Linux belonged to SCO.
How would that justify the license fees that SCO is demanding?
Wouldn't it be more plausible for the license fees to be 20% of the standard
selling price of the software?
Or can SCO just pick any old number out of the hat? Why $700? Why not $100,000
per server?
In other words, what are the legal basis for the determination of the license
fees, if any?[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:23 AM EST |
A Story in the Salt Lake Tribune
http://www.sltrib.com/2003/Nov/11192003/business/112207.asp
I would have thought that the bodyguards time would be better spent stopping
their employers from shooting themselves in the foot:-)[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: kbwojo on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:26 AM EST |
Let me get this straight. TSG only claim outside of the IBM code is the SGI code
that according to everyone but TSG was legally in place? This is what they are
going to sue an end user over. I would love to see the lawsuit in front of the
judge.
Big Linux User: Your honor the code that TSG claims we infringe is copyrighted
by IBM and SGI. Further more the SGI code was removed from the Linux kernel
2.4.22 and was patched for previous versions. On top of all that the code in
question had previously been placed in the public domain, meaning it is very
doubtful that TSG has any proprietary claim to these code fragments in any
case.
Judge: (to TSG) Is this true?
TSG: Well your honor we are suing IBM for this right now, so if we win they will
not have copyright on the code and we disagree with the fact that the SGI code
is not ours and was never entered into public domain and even though the 2.4.22
kernel is clear they had to have at one time had this code on their systems.
Judge: (to TSG) Okay at this time do you own a valid copyright on any of the
code you claim is infringing?
TSG: No, but.
Judge: (cutting TSG off) No buts, I want a yes or no answer.
TSG: No.
Judge: Because TSG has no claim at this time on any code I am dismissing this
case.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: leguirerj on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:32 AM EST |
SCO probably telegraphed who they were going to sue next in this article from
forbes:
Holding up Hollywood
http://forbes.com/forbes/2003/1124/096.html
I guess mentioning HP and sueing and possibly sueing HP customer with a lot of
linux servers was a clue.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: hkstar on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:35 AM EST |
So .. this demonstration case.
Who's a medium size company, high profile, but not all that strong ..
known to use many, many linux servers .. really does not want bad
publicity at this stage? And, icing on the cake, Microsoft hate them too?
You got it: Google. Think about it. It's just too perfect.
And now, do you have that sinking feeling like I did?
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Jude on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:07 AM EST |
I just had a thought about SCO going after end users.
I'd think they would approach the users about licensing before filing lawsuits.
If they do, they have to be prepared for the victims saying "show me the
infringing code". If SCO does show any code, I'll bet they require an
NDA before doing so. The victim then has to decide for themselves whether or
not SCO has a case.
The essential ingredient here is the "... decide for themselves...".
As long as all showings of alleged infringing code are under NDA, each victim
has to consider the merits of SCO's arguments without any outside help. SCO
only has to do the work of preparing their presentation once, but the user
community has to do their side of the analysis over and over again, once per
user.
As long as SCO can get away with hiding the alleged infringment behind NDA, they
have an enormous advantage over th Linux user community. I think this is
something Red Hat should be bring up as an issue in their lawsuit against SCO.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: phrostie on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:08 AM EST |
Is it just me or does anyone else pick up the Irony that Darl McBride
"needs" body guards to offer licenses to linux users.
we can start calling him Sco Face.
---
=====
phrostie
Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of DOS
and danced the skies on Linux silvered wings.
http://www.freelists.org/webpage/cad-linux[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:12 AM EST |
| http://www.amityvillemurders.com/2000/2002/Reviews/IGHS.html [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:13 AM EST |
So Darl McBrides opinion is that the "GPL forces copyright issues onto the
end user", or words to that effect. So I assume that it would also be his
opinion that SCO customers are liable for any issues arising from SCO
distributing Samba without accepting the terms of the GPL.
I realise it's nonsense, but I would be happy if Darl could clarify his
position on this. Why wasn't this question asked? [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:15 AM EST |
I hope everybody knows, David Politis has been shilling SCO stock since the
beginning. Hence the tame question.
Anyway, in the news:
What's the Original-Real-Classic-SCO[1] up to:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/34076.html
Footnote [1]: A number of names get used for Tarantella ("Old SCO",
"Original SCO", etc). Some names with positive conotations might be
preferred like "Real SCO", "Classic SCO" - or combining
several "Original-Real-Classic-SCO").
Pod-People-SCO[2] v "BSD" next year, according to Darl (good quote)
http://www.atnewyork.com/news/article.php/3110981
Footnote [2]: That's Caldera/SCO. I first saw "Pod People"
referring to people in charge of SCO in a Harlan post, and well, it seemed so
eerily accurate, that I feel it should be used more.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: overshoot on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:23 AM EST |
this line of McBride's must be to IBM:by the way, we have shared the
code in question there with IBM under the litigation event - they know what
we're talking about there. Now I could have sworn that IBM
has been complaining to the Court to the exact opposite.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- What a surprise - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 10:39 AM EST
- What a surprise - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:33 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: tcranbrook on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:26 AM EST |
| Here is a summary of
McBrides Keynote speeach at the CDXPO. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:34 AM EST |
State AG's should find this quote interesting:
"McBride: Well, the issue right now is, we've said if you go back to what
we talked about in July, we were going to give people a period of time to
license up. We have had some people license. Then we said we're going to move
them into a litigation phase, so it is license or litigate, and what we're
announcing today is that phase".
Hmmm, once SCO starts to go aggressivly against any company (end users)... then,
does not that extend the threat to others (SCO wants to make an example of
someone first so that others will start to line up to pay not to get sued).
A threat to enforce ownership of something that they are not proving... by, SCO
telling end users that they MUST pay the license fee (for something that SCO
does NOT out-right own 100% of), because it will cost you less than if SCO sues
you... is (close to being extortion-like behavior, maybe), is, at the least
something that the State AG offices or other consumer protection offices
world-wide might find very very interesting!
SCO should be forced to PROVE that they have true owership or title to something
BEFORE they can start to attempt to collect payment. There is enough evidence
of SCO not owning what they say they own for the courts and the state AG offices
to step forward and force SCO to PROVE their ownership PRIOR to extracting money
from LINUX users. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: tcranbrook on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:38 AM EST |
| Some more mouthing off from McBride And Sontag in this
this article.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: zjimward on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:40 AM EST |
I find it interesting that with the Red Hat suit SCO makes comments that they
never made any statements about litigation, but yet here McBride says,
"...if you go back to what we talked about in July, we were going to give
people a period of time to license up...Then we said we're going to move them
into a litigation phase, so it is license or litigate,..." If I were
selling Linux I'd think from this talk that SCO would be suing me. Seems to me
that SCO's people are seriously trying to pull the wool over on every one for a
buck. Especially their SEC filling in where they say, "We are informed
that participants in the Linux industry have attempted to influence participants
in the markets in which we sell our products to reduce or eliminate the amount
of our products and services that they purchase. They have been somewhat
successful in those efforts and similar efforts and success will likely
continue. There is also a risk that the assertion of our intellectual property
rights will be negatively viewed by participants in our marketplace and we may
lose support from such participants. Any of the foregoing could adversely affect
our position in the marketplace and our results of operations." Yes, SCO,
that is what free enterprise calls competition.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: brenda banks on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:58 AM EST |
why cant linux people compile a list of the top 1500 companies and try to figure
which would be the likeliest target?
maybe contact them and maybe even start a fund for defending the first suit?
this way the company has a chance to battle and even maybe knock the air out of
sco.
---
br3n[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: kevin lyda on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:00 AM EST |
you have a make a donation link. pick a day in the next week and devote half of
all donations to a "groklaw sco invoice challenge." give that money
to the first (non-sco) linux end-user to send you in a copy of a sco invoice
sent through the us postal system.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: elrond_2003 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:12 AM EST |
I have been thinking about the Politis questions relating to Novell and Linus.
Where DP and Darl got their wires crossed - Dave was attacking Linus while Darl
wanted to use the question to attack Novell. It sounded like they were reading
different sections of a script.
In a recent press release from SCO
http://ir.sco.com/ReleaseDetail.cfm?ReleaseID=122952,
they bill
themselves as "the owner of the UNIX(R) operating system". David's question and
Darl's replies look like SCO is presenting its "rights" as if anyone who wants
to make or ship a "UNIX-like" OS must have a license from them. Hence, their
clain that they have the right to cancel IBM's "AIX license".
All
they really own is the rights to distribute the Original ATT source code.
Perhaps we need to get into the press an analogy such as: Daimler Benz made the
first automobile and owns the rights to that design. But they do not own the
rights to "automobile". Anyone who wants to can make an automobile without
licensing "automobile" from Daimler. Similarly SCO owns the rights to an early
OS design but NOT to all OSs or even to all UNIX-like OSs. Anyone who wants to
implement a system that adheres to the POSIX(R) standard can do so without
talking to SCO (or anyone else for that matter). Linus did so as did BSDI.
Perhaps there is a better analogy that would help present the
situation to the masses and collapse the stock price
sooner.
---
free as in speech. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:14 AM EST |
| McBride: Yeah. I think we never really did issue an invoicing plan. I know
there was talk of that. What we have done instead of just sending out mass
invoices, I mean the real issue with sending out mass invoices where you don't
know exactly what everybody is using is, you know, you run the risk of not
getting the invoice correct. We don't want to take that risk.
He is
basically saying. If we send out invoices, I will end in jail and I don't want
to do this...
So what we're doing instead is we are following up
with companies on a one-on-one basis. We're going through their issues, we're
working with them, and then based on that, we'll issue an invoice to them more
individually and tailor-made.
Translation: We find some suckers, who are
so mindwashed that they think that they ought to pay (probably past Caldera
users, who don't know about the case).. And offer us an free gift... Ofcourse we
get in writing first that they agree to get the invoice for service and so on..
To the extent we go through these one-on-one issues with customers,
and they choose to say I'd rather have a court hearing on this, so we can see if
your issues hold up in a courtroom,
Translation: 99.999% say "I see you
in court!!".
then that's where the partnership we are announcing today
with David kicks into gear, we hand those over to David, he takes that side of
it and then we go down the litigation path.
So, basically they take the
dumb easy targets first. Those who think that they 'should' pay somebody.. And
the rest ignores them.. Weird enough, I have heared lots of stories about people
TRYING to get an invoice but failed.. So, you should not to be surprised if the
paying customers are part of the Canopy group..
BTW should the FSF/OSDL not sue
SCO because under the GPL you are not allowed to license linux??? And if they
actually are only licensing that part of Linux which they claim its *theirs*
should IBM not be able to get an copy of the invoice!?? Or should IBM not be
able to collect part of the turnover of those licenses?? I mean they are SELLING
something thats not theirs to sell...
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: apessos on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:40 AM EST |
When's the next Groklaw open letter in response to Darl's statements? Last
time it was brilliant and a great read. Once the dust settles, is that going to
happen again?[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:43 AM EST |
(Repeat-post from previous article - sorry...)
How about this scenario:
Google reportedly has thousands of servers running Linux.
SCOG sues Google, which is about to go IPO.
The suit drives down the value of Google.
M$, which reportedly is interested in buying Google, gets them for cheap.
M$ settles and pays up, giving SCOG a healthy infusion from the biggest honeypot
there is.
SCOG uses the fact that Google (i.e. M$) pays up as precedent for its IP cause.
Nah - too obvious - M$ probably needs to use strawmen - or do they?[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Who to sue? - Authored by: apessos on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 10:54 AM EST
- Who to sue? - Authored by: J.F. on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 01:37 PM EST
- Who to sue? - Authored by: PM on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:16 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: mac586 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:50 AM EST |
| Notes on the Scott Phillips Q4 transcript:
1. "litigating and forcing"
should be "litigating and enforcing"
2. "rigorously prosecute"
should be "vigorously prosecute" [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: trox on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:50 AM EST |
| Your personal SCO License
This is from a post yesterday and nobody
seems to notice it? [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:51 AM EST |
Is this proof Skiba's questions were set up?
Skiba: And one last thing
Darl, is the RTU license fee, in the event that you're going after these
companies, is this a $1400, $700, $200 type of fee per server? What
kihd of number are you --
We are supposed to believe that Skiba is
intimately familiar with SCO terminology ("RTU license"), but not with the long
announced price of $699?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:57 AM EST |
| I noticed in the transcript that Boies effectively said that his firms has
positions in other tech companies as a result of the firm performing services.
If this is the case, then it might present a conflict of interest if and when a
suit it filed against one of those companies. So, if the positions are large
enough that they need to file SEC papers to sell shares to resolve the conflict
of interest, then those papers would tip their hand as to which companies might
be targets of TSG.
To EDGAR crawlers: look for Boies' law firm and like
Woodward and Bernstein, "Follow the money." [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- EDGAR - Authored by: overshoot on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 10:10 AM EST
| |
| Authored by: phrostie on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 10:54 AM EST |
from linuxtoday
Novell Responds to SCO Non-Compete Claims
PR: Novell Statement on SCO Claims Regarding a Non-Compete Clause in Novell-SCO
Contracts
Novell has seen the November 18 InfoWorld article in which SCO CEO Darl McBride
refers to a supposed non-compete agreement between Novell and SCO. Mr.
McBride's characterization of the agreements between Novell and SCO is
inaccurate. There is no non-compete provision in those contracts, and the
pending acquisition of SUSE LINUX does not violate any agreement between Novell
and SCO.
Novell has received no formal communication from SCO on this particular issue.
Novell understands its rights under the contracts very well, and will respond in
due course should SCO choose to formally pursue this issue.
---
=====
phrostie
Oh I have slipped the surly bonds of DOS
and danced the skies on Linux silvered wings.
http://www.freelists.org/webpage/cad-linux[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 11:11 AM EST |
Sorry for the somewhat rant here, but to focus on Darls comments about Novell
and SCO's possible actions:
Darl: ...Like in the case of Novell.
When SCO bought the property from Novell, there was non-compete language in
there that would preempt Novell from competing against the core offerings of
SCO. UNIX is a core offering of SCO. Linux is a knock-off of
UNIX.
Hmmm, funny thing is that the non-compete relates to use of
the UNIX code base, not in terms of "SCO and Novell cannot compete". Yes,
Novell is prohibited from competing with SCO through by use of the AT&T UNIX
code base, as described from the Asset Purchase Agreement)
Seller
agrees that it shall use the Licensed Technology only (i) for internal purposes
without restriction or (ii) for resale in bundled or integrated products sold by
Seller which are not directly competitive with the core products of
Buyer
PJ pointed this out in her article on the Asset agreement.
It actually doesn't matter if Linux is a UNIX-like OS, or a 'knock-off of UNIX'
as Darl claims. He can cry about this till he's blue in the face, but it won't
change the fact that Linux is NOT based on the SysV source tree. I don't doubt
that Linux and SysV share the same source, or very similar source in places, but
the part that matters is that these common files will be traced back to the BSD
distributions, or other publicly available sources.
So long as Novell,
or anyone else for that matter, can trace the code back to a public source (BSD,
textbooks, etc), SCO has no case. Specifically when SCO says: "Here, Novell is
using the SysV release to compete with us...", Novell can say, "No, this is not
SysV. This is Linux. The origin of this code can be found from (insert BSD,
etc here), and is public knowledge. The non-compete clause is for the AT&T
source sold to SCO, not (BSD / texbook etc) sources." The license agreemets for
other companies tend to support this view too:
(from SCO's Exhibit C -
AT&T/IBM Side Letter): 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.--
If the code is found to be from / in a publicly
available source, the confidential / proprietary nature of the source is
destroyed. SCO looses on two fronts:
1) The code originated from BSD:
Novell is using the publicly available code base (BSD), not the SysV code base,
to compete with SCO. Thus the information does not fall under the license
agreement with SCO, therefore it is not restricted by the non-compete
clause.
2) License agreements from AT&T allows unrescreicted
distribution of information (code) about/from the software product if it "at any
time becomes available without restriction to the general public by acts not
attributable to LICENSEE or its employees". So, once again, the code used by a
SuSE/Novell distro came from a public source, so it does not fall under the
license agreement with SCO. If a licensee can distribute information, etc about
the code once it becomes public knowledge, surely this applies to Novell as
well, as these agreements were/are in place prior to both Novell and SCO
ownership of the code base in question. IANAL, so this might not be correct, but
it is most certainly equitable.
In any case, it is the source of the
information which would count in both the IBM case and the possible Novell case.
Should the information have been released under the BSD sources or in a text
book (so long as IBM/Novell did not release it), the confidential nature of the
code is destroyed, and so are the clauses dealing with the use / distribution of
that information. Plus, if the information is obtained through a different
license (GPL, BSD, Apache, etc), then the holder of the two licenses is free to
choose which license is used when doing something with the information AFAIK.
It's like a movie theater buying two copies of a movie. One, a DVD for private
viewing. The other a version for public viewing in the theater. Both are valid
licenses, but the theater is not restricted in the use of the movie based on the
warning notice at the start of the DVD copy.
-Tomcat
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 11:30 AM EST |
| http://www.newsforge.com/business/03/11/19/1548242.shtml?tid=2&t
id=82&tid=94
"The end game in the SCO fiasco is at hand. IBM's
dissection of SCO's discovery wish-list is covered in exquisite detail at
Groklaw. As yesterday's conference call demonstrated, SCO's lawyers are being
forced to make increasingly bizarre arguments to just stay in the game."
Ken [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 11:36 AM EST |
I thought this was a "trade secret" dispute?
I could be wrong.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 11:37 AM EST |
The non-compete agreement says:
Seller agrees that it shall use the Licensed Technology only (i) for internal
purposes without restriction or (ii) for resale in bundled or integrated
products sold by Seller which are not directly competitive with the core
products of Buyer
SCO claims that Novell is barred from directly competing with SCO's core
products, while leaving out the bit about using the System V code base.
Even there, however, the contract specifically allows using the System 5 code
base for "resale in bundled or integrated products" , as long as it
is "not directly competitive" with SCO's "core
products."
Novell does not appear to be explicitly barred from distributing the System V
code base.
mickeym
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 11:40 AM EST |
In yesterday's conference, Darl said: "We are in the middle of our annual
financial audit, which should be completed in the next several weeks. We look
forward to providing you with full details on our fiscal 4th quarter and
year-end results during our teleconference scheduled for December
8th."
Wasn't the story a few days ago that the teleconference
was moved from 8 Dec to 3 Dec (perhaps so that the execs could dump stock on the
4th, ahead of the expected slamming in court on 5 Dec)? is this just an honest
mistake by Darl (as honest as one of his mistakes can be) or is SCO switching
the date again?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Thomas Frayne on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 11:55 AM EST |
McBride threatened Novell again over the non-compete clause. I really think
that Novell should sue for a declaratory judgement that Novell is not violating
that clause.
SCO is trying to weasel out of the threats they made against RH, but, if Novell
keeps it simple, SCO won't be able to claim that they didn't threaten Novell,
and Novell's case should be heard quickly.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:04 PM EST |
Kudos to Groklaw, from John O'Sullivan at NewsForge
How did we
ever get by without this site? Groklaw is the kind of thing I always dreamed the
Internet would enable: A place where you can get not only the important
documents, but informed and educational commentary as well. The site's authors
have devoted an enormous amount of time and effort to the cause. Their efforts
have resulted in a well-informed community response to SCO. Rather than just
invective, critics have had tangible legal logic to counter SCO's FUD.
Take a bow, PJ, you've earned it. Also all of those
who have helped, and much thanks! [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: rand on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:06 PM EST |
...there was non-compete language in there that would preempt
Novell from competing against the core offerings of SCO.
This
is not obfuscation or spin. It's an outright lie. The Novell agreement
contains language that anticipates Novell competing directly against old
SCO's core business:
The right to nomination for election to
Buyer's Board of Directors as set forth in this Section 6.1 shall terminate in
the event that Seller's core products become directly competitive with
buyer.
6.2 Right to Maintain.(a) Until the
earlier to occur of (i) Threshold Date; (ii) Seller's core products becoming
competitive with Buyer's core products or (iii) the
expiration of three years
from the date of this Agreement...
The part of the Agreement
that everyone is focusing on just set the conditions on Novell's license-back of
Unix from old SCO. They're not preventied from competing, just not allowed to
sell Unix under certain conditons.
This is an important fact that
needs to be shouted from all the journalistic rooftops. I'm going to start
writing letters to the editors today. Please feel free to join
me.
---
Dim gstrIANAL As String
(Oh, Lord, get me off this
project...) [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Non-compete - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:47 PM EST
- Non-compete - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:09 PM EST
- Non-compete - Authored by: rand on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:42 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:17 PM EST |
A document showed up on the summary, showing IBM added a new attorney to their
side, PHV (so not a Utah guy): David K. Markarian.
While I don't know this to be the same Markarian
- Heise's Florida firm used to be Heise, Markarian and Foreman. If you check
his alumini web site, there is a quote from 2000 from Mark Heise. He says he
just started a new firm with his two best friends, Markarian.
- If you look at the pleadings, etc. for the unconstitutional parking tax case,
that we've joked about. Heise and a David Markarian are working together there
too.
So, if this is the same David Markarian (which I don't know to be), Heise's
best friend, now seems to be working for IBM.
Regards
Quatermass
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Markarian - Authored by: Newsome on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:31 PM EST
- Markarian - Authored by: maxhrk on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:32 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: coffee17 on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:27 PM EST |
I was under the assumption that any evidence, or defence which a lawyer presents
has to at least have some plausibility. Boies' firm is currently
href="http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20031117200128691">representing
a> SCO in the redhat case. If SCO gets around to suing an end user it looks
like Boies' firm will represent them. Is there not some connection which would
preclude Boies from defending SCO from Redhat because since they are suing
someone there is obviously a threat there? Or are facts only taken into
consideration from when the case was filed, thus letting them off the hook since
they hadn't yet retained Boies' for suing an end user or started a suit before
the Redhat case was initiated?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:35 PM EST |
I find it interesting that SCO is too busy with IBM to be able to do Red Hat
discover and would like thatcase delayed. But at the same time they say that,
they are planning to launch another lawsuit; this time against a user. Hummmm I
would say they have too much time on their hands.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:43 PM EST |
Logo in jest of SCO's claims and attitude.
http://www.netimp.org/license it or litigate.png
I offer this little for any one to modify. If I've offended any one by posting
this here I'm sorry. Just thought adding a bit of humor to some of the
seriousness of all this might be a good thing.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: tcranbrook on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:48 PM EST |
| This article quotes McBride in an interview during CDXPO. Here's the
interesting part.
"I agree that the more yarn you pull out the more you
see," McBride said during a press briefing at the inaugural Enterprise IT Week
at cdXpo Conference here. "We have enough sorted out, but we are so focused on
the [IBM litigation]. With our limited energies and what our guys are going
through, we probably won't file any suits against BSD until sometime in the
first half of next year."
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: MattZN on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 12:56 PM EST |
| "If it turns out the way SCO is saying, the ability to yank a million lines
of code, roughly, out of a five million-line kernel that's there today is
substantial. When you take out the SMP, when you take out NUMA, when you take
out RCU, you're talking not about hardened, unbreakable Linux. You're not
talking about Linux that will run in an enterprise if you take all of that code
out. So that's going to be a fundamental question they would have to ask at that
point in time. Do we want to turn the clock back? Do we want to turn Linux back
to where it was in the 90's? Or do we want to keep going, and pay some kind of a
ongoing royalty fee to SCO."
This is unbelievable. SCO would have us
believe that Linux could not have done SMP without having stolen SCO code. SCO
seems to believe that they own the idea of 'SMP' and that it doesn't matter
where the code has actually come from. In fact, SCO seems to believe that
because SMP is 'hard', the open source community somehow could not have ever
written it on their own. I suppose if you are a layman and lack an
understanding of what the open source community actually is, that that
implication might be believable, but the moment you push a little it becomes an
obvious paper tiger and the idea that the court would actually believe that
argument is absurd. Besides, all the major OpenSource OS's have SMP. BSDI and
FreeBSD both have SMP and both were derived from the publically available BSD
codebase. Does SCO believe that FreeBSD is somehow magically violating their IP
because it has SMP capabilities too? This is an impossible assertion by SCO.
There is nothing magical about SMP and nothing in SysV that even remotely
resembles the modern SMP work you see in linux, FreeBSD, etc.
There is also
this issue about 'millions of lines of code' coming up again, yet in the same
breath SCO is saying that if 2.6 does not infringe, 2.4 certainly did. The
Linux community did not remove 'millions of lines of code' between 2.4 and 2.6.
SCO is still spouting this 'millions of lines of code' nonsense even now, and
again while a layman might well believe them nobody with clue will.
And, as
has been mentioned, SCO again makes wild assertions about their ownership of
'UNIX' when, in fact, it is well known that they only own the rights to SysV,
not 'UNIX'. They imply in their argument about derivative works that they
somehow magically control the disposition of all UNIX related work, which is
absurd on its face because it would mean that all the work I have done in the
last 20 years without one iota of input or reference to SCO is now somehow
magically owned by SCO. I mean come on, that is simply insane.
-Matt [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: dtidrow on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 01:07 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Upholder on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:06 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:44 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Harry Clayton on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:20 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:06 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 01:44 PM EST |
Here we go, proof again, that SCO's theory on non-compete with Novell - is not
based on some tortious interpretation of the APA. It is instead based on the
simple concept, that SCO thinks Novell is not allowed to do any operating
systems, period.
I guess that means SCO owns Netware! What a bunch of loons. Quote below
http://www.whatpc.co.uk/News/1149547
SCO plans to contact Novell to discuss the non-competition clauses once the SuSE
deal has gone through. It said that although Novell can develop software
products that work with an operating system, it cannot enter the operating
system market.
"This is something that Novell will have to work out with SCO if the
acquisition goes through and they continue to develop Linux," added
Stowell.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: tcranbrook on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 01:48 PM EST |
| While watching the news, I noticed and announcement on
Slaskdot. about the new MSN Newsbot, MS's answer to Google News.
Thinking to give it a test,
I
searched MSN Newsbot for the keyword "SCO", retrieving 238
entries. I did the same
search on Google News and got 523 entries. That in itself is not
particular concerning. After all, the MSN site says its beta. But then I began
looking through the listed articles, and began noticing that the MSN references
all seemed positive and supporting of the SCO claims.
Well, that could be a
subjective interpretation. So I did a search for GrokLaw. MSN found none, 0.
Google found 13, all in articles about SCO. On the assumption that only
article critical of SCO would contain references to GrokLaw, there seems to be a
pecular shortage of references to negative comments about SCO. It could just be
the news sources covered, but at least one, the Register, is on both
lists.
Perhaps this is explainable in another way, but I find it curious. I
also find it consistant the the MSN-Google search discrepancy discussed earlier
on Groklaw. [ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 01:53 PM EST |
http://www.forbes.com/forbes/2003/1124/096sidebar.html
Another article
from Lyons at Forbes, which strangely, is dated 11/24/2003. It came up when I
did a search for SCO at Forbes. Somehow, I think it wasn't supposed to be seen
until 11/23.
He mistakenly states:
"In creating the GPL,
Stallman found a clever way to turn the copyright system on its head: Instead of
helping keep code secret, the GPL pushes code into the public
domain." [ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Scriptwriter on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:03 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Jude on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:51 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:55 PM EST
- Comments - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:26 PM EST
- That's the point of copyright - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, November 20 2003 @ 01:17 AM EST
| |
| Authored by: tcranbrook on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:02 PM EST |
| LWN.net talks about a press release announcing that the entire Federal Judiciary's
national IT infrastructure will be migrating to a Linux/Intel platform.
"PEC
will support the transition of the Judiciary's mission-sensitive applications,
including case management, finance and accounting, probation and pretrial
services, and case-tracking management systems to the Linux standard. PEC will
provide Linux operating system and applications technical support and
assistance, including planning, advice and recommendations, help desk support,
installation and testing support, and full problem resolution."
It seems
that the court that is trying the SCO case will be converting to Linux, even as
it happens.
What irony! Will SCO demand that the court disqualifies
itself?
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:34 PM EST |
Please start writing emails to Apple, asking them whether they are going to
indemnify you if SCO sues and whether MacOSX contains SCO's IP. If they see
enough concern from users, maybe they follow RedHat's example and seek a
declarative judgement.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:51 PM EST |
There was once an Italian dictator by the name of Mussolini who wrecked his
country's budget successfully attacking a basket case East African country
called Ethiopia. To recoup Italy's economic losses, he ordered an invasion of
Greece. Unfortunately for him, the Greeks generously gave much more in the way
of blows than they got. His friend Adolf Hitler eventually saved his bacon, but
at the cost of six vital summer weeks which cost the German Nazi army its entire
East Front campaign if not the war itself. The moral of the story: you don't
dig yourself out of serious trouble by getting yourself into more serious
trouble.
If Darl McBride is pleased with the progress of the IBM suit, he'll be ecstatic
when IBM hands him his head back. And that will be only a beginning. In the
meantime, Darl McBride has kindly handed us another gold mine of quotes and
telegraphed us his intentions. Never interrupt enemy radio traffic when it gives
its positions and intentions away.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 02:55 PM EST |
The first is here:
Philips: Ok. Alright, well, that's gonna be interesting. Thank you very much.
Good luck.
McBride
Boies: Thank you.
What did McBride say?
The second is that Internet should be capitalized because it is a proper noun
unless you mean connected networks in a generic sense.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:02 PM EST |
| More of the same old same old, but potentially a good source of yet more
contradictory statements from the dimwits at SCO. It's a real laugh-a-minute:
"The breadth of damage that's been done here, it's
like cleaning up the Exxon Valdez... the code violation that is going on inside
of Linux between derivative work, copyrighted work, it's not
unsubstantial."
...
"If people want to talk about conspiracy theories,
they should spend some time poking what IBM, SUSE and Novell are talking about
and what the 'Chicago 7' talked about in Chicago in July [2003. That was a group
of companies with] a half a trillion dollars in market cap talking about what to
do about SCO." [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: penfold on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:14 PM EST |
I am glad that I'm not the only person this occured to. I don't generally
subscribe to conspircy theories... but this one seems like a page out of a TV
show or movie...
I think that Google is a very ripe target for SCO. As already mentioned, M$
offered to buy Google but were declined. I am sure M$ hasn't lost it's teeth
when dealing with someone they view as a competitor, they have just learned to
hide the pointing parts better.
Now that the press has mentioned that Google is working toward an IPO, and they
have like 8 datacenters with a large number of linux boxes at each, it seems to
me like the wolves would certainly be sniffing around Google.
Looking at how well this litigation has helped SCO funding, and their penchant
for spouting off to the press, it seems perfectly plausable that the same
litigation would chill excitement in a Google IPO, and even eat up any funds an
IPO attract. All of which would make getting in bed with M$ something that
Google might eventually not have the luxuary of declining.
And the clencher is it appears Linux is at the core of Google, so switching to
another OS could not be done quickly, conviently, or easily.
So Google paying the license fees just so they can get on with business and an
IPO would be a huge PR coup for SCO. Dragging out the lawsuit would benefit SCO
while hurting Google, while becoming the next topic of SCO FUD, and increase
Google's desire just to make it go away.
And if M$ is coordinating SCO in any way, then M$ is in a strong position to
force Google back to the negotiating table and in a stronger position to force
M$ terms on Google while at that table. And bringing Google under M$ SCO license
would be a huge carrot. Afterward, Google can convert over to a Windows
(longhorn maybe?) OS, and/or get absorbed into MSN.
And if anyone cries "Foul!", M$ can claim that they have not done
anything wrong.
Than again, maybe I have seen too many episodes of X-Files.
---
I'm not kidding, that boy's head is like Sputnik; spherical but quite pointy at
parts! He'll be crying himself to sleep tonight, on his huge pillow.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: gumout on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:31 PM EST |
You can bet Darl McBride is going to sue the BSD community.
From the title "Open Sources: Voices from the Open Source
Revolution"
cited by ESR in "OSI Position Paper on the SCO-vs.-IBM Complaint":
http://www.oreilly.com/catalog/opensources/book/kirkmck.html
"[A] settlement was finally reached in January 1994. The result was that
three files were removed from the 18,000 that made up Networking Release 2, and
a number of minor changes were made to other files. In addition, the University
agreed to add USL copyrights to about 70 files, although those files continued
to be freely redistributed....
... The newly blessed release was called 4.4BSD-Lite and was released in June
1994 under terms identical to those used for theNetworking releases.
Specifically, the terms allow free redistribution in sourceand binary form
subject only to the constraint that the University copyrights remain intact and
that the University receive credit when others use the code. Simultaneously, the
complete system was released as 4.4BSD-Encumbered, whichstill required
recipients tohave a USL source license. The lawsuit settlement also stipulated
that USL would not sue any organization using 4.4BSD-Lite as thebase for their
system. So, all the BSD groups that were doing releases at thattime, BSDI,
NetBSD, and FreeBSD, had to restart their code base with the 4.4BSD-Lite sources
into which they then merged their enhancements and improvements."
In case you missed it above:
"THE LAWSUIT SETTLEMENT ALSO STIPULATED THAT USL WOULD NOT SUE ANY
ORGANIZATION
USING 4.4BSD-LITE AS THE BASE FOR THEIR SYSTEM."
Since the settlement was under Court seal, only The University of California,
USL and successors know if this is absolutely accurate.
I will accept it as such.
Bet you a dollar to a donut that SCO has never seen the sealed USL-BSDI
settlement. HOW FU..IN' DUMB CAN THESE PEOPLE GET?
---
"If people are violating the law by doing drugs, they ought to
be accused and they ought to be convicted and they ought to
be sent up." --- Rush Limbaugh[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: KBellve on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:32 PM EST |
According to this, we can obtain Agreement 1 and 2 from jbingham@sco.com. Are
those agreements available from Groklaw already?
http://biz.yahoo.com/e/031119/scox8-k.html[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: maxhrk on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 03:49 PM EST |
hey everybody, i noticed that SCOX has filed their 8k by the way. it is about
exhibits of NOvell and SCO agreement and so on.
---
SCO: Linux... I am your.. father.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:17 PM EST |
CRN: Can suing customers, as you've said you will, be good for any
vendor?
McBride: First it's not our customers. I would say we're suing
end users. There are only two industries who use the term 'users,' computers and
drugs. Not sure if there's a connection there. But the point is, we're not suing
our customers. We are going after end users of Linux and I think there's a
slight but significant difference there.
Does this quote from the
CRN interview frost any one else's bacon? Not customers basically because Linux
isn't paid for and the not so subtle innuendo between Linux users and drug
users? I mean come on, there are probably more Linux users in Nevada than SCO
[L]users in the whole friggin world right now. He obviously has or is trying to
project a very low opinion for the type of people who would use Linux. It
doesn't really sound like the things that someone would say of an OS who
"doesn't really want to kill Linux" does it? Sounds like someone who hates it
and wants it dead because they know there is no hope they can ever license it
for the long run..
But as PO'd as this makes me, we need to make sure
that this sort of aggravation doesn't spawn any stupid retaliatory behaviors and
prove him right. So my favored response is to read groklaw every chance I get
and savor the hole they are digging and be thrilled for a chance to throw a bit
of dirt in it when it all comes crashing down.. even if it is only virtual
dirt..[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: mojotoad on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:18 PM EST |
| Regarding Mr. Lyons latest
howler:
I'
m going to ignore the blatant misconstrual of the GPL "forcing code into the
public domain"...an SCO party line if I ever heard one.
Instead I'd like to
focus on his reasoning in this paragraph (emphasis added):
Richard
M. Stallman has a chip on his shoulder. He is irked because people use the name
"Linux" to refer to an operating system that rightly should be called
"GNU/Linux," reflecting the fact that Stallman and other developers actually
built much of this system as part of an earlier project to create a free version
of Unix called GNU. Linux is only the kernel, the nucleus of the system. Yet
a Google search of the Web yields 414,000 citations of this supposedly
inaccurate description, versus only 18,900 for "GNU/Linux operating
system."
So what sort of well-applied logic and reasoning is
this, Lyons? By this rational, I think I can soundly prove other interesting
things. For example, since "microsoft rocks" yields 468 hits on google
and "microsoft sucks" yields 8,640 hits, this must mean that Microsoft
indeed sucks! The numbers are even better if you replace "Microsoft" with SCO:
3 rocks vs. 1780 sucks.
Damn, I'm good. I should have been a
high-caliber journalist like Daniel Lyons.
Matt
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:21 PM EST |
It is interesting that the SCO Group is no longer mailing mass invoices but
going down its hit list of 1500 corporate end users on a one-on-one basis. It
sounds a lot like muggings in a dark alley: the SCO Group wants every one of its
potential victims isolated and if possible unable to call for help. The SCO
Group definitely does not want to tangle again with IBM and RH if it can help
it, it doesn't want to add HP to its list of enemies, it might want to push an
end user of SuSE around to see how Novell would react, it doesn't want OSS to
get involved and it doesn't want the state and Federal regulatory agencies on
its back. The SCO Group is probably culling the herd, looking for the kind of
victim that can't or won't fight back even when freedom and safety lie in
fighting back.[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - blacklight - Authored by: Jude on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:50 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - blacklight - Authored by: tcranbrook on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:12 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - blacklight - Authored by: Steve Martin on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:43 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - blacklight - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:00 PM EST
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:30 PM EST |
From the call:
========================
David Politis: And this same thing, to your understanding, traces back to
AT&T when they had it as their UNIX Systems Laboratory?
Darl McBride: The same issue went from ATT to Novell. However, we do hold the
exclusive ownership rights on those and there is a non-compete in place along
the way to protect that.
========================
However, Amendment 2 to the APA says:
"In the event of a Change of Control of SCO, and commencing with the
effective date of such Change of Control, the proviso in subparagraphIIA(2)
setting forth restrictions on the sublicense and/or distribution of Licensed
Technology and modifications thereof shall cease to exist."
This agreement was in 1996, the "New SCO" was formed in 2000.
mickeym[ Reply to This | # ]
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- New 8-k fillling - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:06 PM EST
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| Authored by: SteveS on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 04:34 PM EST |
I'm not sure but would it be possible for us to put together a well researched
and documented article and submit it here?
NPR?
Just a thought,
Steve S.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:09 PM EST |
In yesterday's PM simulcast from cdxpo, Darl took exception to being called a
"Sue-happy Cowboy".
The fact was, he said, he had only issued a single lawsuit since becoming CEO of
SCO.
Well, no shit. And how many has he threatened? Thousands? If you stretch his
words, potentially millions? So, we're supposed to conclude that he's NOT
sue-happy???
...J[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:31 PM EST |
Is it just me or is SCO gearing up to sue the University of California? They
are babbling publicly about retrying the old BSD case. And we
surely use lots of Linux, BSD, etc. I would pay to
watch that. Boies going up against our entire law school (60+ faculty, a
few hundred RAs). And that's just one UC campus. Bring it on, Utah.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:35 PM EST |
Greetings all,
I am posting this as anonymous as my password is on my other machine and I do
not have access to it at the moment.
While I currently work as a system administrator in an Australian University my
undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate education was in Psychology
(experimental social and community psychology to be precise).
We have had at least one post examining SCO's behaviour in terms of cognitive
dissonance theory. There are other explanations that could help to explain
SCO's apparent illogical behaviour as well - Groupthink is one such theory.
(This was touched on in the loud person theory).
I would just like to draw your attention to the latest outburst and subsequent
legal threats by SCO.
Behaviour tends to get more erratic if the behavioural emitter is being ignored
and their message is not getting across. The normal example of this is found in
a child's tantrum. If you ignore a tantrum it will get worse before it gets
better.
I just note some of the regular posters to this forum are showing an increased
level of frustration with SCO's behaviour. I would just say that the
increasing erratic behaviour on the part of SCO is to be expected.
If things are going pear shaped for them they will just get louder and louder.
The louder they get the less people will take notice of them in the same way
that a parent tends to ignore tantrums in children.
/me slinks back under the sofa.
Cheers
Hairball Lightspeed.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:36 PM EST |
They are trying to set a fair market price in compairison to the product that
Linux direcly competes against. Windows isn't that product. It is unix.
If I remember correctly, it costs about the same for Red Hat Enterprise AS as it
does for SCO's Linux IP License. [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:43 PM EST |
Sco basically just said that they are going to try to challenge the BSD case.
Well, go to SCO's website and look at the last question in the LINUX IP LICENSE
faq. They ask if users of BSD need to worry....and answer that BSD is clear.
If they try to claim that the BSD code is thiers, would this do anything to that
claim in court? Maybe we should cache that page for further reference....they
might actually change the page after they try to claim the code.
Great work PJ and friends. Thanx for keeping us updated.[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: sela on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:45 PM EST |
This is a short satire I've just wrote on SCO. I hope you'll enjoy it
SCO proves Logic invalid
------------------------
In a move that sent shockwaves rippling not only across the IT community, as it
usually does, but throught the entire scientific community, SCO's CEO, Darl
McBride, declaired he managed to prove Logic to be invalid, immoral and
unconstitutional.
Darl McBride told analysts and reporters in a teleconference this Friday that
“the proof, developed by a team of MIT mathematicians, clearly show that Logic
have no merit whatsoever, and is therefor null and void. We have a very strong
and broad proof here. We are very confident about it.”.
“When we started all this effort”, said McBride, “people told us that what
we're claiming [regarding the Linux IP] does not come to terms with logic.
People told me 'you are trying to defy logic. It would never work'. Well, we
did just this”.
When asked if SCO considered the damage their attack on Logic could do to the
scientific community, Darl said “We did not want to bring logic into the
picture. We knew this is their [IBM] achilas heel and didn't want to attack
Logic. They brought it in by using Logic in their case. We had no choice but to
step forward and respond to their actions”.
People in the scientific community are still trying to cope with SCO's new
discovery. “It just doesn't make sense. They don't even let us see ttheir
proof without signing an NDA. They're completely irrational about this ... I
can't see the reason behind their actions” said Prof. A. Cademy, a leading
researcher in the field of Logic. In response Darl said “Right. So?”
“When we started investigating this, we knew there were several issues [with
Logic] but we did not know yet the entire scope and seriousness of this problem.
Now we know Logic is just invalid. This is a very serious deal, very strong
thing to support this case. We are quite confident we have two hundred precent
chance of winning the court case now. It just made 360 degrees change of
everything.”
Asked about the MIT mathematicians that were involved in this case, D.M said
“Well, unfortunately they are not here now. It was very unfortunate. After make
this proof complete they just went on proving they do not exist and those guys
just disappeared in a puff of logic. Very unfortunate indeed. Those were very
bright people, rocket scientist type of guys”.
SCO is now planning to send 1500 letters to scientists all over the world,
warning them about the dangers of using Logic. “We just want to educate the
public about the problems of using Logic. We do not intend to take any legal
actions against people using Logic for the time being. We know there are some
people still dependent on using Logic. We are plannig to step forward and help
those folks by releasing SCOlogic license soon, for 699$ introductory price.”
Many scientists are still very sceptic about SCO's proof. Not many people
agreed to sign an NDA that requires agreeing their proof is correct.
“I've seen the proof and it looks very solid. It looks like a very strong proof
agaist logic. They really are right about this”, said Laura Didio, one of the
few analysts that did sign the NDA in order to examine their proof.
As a result of the new events, SCO's stock value jumped to 4532$ today.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Glenn on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 05:47 PM EST |
The two biggest problems taht I have seen is that none of the participants in
the teledance asked any really penetrating questions, like how does SCO claim
code to be theirs that they do not own the coyright or patents for?
The second problem for anyone sued by SCo or suing SCo is to actually get
them into court. (But that day is coming, inexorably, unless all SCO executives
were to commit suicide. (Wishful thinking?))
Glenn
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:07 PM EST |
Any non-compete clause (assuming for the moment that there is one)
is based upon SCO CORE business. However, since their business is now
protecting their IP, even if the non-compete clause existed,
and (assuming) that " Linux is a knock-off of UNIX.", then Novell
selling Linux is not competing with the SCO. I assume your core model would be
the thing that generates the largest percentage of money for a corporation.
Right?[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: SilverWave on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:10 PM EST |
So in summary: McBride - Talking Bollocks, again!
Yes I did read it all - thanks for all the hard work!
Ok this guy is VERY annoying, but bottom line, these clowns will have to show
the code soon and when they do all the bullshit in the world isn’t going to help
them.
The depressing thing is, I believe they will walk away from the rotten, decaying
corpse that is SCOG a lot richer :-(
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: SilverWave on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:16 PM EST |
So in summary: McBride - Talking Bollocks, again!
Yes I did read it all - thanks for all the hard work!
Ok this guy is VERY annoying, but bottom line, these clowns will have to show
the code soon and when they do all the bullshit in the world isn’t going to help
them.
The depressing thing is, I believe they will walk away from the rotten, decaying
corpse that is SCOG a lot richer :-(
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: SilverWave on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:18 PM EST |
So in summary: McBride - Talking Bollocks, again!
Yes I did read it all - thanks for all the hard work!
Ok this guy is VERY annoying, but bottom line, these clowns will have to show
the code soon and when they do all the bullsh*t in the world isn’t going to help
them.
The depressing thing is, I believe they will walk away from the rotten, decaying
corpse that is SCOG a lot richer :-(
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: eamacnaghten on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:18 PM EST |
From a Yahoo Poster....
Decatur
Jones Not Deliberately Shut Out
In the interest of all things
fair, I called up Dion Cornett to find out what happened with the phone line
yesterday. Very nice individual, and I enjoyed the conversation
tremendously.
Turns out that Dion was forced to call up from a cell
phone and ended up with a bad connection he was forced to drop. Dion goes on to
indicate that the SCO management team has been very even-handed and fair with
him. Apparently, he has a lot of respect for the management team. I get the
impression that he feels the company would have been fine if it would have
focused on product and customers without taking the litigation route. I also
sense that he suspects Boies is having unusual influence on Darl and that Darl
may not be getting the best advice in the world.
One thing is very
clear; that Dion is trying as hard as possible to be unbiased and objective.
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:26 PM EST |
Utah State Bar Rules http://www.utahbar.org/rules_ops_pols/rules/rpc_1_8.html
It looks like there may be a chance to get SCO's Lawyers's sanctioned if a
Utah resident want's to file a complaint with the Utah state Bar for acquiring
a personal interest in the litigation in the form of 400,000 shares of stock on
a undefined contingent fee.
Rule 1.8. Conflict of interest: prohibited transactions.
(a) A lawyer shall not enter into a business transaction with a client or
knowingly acquire an ownership, possessory, security or other pecuniary interest
adverse to a client unless:
(1) The transaction and terms on which the lawyer acquires the interest are fair
and reasonable to the client and are fully disclosed and transmitted in writing
to the client in a manner which can be reasonably understood by the client; and
(2) The client is given a reasonable opportunity to seek the advice of
independent counsel in the transaction; and
(3) The client consents in writing thereto.
<portions removed for brevity>
(j) A lawyer shall not acquire a proprietary interest in the cause of action or
subject matter of litigation the lawyer is conducting for a client, except that
the lawyer may:
(1) Acquire a lien granted by law to secure the lawyer's fee or expenses; and
(2) Contract with a client for a reasonable contingent fee in a civil case.
[ Reply to This | # ]
|
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:40 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 06:51 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: rand on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:07 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Jude on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:39 PM EST
- Teleconference McBride, Boies, Bench - Transcript - Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:59 PM EST
| |
| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 07:16 PM EST |
From Yahoo's SCOX board
by: diogenese19348 (49/M)
Long-Term Sentiment: Strong Sell 11/19/03 06:46 pm
Msg: 63417 of 63421
I just realized who they showed those documents to that they needed to file the
8K for.
It was their new accomplices, er, I mean full Partners Boies & Co, who had
to see them to evaluate a case against Novell, and had just acquired 400,000
shares of stock. You know, Darl & Co. have made some stupid moves to date,
but that one may prove to be the stupidest.
And since when is 400,000 x 14.00 = 8,000,000 anyway? Methinks they minted those
shares when the price was $20.00, which would help to pinpoint when all this
crap took place.
So SCOX takes a $8 M GAAP hit for something that is now worth $5.6 million.
Whooee Darl, you sure have a creating value for shareholders. Ya know chief,
sooner or later stockholders are going to start measuring you against the high
they bought at, rather then the all time low you once were at. Sort of like that
Caldera shareholder lawsuit.
http://tinyurl.com/vrao
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:07 PM EST |
| Gartner Group's
George Weiss says "Linux users should not pay SCO"
"Until a judgment in
a case would unequivocally warrant it, Linux users should not pay SCO the
license fees it has asked for to settle its allegations of infringement of
intellectual property rights." - George Weiss, Gartner Group
It's a shame he is
still peddling advice to push vendors for 'indemnification' - But at least the
rest of his recommendations make sense.
Vennt from YahooBoards [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: Clifton Hyatt on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 08:39 PM EST |
good lord 300+ comments, this is approching /. proportions.
Can a subpoena stop a
movement?
Why Linux Is Wealthier Than Microsoft
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: mitphd on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:18 PM EST |
| If it [the IBM suit] turns out the way SCO is saying, the ability to yank a
million lines of code, roughly, out of a five million-line kernel that's there
today is substantial.
Just a little while ago we here were reading
SCO's strenuous insistence that its suit against IBM is purely a contractual
issue regarding "ways of doing things". The only way you can protect "ways of
doing things" is either with a contract or with a patent. SCO holds no relevant
patents. Yet here is Darl claiming that a win against IBM would give SCO
control of the software that other, non-contracted, parties wish to
use.
I'm afraid that Darl is trading on the average reporter's (and
investor's) ignorance of basic IP law. That's the only way I can interpret his
assertion that a win in the IBM case would prove his copyright allegations. (Of
course, we all expect that discovery in the IBM case will actually expose those
allegations as rank, baldfaced lies, but we can savor that when it
happens.)
How can it be that the financial and trade press swallows this
tripe whole? [ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: minkwe on Wednesday, November 19 2003 @ 09:36 PM EST |
Have you been wondering about the real SCO (Tarantella)? Well, they just
anounced Linux versions of their products to go with SuSE and
RedHat.
"The company, which has always listed Linux as an
installation platform for its Enterprise 3 software, said that the additional
support for SuSE and Red Hat had been provided in response to a "growing demand"
for Linux in the enterprise."
The register
reports
[ Reply to This | # ]
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| Authored by: James on Thursday, November 20 2003 @ 12:06 AM EST |
| I posted this above in a sub-thread, but thought I'd post it in the main
thread... enjoy :)
David comes on, he's now a shareholder,
he's rowing with us, and let's face it, he's added significant value to our
company since February. Our stock was around a buck, now it's $14. That's
some of the best money we've spent, not even money, some of the best stock we've
issued.
It's all about the stock price, big shock
there.
CRN: Can suing customers, as you've said you
will, be good for any vendor?
McBride: First it's not our
customers. I would say we're suing end users. There are only two industries who
use the term 'users,' computers and drugs. Not sure if there's a connection
there.
Wow. Just... wow.
Those who are
directly selling SCO Unix products, are cheering us on, saying go, fight,
win.
Except for the ones that have their license agreements
terminated by SCO...
We're on the side of the silent
majority...but at the end of the day it's around who's right. We're rock solid
on our claims... and we're not sitting here day in day out trying to counter the
stones being thrown at us. We have a business to run. Our employees are
reenergized around the movement back to Unix, reenergized around the role SCO is
playing... . Our roots in the Unix business are strong and won't be blown over
by a little bit of Linux wind.
Ignorance is bliss, as they
say. Linux is apparently a tiny wind, so tiny that it is destroying their
business so handily.
We just said we were going to start
investigating IP issues, and IBM said, 'You're just giving Bill Gates an early
Christmas present.' Bill Gates? This is about our IP! What are you talking
about? This was the immediate reaction at IBM and the open source guys.
Unfortunately for them, it's just not reality.
IBM said
this when? Maybe some slashdotter's said it, but I seriously doubt IBM said
anything like this.
After this point, Darl gets very pissy... he starts
spouting off conspiracy theories about the "Chicago 7" plotting against SCO, and
how IBM should "They should start a division in heart lung machines [to support]
all those little companies." After all, according to him, it's not SCO doing
all this, it's IBM and their big bad plot to destroy
SCO.
McBride: We early on looked at GPL-related issues
and felt it was an Achilles heel for IBM but we didn't open them up
initially.
Didn't he just say yesterday that it was IBM who
brought the GPL into the fray? Yet here he says they knew early on that it was
their weak point. DATA DOES NOT COMPUTE!!!
IBM will have a
lot of problems trying to hide behind the GPL. Basically the GPL is countering
U.S. Copyright law.
Supporting the GPL makes baby Jesus cry
too, according to Darl.
Longer term, expect SVR 6, which
will be 64-bit Unix on Intel. That is a few years
out.
Sheesh, no wonder they need all these lawsuits...
64-bit Unix in a few years? Linux would be light years ahead by
then.
The things we're laying claim to are things you can't
pull out very easily....it's very difficult to yank this stuff out. We're not
actually shutting down the flow of Linux, just cleaning it up at the end user
level.
Translation: "We're not putting a bullet in your
head, we're just cutting off your legs. See how nice we really
are?"
[When I came aboard at SCO I looked at this issue of
code and asked:] 'Why don't you guys do this?' They said, 'Because the Linux
community will get mad at us.'
Because the Linux community
is all about stiffling innovation. Yep yep uh huh.
They said
within 90 days [this morning] but I would qualify that and say I'll be surprised
if we get beyond 60 days.
Like a kid on Christmas, Darl
can't wait to open his new can of worms (I mean present). A lawsuit in the hand
today is worth two in the bush I guess. Is this not extortion? Give us money or
we'll sue you with in 60 days, we don't know which one of you, but we'll sue
someone. Sounds just like that company that got shut down by the FTC for
spamming messages through Windows Messenger
Service.
Sontag: SCO had been avoiding testing the
GPL. That's why we didn't take action against the distributors. However when IBM
added the GPL to their defense, that necessitates that we take action in our
case against the GPL...
See, it is IBM's fault that the GPL
has been dragged into this.
Back to your question, yes we'll
probably now be taking action against the GPL and given the fact that Novell has
acquired SUSE and Red Hat has sued us we're likely now to be taking actions if
we so choose against the distributors.
"We're not going to
sue the distributors. We are going to sue them now, I guess." My head
hurts...
Sontag: We've identified a lot of different things.
Early on when we filed against IBM, people wanted us to show the code, even
though we're fighting a legal case and that's where it's appropriately vetted,
we decided to take at least one example and show that. We had to do so under
NDA, because if you're comparing our System V code, it is not released without
confidentiality agreements. If you sign an NDA -- a number of journalists,
analysts and customers have seen the example we showed -- a substantial amount
was a cut and paste job, a few lines changed, but substantial body. You don't
have to be a programmer at all to see copying had occurred. It wasn't just ten
lines of code, that example was over 80 to 100 lines of code. Later some of the
Linux people said that code shouldn't have been there, Bruce Perens said it was
development problem and 'we've taken it out.' My analogy is [that's] like a bank
robber with posse in pursuit swinging back by the bank and throwing the money
back in... .
In that one example, copyrighted code had been misappropriated
and there's substantial benefit out there that has still not been rectified.
There are other literal copyright infringements that we have not publicly
provided, we'll save those for court. But there are over one million lines of
code that we have identified that are derivative works by IBM and Sequent that
have been contributed into Linux that we have identified and there's been no
effort by Linux leaders to start acting and rectify that
situation.
Where to begin... Ok first off, back to the cut
and paste argument. Sontag is clearly mistating the facts here. He completely
ignores Peren's and others analysis of the code which clearly shows that the
samples shown have absolutely NO RELATION WHATSOEVER to SCO. I won't restate
the arguments here, go read Bruce Perens' summary (I don't want to mix up the
facts). No one in the Linux community said the code "shouldn't have been
there", and the code that was removed was done so due to unnecessary duplication
of functionality, and the Unix related code was crap.
As for a lack of
"effort by Linux leaders to start acting and rectify that situation", well you
can't fix something that ain't broke. I've read multiple articles from Linus
practically begging for line numbers of files so he can fix any real problems
that might exist. SCO has refused this, saying they DO NOT WANT the code
removed so the Linux community cannot duck responsibility by fixing the code.
They cannot have it both ways.
CRN:IBM has shown no
sign of negotiating?
Sontag: No.
Translation,
"They won't buy us out."
Well that's about it. PJ, more analysis of this
should be done by someone who has more facts then me, as there are so many lies
and misleading statements here I can't believe Darl doesn't have a lawyer on
hand 24/7 to stuff a cork in his mouth as soon as he opens it. [ Reply to This | # ]
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- Small Companys - Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, November 20 2003 @ 01:45 AM EST
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, November 20 2003 @ 12:42 AM EST |
Hmm, SCO claims WindRiver is "on their side".
This wouldn't be the same WindRiver that recently indicated that they would
help their customers deliver Linux-based solutions, is it?
And it couldn't be the same WindRiver that bought BSDi and then spun it back
out, could it?
If so, I guess we'd have to question their honesty in all future press releases
and business transactions, wouldn't we?
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, November 20 2003 @ 01:22 AM EST |
This is a repost from the APA thread.
I wonder if this is the "no-compete" section that SCO is referring
to? Of course Linux is not a "SVRX product", but there is the whole
derivative works issue, etc.
A question that comes to mind is, does the List of Transferred Assets in the APA
completely describe what a "SVRX product" is, i.e. if something
isn't listed, then it's not a "SVRX product" for the purposes of
the APA.
PJ, the very last line of section 6.3 is missing. It's on the next page in the
pdf version.
4.16 SVRX Licenses
(c) Seller further covenants that immediately following the Closing Date neither
it, nor any of its officers, directors or employees shall (i) take any material
action designed to promote the sale of SVRX products or (ii) provide material
compensation to any employee designed and intended to incentivize such employee
to promote the sale of SVRX products, except for actions incidental to unrelated
business activities of Seller.
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| Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, November 20 2003 @ 11:49 PM EST |
Two more errors:
One of the "Moderator:" labels is not in bold.
The word "internet" is used several times without capitalization.
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