Deluded SCO CEO on witness stand: "Linux is a copy of UNIX" (ars technica)

Posted May 2, 2008 18:37 UTC (Fri) by AnswerGuy (subscriber, #1256) [Link]

You had an agreement with your (former) friend that he could rent your car out to other
people, so long as he respected some earlier rental/leasing (sort of sharing) agreements that
you'd already worked out with some other friends.

So it's not "theft" inte the sense of larceny.  But it was conversion.

Your (former) friend went and *sold* the car; and when you came back to enforce part of the
agreement vis a vis some of the other friends (IBM) then your former friend sued you for
"slander of title" (claiming that you had sold the car to him --- even though the plain text
of your original, written agreement, specifically excluded the title to the car and
specifically established a fiduciary relationship between your (former) friend and yourself.

Yep!  That's about it.

(Other than the quibbles about the analogies between a single tangible car and the infinitely
duplicatable and modifiable sources in software).


JimD

Posted May 2, 2008 14:40 UTC (Fri) by charlieb (subscriber, #23340) [Link]

> Surely someone must be held responsible. 

Have you not been watching? Besides, this debacle is very small change compared to the Iraq
invasion - who's been held responsible for that? Just 'cause something's wrong doesn't mean
that the wrongdoers will be called to account.

Posted May 2, 2008 18:03 UTC (Fri) by rickmoen (subscriber, #6943) [Link]

sbergman27 wrote:

Courts are exceedingly reluctant to pierce the corporate veil, placing liability upon individuals acting on behalf of the corporation. However, if an individual, acting as an officer of a corporation, knowingly lies to the court... how is that handled?

Holding corporate officers accountable for deeds they actually do is not "piercing the corporate veil". That phrase refers to assigning liability directly to corporate shareholders (as owners) for deeds of the corporate entity and its agents (officers), without any showing of their personal involvement, which assignment by law cannot be done unless there's a strong showing that the corporate entity was a sham with no economic substance (i.e., a vehicle for deflecting liability, by hiding personal dealings within a corporate shell). I half-remember from my law classes[1] one of the leading cases of "piercing" involved a city where taxicabs were set up as allegedly independent corporations, one per cab, to limit liability exposure from car-accident plaintiffs. The court applied the sued mini-corporation's liabilities to its owners, holding that it was the "alter ego" of that larger owner.

The larger point is that it's always eminently possible sue corporate officers (and corporate directors) for deeds in which they have actual, provable, personal involvement. That's the whole reason why they tend to carry a million US dollars or more in directors' liability insurance.

(This meme that a corporate entity automatically totally shields from liability anyone associated with the corporation, even for deeds they were personally involved in, seems to have passed around the Linux community for a while. I don't know why, but I've been doing my part to point out this potentially dangerous error, e.g., in the Linux User Group HOWTO (see section "Common Misconceptions Debunked")

In short, any corporate officer who commits perjury in court is potentially in big trouble, exactly to the degree he or she would be, had he or she done the same thing in an individual capacity.

Rick Moen
rick@linuxmafia.com

[1] No, IANAL. However, I studied business law extensively, albeit long ago, in part in preparation to pass the CPA exam.

Posted May 2, 2008 20:07 UTC (Fri) by danielhedblom (subscriber, #47307) [Link]

"Another interesting question this brings up is over the other big SCO customer. Is this why
Microsoft has become so cozy with Novell? "

I really hope not. I like Novell and would hate it to see them too go down in flames as a
Microsoft puppet.