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The amended SCO complaint

The amended SCO complaint

Posted Jun 18, 2003 14:10 UTC (Wed) by ccchips (guest, #3222)
In reply to: The amended SCO complaint by ssharkey
Parent article: The amended SCO complaint

I don't know how the legal wrangling ended up here, but you may not know this: IBM tried the same thing. At one time, on their 360 platform, a completed compile and link and catalog would result in a message like:

*** PHASE ABCPROG1 CATALOG IS SYS1.GODLIB ***

The term "phase" was used to describe exactly the kind of baloney mentioned in this previous message: IBM was leading people to believe that if you wrote, compiled, and linked, *any* 360 program of any kind, it automagically became their property. And this was true even if the program bindings were weak or late.

I wonder--how old are these Sontag and McBride people? Did they have parents who trained them properly at home? Somehow I doubt it.

I also think the same way about the buttholes at IBM who tried that trick in the 1960's and 1970's.

Now that I think about it, remember the H. "Rap" Brown speech?

"We have an understanding of Karma. What goes around, comes around."

Hey---maybe somebody from IBM is reading this? Guys, I like the idea of your involvement with Linux, but I can't help but ask...

"What you goin' do now?"


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The amended SCO complaint

Posted Jun 18, 2003 14:52 UTC (Wed) by dkite (guest, #4577) [Link]

That is funny. Although, I think they sued the right people. IBM won't roll over on
this, and have deep pockets.

What SCO is trying to do is collect royalties on a free system. This won't go to
court. The stuff they are coming up with is so ridiculous and far fetched. They
won't show any evidence, because the possible offending code would be excised
within hours, and likely shown to be from bsd. The purpose is as IBM says, again
the ones who invented it, FUD. That is why they tripled the damages when IBM
didn't sit and beg. And they took the work of a respected Linux journalist and
highlighted it in their claim. I wonder how many users of Linux have sent them a
cheque already? I suspect it would be surprising.

Are the developers, some in employ of other companies, some not, going to let
SCO collect royalties on their work?

Derek

A corporation is not a person; things to ask the people at IBM

Posted Jun 19, 2003 20:22 UTC (Thu) by lilo (guest, #661) [Link]

ccchips wrote:

"We have an understanding of Karma. What goes around, comes around."

It's worth reiterating: A corporation is not a person. How many people who were at IBM 30-40 years ago are still there now? Probably not many. There's a certain symmetry to corporate karma, but one hopes it has no basis in reality. There are a lot of good people at IBM today, and I think they've done a fair amount for the community, in the process of trying to do well by their employer.

However, this does raise an important point. As a result of the chain of events begun by this litigation, IBM might end up with some of the intellectual property rights which form the basis for SCO's complaints. If so, the community would be well-advised to talk with IBM about the disposition of that Unix IP. We know that any corporation can change direction. Providing unrestrictive, perpetual and irrevocable licensing for Unix technology would be a nice way for IBM to demonstrate its long-term commitment to the community behind the technology it's helping to develop and market.

Rob Levin, President
Peer-Directed Projects Center

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