Regarding SCO: What are we waiting for. [LWN.net]

From:		anandsr@hss.hns.com
To:		letters@lwn.net
Subject:		Regarding SCO: What are we waiting for.
Date:		Tue, 22 Jul 2003 19:36:04 +0530
Cc:		moglen@columbia.edu



Hi,

It is funny that SCO Group has proposed to sell UnixWare Licenses for
Linux.

GPL strictly prohibits relicensing of GPL code without the permission
of all authors of a body of code.

TSG is trying to sell a different license than GPL for Linux. This is as
good as relicensing. I think they have opened themselves up for a
class action lawsuit covering all developers contributing code to
all Free Software code.

What is the opinion of FSF on this? I think their legal cousels should
take a go at this. Because if they sell a License for a Linux Distribution
they are covering everything, including FSF code as well.

At least the FSF should give a press release that they will SUE TSG if
TSG manage to sell their license to anybody who is using Linux, without
clearly stating that this license does not cover any GPL code.

If they don't do this, then FSF can sue, or get support from the aggrieved
author for sueing.

In this case the really problematic part is that one side is continuously
shouting and there is a deafening silence on the other side. Anybody
will obviously think that the shouting party is correct and the silent
party
is wrong.

regards,
-anandsr

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SCO is not licensing Linux

Posted Jul 26, 2003 0:55 UTC (Sat) by giraffedata (subscriber, #1954) [Link]

SCO isn't offering to license Linux. SCO is offering to license the SCO-owned code which is supposedly inside Linux. To use Linux, you need a license from every copyright holder.

Though most copyright holders have licensed the public to use their stuff under GPL, SCO claims it is a copyright holder and has not.

Note that SCO isn't offering to give people a copy of Linux along with that license either. SCO is not copying or distributing Linux (anymore).

SCO is not licensing Linux

Posted Jul 31, 2003 12:44 UTC (Thu) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link]

And the other thing is, by licencing their non-GPL code in linux, they have JUST VOIDED the user's GPL licence!

Which means that the user needs to relicence the whole shebang. SCO can't sell them a licence, nor can anyone else.

I think there are VERY CLEAR GROUNDS for a lawsuit, should SCO sell any licences which even MENTION linux. Those grounds are fraud, selling goods under false pretences, and extortion.

Cheers,
Wol

Er, yes it is.

Posted Jul 31, 2003 10:13 UTC (Thu) by dark (subscriber, #8483) [Link]

SCO is still distributing Linux from ftp.sco.com. I'm getting a bit tired of giving out that link in every article! I don't understand why people keep repeating this story that they've stopped when it's so easily falsified. Go to ftp.sco.com, get ls-lR.gz, and grep for linux.