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Caldera Software Linux

Groklaw Turns One 181

Posted by michael from the slow-sunday dept.
JuliusRV writes "Today is Groklaw's one-year anniversary! As PJ writes, 'What a difference a year makes. When we started, all the headlines were saying that SCO was going to destroy Linux or at least make it cry. Now, looking around today, I see almost everyone predicting SCO's imminent doom instead. I think the truth, as usual, isn't in the headlines, and that it's somewhere in between those two extremes.' Thanks, PJ and all other Groklawyers, keep up the good work!"
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Groklaw Turns One More

Groklaw Turns One

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  • Remember... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by kemapa ( 733992 ) * on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:01PM (#9170426) Journal
    Now, looking around today, I see almost everyone predicting SCO's imminent doom instead.

    You must remember that back in the days of the OJ trial many thought he would be convicted, but he wasn't. And people have said so often how Apple will die soon / tomorrow / whatever. So I would hesitate to predicate SCO's doom just yet... but a man can dream!
    • You forgot to add *BSD to your list. :-)

    • Re:Remember... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Suburbanpride ( 755823 )
      I for one do not have much faith in our legal system. forget OJ, look at Microsoft. half a decade in the courts has not forced a change in Microsoft's business practices.

      As bad as SCO's case is, never say never.

      • Re:Remember... (Score:2, Insightful)

        by interiot ( 50685 )
        The thing about American Justice though... it's based on money. If an individual kills someone, and everybody realizes it, but they have a ton of money, they might have a shot at convincing a judge and jury to let them get away with it. But with companies, once their employees, investors, and customers recognize that they're full of shit [yahoo.com], even if the judge doesn't, they lose. Soon someone will take them over, terminate and settle the lawsuits, and make a small amount of profit selling what's left of th

        • Re:Remember... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by the gnat ( 153162 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @11:37PM (#9170775)
          The thing about American Justice though... it's based on money. If an individual kills someone, and everybody realizes it, but they have a ton of money, they might have a shot at convincing a judge and jury to let them get away with it.

          I don't think this concept can be applied so broadly. The lesson I take from the OJ trial is not that millions of dollars can buy acquital, but that millions of dollars can uncover enough potentially exculpatory evidence that might not be seen otherwise. Which is depressing not because OJ went free (although I do think, based on almost zero knoweldge of the case, that he's guilty), but because hundreds of poorer, dumber people are convicted and even sentenced to death based on far worse evidence, because they had no effective legal representation. (Texas being the worst example, which is why I lost all respect for Bush a long time ago, back when compassionate conservatism seemed like it might be the real thing.)

          As for the parallel to SCO, bear in mind that they went up against one of the largest computer companies and a huge user and developer community that were obviously going to take it personally. This means that there is tons of money (or manpower - all of the anti-SCO research would have cost a boatload if a real law firm was doing it) being spent fighting SCO, and they're getting slowly bludgeoned to death as a result. The fact that it's a distributed and largely non-profit effort shouldn't obscure that. SCO really sees itself as the underdog in this fight, and they're correct. (A snarling, vicious little dog, that's trying to gnaw your trousers whenever it isn't copulating with your shoe.)

          • Re:Remember... (Score:5, Interesting)

            by Vellmont ( 569020 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @11:58PM (#9170840) Homepage
            I didn't watch much of the OJ trial, but I've heard from others that one of the things that OJs lawyers did was eliminate any juror that might vote for conviction from the jury and get them replaced with alternates. There were many jurors eliminated, and they almost ran out of alternates.

            That's the part that's about "buying freedom". I don't think anyone should be able engineer a jury like that. The problem isn't that everyone can't do this, it's that if you have enough $$ you can.

            Corporate cases like this are a bit different of course since the judge is going to be (hopefully) un-engineerable. Microsoft got off scot free by just stalling until the administration changed and the new justice dept dropped the whole matter.

            • Re:Remember... (Score:2, Insightful)

              by Anonymous Coward
              That's the part that's about "buying freedom". I don't think anyone should be able engineer a jury like that. The problem isn't that everyone can't do this, it's that if you have enough $$ you can.

              Everyone can do this and everyone does. It's called jury selection and is a normal part of a criminal trial. It doesn't matter how much money you have either. All you need is an attorney who will eliminate the people from the jury who will vote guilty no matter what evidence is presented before them. The prosec

            • Re:Remember... (Score:2, Informative)

              by Aim Here ( 765712 )
              Well both sides in an American jury have the same rights to alternate jurors so it's hardly unfair. If the defence swaps a juror, the prosecution can swap another one and vice versa, up to a limit - it's the same for both sides and the effect is hopefully to get a jury that both prosecution and defence agree on..

              • Re:member... (Score:3, Interesting)

                by Morosoph ( 693565 )
                When it's all about "sides", something important is missing. Both sides selecting jurors has to result in "balance of prejudice" and not "commitment to truth". In fact the latter quality could be seen as dangerous to both sides: an unknown quantity; better to have someone "on your team"!

                • I just recently served on a Jury, and I assure you that it was evident with the questions they asked me and the other perspective jurors that the ability to look at the evidence and facts (the Court's best approximation of truth) was formost on their minds. Prejudices were seen as something that hampers that ability.

                  For instance this case involved someone getting a gun out and shooting his ex-girlfriend becuase she had an abortion. I was the first to be excused, even though my closest ties to the anti-abor

                  • By the way Morosoph, thanks for your participation in that survey. Unfortunately I can't keep everyone playing nice even when I want to. You've always been a true gentleman to deal with.
                    • Thank-you. I don't think that I've been perfect though. I did say that your logic in our previous discussion was lacking when in fact there were really crossed wires due to coming from different perspectives; had I taken more care, I would not have said that.
                  • I think that I'm probably just being cynical, really; I've read too many articles on jury-stuffing, and it lends me to looking at the interests and dynamics likely to be involved, being aware that logical skill is unusual, and that those who have it don't always share others' emotional responses, so that they are less-known quantities.

                    In your case, though, I suspect that the prosecution thought that maybe you would sympathise with the former boyfriend. They have no easy way of telling how extreme or mod


                    • I've thought of that. Another Jury member told me they were worried I might be grounds for a mis-trial. Personally I think they simply syphen off all the alphas that might disagree with them, in this case for the reason you specified. Lawyers, cops and judges are often the absolute first to be removed :)

                      And although I can see the right reasons behind what they do, I'm first to admit Lawyers are very, very good at doing all the wrong things for the professed right reasons.
            • Want to see something even more scary? (fiction, but I wouldn't *doubt* that this doesn't happen every day).

              Watch or Read John Grisham's "Runaway Jury". In the movie, the jury selection for the defense is done by a team of investigators hidden away in another building. (audio and video are transmitted via hidden wireless cameras in the defenses clothing) They have PI's that shadow all the prospective jurors and dig up everything on them, then they have psycologists determining the body language of the juro

          • Re:Remember... (Score:3, Informative)

            by eric76 ( 679787 )
            There's also the T. Cullen Davis case.

            Some people said that he was the first murder defendant in Texas that was richer than the state.

          • Suing freedom of speech (Score:5, Insightful)

            by kardar ( 636122 ) on Monday May 17, 2004 @03:25AM (#9171492)
            Sure, the American justice system may have its flaws, but I doubt that the prosecution in the OJ case went to court saying "We're going to try to put this innocent man in jail so that we can look good and get a promotion". Well, maybe one or two of them were characterized a having had a similar attitude, but it's not like they didn't have a case, and it's not like they didn't have any evidence.

            The problem SCO is going to have is that they underestimated "free software", because they didn't really know ENOUGH about "free software". The people bringing the suit aren't computer scientists, and the analysts claiming that SCO "might have something" aren't computer scientists either. The only chance that they have of winning is if the justice system fails; it's not Linux that's being questioned; it's the US justice system that's being questioned; it's the US justice system that's being sued.

            Furthemore, I think many of us now realize that you can't really sue Linux, because "free software" is everyone, because "free software" is freedom of speech; it's not a company like Microsoft that you can sue. All over the world, people aren't going to stop using Linux, and if SCO is going to get anywhere, they are going to have to win many court cases, and they are going to have to show the same evidence in each case, evidence that, with almost complete certainty, it can be said, does not exist.

            Now... to be fair, I imagine that it would be possible to turn SCO around; look at what Lee Iacocca did with Chrysler - it's possible, but with four patent lawsuits from IBM hanging over your head, a Red Hat lawsuit, and numerous GPL violations to boot, this is going to be difficult, so in their case, there is, let's say, a grave danger of "Live by the sword, die by the sword", happening. Unlike some people, I don't really wish any harm to SCO, because it's not SCO's fault - SCO is a business, and I would never wish financial disaster on any business. That's unethical. It's PEOPLE who work at that business that have encountered misinformation. Misinformation about Linux, misinformation about Unix, misinformation about "free software". It's basically, if I were to boil it down to a simple statement, it's that these lawsuits against Linux are being brought by individuals who aren't computer scientists.

            I remember that there was a case in the US where a man sued "the devil". He claimed the devil had caused him to commit all these sins and hurt his loved ones and that he was taking the devil to court because he wanted to bring him to justice. The reason that the case was thrown out was because the court did not know where to send the devil's subpeona to. So similarly, with Linux, the question is how do you subpeona free speech? Where does free speech live? What is free speech's address? Many would say America. See? But basically, it's freedom of speech that is giving all of these proprietary software companies headaches. And suing freedom of speech is, in a strange but opposite way, like suing the devil.
          • Since the OJ tangent has already been explored I'd like to summarize: The LAPD got caught framing a guilty man. The jury returned the appropriate verdict for what they saw in court.

        • American justice is based on many things (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Infonaut ( 96956 ) <infonaut@gmail.com> on Monday May 17, 2004 @12:10AM (#9170888) Homepage Journal
          "The thing about American Justice though... it's based on money."

          That's a gross oversimplification. Trial by jury is prone to the influence of money in that better lawyers can be hired by one side or the other, but in the end it's even more prone to the social context in which the case takes place.

          For example, jury trials in the American South before the enacting of federal Civil Rights legislation were absurdly biased in favor of whites and against blacks. This had nothing to do with money and everything to do with racism.

          Big companies in the age of Rockafeller and Carnegie were left relatively unfettered until Americans began to resent the range and depth of the Robber Barons' influence. Then in trial after trial, the monopolies were hit hard by plaintiffs seeking damages from large companies. When Americans perceive a powerful entity as being generally useful, they tend not to press it too hard, but when they see it as having overstepped its bounds, juries tend to come down against Big Business.

          Witness the recent spate of Wall Street trials. While there was certainly widespread malfeasance during the Dot-Com era, the Tyco execs, Martha Stewart, et. al. are in some ways being convicted not because of what they specifically did, but because the American public, as represented by jurors, is tired of this sort of rampant greed and wants to send a message to the executive class.

          Lawrence Friedman's Law in America [randomhouse.com] is a great primer (only 200 pages) on how the American legal system evolved, and how it has shaped and been shaped by American society.

          • I don't know if your post is meant to defend the system or damn it.

            What you seem to be saying is that the court system has very little to do with facts and the law and everything to do with the "prevailing attitude".
            • don't know if your post is meant to defend the system or damn it.

              Neither. I probably didn't put it very clearly.

              I don't profess to be a legal expert, but the American legal system was based on common law. That means that to a great extent the law is what "makes sense" (as interpreted at the time) rather than what is "universally true".

              My primary intention was to point out that to simplify something as vast and complex as the American legal system down to a statement that money is the sole determinan

        • While I'll agree that American justice is too often based on who can pay for it, I take issue with the suggestion that the market will somehow self-compensate for this shortcoming.

          For every SCO (where I'll assume that you're ultimately correct that SCO will "lose" by some reasonable definition), there are far larger corporations that continue to not "lose" in any serious way; their misdeeds go unpunished and unnoticed. Edwin Black showed how the Nazis would not have been nearly as effective without the he
        • The thing about American Justice though... it's based on money. If an individual kills someone, and everybody realizes it, but they have a ton of money, they might have a shot at convincing a judge and jury to let them get away with it.

          It's much more complicated. The OJ Simpson's trial is an example of the fundamental flaw of what was considered 600 years ago a great advancement of the Magna Charta - the trial by jury. The problem is that most people are biased in one way or another and they usually hav

      • Re:Remember... (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        look at Microsoft. half a decade in the courts has not forced a change in Microsoft's business practices

        Sure it has. It used to be that Microsoft just strong-armed OEMs and used their size to crush competitors.

        Now Microsoft is fair to OEMs and is using Patents and their size to crush compeititors.

      • Re:Remember... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Jameth ( 664111 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @11:52PM (#9170822)
        I think both OJ and Microsoft are great examples of flaws and strengths in the system.

        Look at OJ. The system cannot convict when done crappily. Did you ever look at the key points in the trial? The prosecutors SUCKED. It didn't matter that OJ spent a lot of money, his team screwed up tons of times, the prosecutors just screwed up tens times as often. The entire trial was botched in every way, and the result was that he wasn't convicted. In lots of past systems, horrible police-work resulted in people going to prison.

        As far as Microsoft, consider whether they truly will last through everything. They've been in the system for eight years or so. Consider that this is a trial dealing with the largest software company in the world, by a fairly long shot. So, the government is careful and slow. Inside of another ten years, it will be resolved.

        Yeah, it sucks that Microsoft is around for twenty years too long and OJ got off without prison time, but at least the government can't just walk in and toss someone in jail on shoddy police work or rip apart an organization at a whim.

        These are examples of flaws inherent in the system, but not examples of things that should be removed from the system.

        That's the trade-off in this sort of a legal system: You have a fair shot in trial and the government cannot just jump all over you, but people get away with things and it is hard to reverse abusive groups.

        A better example of something that needs to be fixed and can be fixed is the way the RIAA is acting.

      • Quoth the poster:

        I for one do not have much faith in our legal system. forget OJ, look at Microsoft. half a decade in the courts has not forced a change in Microsoft's business practices.

        The only reason the court system hasn't forced a change in M$'s practices is because the government, thanks to Dumb-ya, folded a winning hand.

      • Re:Remember... (Score:5, Informative)

        by jesterzog ( 189797 ) on Monday May 17, 2004 @01:16AM (#9171125) Journal

        I for one do not have much faith in our legal system. forget OJ, look at Microsoft. half a decade in the courts has not forced a change in Microsoft's business practices.

        I'm not sure if I agree entirely. I have a friend working at Microsoft, on the Windows team, who I had the opportunity to meet again recently.

        She gave us an informal seminar about working in Microsoft, where she pointed out that any meetings that they have with any clients, including the MS Office team, have to be planned very carefully in advance. One of the rules that they're required to be very careful about is that they don't give any internal information to anyone that doesn't go to everyone.

        On the higher corporate level, Microsoft hasn't really changed a lot. It manipulates the law and competitors, abuses its position, and I fully agree that that's a bad thing and the legal enforcement hasn't had the effect that it should. But it's not entirely correct to say that the lawsuits haven't had at least some effect on many of the procedures followed within Microsoft. Teams that might often have intermingled frequently are no longer allowed to talk with each other in detail about what they're doing.

        • One of the rules that they're required to be very careful about is that they don't give any internal information to anyone that doesn't go to everyone. ... it's not entirely correct to say that the lawsuits haven't had at least some effect on many of the procedures followed within Microsoft.

          So they're vaguely scared of breaking the law in a literal sense. Great! But not enough. Let's see them obliterated. That's the only thing that will stop them breaking the spirit of the law.

      • Re:Remember... (Score:5, Informative)

        by cft_128 ( 650084 ) on Monday May 17, 2004 @01:16AM (#9171126)
        There have been quite a few slashdot [slashdot.org] articles [slashdot.org] on the subject of anti-trust lawsuits and Microsoft. What it boils down too is that Microsoft makes enough money breaking the law that we (not just the US but the EU too) cannot fine them enough to make it fiscally unsound for them to obey the law. They view it as a 'cost of doing business'.

        Even if we raise the fines the legal systems move too slowly to make a difference. On one hand a slow legal system can be good - better to have the time make sure that a innocent person/party doesn't get convicted, on the other hand man does it burn. We do need better penalties to make this work better. One would be to amend the 14th amendment to allow us to punish those at the helms of corporations rather than the corporation itself, or better yet re-evaluate parts of the 1886 Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Supreme Court case which (without any explanations) decided that corporations are people. According to the official records Supreme Court Justice Morrison Remick Waite stated right before the arguments started:

        The court does not wish to hear argument on the question whether the provision in the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution, which forbids a State to deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws, applies to these corporations. We are all of opinion that it does.
        Before that ruling corporations were quite a bit more limited - they could not contribute any money to any political candidates or attempt to influence an elections, the 5th amendment double jeopardy clause didn't apply to them and in some states they couldn't even own other corporations.

        I don't think that all of those things are inherently bad (I work for corporations and do think that many of them are good) but I think we should take a nice long hard look at corporations and what rights we (real humans) think they should have. As Thomas Jefferson said: "I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our government in a trial of strength, and bid defiance to the laws of our country."

      • Microsoft has a real business and a real business plan, but SCO is just a pump and dump.

        What the OJ, SCO and Microsoft cases have in common is that their future was not determined by the justice system (ie. the courts have not succeeded in materially altering anything). SCO will die not because of the courts but because Darl does not care and they have no real business.

    • OJ/PJ difference (Score:5, Insightful)

      by beacher ( 82033 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:09PM (#9170462) Homepage
      The OJ case brought us extreme media saturation, and everybody was cognisant of the circumstances and facts around the case. This is different.. computer media shills trumpeted the virtues of SCO's case and the national magazines pickup up the shill's cries and gave them flight.

      Well, I am really glad that PJ's work has become pivotal in illuminating the real facts behind SCO's "case". It's an excellent central point of information against SCo's disinformation campaign. Excellent work PJ. Congrats on 1 year ;)

      -B

    • Re:Remember... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by XSforMe ( 446716 )
      For whatever its worth, SCO's Mexico Webpage [sco.com.mx] has been dead since friday (no ping answer). I know, it might be anything, but I still hope I can eventually see the same anwser I get from SCO's Polland exwebpage [www.sco.pl] on the mexican site.

  • Actually... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by elid ( 672471 ) <eli DOT ipod AT gmail DOT com> on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:02PM (#9170430)
    Now, looking around today, I see almost everyone predicting SCO's imminent doom instead. I think the truth, as usual, isn't in the headlines, and that it's somewhere in between those two extremes.

    "Imminent doom" may be closer to the truth than you think.

  • GrokDoc?? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by marcushnk ( 90744 ) <senectus@gmaiCOWl.com minus herbivore> on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:02PM (#9170433) Journal
    Any news on how GrokDoc is comming along.. I really like the sound of this project.. :-)
  • I welcome our new Grocklaw overlo....

    Oops.

    I mean Happy Birthday Grocklaw.

  • Good to see them in headlines again (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Noose For A Neck ( 610324 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:08PM (#9170457)
    Groklaw are good people. Actually, the place where I work (I work for a large, high-traffic porn site) was recently served with a legal threat in the form of a letter from SCO's lawyers, and we were able to seek legal advice from them and generally keep up with goings-on in the whole ordeal.

    I'm glad that I can still use Linux, as it's the best operating system for serving up obscene volumes of multimedia content over the web. If SCO had been able to make good on their threats (and I'm sure now that if it hadn't been for Groklaw, nobody would've ever heard about this), our operating costs would've gone through the roof and we would've ultimately had to shutdown. Cheers, Groklaw! And let us hope you have another 1 year of existence ahead of you!

  • Not to nitpick.... (Score:5, Informative)

    by redwoodtree ( 136298 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:09PM (#9170459)
    ....as I know lawyers love to do, but PJ is a grokParaLegal I believe and not a grokLawyer. Regardless, great work and great site.

    It must feel really nice to know you are largely responsible for the ongoing education of millions of readers.

    • She's not a grokParaLegal either ... (Score:4, Funny)

      by magefile ( 776388 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:19PM (#9170490)
      She's a GNU/grokParaLegal

      (please mod me underrated, not funny ... I'd like some more karma)
      • (please mod me underrated, not funny ... I'd like some more karma)

        Then say something insightful or informative, don't crack a standard slashdot joke and beg for karma.


        -Colin [colingregorypalmer.net]

    • Attempted English Lesson (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Someone who posts on Slashdot is a Slashdotter.
      Someone who posts on Fark is a Farker.
      Someone who posts on Groklaw is a Groklawer.

      Try pronouncing 'Groklawer', or just 'lawer' for that matter. Doesn't work. That's why we say 'lawyer' in English, and that's what makes them a Groklawyer. Nothing to do with lawyers, AFAIK.

  • effects (Score:3, Insightful)

    by name773 ( 696972 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:13PM (#9170476)
    well, how has the sco ordeal affected linux already?
    i think the linux people are more unified, but idk how much it has cut in to dev time...

  • The Year of the SCO Group FUD and Outright Lies (Score:5, Informative)

    by NZheretic ( 23872 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:19PM (#9170487) Homepage Journal
    June 2003 : What evidence of origin,ownership,copyright + GPL [slashdot.org].

    December 2003 : The SCO Group cannot expect [slashdot.org] to win any case based upon application interfaces which it's AT&T, USL and Novell predecessors relased in open standards specifically for the purpose of interoperability

    March 2004 : How the lawsuit is going to go in court [slashdot.org]

  • If only... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by peawee03 ( 714493 ) <mcericks@uiuc . e du> on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:20PM (#9170492)
    ... we had GrokLaw for Watergate, Rodney King, Clinton, and OJ, the world would be a much better place. WAIT- no way to get /. "discussions" on Watergate as-it-was-happening. Pity.

    • Re:If only... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by the gnat ( 153162 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @11:49PM (#9170811)
      . . .we had GrokLaw for Watergate, Rodney King, Clinton, and OJ, the world would be a much better place.

      I'm not sure how any of these compare. SCO is claiming something that can be largely refuted based on information that's already publically available, albeit in disperse form, across many versions, and fairly large in size. In all of the other cases except King's, the events in question occured relatively in secret. More like if SCO just sued IBM over AIX (but then the Linux community wouldn't give a shit, so what'd be the point of this whole community discovery process?)

      You seem to be making the point that a distributed, non-profit, internet based investigation system would be useful more generally for all sorts of civil and criminal cases, but there are almost no cases where there's such a wealth of evidence already available. And keep in mind that our various three-letter agencies are trying to do something similar to uncover terrorist plots, and Slashdotters generally hate some of the methods (i.e. Carnivore, encryption laws) they've applied.

      If all of us were doing this collectively out in the open, the potential for invasion of privacy wouldn't be any less and might actually be greater. Take a look at the Powerbook scam article for an example of this; the guy got what he deserved, but isn't it frightening how much the anti-scammers were able to do?
    • Yes you are right we got way too little coverage of the henious crime Clinton committed, and that he did it in the oval office just blowz[/sarcasm]

      Good we now have a decent President that ask for devine guidance before having people killed. 763 as of today I believe for no good reason

  • SCO's Imminent Doom (Score:5, Interesting)

    by cammoblammo ( 774120 ) <<moc.liamg> <ta> <ommalbommac>> on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:20PM (#9170494)

    I wonder what it would take to bring about the demise of SCO. I always assumed that SCO were a company who had turned to litigation because they couldn't sell products. Given that they've started to lay off staff around the world you'd think that their belts must need tightening. Does history have any examples of these things turn out?

    Regardless of what you think of the business direction SCO has taken, it must be worrying for the staff who still have families to feed. ATle ast they'll still be able to afford GNU/Linux...

    • Said staff should not be working for a corrupt, dishonest company.

      (And yes I practice what I say and I do have a family to support)

    • I've said it before, but ... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by krumms ( 613921 ) on Monday May 17, 2004 @12:04AM (#9170865) Journal
      I always assumed that SCO were a company who had turned to litigation because they couldn't sell products.

      Well, that was only the tip of the iceberg.

      The rest of it is that BayStar (and others?) delivered a truckload of cash to SCO with a prod in the ribs and a wink.

      SCO is evil.
      BayStar is more evil, because it funds companies to play the asshole/evil war against the big guns - encouraging companies to take up the rifles of Intellectual Property (and I don't just mean those companies being funded - I mean other companies seeing BayStar make a dollar and wanting to jump on the bandwagon).

      This ENCOURAGES shitty patents. The broader the better: the more you can sue.

      Linux must have looked like a fucking gold mine to BayStar.

      I find the whole idea disturbing. I'm crossing my fingers that before SCO dies, BayStar breathes its last too.

  • It is normal for a story to turn this way (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Space_Soldier ( 628825 ) <not4_u@hotmail.com> on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:25PM (#9170511)
    This is human nature. As much as we like "bad girls" or "bad boys", we always pick the good. In 90% of the stories, the hero (mostly good) wins.

  • Just because I like nitpicking ... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by beanyk ( 230597 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:36PM (#9170546)
    Today is Groklaw's one-year anniversary!

    No, it's Groklaw's first anniversary. The "year" is baked in.

  • Why is this news? (Score:5, Funny)

    by pyrrhonist ( 701154 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:53PM (#9170605)
    Groklaw [groklaw.net] already broke this story [groklaw.net] hours ago.

    Fark and ArsTechnica probably have articles too.

    The /. editors are terrible.

    </satire>

  • SCOX at $5.15 - Where's the bottom (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Animats ( 122034 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @10:55PM (#9170612) Homepage
    Groklaw has done a great job in dispelling Darl's FUD. Nobody takes SCO's threats seriously any more. Of course, Cravath and IBM are doing the heavy work, but nobody would notice without Groklaw. It's not at all common for pre-trial motions to be followed this closely.

    The remaining question for SCOX [yahoo.com] is "how low can it go"? Except for that bump in early April, when SCO tried, unsuccessfully, a stock buyback to prop up the price, the decline from 14 to 5 has been close to linear. If you just project the line out, SCOX goes to zero around late summer. It probably won't go to penny stock levels for a while, though; they have some cash left. But with no licensing revenue and a huge legal burn rate, they can't go on for all that long.

    The real question at this point, and it's one the players in the Open Source industry need to think about, is, who ends up with the rights to UNIX when SCO is gone? Sun? IBM? Red Hat? Boies?

    It's sad, in a way, to realize that the best thing the original UNIX can do is go away.

    • The real question at this point, and it's one the players in the Open Source industry need to think about, is, who ends up with the rights to UNIX when SCO is gone? Sun? IBM? Red Hat? Boies?

      Probably whoever ponies up enough money to buy what is left of SCO at the end of all of this. That might actually have some real value, and therefore SCO stock might actually not be worthless.

      • Re:SCOX at $5.15 - Where's the bottom (Score:5, Insightful)

        by AndroidCat ( 229562 ) on Sunday May 16, 2004 @11:37PM (#9170772) Homepage
        When you buy a company, you aquire its assets and its debts and liabilities. Buying them out before all the legal battles are over would be foolish, and afterwards I doubt that there will be much left.

        Wouldn't it make a nice picture with IBM and other claimants around the table carving the turkey on Thanksgiving? (Too bad it won't happen that soon unless SCO runs out of legal money.)

        • When you buy a company, you aquire its assets and its debts and liabilities. Buying them out before all the legal battles are over would be foolish, and afterwards I doubt that there will be much left.

          True, but with an important twist - the upside is unlimited if your skanky lawsuits are successful, but if you lose, the downside is limited to your investment - you simply fold up the company.

          That is both the beauty, and the curse, of the capitalist system and of corporations.

    • The remaining question for LNUX [yahoo.com] is "how low can it go"? If you just project the line out, LNUX goes to zero around late summer.

      It's sad, in a way, to realize that the best thing slashdot can do is go away.
      • Aww, boohoo. Its flamebait when the exact same evidence the grandparent used against SCO is turned against slashdot via OSDN and VA Software? Whats good for the goose is good for the gander kids. I thought /. was about the free exchange of ideas. Whoever modded that as flamebait should have their moderation priviledge revoked as a blatant abuser. My post contained nothing but facts, and the same facts that got the grandparent post modded +5. Thus proving once again, this website is full of shit and is
      • If you just project the line out, LNUX goes to zero around late summer.

        The rise and fall of stock prices generally follow the Normal Distribution [wolfram.com]. So the value will tend to level off to zero as time approaches infinity.

    • Who will own Unix? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by donnz ( 135658 )
      I'm betting on Microsoft, maybe through Baystar but most likely directly.

      • Re:Who will own Unix? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by rossifer ( 581396 ) on Monday May 17, 2004 @02:37AM (#9171372) Journal
        I'm betting on Microsoft, maybe through Baystar but most likely directly.

        But Novell didn't sell UNIX to SCO so there's no way for Microsoft or BayStar to own it unless either one offers Novell a metric buttload of money for assignment of the copyrights.

        To be correct, you should ask, "Who will own the ability to collect UNIX SysV license fees for Novell and take 5% as a service charge?"

        Regards,
        Ross

    • Re:SCOX at $5.15 - Where's the bottom (Score:5, Insightful)

      by badasscat ( 563442 ) <basscadet75@@@yahoo...com> on Monday May 17, 2004 @12:03AM (#9170863)
      The remaining question for SCOX is "how low can it go"? Except for that bump in early April, when SCO tried, unsuccessfully, a stock buyback to prop up the price, the decline from 14 to 5 has been close to linear. If you just project the line out, SCOX goes to zero around late summer. It probably won't go to penny stock levels for a while, though; they have some cash left. But with no licensing revenue and a huge legal burn rate, they can't go on for all that long.

      I need to at least try to correct this misconception a lot of people seem to have that a company's stock price is directly tied to its very existence. It isn't. In fact, as far as the company is concerned, it doesn't even really matter. If a company is dipping into its market cap to finance anything, it's in serious trouble to begin with - which SCO is, but not because its stock price is going down. SCO is in serious trouble because its business is failing, and its stock price is reflecting that. The cause/effect is reversed, you see.

      If SCO's stock reaches penny-stock levels, they'll be de-listed. It happens occasionally, and a lot of companies are not even big enough to be listed to begin with. But they're still in business. And it won't affect their legal strategy, because they've got cash set aside for that.

      I'm just saying, quit harping on the stock price. It doesn't matter except as a reflection of what a very small pool of not-very-influential people (ie. mostly small investors) think about SCO's future business prospects. It's no secret that their Unix business isn't doing well, they gave up on Linux and their legal strategy is working about as well as their FUD. Plus, BayStar and RBC want out. Add it up and obviously investors want out. But this has no direct effect on SCO's business.

      SCO doesn't automatically go away if their stock drops to penny levels. They've got their cash, and if they burn through it, they'll just need to find some other sucke... er, VC firm to prop them up like BayStar and RBC did. You know MS is not going to let this die; they'll find some other proxy with which to funnel SCO whatever cash they need.

      • Re:SCOX at $5.15 - Where's the bottom (Score:4, Informative)

        by Animats ( 122034 ) on Monday May 17, 2004 @12:41AM (#9170996) Homepage
        SCO doesn't automatically go away if their stock drops to penny levels.

        True. But SCOX went from nowhere to 22, and then back down to nowhere, all on hype. That's a classic speculative bubble. Live by the momentum, die by the momentum. It's not like their revenue numbers are any good, except for that cash infusion from Microsoft.

      • I'm just saying, quit harping on the stock price. It doesn't matter except as a reflection of what a very small pool of not-very-influential people (ie. mostly small investors) think about SCO's future business prospects.

        I keep harping on it in my head because I'm thinking shoot - I knew I should have shorted them.

        • I keep harping on it in my head because I'm thinking shoot - I knew I should have shorted them.

          Think positive. There are more ways of killing a cat...

          The failure of the SCO vs IBM case and/or the total collapse of SCO must lead to the market looking brighter for some other companies. Look, for example, at this [yahoo.com]. What would you predict will happen to RedHat's business when the SCO case collapses? What will happen to Novell [yahoo.com]'s? What about other companies with a strategic cmmittment to Linux?

          I would think any moderately intelligent people around here could easily put together a portfolio [yahoo.com] of [yahoo.com] companies [yahoo.com] whose stock is likely to rise when SCO goes down. And you can bask in the happy knowledge that you're supporting your friends, not gnawing the bones of your enemies.

      • The big deal about being listed is that, for the moment, SCO is currently a publicly traded company, so certain SEC regulations and sections of related laws apply to SCO and their behavior.

        Once they get delisted, these rules no longer apply to them.

        At the same time, if SCO gets delisted, it could bring about class-action lawsuits from the shareholders against the top company executives, and they would not get the coporate limited liability protection either. Delisting is an obvious and actionable cause t

  • not accessible from China? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday May 16, 2004 @11:00PM (#9170636)
    It seems like groklaw is not accessible from China - or perhaps it is just from my location.

    Anyone else in China able to get to it?

    Why would it be inaccessible, I wonder?
  • LinuxWorld [linuxworld.com] already joined the congratulatory celebrations on Saturday

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