SCO Loses 643
An anonymous reader writes "The one summary judgement that puts a stick into SCO's spokes has just come down. The judge in the epic SCO case has ruled that SCO doesn't own the Unix copyrights. With that one decision, a whole bunch of other decisions will fall like dominoes. As PJ says, 'That's Aaaaall, Folks! ... All right, all you Doubting Thomases. I double dog dare you to complain about the US court system now. I told you if you would just be patient, I had confidence in the system's ability to sort this out in the end. But we must say thank you to Novell and especially to its legal team for the incredible work they have done. I know it's not technically over and there will be more to slog through, but they won what matters most, and it's been a plum pleasin' pleasure watching you work. The entire FOSS community thanks you for your skill and all the hard work and thanks go to Novell for being willing to see this through."
And yet... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:And yet... (Score:5, Informative)
--
BMO
HA! (Score:3, Funny)
Re:HA! (Score:4, Informative)
Perhaps DMB has money on SCO stocks delisting and dying. Who the hell knows what was going through their brains.
Re:HA! (Score:5, Informative)
However, the short sellers certainly got in on SCO when they could -- it has the highest short ratio of any stock on the exchange.
Wikipedia does a pretty good job of explaining shorts: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Short_selling [wikipedia.org]
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
So if you borrow 100 shares at $20 and sell them, you have $2000 in pocket. If the shares decline to $5, you can cover the short (buy 100 shares for $500 and return to the broker) and make $1500.
Unlike long positions, though, there's unlimited downside. If you hold $2000 in stock normally, the worst case is the
Re:HA! (Score:4, Informative)
You can also buy a "put" (the "right to sell") at a specific price (say $20). They are more volatile though.
Re:HA! (Score:4, Informative)
Options contracts are traded daily on most stocks that are currently listed. The most commonly traded types are Call Options which grant you the right to buy a stock at a given price any time prior to the expiration of the contract this is what you described above. The opposite bet is the Put Option which grants you the right to sell a stock at a given price prior to the expiration of the contract. Put's are what you buy if you think a stock's price is going to fall.
Put Options are generally less risky than short sales because your maximum loss is limited to the purchase price of the contract. Short sales theoretically expose you to infinite risk as the stock price may keep going up.
I'm not sure that options in a non-existant stock exist as you describe - the contract normally must involve an underlying security of some type - Even if its frozen concentrated orange juice.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
So how do you think that applies to RedHat's suit against SCO?
Will RedHat gain anything but satisfaction?
Re:They're effectively bankrupt (Score:5, Interesting)
Novell's success in the lawsuit against SCO buys them some credit in the open source community and respect from potential clients, such as me, that they badly need in the wake of their ill-managed decision to broker the weird patent protectons with Microsoft. They lost a huge, huge amount of support and credibility in the open source world. This will help them recoer some of it.
Re:And yet... (Score:5, Interesting)
Ultimately, that will probably be up to Novell. The judge has ruled that Novell, not SCO, still owns all the copyrights they held before they got involved with SCO. There may be parts that are still owned by other parties prior to Novell.
My guess is, no, it won't be released, because ownership is too unclear and it's too expensive to make clear (all we know is, it's not SCO). The GPL people can sue SCO for damages, I expect, and have their pick of anything left over after Novell and IBM get through picking the bones. And prevent SCO (or anybody else) from distributing any more copies in violation of the GPL. Of course, by that point, the principals of SCO may be residing in a federal facility, from which they are not allowed to distribute anything.
More (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:More (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, nearly all parties will settle when it gets to that point. Eventually, fighting what's left is no longer worth the cost of the lawyers.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:SCOX: death throes begin - spasms of appeals (Score:5, Interesting)
More accurately, SCO made an agreement with Boies Schiller to cap the fees for this case at $31M, with some additional stock and 'cut of the winnings' language thrown in. Boies Schiller agreed to represent SCO all the way through appeals, but the general assumption is that they won't start any new cases for SCO unless SCO dumps some cash on the barrel-head.
So right now, Boies Schiller is looking at a family of cases where they're basically screwed.. they've lost the Novell slander-of-title case outright, and the best they can hope to do there is prove that the $30M technology license Microsoft bought wasn't entirely based on code Novell now officially owns. To the extent that Novell owns the code, Novell also owns 95% of the money, and money Novell owns won't pay SCO's legal fees. In the IBM case, they've been forced to limit their complaint to literal infringement of code that SCO owns -- and there's pathetically little of that which the judge will allow to be used as the basis of a complaint -- and now SCO doesn't even seem to own the code that IBM has allegedly infringed. To make matters worse, Novell has the explicit right to grant IBM permission to do anything it wants with the code, and Novell did exactly that at the outset of this whole long farce.
The whole family of cases as they stand right now are a train wreck for SCO and Boies Schiller, and the only way they could hope to win would be to go back and reformulate their bitch against IBM in a completely new way. But that's exactly what Boise Schiller isn't likely to do without getting a fresh mound of cash from SCO, and SCO doesn't have any cash to throw around right now. Right now, they're shitting bricks trying to find a way to keep Novell from taking away the $30M that's been propping them up since this whole thing started.
Meanwhile, SCO is still in the crosshairs of all the counterclaims Novell and IBM have filed, most of which Novell and IBM are likely to win, and win big. The damages from those will cost far more than SCO has ever been worth. The end result of that game will basically guarantee that any potential 'successor in interest' to SCO would rather strip naked, stick his feet in a hill of fire ants, and shove his arms into a tree-chipper than even think about trying to pick up the case where SCO left off.
Then we'll have to see whether Darl MacBride and the rest of the SCO management team can escape criminal charges, based on what they actually knew or should have known, what they said to the press and government agencies like the SEC, and whether this whole thing can be written off as the longest and most obnoxious pump-and-dump scheme in history.
So basically, this will all end when SCO's crops have been burned, their fields have been tilled with salt, and their flayed carcasses have been poisoned so thoroughly that even the buzzards won't dare to eat what's left.
Of course, that's only what I can come up with. They don't call IBM's lawyers The Nazgul for nothing.
And all of a sudden.... (Score:5, Funny)
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:And all of a sudden.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:And all of a sudden.... (Score:4, Interesting)
I think VISTA is a wonderful product which will help speed the adoption of Linux throughout the world. I think MS should increase the level of DRM in each succeeding product.
Re:And all of a sudden.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Employees need to evaluate how the company they serve wields the power they generate; if it's less than ethical, they should find a more ethical employer. Talented software developers have the luxury of taking the high road with negligible material risk. Those who just take the money and ignore what they are supporting are, in fact, evil.
(Hey, Google's hiring!)
Summary is Flamebait (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhm, the reason they lost is because they picked a fight with players who had billions of dollars, and a very well-established team of expensive lawyers, ready to fight.
They were Germany picking a fight with Russia.
Most people who get sued unfairly don't have that luxury.
Re:Summary is Flamebait (Score:5, Insightful)
No. They lost because they were _wrong_.
They had funding from Microsoft and Sun to go through with this (the "licenses" SCO sold them in 2003).
What we're all waiting for now is when Yarro, Anderer and McBride go to jail.
--
BMO
Re:Summary is Flamebait (Score:4, Insightful)
While this is true, I think it's also fair to say that a big reason that IBM got to show that SCO was wrong was because IBM has truckloads of money.
If SCO had sued me instead, SCO wouldn't have lost because they were wrong, because I wouldn't have had the money to show that they were wrong. I would have had to find a lawyer willing to work pro bono.
Re:Summary is Flamebait (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Summary is Flamebait (Score:5, Insightful)
Except they didn't lose to IBM. They lost to Novell. The IBM case is still in court, although it will now be a lot easier for IBM to win. It's unclear how SCO can even keep that case going, as the entire premise of it is now blown away. When you don't own the copyright to something, it's pretty pointless to sue somebody for copyright infringement. (Or any of their other claims.)
I actually hope the IBM case does get settled one way or another, because it's a real test of the GPL. The Novell case was a simple question of who "owned" Unix. It looks like the IBM case might fade away now, though, which means still no major test of the GPL in US court.
But the point is they didn't lose because they didn't have financial parity. This was basically MS and Sun vs. Novell, by proxy. If anything, SCO had the financial advantage.
Re:Summary is Flamebait (Score:5, Informative)
MMMmmmhhhh! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Summary is Flamebait (Score:4, Interesting)
In other news... (Score:5, Funny)
Fair??? Language, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
How many BILLIONS of dollars in lawyers fees, thousands of hours of (taxpayer-funded) court costs, and millions of manpower hours has this farce wasted all to come up with the "right" outcome, that SCO has absolutely no basis for this fiaSCO?
Sorry, I can't call this "sort[ed] out in the end" unless Glen gets to personally pull the trigger with Darl standing against the wall. And every stockholder in SCO, IBM, Novell, Redhat, and every open source developer, and several others, get to piss on the corpse.
Re:Fair??? Language, please... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Fair??? Language, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude have some perspective please. Darl didn't rape or murder anyone. Heck he might have actually believed that Linux was ripping off SCO's IP. I am glad they lost maybe even overjoyed. Wishing that level of physical harm over what is just a business deal is just wrong.
Re:Fair??? Language, please... (Score:5, Insightful)
I figure he probably did believe that.
And by the time the discovery rammed home to him that his yes-men should have said no and he didn't have a leg to stand on, it was too late for him to back out. To say "oops" and throw in the towel would have collapsed what was left of SCO - and brought the investors down on him for "breach of fiduciary duty".
This way he can say "I tried!".
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Darl knew perfectly well SCO has no copyrights (Score:5, Informative)
On January 4, 2003, McBride received an email from Michael Anderer, a consultant for SCO retained to examine its intellectual property. Supp. Brakebill Decl. Ex. 12. Anderer stated that the APA "transferred substantially less" of Novell's intellectual property than Novell owned. Anderer noted that Santa Cruz's "asset purchase" from Novell "excludes all patents, copyrights, and just about everything else." Id. Anderer cautioned that "[w]e really need to be clear on what we can license. It may be a lot less than we think."
On February 4, 2003, McBride contacted Christopher Stone, Vice Chairman of Novell, and stated that he wanted Novell to "amend" the APA to give SCO "the copyrights to UNIX." Supp. Brakebill Decl. Ex. 17; id. Ex. 18 ("Stone Dep." at 108-09). Then, on February 25, 2003, McBride twice called a Novell employee in business development, David Wright, and said, "SCO needs the copyrights." Wright passed on McBride's request to Novell's in-house legal department. Supp. Brakebill Decl. Ex. 13. McBride's request was memorialized in an email written that day by a Novell in-house attorney, Greg Jones. Id.
Also early in 2003, McBride and Chris Sontag of SCO contacted Greg Jones regarding the UNIX copyrights. Id. Ex. 8 ("Decl. Greg Jones") at 13, 14; Decl. Christopher S. Sontag 6. McBride stated that "the asset purchase agreement excluded copyrights from being transferred" and that it was a "clerical error." Jones Dep. at 182. On February 20, 2003, Chris Sontag also sent a draft letter to Novell that sought to clarify the parties' rights under the APA. Decl. Christopher S. Sontag Ex.
Again in March 2003, McBride called Stone to ask him if Novell would "give him some changes so he could have the copyrights." Christopher Stone Dep. at 248-49. Ralph Yarro, Chairman of SCO, requested an in-person meeting with Stone. In that meeting, on May 14, 2003, Yarro told Stone that he wanted Novell to amend the APA to give SCO the copyrights. Supp. Brakebill Decl. Ex. 17 at 4; Stone Dep. at 137-8. Stone refused. Id. On May 19, 2003, McBride called Stone and Joe LaSala, Novell's General Counsel, and again requested that Novell convey the copyrights to SCO. McBride said, "we only need you to amend the contract so that we can have the copyrights." Stone Dep. 249-250. Stone made notes in June 2003 memorializing both conversations. Supp. Brakebill Decl. Ex. 17. E. SCOsource Initiative
In approximately this same time frame, in January 2003, SCO launched its SCOsource initiative, which was an effort to obtain license fees from Linux users based on claims to Unix System V intellectual property. McBride commented that "SCO owns much of the core UNIX intellectual property, and has full rights to license this technology and enforce the associated patents and copyrights."
That's just the company (Score:5, Insightful)
Otherwise, they'll just move on to another company, to do mostly the same.
Re:That's just the company (Score:5, Funny)
Otherwise, they'll just move on to another company, to do mostly the same.
Shit, Darl & co. would be lucky to get jobs as janitors in the Tech Industry, let alone anything of any consequence or responsibility. They're pretty much as attractive as a 600lb woman suffering from Tourettes' Syndrome and downing Mezcal by the case.
(well, Maybe Microsoft's hiring or something, but...)
re Business (Score:4, Insightful)
If recent history is proof of anything, Darl will end being CEO of some other company, probably a larger one.
Bob Nardelli ran Home Depot into the ground, got more than $260 million dollars for walking out and now runs Chrysler
You see, now he is an experienced CEO
WW1 (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Now SCO can focus on it's other lawsuit (Score:5, Funny)
The case is expected to be settled just before the universe dies a heat-death.
Round 1 over; Now for round 2 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Round 1 over; Now for round 2 (Score:5, Informative)
I used to work for a VAR, and our customers were allowed to choose between several OSes: Windows, AIX, or Linux. Several of our potential customers refused to buy Linux systems and specifically mentioned the lawsuit as the reason. I'd call that slowing it down, a little.
Re:Round 1 over; Now for round 2 (Score:4, Informative)
Blarg, you're the second person I've seen say that so far in this discussion.
You are guaranteed the ability to get your trial in a speedy manner. There is no guarantee that the trial itself will be speedy.
$699 (Score:5, Funny)
Re:$699 (Score:4, Funny)
IBM counterclaims (Score:5, Interesting)
Still, a good day!
Haha, oopsie! (Score:5, Funny)
Let me be the first to say... (Score:4, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That'll teach 'em... (Score:5, Funny)
Standing to bring suit (Score:5, Informative)
What this decision in this SCO vs. Novell case does is show that SCO does not own Unix copyrights. Therefore, SCO does not have standing to sue.
Standing?
Example: Jane cannot sue Bill for sealing John's tires. Jane does not have standing. (although John has standing to sue Bill for stealing his tires.)
Likewise, SCO does not have standing to sue IBM re: Linux. Novell may have standing. But in any event, Novell waived SCO's right for this suit against IBM.
I'm sure IBM wants to win on the merits. Not just a technicality that SCO does not have standing to sue. But the standing issue is enough to dismiss the SCO vs. IBM (and the world) suit.
On the other hand, IBM has counterclaims against SCO. Including Lanham Act claims. These have teeth. I hope to see SCO get their asses handed to them soon.
Once this fiaSCO is over, I don't know what I'll do. I now read Groklaw as much as I once used to read Slashdot. I hope it is over soon.
Woohoo! (Score:4, Funny)
Utter destruction (Score:5, Informative)
Goodness (Score:3, Insightful)
This in mind, while it's wonderful that the system showed SCO wrong in the end, I have trouble seeing this really as a loss for SCO. They managed to continue their claims for a good five years-- a significant fraction of the lifetime of Linux itself-- without ever showing a whit of substance to those claims. SCO will die now that their case is lost, but they might have died years sooner and possibly poorer if not for this lawsuit gambit keeping them on life support. Microsoft managed to fund this through weird proxies without one single bit of consequences for themselves, and unlike SCO they will live on.
Linux has now weathered its first major court challenge, but the media coverage of Linux's successes in this case has never quite matched up in amount to the withering and credulous coverage of the baseless PR accusations of Darl McBride's heyday-- though we won in the end, the case may well be a net PR loss. Meanwhile, I don't think Linux is as viable as a movement as it was at the beginning of this case. This for all I know has nothing to do with the SCO case itself, but it seems like five years ago people still thought Linux on the desktop had a future, now I don't hear anyone talking about that anymore. Five years ago linux seemed to be going places, whereas now Linux's situation seems largely static, little progressed from where it was five years ago. Maybe I'm just a pessimist, but I don't really feel good right now thinking about how this entire debacle has gone.
I guess my main response is kudos to PJ of Groklaw for her amazing and tireless journalism throughout this case. I'd be curious to ask PJ what her plans are as to what she's going to do next. In the short term maybe she should write a book about this entire thing.
Conversion (Score:5, Informative)
Judge Kimball writes...
So, when Microsoft and Sun gave SCO millions of dollars for a "unix license" back in 2003, according to SCO's APA agreement with Novell, SCO was supposed to pass 100% of that money to Novell, who would then pass back 5% of it as SCO's administrative fee. SCO kept it all. Just as Microsoft and Sun intended. After all, that money was intended to finance SCO's litigation. SCO now owes Novell more than SCO is worth.
Aside: Sun did not need a Unix license from SCO. It already had a license from AT&T. Microsoft surely did not need a Unix license from SCO back in 2003. For what? Oh, yeah, to help finance a baseless lawsuit against a potential competitor (IBM and Linux).
I love the smell of SCO bankruptcy on a Monday morning.
The judge used the word "conversion". Does this mean that it may become a criminal matter?
Still reading the 102 page decision by Judge Kimball.
Re:Conversion (Score:5, Interesting)
But does this open the door to allowing Novell discovery of MS and Sun records should they demand return of the property? I'm still reading the ruling, too, but the judge seemed disgusted that a case with almost no factual basis was brought before the court and took SO much of its time. That SCO Group was unable to bring disputable facts allowed him to gut the case as a matter of law.
Judge should be disgusted with himself (Score:3, Interesting)
Direct quotes from Judge Kimball - February 2005:
"Viewed against the backdrop of SCO's plethora of public statements concerning IBM's and others' infringement of SCO's purported copyrights to the Unix software, it is astonishing that
Re:Judge should be disgusted with himself (Score:4, Insightful)
Kimball knew he was up against BSF, masters at gaming the system. Those statements were in his denial of IBM's initial PSJ motions, which he declined only because discovery was not finished. That discovery was not finished was due to BSF's masterful motion practice.
One ruling in February 2005 does not a case make. While it seems apparent he had a decision in mind at that time, he followed procedure to assure his ruling would be safe from appeal.
Don't blame the judge, blame the lawyers (BSF).
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Tort of conversion (Score:3, Informative)
It's basically the tort equivalent of "theft" in criminal law (but it has a slightly broader definition than theft -- conversion is an offense against someone's right of possession, not necessarily ownership).
The Nazgul of Armonk (Score:5, Funny)
Easy one! (Score:5, Insightful)
Easy: How many years has this taken? What ever happened to our Constitutional guarantee of a speedy trial?
If it just comes down to who owns the copyrights, why the hell wasn't that discovered during the preliminaries? Why did this case ever come to trial? Why wasn't it dismissed out of hand right at the start?
In fact, one can argue that, as has happened before, Microsoft/SCO won in a very real sense: They demonstrated that they can take you to court on bogus claims, never present any evidence against you, and make you pay millions of dollars over several years. The main reason they "lost" was that they took on a group that included IBM, who has very deep pockets. If it had been most of us fighting them alone, we would have been bankrupt long ago, and thus unable to continue the court battle.
This was a successful demonstration of how people with money can use the court system to drag their opponents down and impose huge expenses on them. Many managers in many companies understand this, and have learned the intended lesson: If you want to avoid such court proceedings that drag on for years, you should just buy the stuff sold by the big guys. Stay away from the stuff sold by the little guys, and you'll be safe from the flocks of lawyers.
It's a lesson that needs reinforcing every few years.
Re:Easy one! (Score:4, Insightful)
How long do you think it "should" take to resolve such cases? An hour? The judge just sits down and makes something up?
The purposes of law and justice could not be served any more quickly. You have to go through the process. That is why we are a nation of laws, and not men. That's what "rule of law" means.
It would have been nice to have it over with sooner. It would also be nice to simple execute all pedophiles on sight. However, either of these "niceties" would result in vast injustice.
Re:Easy one! (Score:4, Insightful)
If Novell hadn't had some big-guy backing, they would be the ones now bankrupt rather than SCO. This fact isn't lost on a lot of managers. It is a good part of what has supported IBM's and Microsoft's dominance in the computer market. "Nobody ever got fired for buying
Even though SCO (and their supporter Microsoft) have just had a major legal setback, they have already "won" this one in the sense that matters economically. They've shown that they can haul you and me into court on bogus charges, and make us spend millions of dollars defending ourselves. Whether they actually win the court case isn't important; what's important is that they can drag it out for years without even presenting evidence, and run up the legal bills to more than most small companies' net worth. The legal system strongly supports this situation. You and I have no defense other than to sell ourselves to a company that's big enough to defend us in court.
(That's unless you happen to be a multi-billionaire yourself, in which case forget I said anything.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
And yet the stock -increases-? (Score:3, Interesting)
Someone update the Wiki pls? (Score:3, Informative)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCO_v._IBM [wikipedia.org]
- Jesper
PJ (Score:5, Insightful)
The SCO case launched in 2003. In Moore's-law-years, that's three generations of CPUs. It's a Google IPO, an Apple shift to Intel, assorted consolidations of telcos and other big-board-game inscrutability. What's happened with Open Source? Firefox numbers increasing. Software patents getting a re-examination. (Cory Doctorow announcing a switch to Ubuntu? Uhsowhat.) But what's really changed?
br? I hope that the programmers who write code know that they are doing all the work. They're the heroes. With the attention going to big-name brouhahas and guys with easy money, it's gotta be said that the lonesome hacker is the real world-changer.
Summary is retarded (Score:3, Interesting)
95% of people who get sued don't have same abilities, so system doesn't work for them.
Re:Hurrah! (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Informative)
SCO owns the core UNIX operating system, originally developed by AT&T/Bell Labs and is the exclusive licensor to Unix-based system software providers.
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
You can send them feedback from here [sco.com].
I wrote this:
Subject: You have an error on your website...
Message: It says, "SCO owns the core UNIX operating system, originally developed by AT&T/Bell Labs and is the exclusive licensor to Unix-based system software providers."
NO, YOU DON'T! HA! HA!
Now get those lies off your website.
Cheers!
And then I got the message: Thank you for your feedback.
And in smaller print: You will be hearing from us soon.
Do you think that was a threat?
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
Do you think that was a threat?
The way things are going, it looks like just another lie.
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
I wouldn't worry.
Assassins cost money.
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Insightful)
Um, I don't owe $699 and I get to throw stones at McBride like he said we could if SCO was wrong?
And does anybody remember Seth? A poster here on
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
"needs to"?
How about SLOWPOKES! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Somehow, I'd expected a less matter-of-fact headline.
And much more gloating.
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hurrah! (Score:4, Interesting)
Or can we?
Do we FOSS people still hate Novell because of their deal with Microsoft or love them for standing up for this?
Re:Hurrah! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hurrah! (Score:4, Informative)
Read the Silmarillion.
Re:Hurrah! (Score:4, Informative)
For that matter just read The Lord of the Rings itself. At the council in Rivendell Elrond states: "And that is another reason why the Ring should be destroyed: as long as it is in the world if will be a danger even to the Wise. For nothing is evil in the beginning. Even Sauron was not so." (FotR 2nd ed. pg. 281.)
Re:Hurrah! (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Hurrah! (Score:4, Interesting)
head exploded!!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
This dealt with facts. SCO did not own UNIX. A review court would have to find the trial court abused its discretion in doing this. I don't think anyone believes that court actually would.
Re:For once.. (Score:4, Insightful)
I was interested in his use of the term "subject to conversion" with respect to the MS and Sun deals. There are two remedies for conversion: return of the property or damages. Novell claimed damages, but I wonder if Judge K opened the door for Novell to demand return of the property (the SVRX licenses Sun and MS got) as a method of opening the documents behind those deals up to discovery in suits by Novell against Sun and MS.
Whatever, this judge was disgusted by what he saw and ruled about as forcefully as possible.
Re:Kicking their own asses... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Kicking their own asses... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
If so, could (would?) Novell release the code so no one ever has to
question whether Linux contains parts of Unix.
If I understand this correctly:
While Novell owns the copyrights they are still in that pesky exclusive contract for SCO to administer the licensing, for which SCO gets a big cut and for which SCO paid some big bux once upon a time. That contract is the bulk of SCO's remaining assets.
If IBM finishes demolishing SCO and eats the c
Re:Novell to Open Source Unix? (Score:5, Insightful)
IANAL, and I don't know all the gory details of the contract, but here's a thought: Since this finding now affirms that SCO owes Novell the license fees for the SVRX licenses sold to Microsoft and Sun (whatever that percentage is) I believe it brings SCO very close to bankruptcy. If SCO is unable to come up with these fees then Novell could use that as grounds for termination of the whole contract. Heck, the contract may have an escape clause for Novell if SCO fails to stand up to its side of the agreement, and this decision could be enough for Novell to terminate immediately.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
"[T]he court concludes that Novell is the owner of the UNIX and UnixWare Copyrights."
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I'm posting an overused image
macro on a text-only site!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)