On Dec 27, 12:56 pm, Rick <n...@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Thu, 27 Dec 2007 10:57:54 -0500, PEDRO LITTLE wrote:
> > "Roy Schestowitz" <newsgro...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
> >news:2502704.qgIkLfEznx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >> SCO's Postpetition Liabilities = $6 Million+ -- Tanner's Bills & SCO's
> >> Operating Reports
> >> ,----[ Quote
> >> | That is where so much of the money went, of course, to the law firms.
> >> I | wonder if Novell will try to get them to cough some of that back up
> >> again?
> >> `----
>
> >>http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20071225102224595
>
> > I'm willing to bet that Rick the hypocrite won't ask you - "why do we
> > care what SCO debts are?"
>
> SCO's lawsuits against other Linux related companies have had impacts on
> the Linux community.
This was probably true in 2003, when the lawsuits were first filed.
But several companies, including Red Hat and SUSE (now Novell)
promised to indemnify customers against any liability if there were
any merit to the lawsuits. It was actually a pretty low risk, since
in became evident, almost immediately, that SCO was only looking at
UNIX evolution from a single point of view, and not properly tracing
the OSS (BSD, GNU, MIT...) geneology.
IBM is trying to tie SCO's activities back to Microsoft, so that they
can go after MICROSOFT for not only legal costs, but also triple
damages, including damage to brand. If they are successful, it could
end up costing Microsoft another $3 billion.
There are indicators that Microsoft may have played a key role in a
proxy fight that fired Ransom Love who had successfully grown Caldera
so big that it was able to purchase the entire SCO support
organization. Microsoft may have also been responsible for the
placement of Daryl McBride, whose primary successes involved suing his
previous employers.
If IBM and Novell can prove that McBride was a puppet acting on behalf
of Microsoft, and that Microsoft helped to fund the fraudulent
lawsuit, then the Judge may rule that Defendents may file counter-
claims against Microsoft and it's fiscal agents, including Bay Star
Capital.
Keep in mind that by 1999, IBM had already invested about $3 billion
in Linux. When SCO filed their lawsuit, they attempted to damage not
only Linux, but also AIX, filing for an injunction against IBM's use
of AIX as well as their use of Linux.
Fortunately, IBM already had contracts and proof that, as a major
contributor to Athena, X11, Motif, and numerous other Unix
improvements, they had an irrevocable license. In fact, many of the
code snippets SCO originally claimed were violations of their
intellectual property rights were actually IBM CODE! Some of it has
heritage all the way back to OS/360, EDX, and OS/370. Several of the
snippets SCO claimed it owned as part of the Unix for Merced project,
were actually CONTRIBUTED BY IBM.
It turned out that not only was SCO filing a fraudulent lawsuit, but
most of the claims for which IBM did not request immediate dismissal,
were claims against IBM Software. Not only was SCO filing a
fraudulent lawsuit, but they were also attempting to pirate the IBM
code by falsely claiming ownership.
IBM could have won all summary judgements, but by not requesting
dismissal of those claims which it knew it could prove were
maliciously fraudulent, they left open the door for discoveries, and
the ability to look for deeper pockets behind SCO, which it could
include as defendents in a countersuit.
> Rick
Meanwhile, since 2004, Linux has become increasingly popular in server
rooms, and more and more companies are now using Linux as strategic
servers, and are often choosing Linux as the server of choice for
blade systems sold by IBM, HP, and Dell. Ironically, even though a
blade array might have as many as 128 processor cores in a single 19
inch rack, some of the research firms count each blade array as a
single server.
Rex
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