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Professor Hollaar's Amicus Brief in Bilski
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| Lineo was, of course, an offshoot of Caldera, spun off in
| 1999 as a wholly owned subsidiary. Why would it want
| Hollaar's web site? For what business purpose would it fund
| it? According to a report in April of 2002, by Maureen
| O'Gara, Lineo had ran out of money and was bouncing
| paychecks. If true, maybe paying professors to put up web
| sites isn't a viable business model? I am starting to
| wonder how long ago the idea of suing over the GPL first
| began to stir.
|
| Harris replaced Bryan Sparks as CEO of Lineo in 2001, by
| the way. He started out as VP and General Counsel at Lineo
| when it began. Sparks founded Caldera, Inc. in 1994. Harris
| worked for Summit Law Group also, and in fact he was a
| founding member (more Lineo history at that link), and he
| was the lead technical lawyer for Caldera in its lawsuit
| against Microsoft. You'll find Palumbo in the Caldera v.
| Microsoft filing also. You can find Hollaar's other amicus
| brief submitted by him and IEEE-USA in the Bilski case, the
| one he filed earlier with the appeals court, on his page of
| papers.
|
| Starting to feel like the Ozarks, where everyone is
| creepily related to everyone else you keep bumping into?
| The point is, there is a connection between Hollaar and
| Caldera/SCO that goes back years.
|
| [...]
|
| How can a professor of computer science not know that
| software didn't start out as proprietary? That came second,
| not first. And talk about missing the point of the open
| source development model, where sharing knowledge is
| deliberate. You could call it the scientific method. It's
| like doctors sharing their knowledge from experiments and
| such, so other doctors don't have to repeat what they've
| already done. It's not about keeping that knowledge secret;
| the whole point is to share, so that the state of the field
| can quickly advance. The FOSS community shares on purpose,
| in order to share knowledge, also so the knowledge remains
| available to all. It has nothing to do with cloning
| anything. "GNU's not Unix" is a meaningful phrase. And the
| GPL in no way downplays copyright protection. It is based
| on copyright law, and the GPL is enforced using copyright
| law, so his footnote is grossly inaccurate, not to mention
| offensive and demeaning, to me anyway.
|
| [...]
|
| Oh, and speaking of small worlds, Hollaar's bio says
| "Professor Hollaar is currently working on a new approach
| to patent reform and laws governing shrink-wrap and click-
| on licenses." Speaking of Psystar. And look at a comment
| submitted, according to Terekhov, by Hollaar to the FSF
| during the rewriting of the GPLv3:
|
| This is not a correct statement of copyright law, at
| least in the United States. With respect to "propagate",
| it is likely a tautology because of the defintion of
| "propagate" covering only things "that require permission
| under applicable copyright law". But for "modify", 17
| U.S.C. 117 permits the "owner of a copy of a computer
| program" to make an "adaptation" in particular
| circumstances, and makes it clear that making that
| adaptation does not "infringe copyright if you do not
| accept this License." It also does not seem to recognize
| the "first sale" doctrine codified in 17 U.S.C. 109, that
| permits the transfer of a lawfully-made copy "without the
| authority of the copyright owner". Perhaps the interplay
| between the definition of "propagate" and this section
| covers it, but it is certainly not made clear and, in
| fact, misleads one in thinking that the only way to
| redistribute a lawful copy is to accept the License.
|
| Sounds familiar, doesn't it? A little like Psystar's
| position, isn't it? A lot like Psystar, huh? Coincidence? I
| don't know. But it's eerie, to me.
|
| [...]
|
| And in 2003, "alexander" posted this comment on Groklaw
| about how to work around the GPL, a la Psystar, as I read
| it, and included a link to the SCOX Yahoo! message board,
| to comments by Alexander Terekhov in support of SCO Group,
| making the circle complete.
|
| I know what will interest you the most is the Hollaar
| brief, particularly the arguments on software and whether
| it is math, but at least you will understand from all this
| why, despite not knowing exactly how all these pieces fit
| together, I have come to suspect that the same folks behind
| SCO are somehow behind Psystar too, and that at its most
| fundamental, it was and still is an ideological attack on
| the GPL.
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http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20090922030639824
Recent:
Apple, Psystar Seek Trial On Nov. 9, 2009
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| The system integrator recently introduced a Linux-based personal computer
| that sells for just $299.
|
| Psystar's OpenLite system ships with the Ubuntu Linux desktop preinstalled,
| running on a 1.8-GHz Intel Celeron chip with integrated graphics support.
| Upgrading to a dual-core Pentium chip costs an additional $40. "With
| unparalleled affordability, this computer can bring Windows computing into
| every home and office," Psystar boasts on its Web site, even though the
| system runs Linux, not Microsoft Windows.
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http://www.informationweek.com/news/management/legal/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212000078
http://tinyurl.com/6l2opl
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