[H-GEN] RFC: SCO

Andrae Muys andrae.muys at braintree.com.au
Tue Jun 17 01:33:22 EDT 2003


[ Humbug *General* list - semi-serious discussions about Humbug and     ]
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Raymond Smith wrote:
> [ Humbug *General* list - semi-serious discussions about Humbug and     ]
> [ Unix-related topics. Posts from non-subscribed addresses will vanish. ]
> 
> All:
> 
> I've been approached by a journalist for comment about why Australian
> Linux Groups appear silent on SCO's lawsuit against IBM. Specifically:
> <blockquote>
>     Why? Doesn't this concern the Linux community here? Or is everyone
>     just not bothered enough to get up and do something?
> </blockquote>
> 
> To start things off: I am not concerned about it as I see it as the last
> desperate attempts of an irrelevant company to survive. Furthermore, Ihave confidence in IBM's ability to win this lawsuit.
> 
> The second part of his question is, I think, a little odd. But in my
> case, I can't see what HUMBUG could do about it. Perhaps we could send
> letters of support to IBM or issue a press release like AUUG.
> What do other people think?
> 

I hope to find time for a fuller response later tonight, however for now 
just a few disjointed thoughts.

A pointer to AUUG and LA's release.

Note that SCO has failed to present a credible case to the OSS 
community.  What response is possible until SCO actually makes an 
allegation.  Insults and rumour mongering don't count.

The linux community in general has maintained a rather muted response to 
SCO's actions.  The lack of any substantive allegation, the shifting 
nature of the claims, and the regular resort to personal insults by SCO 
means SCO is being treated as a troll (journalist will prob' require def 
of troll).  ie.  adolesent slashdotters are doing their traditional 
impersonation of a tribe of baboons, and the rest of the community finds 
it difficult to take them seriously, if they can be bothered paying any 
attention at all.

One area that has yet to show visibly is the growing resentment at SCO's 
attempts to portray the community as disrespectful of intellectual 
property rights.  It might be worth pointing out that in the past 2 
decades software copyright infringment (you may need to use the word 
piracy here :( has become common-place throughout our society.  In a 
time when people faced with the choice of infringing on copyright and 
"writing your own" have almost universally chosen to infringe copyright, 
the Open Source Community has chosen the latter.  Far from being the IP 
law rebels casually disregarding the law for their own ideology, the 
Open Source Community has repeatably demonstrated the highest respect 
for IP law and copyright!

Of course the fact that IBM is one of the IT worlds largest companies, 
and the largest patent holder in the world, who has invested over 
$1billion in linux in the past couple of years, gives us some confidence 
in the outcome.

As a legit business SCO is dead, it's only realistic avenue for surivial 
is litigation, and it chose as its first targets IBM and a non-legal 
entity!?  We wait with bemusment what further insanity will come from SCO.

Andrae

-- 
Andrae Muys                       But can it generate *quantum* Haiku
<andrae.muys at braintree.com.au>    error messages, in Latin, where each
Engineer                          line of the error message is a
Braintree Communications          palindrome? -- Mike Vanier on perl



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