SCO has filed a lawsuit alleging that IBM has misappropriated and misused SCO’s Unix code. With two thirds gone of the 100-day period before SCO is due to revoke IBM’s Unix licence, vnunet.com interviewed Chris Sontag, senior vice president and general manager of SCO Source. Sontag has overall responsibility for SCO’s intellectual property.
Interview: SCO’s Chris Sontag
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
As I recall, last interview he said the kernel was OK. This week it’s not. Sounds like they’re gunning for everybody, now.
As I recall, last interview he said the kernel was OK. This week it’s not. Sounds like they’re gunning for everybody, now.
Indeed. The story changes every time someone at SCO opens their mouth. First they were simply examining the situation which, turned out to mean that they were sueing IBM. Then they were only sueing IBM until, they decided to bring in Red Hat ans SuSe but, the kernel was OK with SCO. Now we hear that they intend to go after all commercial Linux distributors (at least those with any cash on hand).
The last paragraph summed up SCO’s real intent. We 0wnz Unix and now we 0wnz0r Linux too. Pay us!
SCO just keeps repeating themselves. The public still hasn’t seen any of this evidence, I’m very curious as to what will happen. I highly doubt that there is any UNIX code in linux. An employee of caldera said there was none and that it was more likely that there was linux code in the SCO kernel.
Time will tell..
Man what a Moron he just wrecked his own case:
{ Finally. Somebody raised a possible problem that you yourselves distribute the infringing code under the GPL licence. Do you see that as a problem from your point of view?
No we do not, because you do not have an infringement issue when you are providing customers with products that have your intellectual property in them.}
No you do not have an infringement issue, BUT when you contribute the source to the Linux kernel it is GPL’ed, that has got to be the stupidest thing I ever heard, you know your IP is distributed with the Kernel but you keep enhancing and distributing it under the GPL, Man I can tell Boies is your lawyer.
{ So you are saying that you are happy distributing the kernel because the offending code belongs to you anyway, as I understand it?
Yes. }
SCO you lost, did you know that every statement you make in public is admissable as evidence in a court proceeding. And by those statements right there you are admitting that you distributed the code, thus contributing it to the Linux kernel. I hope the 15 minutes of fame was worth it because SCO will never do business again. I think Chris Sontag, Darryl McBride and Dave Boies need to read the GPL all over again.
An employee of caldera said there was none and that it was more likely that there was linux code in the SCO kernel.
SCO would likely not be sued for that, since it’s nearly bankrupt (if not completely).
What’s the point? Where are the public statemenst on the Linux Kernel mailing lists asking kernel developers to remove offending code? What makes the people at SCO think this wouldn’t be done at their request, with sufficient evidence?
This is beginning to remindme of Socrates’ “faceless accusers”, except that these *slugs* won’t even have the decency to work with the community they claimed to foster.
In a certain way, I can’t help but thinking people in the Linux community should have paid more attention to Richard Stallman and understood the ideas behind the GPL. It might thus have been even harder for people like Sontag to get away with this kind of demagogery.
I actually think MS should buy SCO out, before I get booed and flamed from hell hear me out first. Microsoft cannot afford to kill its competition right ? The government would never let that happen. Since Linux does not contain any UNIX IP, its a standalone product and it wouldnt have to worry about lawsuits. SCO has no case now and I am sure MS knows this. the only people that would have to pay royalties are SGI, SUN, IBM, HP. And with the Government watching MS Like a Hawk, Microsoft is about the only one I would trust to hold the UNIX source code right now. I doubt IBM or anyone else will buy SCO because if they were going to, they would have already.
Text: “There is no credible defence to any of the arguments and claims we made.”
Subtext: “And if the judge doesn’t make us present any evidence, there never will be.”
Text: “We expect and feel we have strong evidence to support the claims we have made. ”
Subtext: “I left it back in the apartment. I’ll get it later.”
Text: “There is strong contractual language that allows us on breach – as we have alleged in the lawsuit – the right to revoke the AIX licence.”
“IBM has systems out there running AIX. Presumably IBM would be liable for every single one as far as you’re oncerned – every single use, deployment?”
“I don’t know if I would characterise it that way. It’s an element of the lawsuit certainly.”
Subtext: [rubs hands together and cackles]
Text: “I have reviewed the agreements we have with SuSE. I would not characterise them in any form whatsoever as providing SuSE with any rights to our Unix intellectual property. They are dead wrong on that issue. ”
Subtext: “The ones you hold closest are the ones easiest to put a knife into.”
Text: “Certainly our intention is not to destroy anything. Our intention is to enforce and get value for our intellectual property. Just as anyone who has intellectual property is going to want to protect their property.”
Subtext: “Our CEO has this golf course, you see. We don’t want to force Linus to water it all of the time, just every weekend. And mowing on Wednesdays.”
Text: “So when certain elements in the Linux community say ‘show us the lines of code’, yes there are lines of code. But of even greater concern to us are the areas we have identified that we say have been obfuscated: changed around so as to hide the fact they are from our source.”
Subtext: “No, we’re not going to show you the lines of code.”
Text: “Actually I would not characterise us that way. We announced with our first-quarter earnings that our financial situation had dramatically improved. I will leave it at that, but we expect very shortly to be announcing our second quarter and it is my understanding that it should be very favourable.”
Subtext: “We expect some of the smaller vendors to cave within the next three months.”
Text: “We have concerns and issues even with areas of the kernel.”
Subtext: “Hey Sharp! You and your Zarus is next!”
With all of this talk it appears that Ballmer was right. Linux does bring a virus, and that virus is greed.
“There is no credible defence to any of the arguments and claims we made. ”
…cause there’s no credible argument or claim we made
“Q: Finally. Somebody raised a possible problem that you yourselves distribute the infringing code under the GPL licence. Do you see that as a problem from your point of view?
A: No we do not, because you do not have an infringement issue when you are providing customers with products that have your intellectual property in them.”
WTF? He did understand the question didn’t he? The point is, if you distribute your beloved intellectual property under GPL, then it _becomes_ GPL. And you can’t claim infringement anymore, as long as people using it don’t violate GPL.
“SCO has filed a lawsuit alleging that IBM has misappropriated and misused SCO’s Unix code.”
Gee, that’s funny. Last time I checked, the lawsuit motions themselves never alleged anything as concrete as actual miscopying of code.
Something is rotten here.
.. and who would *ever* do business with a company that can only make profit from spurious legal claims. Not that they’ll have the option soon, hopefully SCO will fall all the way into bankruptcy before they get a chance to take some other companies with them.
It’s the SCO employees I feel sorry for, imagine being an engineer at a company and the management are gunning for all the companies who are currently making things interesting. Their jobs probably now rely on management’s greed.
“But of even greater concern to us are the areas we have identified that we say have been obfuscated: changed around so as to hide the fact they are from our source”
What you mean it does the roughly the same thing but looks nothing like your code? Well bugger me, how likely is *that* ?
Firstly, http://www.vnunet.com/Analysis/1140828 doesn’t appear to exist any more. Bl^&dy pain, that!
Secondly, if IBM ever needed a good reason to jump ship permamnently from Unix/AIX to Linux, SCO has just presented them with it. And since IBM appears to have used some of its own programming expertise to upgrade SysVRx/AIX’s capacity to midrange level, that self-same programming expertise is now free to be applied to Linux. To Linux/390, to Linux/80×86, to Linux/SPARC. to Linux/PPC, to Linux/ARM, to Linux/whatever…
SCO, assuming it survives, won’t be in any position to fight back. So the assumption it may survive, is very much the best case scenario, and that survival won’t mean a thing to anyone…
It’s a real pity, SCO did do some very good things there for a while, releasing the Ancient Unix source code under the BSD license…