SCO Includes OS Products In OpenServer 6 268
William Robinson writes "In a bid to be friendly with Open Source, SCO has included 7 OS products in their Unix product. Among the included packages are MySQL, PostgreSQL, Samba, Apache, Tomcat, and FireFox. SCO's position is consistent, spokesman Blake Stowell argued. 'We don't necessarily have issues with open source, we just have an issue with open-source technology that includes intellectual property it shouldn't' he said."
Of course they're consistent (Score:5, Interesting)
From Groklaw [groklaw.net]:
So, yes. Their position on the GPL is completely consistant. i.e. The GPL is invalid, therefore they can take and redistribute all the software they want without any reprocussions from copyright law. They're wrong, but at least they're consistent. (In a twisted, "believe what I want you to believe," sort of way.)
P.S. Shouldn't this be under YRO or general articles instead of Apache?
Does this mean (Score:5, Interesting)
I know there was never much doubt, but IIRC one of SCO's arguments was that the GPL was invalid.
Does that mean (Score:5, Interesting)
McDonalds is a Customer (Score:3, Interesting)
Curious (Score:5, Interesting)
"The GPL violates the U.S. Constitution, together with copyright, antitrust and export control laws, and IBM's claims based thereon, or related thereto, are barred."
Given this position, isn't there standing for a contributor to actually litigate the validity of the GPL? You've got a company that has disclaimed the GPL, but still uses the software.
That's not the way it works, you can't have it both ways. Either you agree to play fair, or you have to create your own software, not take others.
And of course, the PR spin on this being "consistent" is hillarious.
SCO, a company without shame (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not an attempt at bridge building. It's a reflection of their desperate need for Open Source in order to offer ANYTHING worth using with their OS.
It's a clear statement that they consider Open Source to be code that they can use for whatever they want, but no one else should be allowed to use.
It'd be like FedEx trying to keep UPS from using the US highway system.
It's not trying to be nice to Open Source. OSS doesn't need any boned from the SCO jackal. They're trying to continue to take advantage of Open Source even as they try every legal trick they can think of too hurt it.
Re:Of course they're consistent (Score:3, Interesting)
If the GPL is invalid, or if they don't agree to it, they can't distribute the Linux souce code *at all* since it's copyrighted. The GPL is the only license that allows redistribution of the Linux kernel. Attack the GPL and they're guilty of breaking copyright law.
MySQL AB et al (Score:3, Interesting)
It seems only fair that SCO should fork over the cash, I'm sure their lawyers and accountants would understand.
Re:Of course they're consistent (Score:3, Interesting)
Agreed. But the SCO "consitency" issues raised in the article are related to the GPL in specific. Thus my response.
Of the open source products SCO is distributing I'm pretty sure only MySQL is GPL'd.
It's interesting that they decided to bundle MySQL. Had they bundled PostGreSQL, they could have gotten away with a continued anti-GPL stance. (Although I imagine that they still distribute a lot of tools and utilities that are GPLed. Esp. GCC.)
It doesn't matter how wrong someone like SCO is, making nonsensical arguments against them doesn't help.
It is important to note that I was mostly joking. SCO's position has *never* been consistent. My post merely makes levity of their latest attempt to claim such consistency.
Re:Does anybody take SCO seriously? (Score:2, Interesting)
I have been involved in quite a few switchovers for former SCO clients, and not all were particularly smooth, though all have been succesful. It's the stupid little stuff that bites you - slight syntax differences in shell scripts, path differences, that kind of thing. The easiest are the ones where all they have is one app and don't use it for anything else, but even those can have little gotchas.
I find that it's easiest to persuade a switch when the hardware and OS plainly have to be upgraded anyway, but I do constantly warn the SCO users that they need to be prepared to switch even if they don't want to - the funny thing is that those who take that advice and put up a Linux box "just for testing" have ended up switching more quickly than they or I thought they would.
Other folks are mired more deeply and would have to buy entirely new application software to move off SCO. Often these are people with marginal businesses or tight profit margins; they didn't move to better software years ago because they couldn't afford to. So they are very, very stuck: the cost of a switch is more than they could bear.
I suppose somewhere there may be some die hard person who really thinks they should stay with SCO because it's "better". I doubt there are many of those left, but once in a while I do hear someone wistfully comment on how "reliable" their SCO has been. But even those folks seem to understand that it's time to move on..
Interestingly, one of the holdouts who as recently as 90 days ago insisted on sticking it out called me this morning to discuss planning a transition. He *could* do Windows, but is adamantly opposed, so it will be Linux. One more down, but still plenty to go.
Just say no... (Score:3, Interesting)
If the software is GPL'd, but they don't believe the license to be valid - then how do they go about distributing someone else's code w/o any license? It's my understanding that the code is automatically copyrighted by the author unless the author grants some other rights to users, such as under the GPL; so that should mean that if they don't accept the license that the author released it under (GPL) that it's still copyrighted by the author, and SCO would have to go to the author for a license to distribute.
Given the trouble they've caused everyone with their temper-tantrums over the past few years, if I were mySQL - I'd say "ummm, no thanks. We'll pass on allowing you to distribute our stuff if you don't want to do it under the GPL. And by the way, we need you to sign a document under penalty of perjury that you accept the license we offer (GPL) in it's entireity, and agree not to dispute any portion of it in perpetuity, and to indenify, protect, and defend us against any and all claims as may come relating to said license..."...
basically toss it right back at 'em...
And finally - can we get rid of this half-assed "confirm you're not a script" crap... most of them are an absolute bitch to make out.
Re:McDonalds is a Customer (Score:3, Interesting)
Cheers
Stor