[Sussex] IBM denies everthing

[Geoff Teale]

So...

IBM have filed a response to SCO's four allegations, and they've come out
with an air of fight about them (unsuprisingly).  IBM are denying that they
in any way made use of SCO's intellectual property in advancing LINUX.  This
holds true to what we all know about the way Linux was, and is still,
developed, though as an interesting side note, several former Caldera
employees are suggesting that world might be better servered looking for GPL
code illegally used in SCO Unixware.  

In addition to defending their own actions, IBM are accusing SCO of
deliberatly trying to bring the Open Source movement off it's rails so they
can save their failing business.  It seems IBM doesn't just want to win this
case, but they want to set a precedent against companies claiming against
open source projects.  It may seem odd that the largest owner of IP in the
world should be trying to defang the effect of future IP claims - but they
are allying themselves to Open Source so heavily now that, at a general
level, they feel what is good for the community is good for IBM.  It's worth
noting that IBM will no doubt realise that getting the community (and also
the press) on side may well be an important weapon in swinging the case - no
court room is immune to public opinion.

Here's my take on things:

It seems that Caledera wasn't getting much business selling LINUX with a
per-seat license (doh!) and licensing revenues for UNIX IP have dropped off
sharply as a large portion of the traditional UNIX market base has been
replaced totally by Linux over the last 10 years.  With the likes of SGI,
HP/Compaq and IBM moving away from IRIX, HP-UX, Tru-64 and AIX towards the
promotion of Linux as a broadranging solution, and generally choosing
vendors with a clue (and existing market share) to do business with, SCO
were left out on a limb, with a LINUX distro that had once been worthwhile
but was now washed up and a product that is in direct competition (UnixWare)
and failing badly.  What was left?  Sun microsystems - the largest licensee
of UNIX IP left in the world.  So SCO had planned to to live out its days
sucking blood from the intestinal tracts of SUN.  Oh dear, though, what's
this, SUN isn't doing so well as it had been - when the internet bubble
burst people started to realise that you could get something similar for a
lot less using LINUX on x86, so Sun's market eroded, and under the weight of
such market pressure even Sun are now moving to LINUX for the bulk part of
their business (believe me, they sell a lot more Cobalt RAQ's than they do
Starfire's) - they rerouted the blood supply and now SCO is getting less and
less out of them. 

So what are SCO doing?  Well, they're doing what any good parasite would do
when then blood stops flowing - they're looking for a new host.  If they win
this case they get to sink their teeth into IBM's back and then use the
precedent to reel in all the LINUX vendors.  Effectively SCO are trying to
convert their UNIX IP into LINUX IP because that's where the money is!

For the little SCO mosquito this action is do or die.  As Ransom Love (great
name, so appropriate now..) has predicted, IBM are about to turn the Utah
sky black with lawyers, and from their opening statements it sounds like
they plan to not only defend themselves, but OpenSource as a whole.

...let the games begin...

-- 
GJT
Free Software, Free Society. 
http://www.fsf.org   http://www.gnu.org


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