Posted on 01/26/2005 6:03:54 AM PST by ShadowAce
What goes around, comes around, they say. And we now have the hilarious opportunity to watch SCO tell the court how burdensome it would be for SCO to have to produce to IBM every product Caldera distributed for the past 6 years. These are the same folks who whined until they got not only every released version of AIX and Dynix going back to the '80s but every *unreleased* one also, in their own discovery demands.
Here, for your enjoyment, are SCO's objections to IBM's discovery efforts related to IBM's patent counterclaims:
Objections to International Business Machine Corporation's Rule 30(b)(6) Notice of Deposition ("The Click-Wrap Notice");
I don't know when I've enjoyed reading anything so much. I love hearing SCO tell the judge that IBM's depositions notices are unduly broad and burdensome. They don't have enough time to prepare, they don't want the depositions to be in Utah, it's too soon for them to answer questions, IBM is allegedly seeking info or documents protected from discovery by the attorney-client privilege, and on and on. They must be just going down a list they found of conceivable objections to discovery.
The problem is, they just argued very persuasively that massive discovery is essential to prove their case, and they got a lot of what they asked for. Now, to turn around and make an opposite argument isn't likely to go down so smoothly. One thing judges really do try to do is play fair with both sides. And if IBM can persuade the court that they need the materials and information they are asking for, they will certainly get it. And that will cost SCO's legal team, as well as the company, a lot of time and effort and money. Two of those three are exactly what SCO doesn't have a whole lot of any more.
But the bottom line is, what's good for the goose is good for the gander. Litigation is, like any other human interaction, reflective of how you act. That is, if you are polite and civil and play fair, the other side usually will too. If they don't, then the other side will match you.
As one attorney said once when we were in negotiations, "If it's love, it's love. If it's war, it's war. Take your pick." That's essentially what I see in these documents. IBM has been the polite one from the beginning. Now it's war. And SCO is screaming, "Mommy! Mommy!"
Oh, and IBM is also seeking "testing, evaluation, analysis and debugging" materials regarding all the products going back 6 years. They also have asked for such things as the names of SCO personnel most knowledgeable about the discovery matters and "the identity of the original developer and all persons who worked on, and the location of any documents regarding, the development of configurable monitors and recovery schemes in such product" for all Configurable High Availability Product acquired by and thus not originally developed by SCO. See what I mean? And I haven't even listed the half of what IBM is asking for.
Litigation is, as I have said, a conversation with the judge. But it's also a conversation between the two sides' attorneys. I hear IBM saying to SCO, fine. Let's both be burdened by having to get busy pouring through mountains of documents in this stupid, pointless lawsuit. SCO objects "insofar as it causes annoyance, oppression, undue burden, or expense to SCO." Excuse me while I laugh out loud. Annoyance, oppression, undue burden and expense, as far as I've been able to tell, are the four horsemen of SCO's entire legal strategy.
SCO Ping!
As any self respecting lawyer would tell you, your suggestion is fraught with ambiguity and incapable of application or even discernment of original intent. And lawyers are fundamentally good about protecting their own butts, which means that 99.9% of them would read the rules you set out, form in a circle in which their butts faced inward, and begin firing or alternately suing anyone on the outside.
Discovery applies only to entities that have big bucks and can afford it!
*whine*
*Whine*
Looks like IBM's getting quite p!ssed off at SCO, and retaliating to SCO's antics. They've been pretty nice on discovery up until now.
Yeah. I can sense the gloves starting to be untied just before they come off.
SCO further objects specifically to Topic No. 1 because, by seeking "Each version and release of each Click-Wrap Product," the topic is overly broad and unduly burdensome.That's hilarious if you've read their earlier motions to compel discovery on IBM. I've enjoyed watching SCO take one position on a subject in one case, and tell exactly the opposite to a judge in another case, but now they're contradicting themselves within the same case.
bttt
SCO had to have seen this coming. I mean, c'mon I'm not even a lawyer and I would have done the same thing. SCO's case is going to become constrained by it's draft and eventually run aground.
What do you guys think about how this will affect the Red Hat case? Will SCO's delay plus a possible delay from this one be enough to get the judge to stop the stay?
IANAL, but I would think not. I can't see that all these delays are anything but human frustration, rather than legal frustration. Since the judge has to go with the law, rather than his (possible) frustration over all this, I can't see why he would lift he stay.
Because her stay order said "If, for any reason, that litigation is not progressing in an orderly and efficient fashion, the court may reconsider the stay."
This IBM discovery could be a massive delay not related to the question of tainted Linux, so it might get the RH judge going.
Sure sign of their Leftist leanings.....
IBM has their counterclaims. It's about time they got cracking on those, while SCO still has (money to pay the) lawyers.
M_J_News
Since Jan 26, 2005
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