SCO says it's time for Linux users to pay up.

The Register ^ | 21/07/2003 at 15:47 GMT | Ashlee Vance

[amigatec]

SCO is giving the "tainted" Linux users out there a way to clean up their filthy ways via a licensing program that will begin in the coming weeks.

After dolling out threats of legal action, SCO has called on enterprise Linux users to come forward and pay for code the company claims to own. The legal zealots at SCO reckon Linux has grown up too fast by nicking technology such as support for large SMP systems from its copyrighted Unix code. SCO plans to start calling Linux customers this week, asking them to pay up or face the consequences.

"Following the distribution of our letter to the Fortune 1000 and Global 500, many prominent companies using Linux contacted SCO to ask, 'What do you want me to do?'," said Darl McBride, president and CEO, The SCO Group, in a statement. "Today, we're delivering a very clear message to customers regarding what they should do."

Well, it's not all that clear of a message. SCO says the pricing terms for a license will not be announced for weeks. The suspense continues.

SCO's sudden burst of courage comes after it received U.S. copyright registrations for Unix System V source code. The company had been waiting to make sure all its legal bits and pieces were in proper order before kicking off its Linux licensing business.

IBM has been SCO's main target up to this point, but now the company wants to attack all the dirty, open source users out there.

"Today, we're stating that the alleged actions of IBM and others have caused customers to use a tainted product at SCO's expense," McBride said. "With more than 2.4 million Linux servers running our software, and thousands more running Linux every day, we expect SCO to be compensated for the benefits realized by tens of thousands of customers. Though we possess broad legal rights, we plan to use these carefully and judiciously."

Doesn't that put your mind at ease?

After making "no contribution" to the 2.2 Linux kernel, large vendors began dumping hundreds of Unix files into the OS in the 2.4 and upcoming 2.6 Linux kernels, according to SCO. This code has made it possible for Linux to run well not just on the two processor servers where it got its start but on eight, 16, 32 and 64-way boxes.

SCO is demanding that enterprise users pay for this SMP technology, but why?

There are but a few Intel-based boxes that size in existence, and IBM, the main target of SCO, does not even scale to 64 processors as of yet. Linux is most often found on small systems or on clusters of servers. The number of customers benefiting from this Unix code is quite slim.

Still, Linux customers of all shapes and sizes are to pay for all the bells and whistles in the code. SCO says home users and small-time players aren't on its immediate legal horizon, but contaminated corporate users need to fess up.

"We have a solution here that gets you clean," McBride said, in a conference call.

SCO suggests that the dirtiest players of all are companies such as IBM and Red Hat that let users purchase Linux without providing an OS warranty. SCO continues to put pressure on IBM to help its customer base out and take on the Linux IP costs.

SCO also added a little pressure to Linus Torvalds. Up to this point, SCO has been attacking IBM on contractual issues which left Torvalds out of the fray. With the new copyright claims, however, SCO says Torvalds may come under attack.

"As of today, it is a different game," McBride said. "We are not saying Linus created the problems, but he inherited them."

SCO claims it has a well thought out plan for licensing the Unix IP but remains reluctant to provide any details on the costs a business may face. The lack of information here leaves a nasty air of intrigue hanging over the matter, and we think SCO should speak up sooner rather than later. ®

[amigatec]

This man is a bigger fool than I thought. This is going to get even crazier.

[amigatec]

Calling all Penguins!!

[dr_who_2]

To think he could be one ruling away from getting away with this.

[isthisnickcool]

SCO also added a little pressure to Linus Torvalds. Up to this point, SCO has been attacking IBM on contractual issues which left Torvalds out of the fray. With the new copyright claims, however, SCO says Torvalds may come under attack.

I first ran across Linus in 1991. That boy is wicked smart. Smarter than everyone at SCO and certainly smarter than David Boise. SCO knows that. They have been wise enough to keep away from Linus. This looks like desperation to me.

[Wonder Warthog]

"After dolling out threats of legal action, SCO has called on enterprise Linux users to come forward and pay for code the company claims to own."

Just a scam by a bunch of lawyer con artists UNTIL the courts settle whether or not SCO actually DOES "own the code".

[Jack Black]

OK, just for the sake of discussion let us stipulate that:

An engineer at a Very Large Computer company was asked to work on the getting Linux (a key strategic initative to blunt Microsoft for this Very Large Computer company) to "fix" Linux so that it ran well on bigger machines, which were a speciality of the VLC Co. Lets say that he was lazy, or tired, or overworked, or upset because his job was being outsorced, and for what ever reason didn't think about IP, patents, etc. but just grabbed a bunch of code that he had from VLC's other project and dumped it into Linux.

Only later it turns out that code wasn't owned by VLC, but was licensed. But it's too late, the code is everywhere because Linux publishes source. The License holder is unhappy, the contract said licensees would "protect" it's assets.

If this happened (SCO says it did, but may be wrong, I suppose) here are the questions:

Does SCO deserve compensation from VLC?

Does SCO deserve compensation form people using Linux? If not why not?

Does Linux (the organization) need to compensate SCO for misuse of their property?

Do other companies making money off of the Linux w/ misappropriated IP in it need to pay SCO?

[Jack Black]

Rather than argue about the actual facts, which we can not determine I think it is interesting to stipulate the facts (for the sake of discussion) and answer the 4 questions as if the stipulated facts are true.

This gets us to the crux of some interesting questions on IP I believe. I'd appreciate people answering the 4 questions.

[Jack Black]

BTW: If you answer the 4 questions yes, then the SCO suit makes sense. I have assumed from day 1 that they have the "smoking gun" otherwise they are truely insane. By smoking gun I mean they have exact duplicated line by line examples of misappropriated code.

What I find interesting is many people answer the 4 questions no. Just like people don't see file-sharing as a crime. As we've seen with Napster though, judges aren't real influenced by Wired or the EFF and tend to stick to the law.

[Nick Danger]

SCO creates an interesting box for itself doing this. By asking for money to run "linux," SCO must assert that the presence of its code in linux (that itself is an unproven claim, and will be until the IBM suit is decided) makes "linux" an SCO property. Anyone threatened by SCO with litigation unless they pay can choose to go to court and dispute the SCO claim to linux.

Here's the fun part: if SCO loses, then they were wrong all along and they could presumably be made to return whatever license fees they had collected. However if SCO wins, then the GPL is abrogated, and all the hundreds of little chunks of copyrighted code belonging to linux contributors fall back to basic copyright law. Now SCO is charging money to license works that are neither GPL'd nor SCO's property. They are, in short, stealing money from all of the hundreds of copyright owners who had previously GPL'd their code. Every one of those people hates SCO's guts, and every one of them has a lawsuit against SCO for stealing their property.

Boies is not so dumb that he wouldn't see this coming, so actually getting to that point cannot be in their action plan. This is just more "pump and dump" on the SCO stock. They will probably accept money if they can find any sheep who wish to be shorn, but the minute they are challenged on this, they have to fold because they lose either way if the case is ever decided.

[ThinkDifferent]

McBride is reminding me more and more of Kim Jong Il. I expect both of them to meet similar fates.

[FreeMeansNoID]

SCO is such a joke. I'm quaking in my boots.

[FreeMeansNoID]

In order to prove their case SCO would have to reveal what code is infringing. At which point we'll just clean-room rewrite it. If it really exists.

[ThinkDifferent]

In order to prove their case SCO would have to reveal what code is infringing.

Exactly. And their refusal to reveal such code means one of two things: either it doesn't exist, or it's so trivial that a halfway competent programmer could reimplement it in an afternoon.

[rdb3]

The Penguin Ping.

Wanna be Penguified? Just holla!

Got root?

[dr_who_2]

Anyone who is not knowingly using SCO owned code should not be held responsible for the actions of this engineer. Said engineer should be held responsible for stealing. Any code belonging to SCO should be removed from the Linux tree, assuming there really is any (Anyone distributing tainted Linux code/binaries after such a ruling is in violation of the law and in danger of being sued unless they pay a license). The burden of proof lies with SCO. The mere fact that Linux may implement SysV-like features with pointers, structures, well-known algorithms, and similar variable names in /usr/include/sys header files proves zilch. The truth lies in data from revision control logs.

[Redcloak]

I hope that more than a few people respond to their phone calls with something like: "But I downloaded my free copy of Linux from your server. That means that I have your permission to use it."

[sigSEGV]

(Anyone distributing tainted Linux code/binaries after such a ruling is in violation of the law and in danger of being sued unless they pay a license)

Which, ironically, includes SCO.

[demlosers]

Are these guys for real??

How are they going to extort money?

[TheEngineer]

In order to prove their case SCO would have to reveal what code is infringing. At which point we'll just clean-room rewrite it...

I doubt it would be that simple. With the SCO source code [allegedly] all over the internet, creating a clean-room environment would be impossible. SCO would undoubtedly make this point in court.

[demlosers]

I'm getting a whiff of a Microsoft weenie behind SCO.