Linux community told to 'get real'

[bhoggett]

@Wolfe

Or it might be that a lot of important and powerful people are sh*t-scared that their blatant lies will be exposed as such and the Iraq war will be seen as what it really was: a blatant military conquest motivated by political and economic self-interest.

As for the article in question, it's not biased, just based on misleading assumptions. They are assuming the Linux community is against SCO for defending their copyright, when in fact the community is against SCO because the indications are that they are lying their heads off.

I'd rather listen to the BBC than US based news services like Fox News, who are nothing more than a jingoistic propaganda channel, or privately owned channels who are obliged to reflect their patron's political and economic opinions.

[bhoggett]

@Targhan

First things first. What exactly is SCO claiming was "copied"?

Some code from UNIX was supposedly copied into the Linux kernel. SCO say this was done by IBM, but they are refusing to divulge further details. Even the heavily disfigured snippets of code they have supposedly shown fail to prove their case.

Next, where should (not is) their blame be pointed to?

If their allegations were true, then the blame should be pointed at IBM. At first, this is what they did because they wanted to invite (force?) a buyout bid from them, but then they received a bribe from Microsoft (in the form of MS buying a license they didn't have any use for) to turn the fight into an anti-Linux one.

Finally, why is it that the users got drug into it?

Because SCO chose to do so. The fact is that the only effective way to hurt Linux is to attack the users. Also, threatening users who have no access to the evidence of the case is easier than threatening IBM who know what they did or did not do.

GPL is fairly clear, and a user only has that to go on when the acquire a Linux Distrobution.

True, but any license is only as binding as the legality of the original contribution allows. If IBM illegally contributed code they did not own under the GPL, then the GPL license as applied to that code is void.  Unfortunately, a user buying "in good faith" is not necessarily a good enough defense.

I do want to add that it is utterly disgusting, in my opinion, for ANY reporting body to attack USERS.

In this case, it's a question of hitting soft targets. It's the software industry equivalent of a military attack on civilian targets in order to turn popular opinion against its own side for causing or prolonging the war. Software terrorism, you might say.