[CLUE-Talk] Why SCO still sucks...

[Kirk Rafferty]

On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 05:51:09PM -0600, Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier wrote:
> I'm curious -- does anyone actually believe that SCO has a case? I can't
> wait for this to get to court where SCO actually has to produce some
> evidence of their claims. 

They have a case if they're really telling the truth, and if there really
are signifigant amounts of Unixware code that made it into the Linux
CVS tree.

It's not so hard to believe that a disgruntled (or perhaps slightly
anarchic) coder who had access to the Unixware sourcecode decided that he
didn't give a damn about silly things like licenses.  All he's got to
do is cut and paste some code, and bada-bing!  Instant deed and title to
his own little plot on the noosphere.  Or, if you're a conspiricy theorist,
maybe this has been in the works for some time, and SCO had their code
"planted" in Linux.  The point is, it's certainly possible that SCO could
be right.

The greatest strenght of the GPL in general, and Linux specifically,
is also it's weakness: Anyone can submit code, and it's right out there
in the open for everyone to see.  *Anyone* can submit code.  There are no
checks, other than Linus saying it's crap or it's not crap.  This is what
Microsft means when they say that Linux is a liability because nobody
"owns" it.  Right or wrong, it's a powerful argument, and SCO have already
hurt Linux by simply pointing it out.  C[EFI]O's all over the world are
bound to be taking another look at Linux, but now with a jaded eye.

Having said all that, my feeling is that there's a really good chance
that SCO are simply blowing hot air.  But simply by bringing up the
possibility that Linux is contaminated makes their hot air an effective
scorched earth weapon.

-k