SCO has valid case

[Peter L. Peres]

On Sat, 23 Aug 2003, Rick Tomaschuk wrote:

> peanuts compared to the long term value it offered. What on earth is
> wrong with a free market? Our whole economy is based on a free market.

This is not about free market, this is about some firm or other dragging
down the good name of Linux and attacking the GPL in a FUD war that
precedes a multi-billion multi-year lawsuit in a country other than the
one where you (I understand) and I (certainly) live, for months on end
(**), where such things are a national passtime apparently.

The FIRST thing that should worry a Linux user/developer is whether the
GPL was violated by someone. Not by whom. Then the second worry would be
to undo the damage asap, first by applying the GPL provisions for
violations of the GPL license, since THIS is the license that was
violated, not some IP ownership or other, about which as a Linux
user/developer you should care only as a second thought. That means
immediate summons from the GPL and FSF (as appropriate) copyright and
license rights owners (such as Linus Torvalds, who owns the copyright on
the majority of the kernel code) to the involved or suspected parties to
cease distribution and use of Linux and of the name Linux (Linux is also a
trademark of Linux Torvalds) until the matter is cleared, and in parallel
an effort to find and remove the code that OFFENDS THE GPL (I do NOT care
who else it offends !) from the Linux codebase, and replace it as
necessary. THIS is what Linux users and developers need.

THEN, when on the side, we can talk about whose made a mistake and who
went along with it, and have all the fud you want, about those firms who
are involved in this. *NOT* about GPL and Linux, which is a *victim* of
misuse by someone of someone else's IP, and not *guilty* of it. Come to
think of it, the GPL copyright holders could sue both big firms for
license violation and slander.

> The world is moving toward globalization. The GPL is a welcome
> addition to our world but we still need to maintain other options. IMHO

The GPL is a welcome addition to what exactly ? It has been here for
nearly 10 years I think. Other options ? As many as you want. But without
the Linux codebase and the GPL, thank you, we will not have them mixed
into the continuous-lawsuit-thing that takes part in a certain country.

{\footnote (**) New Linux versions come out about every 6 months. If the
lawsuit will work as such lawsuits worked until now, it could bog down
Linux development for 6 versions, easily. I do *NOT* want that, badly
enough, to start contributing to a new codebase derived from 2.2, and thus
unaffected by the lawsuit, starting tomorrow. And I know I am not alone on
this. Know thy history, at least so you can avoid past mistakes. 'Waiting
it out' is not a good idea in this case. And I don't care if I have to
call it 'Notlin' or something like that. }

Peter
--
The Toronto Linux Users Group.      Meetings: http://tlug.ss.org
TLUG requests: Linux topics, No HTML, wrap text below 80 columns
How to UNSUBSCRIBE: http://tlug.ss.org/subscribe.shtml