Yep, it had to happen. SCO are out and singing the SCO drinking song again , sue sue sue sue, sue sue sue sue (have you learned the words yet?).
Considering the recent Novell moves, it’s not at all surprising that SCO have in fact sued Novell over their copyright filings.
On the one hand, SCO really had to take this step regardless of whether it was smart or not: If any of the other cases had gone to court with the copyright claims ove Novell unresolved, the cases would have been tossed out.
I think this means that on the SCO timeline, this issue really must get resolved before the RedHat, IBM (and end users?) cases get to the courthouse.
The Filing by SCO reads:
Novell has improperly filed copyright registrations in the United States Copyright Office for UNIX technology covered by SCO’s copyrights.
Novell has made false and misleading public claims that it, and not SCO, owns the UNIX and UnixWare copyrights.
Novell has made false statements with the intent to cause customers and potential customers to not do business with SCO.
Novell has attempted, in bad faith, to block SCO’s ability to enforce its copyrights.
Novell’s false and misleading representations that it owns the UNIX and UnixWare copyrights has caused SCO irreparable harm to its copyrights, its business, and its reputation.
The lawsuit, filed in Utah State court, in Salt Lake City, requests preliminary and permanent injunctive relief as well as damages. The injunction would require Novell to assign to SCO all copyrights that Novell has wrongfully registered, prevent Novell from representing any ownership interest in those copyrights, and require Novell to retract or withdraw all representations it has made regarding its purported ownership of those copyrights.
“‘SCO takes this action today given Novell’s recent and repeated announcements regarding their claimed ownership of the UNIX and UnixWare copyrights. SCO has received many questions about Novell’s actions from potential customers, investors and the press. Although SCO owns the UNIX and UnixWare copyrights, Novell’s efforts to claim ownership of these copyrights has forced this action,’ said Mark Heise, partner, Boies, Schiller and Flexner, LLP. ‘We encourage the public and commercial Linux users to read the Asset Purchase Agreement from 1995 (including Attachment E found at www.sco.com/novell) and Amendment 2 so they can see for themselves that SCO owns the copyrights to UNIX and UnixWare.'”
“The lawsuit seeks damages in an amount to be proven at trial for Novell’s alleged slander of SCO’s title to the UNIX and UnixWare copyrights. In addition, the lawsuit seeks punitive damages in an amount to be proven at trial for Novell’s malicious and willful conduct.”
The general community is now rubbing their hans a bit here: This is yet another legal front on which SCO are going to have to fight. It’s generally accepted now that they are doomed to be nothing but a litigation company: No new products will come out of the Utah company.
Indeed, to support this, look how old System 5 is anyway: No major changes since 1988 (Yes, 1988!). Look how far Linux has come in it’s first 10 years and it’s easy to see why it’s all over for Unix as an OS.
All the major Hardware vendors traditionally relying un sub-licenses of Unix now offer Linux options. All. Not some. You do the math.