A Discussion of SCO's Fate With Groklaw's Pamela Jones 84
An anonymous reader writes "The SCO Group's current fate can be neatly summarized by the title of Pamela Jones' very first article on the case, back in May 2003 — 'SCO Falls Downstairs, Hitting its Head on Every Step.' In the intervening years PJ and Groklaw can be credited with unearthing and exposing many of the flaws in SCO's case, most notably, obtaining and publishing the 1994 settlement in the USL vs BSDi case. An article at the ITPro site interviews PJ about SCO, the impact of Groklaw and future of free software and the law."
Give her credit (Score:5, Interesting)
Interesting also in the article: she mentions she saw what's underneath the corporate media and analysts. Yes, there is a lot of corruption there: you can "buy" favorable reviews with quid pro quo. And no one seems to object, that's just the way business is done. It's not so easy to fight: when you are young, you don't have the power to be different, and if you object, you are out on the street. As you get older (and more senior), you finally can object, except by then you have been doing it for years. So that makes you either an hypocrit, or at a minimum people will be able to come after you for past actions. Any solutions?
So just say thanks to Pamela for what she did.
I enjoy slamming the SCO but... (Score:3, Interesting)
On the other hand the majority of the interview about Groklaw and Jones' feelings about it was quite interesting, especially the part discussing democracy and the nature of Groklaw.
PJ's status in the Corporate world (Score:5, Interesting)
Although she does deserve a nice bonus from all the companies that were aided by her efforts.
She made a place where people could discuss and analyze the case, thus enabling many different minds to come together and put their different strengths to greater benefit. You give people access to the info and let them think for themselves, and you give them power. You also get people lining up to try and help.
Both her and Ray (for the RIAA cases) deserve a lot of credit for putting together a compendium of info that would be way too time consuming for people to get for themselves. They see what is going on in different cases, and can connect the dots. While we were in a sense helping out corporations, we were also helping out ourselves, and without the place to go to get the info and a safe place to discuss it, it wouldn't have happened.
So Thanks PJ, you helped open the window to what SCO was trying to do, and showed what they were hiding. And this is why people are afraid of the open source and info movements - they don't want people able to see what they are up to (such as borrowing code, not disclosing hard to find info, etc).
"SCOX is deficient and bankrupt." (Score:3, Interesting)
So, what's this [honeypot.net] all about? The SCOX page in Yahoo! Finance is the only Google result for that phrase. Is this a prankster at Yahoo!, or something more entertaining?
Re:That's one theory... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:An educated public (Score:3, Interesting)
Once in awhile the water cooler talk around my area turns to SCO (among the IT crowd - I've yet to meet any non-IT folks who know about SCO). It's rather interesting that the conversation about SCO's legal wrangling includes a lot of details that never surfaced in any court of law. People have readily confused the court cases with press releases and public statements made by SCO and its agent(s).
This is where Groklaw affecting public perception is important. SCO's outlandish claims have been mostly nullified by information dug up by the efforts of Groklaw. And while people may confuse exactly what is being said where - I've yet to meet anyone who takes any SCO claim seriously.
That Groklaw has surfaced in the actual legal cases in question and is very likely being used as a reference by agents of the court is an additional bonus. Even those agents are part of the "public".
And now, back to Utah: BK judge lifts stay (Score:3, Interesting)
Remember how that went down:
1. Utah judge agrees with Novell in Summary Judgements that SCOX did not get the copyrights, that they owe Novell money, and are guilty of conversion.
2. Novell tells the judge that SCOX is about to go bankrupt and that he should put the money in constructive trust.
3. SCOX successfully convinces the judge that they are NOT about to go bankrupt, and the judge says there is no need before the trial.
4. On the Friday before the trial was to start Monday, 17 September, 2007, SCOX declares bankruptcy in New Jersey, causing an automatic stay in Utah.
5. Novell asks the BK judge to lift the stay.
6. Today, the BK judge agreed.
7. Now the SCOX v. Novell case in Utah will go before that judge, who may not be happy with the way he was very publicly suckered and made to look foolish by SCOX's bankruptcy ploy.
It will be interesting to watch... on Groklaw.