Ownership of Unix copyright headed to trial

[Quadophile]

The future of Linux? Open source in question? Will we have to pay? Only time will tell.

August 25, 2009

By P. SOLOMON BANDA
Associated Press Writer

DENVER (AP) - A federal appeals court on Monday reversed a judge's decision that granted the copyright of the Unix computer operating system to Novell Inc.

A three-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a judge erred in August 2007 by granting the copyright to Novell. The panel ordered a trial to determine ownership.

Novell, a software and computer infrastructure company, has been locked in a yearslong legal battle with The SCO Group Inc. of Lindon, Utah, over ownership to the copyright.

SCO said the ruling paves the way for resumption of the court case.

SCO filed for bankruptcy protection in 2007, drained by unsuccessfully filing lawsuits claiming its software code was misappropriated by developers of the open-source Linux operating system.

"For us it's a case of survival, of protecting what we own." SCO chief executive Darl McBride told The Associated Press.

Part of the Unix computer code, which was developed by AT&T in 1969, is used in the Linux operating system.

McBride said the development and distribution of Linux has caused the company's revenues to drop from $250 million a year to $15 million, forcing the company to file for bankruptcy.

"There are 20 million versions of Linux running around the world," McBride said, referring to his estimate of company servers using Linux. "Linux at the end of the day is a knock off of our Unix."

Novell has operations in Provo, Utah, and Waltham, Mass. A Novell spokesman did not return a message seeking comment.

SCO has another lawsuit pending against IBM Corp., claiming Big Blue's Unix license for IBM's core AIX system was canceled in 2003 and IBM improperly gave away Unix source code for use in Linux.

McBride said the appellate panel's ruling reinstates SCO's claims against IBM, most which had been dismissed because of Novell's claim to the Unix copyright. A message left after business hours for IBM was not immediately returned.

Trial dates for SCO's lawsuits against Novell and IBM have not been set. Both cases are pending in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City.

 

[floppybootstomp]

That could be interesting.

Supposing people had to pay for Linux? Would people still use it?

I know companies already pay for server distros and if SCO were to win their case I'd imagine they would be entitled to a percentage of every Linux Server Software sale. Which would probably result in a price increase but I personally don't think it would affect professional sales much.

What's interesting is how it might affect personal user distros. It's already a difficult enough choice whether to use Linux or not because of it's user unfriendliness when it's free, would people actually pay to use it?

Maybe everybody would just stick with the distro they're using at the time SCO may win their case and not update.

 

[Abarbarian]

More news here,

http://www.h-online.com/open/SCO-vs-Linux-Unix-copyright-dispute-enters-the-next-round--/news/114079

Even if the case goes to trial, don't forget this is happening in the USA so it will take years for a decision to be reached, maybe even a decade. So nothing to worry about for a while yet.

 

[Urmas]

*yawn*

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_SCO-Linux_controversies

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCO-Linux_controversies

 

[Quadophile]

I hope it takes a decade or two the way the timeline is currently. This has been going on for half a decade already.

 

[Urmas]

From the archives:

Jul 13, 2003

Mar 07, 2004

Oct 17, 2004

May 22, 2005

And so on... http://www.userfriendly.org/cartoons/archives/