Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 09:34:36 +0200 From: Willie Viljoen <will@highveldcs.com> To: mikel king <mikel.king@ocsny.com> Cc: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: trouble brewing over the UNIX thing again... (was on freebsd-questions, moved to freebsd-chat) Message-ID: <200301240934.36578.will@highveldcs.com> In-Reply-To: <3E309AA0.3020705@ocsny.com> References: <3E309AA0.3020705@ocsny.com>
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> Here's a thought what about the intellectual property that the've enjoy > at the expense of all of the BSD's? What would happen if the BSD world > recinded the rights to TCP/IP and demanded compensation for it's use > from say everyone? Mike, the rights to IP itself are with DARPA, so we couldn't recind it, b= ut,=20 UCB designed the origional UNIX IP stack (which could be installed as a=20 supliment to AT&T UNIX as part of the patch set then known as BSD). If we= =20 recinded that, even MS would have to pay up for including the code in Win= dows=20 2000. Ofcourse, nice thought as it may be, we are far too nice to do that. The = BSD=20 community has always taken pride in beating out the compettition with=20 overwhelmingly superior technology. Sueing all your compettitors is a=20 kindergarten business tactic only employed by companies who rely on old,=20 proprietary technology that nobody wants anymore, and are making huge los= ses=20 still trying to sell that old technology. IMHO, the money SCO would be=20 spending on trying to sue every UNIX-like OS developer in the world would= be=20 better spent on developing a product we actually want. Developing products we want has not been their strong point in the past. = SCO=20 Unixware (the origional SCO, The Santa Cruz Operation) was rather handy, = this=20 is ofcourse not the SCO we are dealing with today, ie, what used to be=20 Caldera. I don't think I know one person who ever willingly used Caldera=20 Linux, or anybody who actually bothered to buy their proprietary CDE desk= top=20 environment. Why would we want to? We could download a free ISO with the = same=20 thing, and having the same level of sickening userfriendlyness, from Red = Hat =20 I wouldn't be caught dead using RH, still, it's handy for making a point. Still, from the new SCO's point of view, that's probably a bad business p= lan,=20 ie, making money the honest way. Why eat into McBride's salary to spend l= ots=20 of money, and lots of time, researching new technology, when they can jus= t=20 spend their shareholders' money quickly and sue everyone into paying them= =20 "royaltees" for what might be their intilectual property, but most certai= nly=20 is not their work. From a BMW-driver's perspective, it's a brilliant busi= ness=20 model, apart from a legal team, you need no employees at all. That works just wonderfully for management. They don't like engineers=20 remember, most engineers are smarter than most management, management don= 't=20 like employees that don't think their manager is an all knowing all seein= g=20 entity of universal power which has the final authority on everything. If= =20 managers had their way, they'd be regulating when we are allowed to relie= ve=20 ourselves. Just think about seeing this on your office wall: "Employees w= ill=20 not use company sanitation facilities more than once a day. Failure to co= mply=20 will result in manegarial centure of the employee, and complete revocatio= n of=20 sanitation facility privilages." Back to the point, I can't see how this will go very far. Simply looking = at=20 Boies' track record, in the words of a slashdot poster who's name has sli= pped=20 my mind, but credit where it's due: "Boies is living proof that high prof= ile=20 failures will do more for your career than low profile successes." The only thing that could possibly be acumplished by SCO is a new line of= =20 Microsoft anti-UNIX (and specifically anti-Linux) propaganda. Just when t= hey=20 stopped calling it a cancer, and started to rather attempt to bring out t= he=20 advantages to Windows (if there are truly such things). Now, I'm just wai= ting=20 for TV adds saying: "Microsoft's software is 100% origional, we guarantee= no=20 problems with copyright liability." This doesn't cover the thousands of l= ines=20 of code, which rumours say, were procured by less than honerable means, o= r=20 the practice of seeing a good product, buying out the creator for a huge=20 ammount, and then marketing the product as their own. Ofcourse, I wouldn'= t=20 want to be caught spreading rumours about them, they might sue me, oh hec= k,=20 I've used some of their privately owned words in my e-mail, oh my, they m= ight=20 sue me.... Let's just all remember where the only good product they ever=20 sold, MS-DOS, really came from. Yet again, I deviate from the topic. To get back to the issue at hand, I = want=20 to alude briefly to a sugestion that's popped up in a few strange places.= =20 That being, the open source community setting up a consortium (if we get=20 thousands of people to donate, it's not that expensive is it?) and simply= =20 putting SCO/Caldera out of its misery by a hostile takeover. It's a nasty= =20 tactic generally employed by evil MonopoliStic types, but in this case, i= t=20 would let duped shareholders get back some of their money, and give the n= ew=20 board, elected by the new shareholders, us, the right to wave all their=20 intilectual property rights, and maybe use the company's employees and=20 resources for something nice, like say, research. Anyone for SCO stock? Now, as all management think we should be doing, I'll add a standard=20 disclaimer to my e-mail. Almost all of this is just my own personal ranti= ngs.=20 If you take this letter seriously, your are stupid. The content of this=20 message is not neciserally the view of all engineers, most of us just lov= e=20 management, really. This message is posted in the hope of promoting=20 histerical laughter with all readers, if you did not find it funny, or fe= el=20 offended by anything I have posted, I would like to express my sincerest=20 apologies that the terrible genetic imbalance responsible for your inabil= ity=20 to process humor has so profoundly affected you and would like to advise = you=20 that medication is available for this condition. There we go, I've gotten everybody's two cents worth, that'll do for the = day.=20 If you would like more nonsensical ranting and random abuse hurled at lar= ge=20 corporations, please contact will@highveldcs.com, I am always available f= or=20 unfriendly comments. Will --=20 Willie Viljoen IT Solutions Consultant Highveld Computing Solutions 214 Paul Kruger Avenue, Universitas Bloemfontein 9321 South Africa +27 51 522 15 60 +27 51 522 44 36 (after hours) +27 82 404 03 27 (mobile) will@highveldcs.com Be ahead of the pack, visit http://www.highveldcs.com/ and find out how o= ur=20 next generation IT solutions will propel your business into the 21st cent= ury. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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