ServerWatch: Enterprise Unix Roundup: Shopping for Peace of Mind at the SCO Store

"Now, we no longer have to leave home to shop for Linux stuff because SCO has opened up its online Linux license store. The store is peddling licenses to Linux, licenses SCO says are necessary to remedy the IP infringements it claims are widespread throughout the operating system.

"So what's peace of mind going for these days? About $700 per CPU, according to SCO, with some discounts for those running 8-way systems (although there's an inexplicable $49 gouge over the base price of a single CPU once you go over eight processors).

"SCO's also provided a handy FAQ to answer all of your questions, including some pressing ones raised by Free Software Foundation counsel Eben Moglen that we dutifully passed along a few weeks ago.

"Perhaps the most alarming part of the FAQ is question number 17, which we're tempted to begin calling the 'Teen Slasher Movie Clause.' Here, SCO asserts its right to continue suing people even if IBM manages to deflect every one of its charges in the suit in which the two companies are embroiled. With Zen-like calm (or Jason-like implacability), SCO asserts that the IBM suit will not settle the issue of whether SCO's code is really in Linux or not. So that question, and thus the theory on which SCO is trying to sell licenses, seems like it might well involve another suit or two when SCO finally gets around to trying to enforce its license in the courts. That enforcement, by the way, is due 'real soon now...'"

Complete Story

Related Stories:

• ServerWatch: Enterprise Unix Roundup: What's in a License? XFree's Instructive Flap(Feb 21, 2004)
• ServerWatch: Enterprise Unix Roundup: A Red Hat Retrospective(Oct 27, 2003)
• Enterprise Unix Roundup: Solaris x86 Resurgent, Sun's Side of the Story(Oct 18, 2003)