Novell,MS and Xen

Jeffry Smith jsmith at alum.mit.edu
Sat Nov 11 14:54:11 EST 2006


On 11/11/06, Bruce Dawson <jbd at codemeta.com> wrote:
> Not to throw cold water on these well-fanned flames but...
>
> Prediction: Microsoft will buy Novell/SUSE or otherwise acquire all the
> Unix IP and try to litigate Linux/Unix out of business. Then it will
> turn its lawyer cannons on the GPL.
>

Only one problem - I doubt Novell owns all the Unix copyrights.  If
you look at the agreement by which assets were sold by Novell to SCO
(Santa Cruz Operation - not the new The SCO Group, former Caldera), it
very carefully does NOT spell out what Unix copyrights Novell owns.
Original excludes all copyrights, amendment two offers to transfer at
a future time those required for SCO to carry out the agreement - it
does NOT specify what those are.

Why would they be so careful to NOT spell it out?  Again, look at Unix
history, especially in light of the now-revealed BSD agreeement.
Original Unix copyright was probably so many different ways, no one
owns it all.  At best, Novell could grant sublicensing, but didn't own
it.  So, if Novell doesn't own it, MS buying Novell doesn't grant it
to them.

And, it makes no difference to Linux anyway.  No patents left (over 20
years), Trademark to The Open Group, no trade secrets.  That leaves
copyrights.  Which Linux doesn't violate.

So keep on developing -

jeff


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