SCO vs. Novell; Novell wins.

[Jeffry Smith]

> Not entirely true. Novell waived the copyrights. TSOG still holds the
> contractual rights. While SMP, NUMA, and JFS were developed by IBM (and
> Sequent) under the strict terms of the original AT&T contract these are
> considered derivative works. IBM needs to prove in court that the
> derivative clause does not apply. They signed their perpetual contract
> with AT&T before AT&T sold USL to Novell. This has not yet been
> adjudicated which is why I am including JFS which (IBM claims) was not
> part of AIX. Basically, while Novell owwns the copyrights to the Unix
> source code, TSCOG has the right to manage and sell licenses. This is
> what Santa Cruz bought from Novell.

Actually, Novell has the right to waive those claims, not just the
copyright.  TSCOG is agent for Novell, not owner of the contract
(that's why the contract says 100% to Novell, who remits a 5% fee to
SCO) - TSCOG has ownership of code developed after the sale.  Not the
overall rights.


>> Quick check - SCO is still claiming unfair competition, interference
>> in contracts, and interference in business relationships, based on
>> their last report on the case to the judge, after Judge Kimball ruled
>> for Novell (which it looks like this is the jury trial confirming) -
>> ref:  http://groklaw.net/pdf/IBM-1079.pdf
>>
>> Of course, they have to prove those claims.
>>
> In any case, there are still some rulings left in the SCO vs. Novell
> case that are before Judge Stewart.
>

Agreed - we'll see how it goes.  Of course, Darl's admission on the
stand that they didn't need the copyrights to conduct Unix business
should be pretty devastating to their case.