Open Source Weblog

In his article, Vaughan-Nichols, noted a recent CBR story about (as he put it) "SCO accusing IBM of destroying evidence". Actually, the story was about IBM’s response to SCO accusing IBM of destroying evidence.

The difference is important and explains why CBR will continue to track the case. As is pointed out to us in some of the emails we get, CBR reported SCO’s statements at the time – for example "SCO claims IBM destroyed evidence in Unix case" - and it is important to us that we also report IBM’s response.

Throughout this case, IBM has kept its talking to the courtroom, in stark contrast to SCO’s willingness to state its claims in press conferences. Because of this, many of IBM’s responses to SCO’s claims are only now coming to light, months and even years after the initial claim was made.

Once again, it is important to us that we continue to present both sides of the story.

For example, at its SCO Forum event in August 2003 SCO said that it that it had used pattern recognition matching technology to identify 1.1 million lines of Unix code from 1,549 files in the Linux operating system.

It was not until April that IBM accused the Unix vendor of acting in bad faith and willfully failing to comply with court orders for it to detail its evidence and not until June that Magistrate Judge Brooke Wells called SCO’s failure to detail its evidence against IBM 'inexcusable’.

CBR reported these events as they happened, and will soon be bringing you its report on District Judge Dale Kimball rejecting SCO’s objections and affirming Judge Wells’ order (for more of this in the meantime, see Groklaw).

There are many more examples, but probably the best answer if you’re are looking for more recent coverage of SCO’s legal disputes is to look at this list of search results.

It was not surprising to see the email we received this morning was also critical of our coverage of Microsoft’s patent claims against Linux. This is a divisive event that has once again angered many Linux and open source users. Sure, we covered Ballmer’s statements here but we also covered Novell’s response here.

We have also covered various responses to the deal from the Samba team, the SFLC, the OIN, Bruce Perens, Richard Stallman, and Mark Webbink.

It is important for CBR to stay independent on these matters, but where an opinion is called for we will give it, and you can also get a fair idea of my thoughts on this matter here and here.

I have no idea whether Microsoft has a case or not, but the place to make its claims is in the courtroom, not by spreading FUD in customer and press conferences. Should the patent issue make it to court CBR will follow the case, just as it continues to follow SCO versus IBM.

Digg this