Linux under siege, geeks called into battle

Linux under siege, geeks called into battle

Vishnu K. Mahmud, Contributor, Jakarta, vmahmud@yahoo.com

If there's one thing many people despise, it's bullies. Be it
those who use weapons to terrorize innocent people or nation-
states that cause collateral damage during invasions, a bully is
still a bully. Which is precisely what the world's Linux
community may be facing right now.

Linux is an open-source operating system, making it free for
programmers to download, modify and share source code with
others. Any problems or bugs can immediately be eradicated and
tested by practically anyone, to ensure security and
cohesiveness. The system's entire source code is also open for
inspection, to make sure that no one has tampered with it by
inserting viruses or Trojan horse programs.

With this community zeal, Linux has managed to capture the
hearts of people and corporations looking for an alternative,
secure and cost-effective operating system.

Suddenly, this idealistic digital commune finds itself under
the barrel of a rather nasty legal battle. The Santa Cruz
Operation (www.sco.com) have declared that portions of the Linux
kernel (the heart of the operating system) contained some parts
of their UNIX proprietary code that was illegally incorporated.

The company is also suing IBM for US$3 billion due to its
"concentrated efforts to improperly destroy the economic value of
UNIX, particularly UNIX on Intel, to benefit IBM's new Linux
services business." They have accused IBM of inserting the SCO
code into Linux.

In addition, SCO issued letters to 1,500 large companies
claiming that Linux is an unauthorized derivative of UNIX and
that they may face legal risks as users for copyright violations.
SCO recently offered a licensing scheme for Linux end-users ($699
now, $1399 in October 2003) to ensure compliance. Some see it as
a "pay us and we won't sue you" kind of deal.

With this legal cloud in the air, many companies are getting
worried about being in the middle of an intellectual property
battle. SCO have so far refused to identify the offending code in
Linux (except under a nondisclosure agreement), nor have they
issued evidence that the said code is officially theirs. Which is
rather ironic since SCO themselves have sold their own version of
Linux (with the offending code) under the General Public License
(GPL), the cornerstone of the open-source movement.

With the trial of the case against IBM set for 2005, there is
still plenty of time to sow fear, uncertainty and doubt about the
viability of open-source software. Linux's competitors are no
longer talking about its overall total cost of ownership,
reliability or security, but about its potential copyright
liabilities.

Is Linux doomed? Far from it. Red Hat (www.redhat.com), one of
the world's top Linux distributors and solutions providers, has
filed a lawsuit against SCO, basically telling itup or shutover
does he meant "it to put up or shut up over"? its copyright
allegations. Red Hat entered the fray after seeing many of its
customers becoming increasingly worried about potential legal
liabilities.

According to Red Hat's general counsel Mark Webbink, SCO's
unsubstantiated and untrue public statements attack Red Hat Linux
and the integrity of the open-source software development
process. They also want to ensure the protection of their user's
legal rights, noting that the collaborative process of the open-
source software movement has been unjustly questioned and
threatened.

Red Hat has also said they are always careful about
intellectual property rights and would correct any mistakes
found. With the help of the open-source community, those
corrections could be done immediately, taking mere days, if not
hours, to devise a program around it and to patch.

IBM has also countersued SCO, saying they violated the Free
Software Foundation's (www.fsf.org) GPL license. According to a
FSF statement, the fact that SCO themselves distributed the Linux
kernel under GPL through their Caldera Linux meant they had
licensed "anyone, anywhere, to copy, modify and redistribute that
code." The fact that the code was always open for inspection
makes some people wonder why they didn't catch it in the first
place.

Linux geeks at the popular Slashdot (www.slashdot.org) website
have also condemned SCO's moves. Some even say these legal
maneuvers and accusations are part of the company's "pump and
dump" strategy to raise their stock in order to sell it for a
profit. Formerly a penny stock, SCO stock is now in the $11
range.

Frank Hayes, a senior news columnist at Computerworld
(www.computerworld.com) noted the company recently purchased
Vultus Inc. with newly issued SCO stock, whose price gets a boost
whenever a new threat is issued. Is this a battle about
intellectual property or a cynical play on the dotcom era's stock
bubble as revenue to gain profits?

In any event, sales of Linux products and servers since the
lawsuit began have continued to climb. Governments in Germany,
Brazil and Chile are using Linux, as are many Fortune 500
companies. Most are confident about the viability of open-source
software and are ready to lend a hand in the battle if needed.

Is this a case of David (SCO) versus Goliath (IBM), or an evil
empire against a rebellion alliance (Linux)? Only time will tell,
but as an IT Manager for a major American bank noted, there are
too many Linux users now, and they won't stand idle while their
open-source movement is destroyed by proprietary software. Linux
users can easily create their own software en masse quickly and
securely within the confines of intellectual property rights law.