SCO: Portrait of a loser

So, SCO. Where to begin? It is now such a twisted, tangled, jumbled mess, that if you haven't been following the situation since it broke last year, it is going to seem extremely confusing now. As The Dude would say, "this is a complicated situation; lotta ins, lotta outs".

The situation is the latest shining example of corporate "Intellectual Property" claims gone stark, raving mad. Here's the short version: SCO is a washed-up company that backed the wrong horse a few years ago. They essentially own no concrete intellectual property, but they do have a financial interest in UNIX that they have been attepting to finesse into an impression of something resembling ownership control over all things UNIX and UNIX-like, including especially GNU/Linux, the popular Free Software OS. They are attempting this both in the courts, and in the court of public opinion. They've had a pretty wild ride, but the endgame is near, and it appears that it's going to be checkmate for dear old SCO.

Let's start with a little history. SCO is short for "The SCO Group", a company based in Lindon, Utah. They were formerly known as Caldera Systems. There was another company named "The Santa Cruz Operation" (SCO for short) that did some very nice UNIX work, developing their UnixWare OS for Intel hardware (i.e., PC's). At some point, this "old" SCO renamed itself "Tarantella" and sold the SCO brand and UnixWare to Caldera. Shortly after that, Caldera hired a new CEO named Darl McBride, and renamed itself The SCO Group.

Confused yet? Caldera Systems was a Linux company. Let's be very clear about that. They had their own version of Linux which they distributed for years, under the terms of the GPL. When Caldera purchased UnixWare from oldSCO, they did so with the publically proclaimed intention of bringing some enterprise-level functionality from UnixWare, into Linux. Let's also be quite clear about that.

Unfortunately for Caldera, the tech bubble burst just as their little UnixWare/Linux mind-meld was getting underway. Their Linux business tanked, and they were forced to reinvent themselves. That's when this guy Darl McBride took the helm. Charged with turning the company around, he examined their list of assets. Now I can't claim to know what McBride's train of thought was, but I like to think it went something like this:

"Okay. We own UnixWare, but nobody seems to want it anymore because of this darned Linux thing, which is now way better than UnixWare, and --get this-- it's free! What the hell? Whatever happened to 'you get what you pay for'? How is it possible that a bunch of hobbyists are kicking our butts? Anyway, I can't wrap my Econ-101 mind around that, so I'll just set it aside for now. What else do we own? Well, we have this contract with Novell (who now own the copyrights to the original Unix developed by AT&T). It says that we get to help them license UNIX to people in return for 5% of the licensing revenue. Hmm, not much of a deal for us, since nobody wants to buy UNIX anymore! Gah, that Linux thing strikes again! I don't get it, how can it develop so quickly if most people working on it aren't paid? How can it be such a stupendous badass? Ah, nevermind. Focus, McBride! We need options here!

"Could ride the Linux train. I bet there's some good gravy there; all those fools develop it for nothing, then we get to rake in the profits! Nah, I guess they tried that already when Ransom Love was in charge. Didn't work out for some reason. Anyway, I need something bold. A new page. Something that will really shake things up...

"Wait a minute, wait a minute! This Linux, it's kind of like UNIX, right? Well, Novell put us in charge of licensing UNIX to people, and we never licensed anything to those damned hippies! I bet Novell is going to be pissed when they figure it out! Better yet, let's have a look at this contract. Ah ha. If you close one eye, squint the other, and read it backwards in a darkened room, it almost seems like Novell granted us ownership rights over UNIX, and didn't just outsource licensing duties to us! Heck, that means all these Linux weirdos owe us big time! But they'll never go for it. It's too flimsy. But it's all we have. We need to start yammering to the press about how we own all things UNIX, and how Linux probably, like, copied all of their good stuff from us. It's like what's-his-name said, if you want people to believe your lies, you just repeat them over and over, right? Who said that again? Anyway, some smart guy. Then, once the idea gets a toe-hold, we send out invoices to known Linux users. Hundreds of them. Heck, thousands! Some sucker will bite. Then we'll use that sucker as leverage against the rest. Like dominos, they'll all cave in eventually! That's so crazy, it just might work!

"And what's this here about 'Project Monterey'. Some thing Caldera did with IBM. Looks like they were trying to unify their two versions of UNIX, to make it easier for businesses to interoperate. Hey, but wait a minute! IBM has since gone on to develop enterprise features for Linux (God, who woulda pegged Big Blue as a hippie-hugger?); I bet they probably definitely stole some of our junk from Project Monterey and stuck it right into Linux! Ha! That's it! The 'Piece of Resistance', as the French say! WE'LL SUE IBM!!!!11one1"

And the rest, as they say, is history. Ever since, SCO has been tap-dancing in court, trying to delay the inevitable clock-cleaning that they are going to receive from IBM's legendary lawyers. In the public eye, they have been very actively shouting their outlandish "Linux copied everything from us!" claims, and even more actively not showing any evidence whatsoever to back it up.

Here's another account of this history, which is extremely clever IMO, but if you aren't pretty familiar with IRC, you might not get it.

Thee's a lot more to the story, but I think I'll just leave it here for now. For more information, I highly recommend Groklaw, which is bringing the concept of Open Source to the world of the Law. When the story of SCO's destruction is told, the tireless efforts of PJ and the other Groklawyers will be a crucial component.