LinuxTag Sends Cease-and-Desist to SCO

(Forwarded from Pho list)

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: pho: Linux community organization sends SCO a cease-and-desist
letter
Date: Mon, 26 May 2003 19:03:17 +0200
From: Michael Kleinhenz <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]


http://www.linuxtag.org/2003/en/press/releases.xsp?id=3

Lawyers representing the LinuxTag association have given notice to SCO Group
GmbH to desist from unfair competitive practices. The notice, dated Friday,
May 23, maintains that SCO Group is sowing uncertainty among the community
of GNU/Linux users, developers and suppliers. "SCO needs to stop claiming
that the standard Linux kernel violates its copyrights, or they need to lay
the evidence for their claim on the table," said LinuxTag's Michael
Kleinhenz.

The association demanded that the German SCO subsidiary retract its claims
regarding ownership of Linux kernel code by this Friday, May 30, or make its
evidence public. "SCO must not be allowed to damage its competitors by
unsubstantiated claims, to intimidate their customers, and to inflict
lasting damage on the reputation of GNU/Linux as an open platform,"
Kleinhenz added.

Until a few weeks ago, SCO itself distributed the Linux kernel GNU General
Public License (GPL) as a member of the UnitedLinux alliance. Thus even if
SCO owns parts of the Linux kernel, it has made them into Free Software by
distributing them under the GPL.

"This situation illustrates the superiority of the Free Software licensing
model: If a software manufacturer withdraws from the development of GPL
software, its contributions that were published under the the GPL up to that
time remain available to users," said Jürgen Siepmann, attorney and founding
member of LinuxTag. Till Jaeger, Director of the Institute for Legal Aspects
of Free and Open Source Software, agrees: "Companies see this as an
important pillar of investment security." 

-- 
Michael Kleinhenz              LinuxTag 2003 - Europes largest Linux Expo
[email protected]                           http://www.linuxtag.org/
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