On Thu, Jun 16, 2005 at 05:24:44PM -0700, Russ Johnson wrote: > >Tell that to a certain company based in Utah who at last check had more > >lawyers than programmers and claimed that they OWNED Linux and all of its > >ancestors.. > > > Yeah, and if Linux suddenly becomes a bad thing to run, there's any of > the BSDs, and now Solaris.
Said company claimed it owned those too. > Not to mention several other OSes out there. Yeah? Like what exactly? The UNIX platforms are the only viable alternative to Windows on x86 hardware. Everything else has fallen flat so far. > Besides the fact the the alluded to company is shooting themselves in > the foot, would linux really go away if they were somehow able to prove > their case? > > I think not. You're missing the point--you said that licenses weren't a big deal, but they are both what the aforementioned comany used to claim their position as owner of Linux and all things UNIX _and_ the rest of the world used to prove their claims were simply equine excrement in large quantity. This notion that you can do whatever you like because you're not likely to be sued--the same notion I fought against back in 1998--is even more obviously ridiculous today now that media companies have shown us how to really screw with people who infringe Copyrights. (Failure to meet the terms of a license agreement is a Copyright infringement after all.) This doesn't necessarily mean that you will obey the terms of any given license, just that you should beware of what you're agreeing to. (On another topic, has anyone else read the standard forms they have you sign anymore when you go to see a doctor or go into the hospital? Their "standard", "boilerplate" stuff isn't exactly.) _______________________________________________ EUGLUG mailing list [email protected] http://www.euglug.org/mailman/listinfo/euglug
