Editing SCO Group (section)

=== "The Most Hated Company in Tech" <span class="anchor" id="The Most Hated Company In Tech"></span> ===
The stakes were high in the battle the SCO Group had started, involving the future of Unix, Linux, and open source software in general.<ref name="iw-if-0">{{cite news | title=SCO Rolls the dice | magazine=InfoWorld | date=September 22, 2003 | page=41}}</ref>  If SCO were to win its legal battles, the results could be extremely disruptive to the IT industry, especially if SCO's notion of derivative works were to be construed broadly by the courts.<ref name="iw-if-1">{{cite news | title=What if SCO Wins? | author-first=Robert | author-last=McMillan | magazine=InfoWorld | date=September 22, 2003 | pages=42, 44}}</ref>  Furthermore a SCO victory would be devastating to the open source movement, especially if the legal validity of the GPL license were to be called into question.<ref name="iw-if-1"/>  Conversely, a clear SCO loss would clarify any intellectual property concerns related to Linux, make corporate IT managers feel more relaxed about adopting Linux as a solution, and potentially bolster corporate enthusiasm for the open source movement as a whole.<ref name="iw-if-2">{{cite news | title=What if SCO Loses? | author-first=Ed | author-last=Scannell | magazine=InfoWorld | date=September 22, 2003 | pages=43, 45}}</ref>

{{Quote box|quote=There's nothing like a good legal battle to whip up passions, and the SCO Group-versus-the-open-source-world dogfight is no exception. Rhetoric runs high. From the open-source advocates, it's "you're stifling free thought in the name of greed." SCO allies counter with "you're attacking the core values of capitalism."|source=—LinuxInsider, 2004.<ref name="li-groklaw-2004"/>
|width=27%|align=left|style=padding:8px;}}

Linux advocates were incensed by SCO's actions,<ref name="cnet-ddos"/><ref name="bw-hated"/> accusing the company of trying to reap financial gain by sowing [[fear, uncertainty, and doubt]] (FUD) about Linux within the industry.<ref name="nyt-profit"/>  Linux creator [[Linus Torvalds]] said, "I'd dearly love to hear exactly ''what'' they think is infringing, but they haven't told anybody. Oh, well. They seem to be more interested in FUD than anything else."<ref name="ap-unauth"/>  Open source advocate [[Bruce Perens]] said of SCO, "They don't care who or what they hurt."<ref name="ap-unauth"/>  Industry analyst and open source advocate Gordon Haff said that SCO had thrown a [[dirty bomb]] into the Linux user community.<ref name="cnet-letters"/>

Many  Linux enthusiasts approached the issue with a moralistic fervor.<ref name="cnet-letters"/>
By August 2003, McBride said that pickets had been seen at SCO offices.<ref name="nw-forum03"/>  McBride tended to compare Linux to [[Napster]] in the music world,<ref name="nyt-myclip-2003"/> a comparison that could be understood by people outside the technology industry.  The assault on open source produced intense feelings in people; [[Ralph Yarro]], chairman of SCO and head of the Canopy Group, and the person characterized by some as the mastermind behind ''SCO v. IBM'',<ref name="fortune-2003">{{cite news | url=https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2003/07/21/346123/index.htm | title=Penguin Slayer | author-first=Adam | author-last=Lashinsky | magazine=Fortune | date=2003-07-21}}</ref>  reported that back in his home area in Utah, "I have had friends, good friends, tell me they can't believe what we're doing."<ref name="bw-hated"/>  Internet message boards such as [[Slashdot]] saw many outraged postings.<ref name="fortune-2003"/>  The [[Yahoo! Finance]] discussion boards, a popular site at the time for investors, were full of messages urging others to sell SCO stock.<ref name="nw-forum03"/>

SCO suffered a [[distributed denial-of-service attack]] against its website in early May 2003,<ref name="cnet-ddos">{{cite news | url=https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/net-attack-crushes-sco-web-site/ | title=Net attack crushes SCO Web site | author-first=Stephen | author-last=Shankland | publisher=CNET | date=May 5, 2003}}</ref> the first of several times the website would be shut down by hackers.<ref name="bw-hated"/>  One that began in late January 2004<ref name="cnn-mydoom">{{cite news | url=https://money.cnn.com/2004/01/27/technology/techinvestor/lamonica/index.htm | title=Of worms and penguins? | author-first=Paul R. | author-last=La Monica | publisher=CNN Money | date=January 28, 2004}}</ref> became the most prolonged, when a denial-of-service attack coming out of the [[Mydoom]] computer worm prevented access to the <code>sco.com</code> domain for over a month.<ref name="zdn-mydoom">{{cite news | url=https://www.zdnet.com/article/sco-recovers-from-mydoom/ | title=SCO recovers from MyDoom | author-first= Munir | author-last=Kotadia | publisher=ZDNet | date= March 8, 2004 }}</ref>

{{Quote box|quote=The theater of {{nowrap|this{{px2}}{{mdash}}{{px2}}}}it's sort of beyond belief for all of us.|source=—Darl McBride, 2004.<ref name="bw-hated"/>|width=27%|align=right|style=padding:8px;}}

The general IT industry was not pleased with what SCO was doing either.  The September 22, 2003 issue of ''[[InfoWorld]]'' had a dual-orientation cover that, if read right side up, had a thumbs-up picture with the text "If SCO Loses", and if read upside down, had a thumbs-down picture with the text "If SCO Wins".<ref name="iw-if-00">{{cite news | title=Cover | magazine=InfoWorld | date=September 22, 2003}}<!-- can see most of cover it at https://books.google.com/books?id=zjkEAAAAMBAJ&pg=RA1-PA1#v=onepage&q&f=false --></ref>  
By February of the following year, ''[[Businessweek]]'' was headlining that the SCO Group was "The Most Hated Company In Tech".<ref name="bw-hated">{{cite news |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2004-02-01/the-most-hated-company-in-tech |title=The Most Hated Company In Tech |author-first=Jim |author-last=Kerstetter |magazine=Businessweek |date=February 2, 2004 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210423002322/https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2004-02-01/the-most-hated-company-in-tech | archive-date=April 23, 2021 | url-status=live<!--paywalled-->}}<!-- copyvio site https://sco-vs-ibm.org/review/2004/0202.html --><!-- seems gone now, but have a txt file from a quick ^a^c of the archive site --></ref>  A similar characterization was made by the [[Robert X. Cringely]]-bylined column in ''[[InfoWorld]]'', which in March 2004 called SCO "the Most Despised Technology Company".<ref name="iw-despised">{{cite news | title=Notes from the Field: Misery Loves Companies | author-first=Robert X. | author-last=Cringely | magazine=InfoWorld | date=March 29, 2004 | page=12}}</ref>  The cover of a May 2004 issue of ''[[Fortune (magazine)|Fortune]]'' magazine had a photograph of McBride accompanied by the large text "Corporate Enemy No. 1".<ref name="fortune-2004">{{cite news | url=https://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2004/05/17/369609/index.htm | title=Gunning for Linux | author-first=Roger | author-last=Parloff | magazine=Fortune | date=May 17, 2004}} Also cover of issue.</ref>  SCO's actions in suing Linux end users was especially responsible for some forms of corporate distaste towards it.<ref name="fortune-2004"/>

[[Image:Bruce Perens Belfast 2006.jpg|thumb|left|One of the most prominent critics of SCO's actions, Bruce Perens, speaking at a free and open source software conference in 2006]]

The company that had previously held that title, Microsoft,<ref name="bw-hated"/><ref name="iw-despised"/> had by February 2004 spent a reported $12&nbsp;million on Unix licenses from SCO.<ref name="bw-hated"/>  The industry giant said the licenses were taken out as part of normal intellectual property compliance for their [[Windows Services for UNIX]] product, which provided a Unix compatibility environment for higher-end Windows systems.<ref name="r-ms-lic">{{cite news | url=https://www.wired.com/2003/05/microsoft-licenses-unix-from-sco/ | title=Microsoft Licenses Unix From SCO | agency=Reuters | magazine=Wired | date=May 19, 2003}}</ref>  Linux advocates, however, saw the move as Microsoft looking for a way to fund SCO's lawsuits in an attempt to damage Linux,<ref name="bw-hated"/> a view that was shared by some other large industry rivals such as [[Oracle Corporation]]'s [[Larry Ellison]].<ref name="r-ms-lic"/>  Indeed, Linux advocates had seen Microsoft's hand in the SCO Group's actions from almost the beginning; as Bruce Perens wrote in May 2003:  "Who really benefits from this mess? Microsoft, whose involvement in getting a defeated Unix company to take on the missionary work of spreading FUD [...] about Linux is finally coming to light."<ref>{{cite web | author-last=Perens | date=May 20, 2003 | url=https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsofts-spreading-fud-over-linux/ | title=Microsoft's spreading FUD over Linux | author-first=Bruce | publisher=ZDNet}}</ref>  The open source community's antipathy towards Microsoft only increased when it became apparent that Microsoft had played at least some role in introducing the SCO Group to BayStar Capital as a potential investment vehicle (both BayStar and Microsoft said there was no stronger role by Microsoft than that).<ref>{{cite news | url=https://www.eweek.com/database/microsoft-led-sco-to-baystar/ | title=Microsoft Led SCO to BayStar | author-first=Peter | author-last=Galli | magazine=eWeek | date=March 22, 2004}}</ref>

The distaste for SCO's actions seeped into evaluations of SCO's product line and technical initiatives as well.  ''[[Software Development Times]]'' acknowledged at one point that "many writers in the tech media, which has a pro-open-source, pro-Linux bias, are subtly or overtly hostile to SCO."<ref name="sdt-edgeclick"/>
As an instance, in July 2003 a columnist for ''[[Computerworld]]'' examined the SCO Group acquisition of Vultus and concluded that the purpose was not to acquire its technology or staff but rather that Canopy was playing  "a shell game [...] to move its companies around" in order to exploit and cash in on the SCO Group's rising stock price.<ref name="CW_shell_2003">{{cite news | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gXrMKeIkx74C&pg=PA50 | title=SCO's Shell Game | author-first=Frank | author-last=Hayes | work=Computerworld | date= July 28, 2003 | page=50}}</ref>
As an analyst for [[RedMonk]] stated, "Regardless of the technology they have, there are a lot of enterprises that are going to be ticked off with them. Some of them are receiving these letters (demanding license fees for Linux). There's a perception among companies we've spoken to that SCO is really out to get acquired or to make their money off of licensing schemes rather than technologies. That's an obstacle to adoption of their products."<ref name="cw-vultus"/>  This kind of attitude was exemplified by an apologetic review of UnixWare 7.1.3 in ''[[OSNews]]'' in December 2003 that acknowledged that SCO had "earned their now nefarious reputation of pure evil" but that "SCO does actually sell a product" and that the reviewer had to assess it objectively.<ref name="osn=uw713">{{cite news | url=https://www.osnews.com/story/5416/unixware-713-review/ | title=UnixWare 7.1.3 Review | author-first=Tony | author-last=Bourke | publisher=OS News | date=December 16, 2003}}</ref>

Another group of people who found the actions of the SCO Group distasteful were some of those familiar with the Santa Cruz Operation, including those who had worked there and those who had written about it; they became protective of that earlier company's reputation, especially given the possible name confusion regarding the two.<ref name="sarai-rem"/><ref name="coursey-bad"/><ref name="stross-p5"/>  In an ''[[eWeek]]'' column entitled "SCO: When Bad Things Happen to Good Brands", technology journalist David Coursey wrote that "SCO was a good company with a good reputation. In some ways, SCO was Linux before Linux, popularizing Unix on low-cost Intel machines [...] It's a good brand name that deserves better, or at least a decent burial and a wake. But instead, its memory is being trashed by people who don't and maybe can't appreciate the fondness many of us still have for the old Santa Cruz Operation."<ref name="coursey-bad">{{cite news | url=https://www.eweek.com/servers/sco-when-bad-things-happen-to-good-brands | title=SCO: When Bad Things Happen to Good Brands | author-first=David | author-last=Coursey | magazine=eWeek | date= June 15, 2004}}</ref>  Science fiction author [[Charles Stross]], who had worked as a tech writer in the original SCO's office in England in the early-mid-1990s, called the SCO Group "the brain-eating zombie of the UNIX world" that had done little more than "play merry hell with the Linux community and take a copious metaphorical shit all over my resumé."<ref name="stross-p5">{{cite web | url=http://www.antipope.org/charlie/blog-static/2009/06/how_i_got_here_in_the_end_part_3.html | title=How I got here in the end, part five: 'things can only get better!' | author-first=Charles | author-last=Stross | publisher=antipope.org | date=June 19, 2009}}</ref>  More simply, former original SCO employee turned journalist and publisher Sara Isenberg, in writing about the history of tech companies in the Santa Cruz area, wrote about The SCO Group, "I'll spare you the sordid legal details, but by then, it was no longer our SCO."<ref name="sarai-rem">{{cite news | url=https://www.santacruztechbeat.com/2015/04/23/tech-in-santa-cruz-sara-isenberg/ | title=Don't let anyone tell you tech is new in Santa Cruz! | author-first=Sara | author-last=Isenberg | newspaper=Santa Cruz Tech Beat | date=April 23, 2015}}</ref>

To be sure, not all former original-SCO employees necessarily felt that way.  The company still had developers and other staff at the original Santa Cruz location, as well as at the [[Murray Hill, New Jersey]] office<ref name="nw-surviveiflose"/> that dated back not just to the original SCO but to Novell and Unix System Laboratories and AT&T before that.<ref name="cw-init"/>  There was also a development office in [[Delhi, India]],<ref name="nw-surviveiflose"/> as well as regional offices that in many cases came from original SCO.  And in 2006, Santa Cruz Operation co-founder Doug Michels made a return to the SCO Forum stage, with McBride presenting him an award for lifetime achievement.<ref>{{cite video | url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9Vnb_omAoM | title=Doug Michels receives lifetime achievement at SCO Forum 2006 | publisher=CitizenValley.org and BayLive Media | access-date=December 9, 2019}}</ref>

[[Image:SCO Forum 2004 Darl McBride and others on video screen.jpg|thumb|right|SCO Group CEO Darl McBride speaking at a SCO Forum 2004 keynote session at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas; SCOsource division head Chris Sontag and vice president of engineering Sandy Gupta stand alongside him]]

A major factor in the SCO&ndash;Linux battle was the [[Groklaw]] website and its author, paralegal [[Pamela Jones]].<ref name="reg-groklaw"/> The site explained in depth the legal principles and procedures that would be involved in the different court {{nowrap|cases{{px2}}{{mdash}}{{px2}}}}giving technology-oriented readers a level of understanding of legal matters they would otherwise not {{nowrap|have{{px2}}{{mdash}}{{px2}}}}and pulled together in an easily browsed form a massive number of official court documents and filings.<ref name="li-groklaw-2004"/>  Additionally, some Groklaw readers attended the court hearings in person and posted their detailed observations afterward.<ref name="reg-groklaw"/>  Accompanying these valuable data points on Groklaw was an interpretative commentary, from both Jones and her readers, that was relentlessly pro-open source and anti-SCO,<!-- see also https://newmedialaw.proskauer.com/2010/03/10/jury-picked-and-trial-commences-in-sco-v-novell-unix-code-copyright-ownership-dispute/ --> to the point where journalist [[Andrew Orlowski]] of ''[[The Register]]'' pointed out that Groklaw sometimes suffered badly from an [[Echo chamber (media)|online echo chamber]] effect.<ref name="reg-groklaw">{{cite news | url=https://www.theregister.com/Print/2005/04/30/groklaw_monterey_mystery/ | title=SCO, Groklaw and the Monterey mystery that never was | author-first=Andrew | author-last=Orlowski | work=The Register | date=April 30, 2005}}</ref>  In any case, such was Groklaw's influence that SCO made thinly veiled accusations that Jones was, in fact, working on behest of IBM, something that she categorically denied.<ref name="li-groklaw-2004">{{cite news | url=https://www.linuxinsider.com/story/32990.html | title=Writing Linux History: Groklaw's Role in the SCO Controversy | author-first=David | author-last=Halperin | publisher=LinuxInsider | date=March 1, 2004}} and the follow-up {{cite news | url=https://www.linuxinsider.com/story/33059.html | title=The Groklaw Story, Part Two | author-first=David | author-last=Halperin | publisher=LinuxInsider | date=March 8, 2004}}</ref>  <!-- TODO find the Groklaw bit about Darl admiring their passion -->

The personification of the SCO&ndash;Linux battle was no doubt McBride,<ref name="fortune-2004"/> who was viewed by many as a villain.<ref name="lbw-dmb-hated"/>  Columnist Maureen O'Gara, generally seen as at least somewhat sympathetic to SCO's position, characterized McBride as "the most hated man in the computer industry".<ref name="lbw-dmb-hated">{{cite news | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040529052830/http://www.linuxworld.com/story/44809.htm | archive-date=May 29, 2004 | url=http://www.linuxworld.com/story/44809.htm | title=Latest SCO News is Plain Weird | author-first=Maureen | author-last=O'Gara | magazine=Linux Business Week | date=May 14, 2004 }}</ref>  McBride acknowledged, "I know people want us to go away, but we are not going to go away. We're going to see this through."<ref name="bw-hated"/>  The ''[[Sunday New York Times]]'' business section's "Executive Life" feature ran a self-profile of McBride in February 2004, in which he reflected upon his no-nonsense father raising him on a ranch and the difficulties of being a [[Mormon missionary]] in Japan and later a Novell executive there, and concluded, "I am absolutely driven by people saying I can't do something."<ref>{{cite news | title=The Boss: Cowboy Willpower | author-first=Darl C. | author-last=McBride | newspaper=The New York Times | date=February 29, 2004 | page=10 (Sunday Business)}} As told to Eve Tahmincioglu.</ref>
McBride received death threats serious enough to warrant extra security during his public appearances.<ref name="bw-hated"/>  Asked in May 2004 to reflect upon what the preceding year had been like, McBride said "This is like ... nothing ... nothing compares to what's happened in the last year."<ref name="lbw-dmb-hated"/>