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Caldera The Almighty Buck The Courts Linux Your Rights Online

SCO Group Files For Chapter 7 190

Posted by Soulskill from the it-just-goes-on-and-on-my-friends dept.
New submitter rkhalloran writes "The remnants of the failed litigation engine that was the SCO Group has finally filed for liquidation under Chapter 7 of the bankruptcy code. 'There is no reasonable chance of "rehabilitation."' Groklaw describes the recent filing (PDF) thus: 'I will try my best to translate the legalese for you: the money is almost all gone, so it's not fun any more. SCO can't afford Chapter 11. We want to shut the costs down, because we'll never get paid. But it'd look stupid to admit the whole thing was ridiculous and SCO never had a chance to reorganize through its fantasy litigation hustle. Besides, Ralph Yarro and the other shareholders might sue. So they want the litigation to continue to swing in the breeze, just in case. But SCO has no money coming in and no other prospects, so they want to proceed in a cheaper way and shut this down in respects to everything else.' I guess that means the lawyers will suck the marrow from the carcass and leave the bones to bleach out in the sun."
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SCO Group Files For Chapter 7 More

SCO Group Files For Chapter 7

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  • good riddance (Score:5, Insightful)

    by gmack ( 197796 ) <gmack@noSpAM.innerfire.net> on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:34PM (#40911529) Homepage Journal

    Hopefully this will be a lesson to other companies who compete using lawsuits rather than customer service.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kergan ( 780543 )

      Good riddance

      Maybe not quite yet... Someone could buy the portfolio, no?

      • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

        by ackthpt ( 218170 )

        Good riddance

        Maybe not quite yet... Someone could buy the portfolio, no?

        ONOS! Not teh Micorsfots!

        Honestly, I think they have enough on their plate, trying to head off Andriod and iOS. More money into research and do some skull cracking of those departments who refuse to work together (read: support their employer, rather then empire building) and Microsoft could have a chance .. in a few years.

        • Re:good riddance (Score:5, Interesting)

          by postbigbang ( 761081 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:34PM (#40912337)

          They're making scandalous sums in royalties from Linux and Android. What do they care, now that the IP litigation is impossible? For Microsoft, this is Profit: stand up you PC and Phone Makers: On the left, is the $$ you'll pay for using Linux (so you won't get sued) and on the right is the $$ you'll pay for integrating that Android Stuff.

          And if you think we were fooling, here's our RT tablet. Open the wallets or die! That's the mantra.

          • If they're making scandalous sums off of android and Linux that just means android and Linux are worth scandalous sums of money and then some. It legitimizes the platforms just that much more. Patents run out so the racket can't last forever and when it's over Linux will still be there. How much are they making off of windows phone again?

            • Re:good riddance (Score:5, Insightful)

              by FireFury03 ( 653718 ) <slashdot@NoSPAm.nexusuk.org> on Wednesday August 08, 2012 @03:07AM (#40915405) Homepage

              If they're making scandalous sums off of android and Linux that just means android and Linux are worth scandalous sums of money and then some. It legitimizes the platforms just that much more. Patents run out so the racket can't last forever and when it's over Linux will still be there. How much are they making off of windows phone again?

              By the time the patents have run out they will be obsolete and will have been replaced with something else that MS is claiming they own. The problem isn't that Linux might be infringing MS patents, its that MS will never tell anyone what those patents are to give Linux a fighting chance of avoiding infringement. Someone needs to call MS's bluff and go to court over this so the patents get exposed. Companies that threaten alledged infringers but won't say what is being infringed really should have to forefit those patents.

              • The gist of your post is fine, but this sentence is ridiculous:

                Companies that threaten alledged infringers but won't say what is being infringed really should have to forefit those patents.

                If the company won't say which patents they is talking about, how are you going to those patents away from them?

                • *they _are_ talking about

                • The gist of your post is fine, but this sentence is ridiculous:

                  Companies that threaten alledged infringers but won't say what is being infringed really should have to forefit those patents.

                  If the company won't say which patents they is talking about, how are you going to those patents away from them?

                  Because when company A threatens company B by saying "Linux infringes a number of our patents but we're not going to tell you which, pay us a licence fee in order to avoid court action", company A would automatically forefit those patents. Now, you're right that no one will know which patents they are forefitting, but it does mean that if company A subsequently sues someone for infringing their patents through the use of Linux, they have now revealed some of the patents they have forefitted and therefore h

                • A judge can say, tell us which patents, or we'll place all employees under arrest, and suspend all financial transactions from said company, ie, a full corporate Coma.

                  ps. dont buy win-v8 Win2012 whatever its called.

                  Does that mean win7 is out of sale, and now can be considered free for all , pirate all you like, since its out of sale, never to be sold again.

              • Re:good riddance (Score:4, Insightful)

                by oakgrove ( 845019 ) on Wednesday August 08, 2012 @09:16AM (#40917173)

                Someone needs to call MS's bluff

                B&N did and apparently it worked out pretty well for them.

                By the time the patents have run out they will be obsolete and will have been replaced with something else that MS is claiming they own.

                True that but every Android or Linux unit that shifts may be 5-15 dollars in MS' coffers but it represents one atomic unit of less direct influence they have over the market. I'd rather they get a patent fee than an in the field Windows license.

      • I'm a little surprised that IBM didn't buy their portfolio a long time ago. Unless they were waiting for the price to go down. Come to think of it, it probably has.

        • Probably amused them more just to bleed them dry in court. IBM's patents have patents so I doubt they give a shit about a toy company like Santa Cruz Operations.

        • Re:good riddance (Score:5, Informative)

          by whoever57 ( 658626 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @11:45PM (#40914323) Journal

          I'm a little surprised that IBM didn't buy their portfolio a long time ago.

          Portfolio of what? A jury decided that Novell owned the old Unix copyrights and SCO only had one patent.

        • Re:good riddance (Score:5, Insightful)

          by gmack ( 197796 ) <gmack@noSpAM.innerfire.net> on Wednesday August 08, 2012 @04:21AM (#40915757) Homepage Journal

          Buying the portfolio would have been settling and it's also exactly what SCO(TSG) wanted them to do but IBM has a scorched earth policy when it comes to lawsuits. When sued, IBM will call in the lawyers and fight for every penny even if the resulting litigation is more expensive than the settlement would have been. It makes each lawsuit more expensive but it discourages others from trying and you can see the result: IBM doesn’t' get sued anywhere near as much as other tech firms.

      • Maybe not quite yet... Someone could buy the portfolio, no?

        A portfolio of what? Unsubstantiated lawsuits? I thought people usually buy assets.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by DrXym ( 126579 )
          The source code to SCO Unix must be worth something to somebody. There must be a lot of point of sale devices and servers dotted around running it that still need some kind of support.
          • The only code SCOX holds any rights to is whatever additions were made to Unixware *after* the deal; they had a *redistribution* license for the UNIX codebase from AT&T/USL/Novell same as IBM, HP, Sun, etc. Santa Cruz *wanted* the codebase, Novell wanted out of the UNIX business, but Santa Cruz Operation (!= SCO Group) couldn't produce the money, so what they got as a sop was the royalty collection business from the other source licensees. They got to deal with the billing, collection, etc and keep 5%
    • Well, Apple has that lawsuit going on right now... so I don't think they've learned any lessons from this yet.

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by jd2112 ( 1535857 )

        Well, Apple has that lawsuit going on right now... so I don't think they've learned any lessons from this yet.

        Well, Apple does have more of a case with the rounded corners thing than SCO had with it's 'stolen' source code...

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by Splab ( 574204 )

          Do enlighten us on how they do that, because that sure as hell aint exactly obvious to the rest of the world...

    • Re:good riddance (Score:5, Interesting)

      by dbIII ( 701233 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:30PM (#40912275)
      Not really. One of the lawyers sucking the marrow from the bones was Darl's brother.
      It's like deliberately crashing the company car into a wall so your family's repair business can get some work.

    • "Hopefully this will be a lesson to other companies who compete using lawsuits rather than customer service."

      Companies are expendable paper constructs which can be and are blithely created and destroyed. They are "game characters".

    • Yeah, that'll teach you, other companies. Frivolous copyright litigation will lead to bankruptcy. A decade later. Maybe.

    • Re:good riddance (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Quila ( 201335 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @11:27PM (#40914169)

      Not really. Those in charge get to skate with their money. They're free to try it again with another company.

      What they need in this case is piercing of the corporate veil. Those who started this, and cost other companies so many millions of dollars in this bad-faith fraud, need to be held personally accountable.

      • Not really. Those in charge get to skate with their money. They're free to try it again with another company.

        Darl managed to lose all or most of what he got from SCO, I think his house was foreclosed on some time after he lost his job at SCO.

    • If you read the source (the Groklaw article) you will see that it's far from over yet. SCO is asking the judge to be allowed to keep the litigation alive, despite SCO being in chapter 7.

      If anything this sets an awful precedent: as in create a shell company (or bankroll an existing one) have it start litigating, pay the lawyers in a share of the proceeds, sink it in chapter-7 protection when the money runs out, and let the litigation roll on. Especially effective against Open Source.

      If you feel this is

  • ... and on this day... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by logicassasin ( 318009 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:35PM (#40911535)

    ... not a single f_ck was given.

    SCO got on the shitlist of many a person and corporate entity with their senseless trolling. I'm surprised that it took this long for them to finally hit rock bottom.

    • Re:... and on this day... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @09:04PM (#40912751)

      ... not a single f_ck was given.

      SCO got on the shitlist of many a person and corporate entity with their senseless trolling. I'm surprised that it took this long for them to finally hit rock bottom.

      The reason why it took so long was the huge injection from BayStar and the cash train from Redmond. If you know anything about what really went on just look into how and why Novell/Suse is surviving this nonsense. Fact is the real target of all this crap was RedHat and the server side of Linux and the main antagonist was and still is Microsoft.

        Sco was just a fishing and fud throwing expedition and to a large extent it succeeded. Windows has gained server market share because of all the fud. The money channelled into Sco from Microsoft to do all this bullshit is small change in comparison to the market sales they gained in the high end server game.

      • Maybe so but Linux went though the copyright trial by fire against some very powerful enemies and when it was done and over, Linux came through looking better than ever. So when the FUD slinging starts, this is an easily cited IP victory.

        • Maybe so but Linux went though the copyright trial by fire against some very powerful enemies and when it was done and over, Linux came through looking better than ever. So when the FUD slinging starts, this is an easily cited IP victory.

          And yet MS is still raking in the cash over patents they claim Linux is infringing...

          • I thought that at first but I'm not so convinced any more. I get the impression it's like those deals where companies buy out each other using stocks. So the licensing money paid is offset by free Windows Phone licenses or some other similar wheeze.

          • And yet MS is still raking in the cash over patents they claim Linux is infringing...

            If they're raking in cash then that means Linux units are shifting. What is better for Linux, more mindshare from more Windows licenses in the field or a paltry patent fee and less mindshare due to a Linux unit in the field and the Linux using OEM gets a share of the profit.

            • If they're raking in cash then that means Linux units are shifting. What is better for Linux, more mindshare from more Windows licenses in the field or a paltry patent fee and less mindshare due to a Linux unit in the field and the Linux using OEM gets a share of the profit.

              You're making it sound like anyone is benefitting from MS charging a licence fee on Android. Paying MS a chunk of money for each Android device doesn't decrease the windows mindshare whilst it does support MS for doing basically nothing. The licence fee isn't "paltry" - I certainly would prefer my phone to be $15 cheaper. If you don't mind paying people who've done nothing to help produce the thing you're buying, how about you give $15 to me the next time you buy a phone? I've probably done about as muc

              • Paying MS a chunk of money for each Android device doesn't decrease the windows mindshare whilst it does support MS for doing basically nothing.

                If a consumer buys an Android device in lieu of a Windows device be it phone or tablet then that does dilute Windows' mindshare. Not only that but it is a precedent at least in the tablet space since most people are used to equating computer=Microsoft and tablets while not completely breaking that chain of thought certainly weaken it. Most people aren't rich and if they buy a tablet at all only buy one so if they're buying an Android they are almost certainly not buying another Windows laptop or any hypot

    • finally hit rock bottom

      More like they finally ran out of shovels.

    • well, one was, but SCO was on the receiving end

  • sigh. (Score:3)

    by Kaenneth ( 82978 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:35PM (#40911539) Journal

    And nothing of value was lost.

    • Re:sigh. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:16PM (#40912091)

      Yes, but the chapter 11 bankruptcy administrators earned a lot of money and ensured that none of it went to actual creditors.

      • Speaking of which wasn't there a constructive trust involved?

        I think that there may well be a case for negligence against the trustee for not sending that money Novell's way pronto.

        The court already decided the money was already Novell's and that it wasn't even supposed to be part of the bankruptcy estate to begin with.

        • Oh sure, they'll send a few cents to Novell. But they have administrative fees to collect first. That means however many lawyers you have multiplied by hourly rates, suck up any excess cash fast. No one would ever be an administrator if they had to do it for free, and extremely few would volunteer for it if they couldn't make good money at it.

  • Ding Dong (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:36PM (#40911553)

    the Witch is dead!

    • SCO fits the 'green and warty' set pretty well. :)

      Although the Scooby Doo ending is also appropriate; "They'd have gotten away with it, if it hadn't been for PJ."

  • Let's not forget (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Bruce Perens ( 3872 ) <bruce@perens.com> on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:37PM (#40911559) Homepage Journal

    Ralph Yarro enriched himself tremendously. While SCO the company might be bankrupt, a lot of the money ended up with him.

    Robert Penrose and Val Kriedel (Noorda) both committed suicide over their involvement.

    Tens of thousands of us were damaged in some way.

    • Ralph Yarro enriched himself tremendously. While SCO the company might be bankrupt, a lot of the money ended up with him.

      Robert Penrose and Val Kriedel (Noorda) both committed suicide over their involvement.

      There was a veil attempt to clear the name of Val Kriedel after her suicide - http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=20050407113517663 [groklaw.net] - but anyhoo, what do we do with Ralph Yarro ?

      We should not leave him scot free after what he had done to thousands and thousands of us

      If we let Ralph Yarro go we only send a clear signal to the world - come and troll us, hurt us, impair our ability to renovate, and at the end, we will let you go scot free

      I am not calling for a violent

      • Re:Suicide (Score:5, Informative)

        by Bruce Perens ( 3872 ) <bruce@perens.com> on Wednesday August 08, 2012 @03:09AM (#40915427) Homepage Journal
        I have no reason to believe that Ms. Kriedel was anything but a victim. I believe the Noorda family were all victims, and that little of this would have been allowed to happen had Ray Noorda had his full mental capabilities. As it was, the family was vulnerable to a Svengali. I appreciate that Ms. Kriedel's brother pointed out the role of Rob Enderle and Laura Didio.

        What can you do? Do not do harm to anyone. We can wish for justice from courts or society, but I'm afraid all we can do this time is wish.

        I'd like to see something like this [slashdot.org] for Mr. Enderle and Ms. Didio, but I don't think it'll happen as part of the SCO case.

        As for Mr. Yarro, I hope that folks understand what he did and shun him, but I have no idea if that happens or not.

        • Dear Mr. Perens,

          Long time no talk !

          I hope I can be as calm and as cool as you after being put through hell by those trolls

          How many years of setback that we have to endure, with all that SCO (with the backing from Microsoft) hullabaloo ?

          And Microsoft's scare-n-blackmail racket is still making untold millions for hinting that Linux infringes on their "patents" that they refuse to disclose

          One day we do not fight back, one day they will find more ways to make our lives miserable

          All we want is to create, to inno

          • See if there's a way to put that energy into EFF or Public Knowledge.

            I am equally bothered, especially with the companies that do their best to encumber us with their patents and also act (in their own interest) as members of our community. Many of them have joined the Linux Foundation, and some are on its executive board. Many of them (including Microsoft) are part of organizations like Apache Foundation, etc. Some of them are Linux distribution companies. Try to get one of those to take a real stand abou

  • No longer SCO (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ClaraBow ( 212734 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:53PM (#40911755)
    I went to www.sco.com and lo and behold a new company has emerged from the ashes!

    • Re:No longer SCO (Score:5, Interesting)

      by landoltjp ( 676315 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:01PM (#40911837)

      From the "Company Profile" page:

      "UnXis, Inc., a new company formed by Stephen Norris Capital Partners and MerchantBridge Group created to acquire all the operating assets and intellectual property rights of The SCO Group, Inc."

      However, I like this line:

      "Led by a team of visionary and accomplished technology and businesses executives"

      *chuckle*

      • > "Led by a team of visionary and accomplished technology and businesses executives"

        Really? Like, from where?

      • I like the comment on this page [sco.com] which says "UnXis's award-winning Global Services offer a complete portfolio[...]". Which "Awards" exactly? Buying the remains of SCO probably $600k down-the-drain. I also note on the The OpenGroup's website (the owners of UNIX), that they (TheOpenGroup) own the trademark UNIXWARE. So what do UnXi actually own? A few hundred thousand lines of unmanageable and out of date code? Seriously guys, Unixware and OpenServer are deader than a dead thing with dead dangly bits.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by ignavus ( 213578 )

        "Led by a team of visionary and accomplished technology and businesses executives"

        I think they mean "hallucinating".

    • Correctm they are just rebooting (Score:5, Informative)

      by tlambert ( 566799 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:37PM (#40912377)

      They are coming back as UnXis, and they are still asserting that Linux is infringing their intellectual property, including the McBride letter:
      http://www.sco.com/5reasons/#5 [sco.com]

      It's a coventure between Stephen Norris Capital Partners and MerchantBridge Group. Stephen Norris' biography includes the former presidency of the Carlyle Group, who tried to invest in SCO in 1998, in a deal netting his group 51% ownership with a court filing that included the statement "provides that the reorganized SCO will pursue the Novell/IBM litigation and other pending litigation claims aggressively,".
      http://www.sltrib.com/business/ci_8267122 [sltrib.com]

      MerchantBridge Group is a very deep wallet:
      http://www.mbih.com/ [mbih.com]
      Eric le Blan of MerchantBridge is Chairman at UnXis.

      I do not expect this saga is over.

      • No reboot possible (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Bruce Perens ( 3872 ) <bruce@perens.com> on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @11:15PM (#40914075) Homepage Journal
        This is VCs attempting to look good or to drag it out to the last gasp for the folks behind this deal (I would guess Microsoft, given the testimony from Benchmark Capital).

        But I don't think they actually have anything salable no matter how hard they try. There are enough court findings about the provenance of this IP that any going back to that will just cause a motion for sanction under Rule 11, which is about frivolous and factually baseless proceedings.

      • UnXi's claim that you link to http://www.sco.com/5reasons/#5 [sco.com] is just lies. In the UK, I think the Trading Standards Authority would have something to say. If one thing is now clear, SCO never owned the rights to Unix, never owned unix, still don't own unix.

  • Worse than Lost (Score:3)

    by sizzzzlerz ( 714878 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @07:59PM (#40911813)

    Nobody who died on that show stayed dead. Like SCO, they kept bringing them back for one more episode. Well, its time to let go, SCO. Walk off into that bright light.

    • But at least the average network knows to keep a show dead when nobody wants to watch it anymore. And SCO jumped the shark years ago.

  • Let's all lock arms and dance (Score:5, Funny)

    by PRMan ( 959735 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:01PM (#40911835)
    Ding, dong, the witch is dead...
  • You gotta shoot the zombie in the head........

  • Interesting (Score:5, Interesting)

    by DaMattster ( 977781 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:06PM (#40911915)
    I am curious what SCO will do with its UNIXWare product portfolio. I would love it if Unixware source code would be made publicly available on a public domain license. There is no telling what exciting things will change in the current open source world.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Osgeld ( 1900440 )

      It will be sold off to the highest bidder just like every other asset

  • Oh no! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Billly Gates ( 198444 ) on Tuesday August 07, 2012 @08:10PM (#40911985) Journal

    Where else am I going to buy that cutting edge modern SCO OpenServer that runs on so many different varieties of hardware that has a steal price of only $1800 for a TCP/IP stack to connect to the internet plus +$799 per core!

  • I've got an accumulator bet on a number of horses at odds of 1/2349088560, would anyone here like to invest in this legitimate business opportunity.
    --

    ref: "the Chapter 11 Trustee believes that it is in the best interests of the Debtors' estates and its creditors to continue the prosecution of the District Court Action [groklaw.net], which was the subject of this Court's Order Granting Stipulation and Order Modifying the Automatic Stay [D.I. 1396]. Based on these circumstances, the Chapter 11 Trustee requests that thi
  • Aren't you dead yet?

  • Don't forget to pay your $699 licensing fee you cock smoking teabaggers.

  • Don't sugar-coat it, PJ.
    Tell us how you really feel.

  • ...SCO was a respectable UNIX vendor. Then the bean counters and lawyers took over; they became hungry for power, and turned to the Dark Side. They built a Death Star of litigation, confident that they could use it to crush the rebel Linux alliance. But ultimately the rebels prevailed. (The End?)

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