[Leaplist] microsoft / novell

[Justin M. Keyes]

On 11/5/06, Fred Moore <fred at fmeco.com> wrote:
> On Sunday 05 November 2006 5:38 pm, Jim Hartley wrote:
> > It is certainly your right to refuse to use this product (or any other).
> > And lord knows I hate Micro$haft as much as anyone ... although I am now
> > a strong Linux advocate, I am STILL p*ssed at them for the way they
> > sabotaged OS/2. Had I been the judge at the anti-trust trial, they would
> > have been broken into about SIX pieces, with a sixth (or more) of the
> > resources given to a "Windows 98" company, and far less to the "Windows
> > NT/2K/XP" company  ... how's that for sabotage, hmmm?
> >
> > BUT ... I think you are starting to sound a little Stallman-ish on this.
>
> No reason to insult people.. While I totally support a very few of his views.
> I don't think I support any of his political views.
>
> My problem with Novell is them restarting the SCO crap again.  Here we go.
> Linux is bad you need to be indemnified or you may get sued by big microslop
> as linux most likely has code copyrighted by Microsoft.  Novell has stated
> they will NOW endemnify their customers... Novell has even said that it was
> sone of the reasons they signe an agreement.  Even Red Hat recognizes what is
> going on.  They have now changed their web site to include the word
> indemnification.    All this when the SCO crap could be coming to an end..

I haven't made a conclusion on the Novell-MS agreement, but I must say
you are dead wrong on the indemnification part. Offering
indemnification (which Red Hat also does now) will strengthen
customers' confidence in Linux. If companies (viz., Red Hat, Novell)
are willing to providence insurance against litigation, that means
they believe that the risk of litigation is less than the harm to
reputation. In other words: Red Hat is willing to bet the cost of a
legal battle(s) on the legal legitimacy of the software it
distributes. This, I would say, helps, not hurts, the reputation of
Linux et. al. It does not, as you imply, give the impression that
"Linux is bad". The threat of a patent lawsuit is a real risk for
*any* software company--legitimate or not, Microsoft has used it to
put  L E G I T I M A T E  companies out of business through sheer
legal costs. Do you expect CEOs, CIOs, CTOs, to ignore that?

-- 
Justin M. Keyes