Linked by Roberto J. Dohnert on Tue 10th Jun 2003 01:06 UTC
On March 7th 2003, the SCO Group filed a lawsuit against IBM for misappropriation of tradesecrets and contractual agreements. The scope of SCOs complaint is that IBM introduced parts of Unix System V and Project Monterey into the Linux kernel. Project Monterey was a effort to port IBM's AIX 5L onto the Intel Itanium platform, IBM withdrew from that project for reasons unknown according to the press, I believe that it was because the Itanium is a bomb. 
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I find it weird that SCO also released very little code. I think the code that they did reveal was code that had the strongest case of patent infringement.
So, you feel it would make more sense for them to show the code that has 0% of backing up their claims? Whatever.
...UnixWare had no support of any kind for USB, Xeon processors or any support for any kind of modern device.
Do you really think this is about USB drivers? Honestly?
...SCO will have to find a better way to reveal their "stolen" code. The way it is being done now is to flawed and raises questions of reliability.
Legally, SCO has no requirement to show any code to the public. The only times a litigant has to show evidence to back up their claims is during the pre-trial discovery phase (and only to the defending party if requested) and the trial itself. They don't have to show their information to anyone but IBM since they are the defendants in the suit.
...the offending code will be revealed and it will be removed and replaced. Linux and Open Source Software is too pervasive for any real damage to be done to it.
You're so wrong here it's not even funny. So, you believe that if SCO wins they will play all nice-nice and just forgive all of the commerical Linux distributors and companies that have had Linux deployed for the months/years that they have been illegally using patented code? If so, then why would they even bother with the suit. It's all about money and SCO wants what they feel they are due.
A $1B judgement against IBM would certainly be felt by IBM. Not only financially, but possibly in their desire to continue working on/using Linux. SCO would also have the legal ammo to go after SUSE, RedHat, etc... and all of the companies using Linux. SCO would want their pound of flesh for patent infringements and would have legal precident to get it. The Linux community would most definately suffer if SCO wins. Just because the offending code could be replaced it doesn't mean that SCO won't bother going after monetary damages for the time that the offending code was used.
About the only thing in the article that was reasonable was the sentence, "...I'm no lawyer...."