The end is near for SCO (hopefully)

[gaf-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org (Jerry Feldman)]

On 05/06/2009 01:57 PM, John Abreau wrote:
> On Wed, May 6, 2009 at 1:33 PM, Don Levey <lug-TwWeWiF2EGRi+ztankeudA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
>
>  =20
>> I had some fond memories of Caldera before the SCO days.
>>  -Don
>>    =20
>
>
> It seemed to me that Caldera had a lot of difficulty finding a way to
> distinguish itself from Red Hat.  The earliest Caldera Linux releases
> were basically just a rebranded Red Hat sprinkled with a handful of
> proprietary ingredients.
>
> Unfortunately after they bought some of the original SCO, the existing
> SCO customer base proved too tempting.  Caldera was seduced to
> the Dark Side, and abandoned the FLOSS community.
>
> I'm not sure their corporate culture ever really understood the FLOSS w=
ay.
>
>
>  =20
Basically, the way I thought of Caldera was more of a shrinkwrap Linux.=20
Early on they were trying to sell to the corporates in the same way that =

SCO was selling SCO Unix. Essentially they were the suits going into the =

front door where the Red Hat guys were the blue-jeaned guys talking to=20
the IT professionals. Essentially if you look at the way IBM used to=20
operate, is that IBM would go to the top management, and convince them=20
that IBM is the only way to go, then the lower level people got the=20
idea. But, to go top down, you've got to be IBM. Novell had a good thing =

going because they really had the networking expertise with Netware.

The bottom line is that Ransom Love was committed to Linux, but Darl=20
McBride wanted to keep his brother (an attorney) employed. While it may=20
have been a good move to push the SCO products, it was (IMHO) a very bad =

move to try to kill competition by suing IBM and possibly Apple (early=20
on they were targeting MacOSX), and forcing licenses on Linux. I think=20
the lawsuits were a bug distraction for SCO and cost them not only=20
bucks, but focus on selling product. IMHO, SCO could very easily have=20
been able to sell SCO Unix and Linux into the IT organization=20
head-to-head with Red Hat and SuSE. I do think the Caldera suits tended=20
to turn off the blue jean IT culture, but the lawsuits essentially=20
caused us to turn against SCO.

--=20
Jerry Feldman <gaf-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org>
Boston Linux and Unix
PGP key id: 537C5846
PGP Key fingerprint: 3D1B 8377 A3C0 A5F2 ECBB  CA3B 4607 4319 537C 5846