Torvalds Sounds Off On SCO Lawsuit

Linus Torvalds won't render his own verdict on SCO Group's legal case against IBM until the Unix code in question is revealed in court.

In an e-mail response to CRN, Torvalds, widely considered the father of Linux, said he is awaiting judgment until SCO identifies the Unix code IBM allegedly misappropriated and handed over to the open-source community.

But at this point, he said he's skeptical the case has merit.

"SCO isn't even telling what they have, and I'm not a lawyer anyway," Torvalds wrote. "The people I've spoken to seem to think the merit of the case lies in whatever details, and since SCO hasn't disclosed any of those details, they can't say."

Torvalds compared the situation to Clonaid's debunked claim earlier this year that it had cloned a human infant.

"SCO is playing it like the Raelians [the organization backed by Clonaid's founder, known as Rael], saying, 'We'll show you proof in a few weeks, through an expert panel that we trust.' Let's see if there is any baby or not."

News source: CPN: Daily Archives