SCO wishes the Linux community a merry Christmas

SCO is celebrating the end of one year and the start of the next with a new twist in its long, ever-changing, and never substantiated legal saber-rattling against IBM and all things Linux. In this latest turn, they have embraced the DMCA, claiming in a news release today that “Distribution of the copyrighted ABI code, or binary code compiled using the ABI code, with copyright management information deleted or altered, violates the Digital Millennium Copyright Act codified by Congress at 17 U.S.C. §1202. DMCA liability extends to those who have reasonable grounds to know that a distribution (or re-distribution as required by the GPL) of the altered code or copyright information will induce, enable, facilitate, or conceal an infringement of any right under the DMCA.”

In other holiday news from SCO, they will hold a “listen-only” teleconference this morning to discuss their latest financial results. The refusal to take questions is interesting since the company typically uses these calls to maximize and dramatize their legal claim of the day.

In a press release ahead of the teleconference, SCO states: “Fourth quarter revenue from UNIX products and services was $14.0 million. In addition, revenue generated from the Company’s SCOsource licensing initiative was $10.3 million, which was derived from licensing agreements reached with Microsoft Corporation and Sun Microsystems, Inc. earlier in fiscal 2003.”

What that actually means is that revenue from normal business operations is down one million dollars from the same quarter last year, and that there are no new sales of its “licensing initiative.” The two sales noted for that initiative, to Microsoft and Sun, have long been known.