SCO still wants info from IBM

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SCO is trading on the Court's lack of knowledge

I am very troubled by SCO getting away with too much. As the Director of Research & Technology for a law firm, (hey its the title the lawyers changed Director of I.T. to, not my choice.) I am seeing SCO "play" the Judge in this matter.

SCO keeps pushing and they have yet to answer, to my knowledge, the Motion for Summary Judgement. What that means is that IBM is claiming that the FACTS do not support SCO's position. SCO appears not to have answered with facts, but rather more wild tales.

The demands to see code are rather interesting and troubling. I know in our Federal District the judges would not require the release of the source code but rather appoint someone who is neutral to look at what SCO wants, and see if their position is supported. This avoids SCO from seeing information that would potentially benefit them.

Discovery is NOT a fishing trip. There must be a proper basis for the requests and their basis is far too broad. They are literally asking for truckloads of information; little of which they need to prove or disprove their position.

There is also one thing that Darl needs to keep in mind too...IBM can charge then reasonable copying charges for the documentation. At 25 cents or so a page that could easily become more than the net work of SCO, which declines daily. IBM is not required to bear the cost of requests for documentation. SCO does. So if SCO wants 40 million pages of documents, IBM can say fine, it will cost you $15 million, and it would be proper. That tends to curb fishing expeditions.

I recall a case in our firm where an employer, a major university, wanted the entire medical history, from birth of an injured worker. Most of the workers medical treatment was in another state, and he had undergone numerous surgeries, not related to the injury that occured while working at the university. It was harassment.

This local university sent a demand to the hospital that treated the worker. The records totalled over 80,000. The university was told that it would cost $80,000 plus shipping. The university had no recourse. The cost for the copies was going to be double what they could settle the case for. They settled.

Also, IBM can demand the money be paid BEFORE they produce the documents. Since the number of documents is so huge they can also require SCO pay for all compiling costs, document management costs, etc. It is more than making copies of a couple of hundred pages.

There is also the issue of how reasonable is the demand for documents. Since IBM responded and SCO is claiming they want more; SCO had a big burden to prove to the Court they really need all these documents, and they exist! Judge Kimball may well be waiting for SCO to push with no basis. They may have hit that point.

I think I see where Judge Kimball is going. She is clearly trying to give SCO enough rope the hang themselves, to reduce the chances of an overturn on appeal. I suspect if she does not shut the case down, SCO will simply run out of money.

All this lawyering costs a boat load of money. There is also the question of the staff SCO will have to hire to manage and research the documentation from IBM. Do they have the funds to do it. Again, I point out that we are talking probably millions of pages of documentation. How are they going to manage the documentation, and pay for that cost? They do not have the staff at SCO to handle that. They also have to provide for the security of the documents. More expense.

Yep, Dsrl needs to just do every one a favor and go away!

Posted by: drichards1953   Posted on: 07/12/04 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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