Re: Corel Lawsuit
Oi! I disappear for a weekend and YACF (yet another Corel fuckup) happens?
(Sorry, I think we're developing a need for a new acronym)
> On Fri, Nov 26, 1999 at 11:48:30AM -0800, Bruce Perens wrote:
> > > They are clueless, but are you serious about a lawsuit?
> >
> > Perhaps not _this_ time, but I am throwing up my hands because I have no way
> > to keep them from doing something much more clueless next time and then a suit
> > may indeed be necessary.
>
> I think we should be serious about one. Corel has again and again tried
> to pull this crap with licenses. Each time they do it and we catch them
> at it they claim they simply didn't know any better. Well this being the
> fourth or fifth time(?) it's pretty obvious that one of two things are
> happening here:
>
> 1. They truly have made these same "mistakes" consistantly, which
> raises serious questions as to their compitence.
>
> 2. They're NOT making "mistakes" and are just trying to get away
> with whatever they can get away with.
>
> I think it's time to quit playing games with Corel. I should point out
> that I was originally one of the people SUPPORTING Corel's efforts and as
> late as even the beginning of September would have been willing to try and
> work things out. But the fact is that either Corel has no clue (about
> anything) or they're actually trying to pull one over on us.
>
> I doubt the company has lasted this long by being stupid, so I'm forced to
> assume they're trying to pull a fast one. Trying hell--they've already
> pulled it and have all but gotten away with it at this point.
Fact is, you're dealing with a situation where a certain company has
induhviduals that believe that they don't owe anything to Debian. From
all the stuph I've heard about them, I get the impression that they
think that:
a) because they're not dealing with a corporate entity, they can respond
with anything that's convenient
b) they're dealing with a bunch of amateurs or whatever who can't affect
them
As I recall, a while back Corel claims that they're talking with RMS to sift
out issues with the GPL - do you not get the impression that they're
ignoring the party whom they've pissed off and trying to get away with it by
smoothing things out with "authority" types? I sure do! It's like (ignoring
protests...) - yeah but we know RMS and he said so and so. Good grief!
> > You can tell I'm frustrated. It's because I tried to smooth these things
> > out _twice_ so far, first with the beta license, and again with the APT
> > license issue. Dan Quinlan and I discussed their advisory board at Comdex.
> > The board met once, and never again.
>
> Face it, we've been had. We _must_ persue this issue or the licenses on
> our packages means nothing. Our partnership with Corel was made in good
> faith. I'm sorry to see them attempt to take advantage of it.
I would've thought they would figure things out after the beta fuckup. With
Zygo Blaxell indicating that they're trying to hire someone to specialize in
licensing issues and such. Frankly I was very pissed off with the way the
apt licensing issue was dealt with. Kowtowing to them and letting them get
away with things is only going to let them think that they can get away with
things.
> > A lot of the software contributors were legal minors at the time they
> > contributed the software, and some of them still are, and Corel accepted
> > _their_ licenses. Should those contributors now turn around and say they
> > had no legal right to give Corel those licenses and thus they are void?
> > Or shall we assume that they had the collusion of their parent or guardian
> > and thus the licenses are legal, in which case Corel should make the same
> > assumption in their license?
>
> I don't think anyone can assume anything in this area can they?
<flabberghasted sounds>
This all sounds like something some smartass there noticed and decided to
use it to their advantage (the 1st sentence there). It strikes me as, "we'll
deal with your parents but we won't deal with you".
> > I am trying to explain to them that they are distributing somebody else's
> > software, and they keep unintentionally, and with no malice involved, pissing
> > off the very people who wrote their system. And when I explained this to their
> > P.R. person at Corel, it was clear that she thought the developers were
> > whining children and didn't want to concern herself with them. OK, some of
> > them really _are_ children, but Corel bought that headache when they decided
> > to make use of their code.
>
> I don't believe that. Not anymore. This is only the latest in a long
> series of attempts to screw us on the licensing front and essentially
> hijack a Linux distribution. As long as they were playing fairly I'd have
> been (and in fact was) happy to support them---and in fact as long as they
> were playing fairly we _couldn't_ stop them. They've abused our trust and
> our licenses repeatedly. They show no intent to change their behavior nor
> do I believe they consider us any real threat.
>
> It's time to stop playing around with them. They're not serious about
> delivering on their promises. If all they want is a free ride, I have no
> use for the company.
>
> --
> - Joseph Carter GnuPG public key: 1024D/DCF9DAB3, 2048g/3F9C2A43
> - knghtbrd@debian.org 20F6 2261 F185 7A3E 79FC 44F9 8FF7 D7A3 DCF9 DAB3
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> <Mercury> emacs sucks, literally, not a insult, just a comment that its
> large enough to have a noticeable gravitational pull...
I fully support the notion of taking action, whether it be a lawsuit or
something else. Face it, Corel never listens, they keep trying to pull the
wool over your eyes about them not knowing this and that.
Corel induviduals may claim that Corel has done this and that for the
open source community and that people should be _grateful_ for their
"work" but consider this:
a) contributions to wine -> consider motive
b) do they really expect us to believe that they (developers) have absolutely
no control over things?
c) contributions are NO EXCUSE for all their screwups
d) regarding the releasing of their source code -> considering how buggy the
code is and how clueless <rant rant rant> are, they're just _using_
Debian and friends to fix their mess for them. <sighs pitifully> I've
heard all sorts of stories about how they have absolutely no clue about
how to fix their bugs.
Honestly, just because they've made some contributions they claim that we
should overlook things and "forgive and forget".
Please do something. They keep talking about working with the open source
community this and that but I hope it's clear by now that it's simply not
true. It's more like propaganda to make them look good and up their
stocks/get people to buy their stuph. Haven't we had enough of this?
Action _is_ necessary. Corel DOES NOT DESERVE AN APOLOGY. Corel should be
doing to apologizing. Where's the apology for the previous screw ups anyways?
Amy Fong
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