[nylug-talk] Companies demonized as "Scummy" and "Evil" -- WAS: Looking for recommendations

[Eric Moore]

"Bryan J. Smith" <b.j.smith at ieee.org> writes:

> Eric Moore wrote:  
>> Well, would you consider SCO's approach acceptable?
>
> Which "SCO" approach?
>
> The SCO that GPL'd a lot of legacy, but important and useful, UNIX
> Systems Labs (USL) code?
>
> Or the SCO that radically changed in 2002, made a "last ditch effort" in
> 2003 March to resolve a "contract dispute" (to quote Linus, ESR and
> others) with IBM?
>
> Or the SCO that started "Smoking Crack" (to quote Linus) in 2003 May
> after their original 2003 March filing met rabid response from the Linux
> community (who didn't realize that the original 2003 March filing was a
> contract dispute, not an affront on Linux, that wasn't until May when
> IBM didn't settle and SCO went off the legal reservation)?

The latter.

[...]

>> How about a hypothetical "Black Hat Linux" that sold it's product
>> by "nice website you got here, would be a shame if there were to be
>> a DDOS attack on it" <DDOS attack follows>.
>> Is there any business practice sufficiently low and scummy for you
>> to "demonize" it?
>
> I only exist to explain, not demonize.  I had an entire project
> canceled from under me at a Fortune 20 company because of SCO
> v. IBM, when SCO expanded and started "Smoking Crack" after 2003
> May.  I did not have the luxury of demonizing SCO, only explaining
> the real, legal issues that did and did not exist.

All business practices, including extortion are fair game?  At what
point will you "explain" that a given set of business practices are
unacceptable, immoral, or the like?  And what difference is there
between that and "demonization"?

And how about "Black Hat Linux", anyway?  Is *that* acceptable?

[...]

-- 
Eric