tarent.com

tarent obtains fine against SCO

The Landgericht München I imposed a fine of 10.000,- Euro on the SCO Group GmbH on 28 August 2003.

tarent, Linuxtag e. V. and other companies obtained a interlocutory injunction that forbids the SCO to claim that "the software linux contains illegally acquired intellectual property of SCO". The court reproaches the SCO Group GmbH "negligent behaviour" in running their corporate site, on which even after the interlocutory injunction the claim could be read that the "endusers who use the software linux can be hold responsible for segmentation faults of the intellectual property of SCO."

Our attorney Dr. Till Jaeger "The Landgericht München made it clear in their explanation for the fine that SCO's claims are to be seen as "massive unethical comments" that concern "an extremely sensitive area". It is not permissible to do business with the fear with unproved claims at the expense of third parties. Therefore we will check on which scale the SCO made itself liable for damages against the companies in the linux-field and will accordingly call the SCO to account.

We rate the SCO's campaign as part of a strategy to make GNU/Linux users and people who maybe want to switch massively unsure. That german courts put a stop to this repeatedly, shows how this strategy is to be classified: as an attempt to destroy the marked for GNU/Linux products and companies with untenable claims. Obviously these plans do not work out.

Stand 4/2004

On regular intervals, the SCO still tries to get presence in the media and to make users unsure with their unproved claims. What has changed is, that the claim that GNU/Linux would contain code that is property of SCO, no longer is allowed. Therefore the SCO makes efforts to circumscribe them. But these circumscriptions can't hide one thing:

• The SCO signed a prohibitive injunction that is still bounding
• Allthough the sources are open and therefore make a research quite easy, it failed to adduce an example for stolen code. It still counts: LINUX users and companies are secure. After all companies like IBM do not invest billions of dollars in LINUX without having considered their legal department...

See more on e. g. prolinux, heise, golem, de.internet.com

or on Preliminary Injunction, Frequently asked questions

Preliminary Injunction

In the legal action

Tarent GmbH, represented by its managing director Mr. Elmar Geese, Bahnhofstraße 13, 53123 Bonn

- Petitioner –

Counsel for Petitioner (authorized proxy): Rechtsanwälte Jaschinski Biere Brexl, Steinsdorfstraße 5, 80538 Munich

v.

The SCO Group GmbH, represented by its managing director Mr. Hans Bayer, Norsk-Data- Straße 3, 61352 Bad Homburg

- Respondent –

Counsel for Respondent (authorized proxy): Rechtsanwälte v. Boetticher – Hasse – Lohmann, Widenmayerstraße 4, 80538 Munich

regarding cessation

the Landgericht München I, 17th chamber for commercial disputes, decreed on June 4, 2003 the following

1.Preliminary Injunction

• Respondent is, in order to avoid

an administrative fine from EUR 5 up to EUR 250.000,- and, in the case that this cannot be collected, administrative detention or administrative detention of up to six months to be enforced in the person of the managing director in each case of contravention

prohibited

in business relations from claiming and distributing the assertions that the software „Linux“ contains SCO’s intellectual property that has been unlawfully obtained, that end users who apply Linux are liable for intellectual property infringements towards SCO, and / or that LINUX is an unauthorized derivative of UNIX, as far as such assertions are not proven to be true.

• Respondent hast to bear the costs of litigation.
• The value of the dispute is assessed to EUR 50.000,--.

Grounds:

The preliminary injunction is based upon UWG Sect. 14. Respondents writ for protection dated May 30, 2003 (O OH 10193/03) has been taken into consideration. It does not furnish prima facie evidence for the truth of the assertion.

Waitzinger

Presiding Judge at the Landgericht

© 2003 tarent GmbH Bahnhofstrasse 13, 53123 Bonn www.tarent.de

Frequently asked questions

1. When and where did tarent obtain the preliminary injunction against SCO? The preliminary injunction was decreed by the Landgericht Munich I (District Court Munich I) on June 5, 2003 and served upon SCO on that day.

2. What is the injunction’s subject matter? The Landgericht Munich I has enjoined SCO from claiming and from distributing the assertions in the course of its business activities

• that the software „Linux“ contains SCO’s intellectual property that has been unlawfully obtained
• that end users who apply Linux are liable for intellectual property infringements towards SCO, and / or
• that LINUX is an unauthorized derivative of UNIX, as far as such assertions are not proven to be true.

3. On which cause of action was the judicial restraining order decreed? SCO violated German unfair competition act (UWG) Section 14, which outlaws denigrations (Anschwärzung) of competitors’ goods or services, unless the factual assertions are proven to be true.

4. How did SCO react? SCO initially only removed some of the pages of its German website that contained the statements, but later on disconnected the whole German website.

5. What happens if SCO does not obey the restraining order? Violations of the order can be counteracted by tarent by means of the usual instruments of compulsory enforcement. Accordingly, tarent can file a motion for imposition of penalties up to EUR 250.000 or for arrest up to six months for contempt of court. Since SCO did not remove immediately all pages of its website that contained the statements not proven to be true, tarent did file such a motion with the court applying for a penalty of EUR 10.000,-. So far, the court has not yet decided on the motion.

6. What is SCO able to do against the preliminary injunction? For how long is the preliminary injunction effective? SCO can file an objection against the preliminary injunction. Then, the District Court has to decide on the matter again, whereas this time, a hearing in front of the court will take place. If the second court decision confirms the original order, SCO is able to go on appeal in front of the appellate court (Oberlandesgericht Munich). In case SCO does not file an objection, the preliminary injunction is effective until the following proceedings in the main action are completed. However, in order to avoid the main proceedings, SCO may also officially declare by means of a letter to tarent, that the preliminary injunction is permanently accepted for all future.

7. In order to obtain the preliminary injunction, did tarent have to demonstrate before the court, that it suffered irreparable harm? No. According to the German unfair competition act, the urgency of a matter is statutorily presumed.

8. Did SCO file in the proceedings a riposte? SCO has submitted to the court a so called “writ for protection” (Schutzschrift), prior to tarent’s motion for preliminary injunction. Notwithstanding this writ, the District Court Munich I decreed the order. The District Court found, that SCO did not show, that the Linux kernel does infringe upon SCO’s rights. After the decree of the preliminary injunction, SCO has not submitted any statement to the court, so far. Yet SCO is not obliged to do so.

9. Who is legal counsel to tarent? tarent is represented by its attorneys belonging to the firm JBB Rechtsanwälte.

10. In which countries is the preliminary injunction effective? The preliminary injunction is only effective in Germany or for activities that affect the German market.

11. Why did tarent go to court against SCO? tarent was not willing to tolerate that GNU/Linux users become confused or irritated and that Linux companies suffer financial harm. Being a company, that gains benefits from Free Software, tarent felt obliged to take action against SCO. tarent hopes that its activities contribute to an increased legal certainty for the use of Linux.

12. Are other domestic or foreign companies able to take action against SCO? The preliminary injunction does govern only the relationship between tarent and SCO. Basically, also other companies are able to take action against the unproven statements. The question if similar actions are possible in other countries or jurisdictions, as well, has to be answered by the applicable foreign law.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Dedication

We went to court with the SCO in the name of Linux users and obtained an injunction and a fine for the opposing party.(more...)

Elmar Geese, Managing Director of tarent GmbH, has been the Chairman of the Linuxverband since 2004.

We supported FrOSCon 2007 as a platinum sponsor.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Partners

Linuxverband (German Linux Association) The purpose of the Linuxverband is to further the professional use of Linux and maintain the free availability of the operating system. We believe that a counterweight to the existing associations and lobby organizations is necessary to make the possibilities of Linux and Open Source better known. For this reason, we are a member of the LIVE Linux-Verband.

Ansstand e.V. ANSSTAND e.V. is a club of users of the software development standard for public administration.
For several years, we have been V-Model users and a member of this club. Its task is to support the use and further development of this software development standard. In addition to users of the standard, members also include many of the institutions and companies that head up the standardization committees.

FFII e.V. FFII e.V. (Förderverein für eine Freie Informationelle Infrastruktur e.V. (Promotional Club for a Free Informational Infrastructure)) is a club that promotes the lasting development of public information goods on the basis of copyright, free competition, and Open Standards. We support the Verein für eine Freie Informationelle Infrastruktur with our sponsor membership because we do not see the sense of software patents. We do not see the advantages that these patents would bring us or our customers. Until now, computer programs and other organizational and computing rules were not patentable inventions in Europe. We fear that this may soon change. FFII e.V. (Förderverein für eine Freie Informationelle Infrastruktur e.V. (Promotional Club for a Free Informational Infrastructure)) is a registered club that promotes the lasting development of public information goods on the basis of copyright, free competition, and Open Standards.

Free Software Foundation Europe We are a sponsor of the Free Software Foundation Europe, the European branch of the "inventor" of Free Software. Nowadays, Free Software is often called "Open Source." Free Software does not necessarily mean software that is free of cost and does not mean freedom without obligations. Free Software (such as tarent-contact) is usually published under the GPL license.

fairworks e. V. In the tarent, education is important to us. We ourselves offer several trainig spaces und support students during their diploma and bachelor theses. We think: Education needs to be fair for both sides. We expect comitted employees as well as motivated people who start their job. But we think: Work needs to be payed appropiately from the first day on. We observe with concern that a "grey work market" of interns and trainees arose. Due to that we support the work of fairworks e. V. - an initiative against the systematical exploiting intern economy.

Sun Microsystems GmbH Everything is connected with the worldwide network and everyone can access all data securely from anywhere. To realize this vision, a highly reliable, scalable infrastructure of Sun Microsystems is the right choice. Two focuses connect us to SUN: we develop most of our solutions on the Java platform. In addition, we are very active in the area of officer interoperability. The StarOffice/OpenOffice products play a large role here.

IBM IBM is one of the world's largest suppliers of information technology (hardware, software, and services). The company has about 320,000 employees worldwide and is active about 170 countries. Together with partners, IBM offers its customers a complete spectrums of products with advanced information technology: from hardware, software, services, and complex application solutions to outsourcing projects and offers for further education. With a focus on innovation, IBM equips its customers for future challenges and quickly changing market requirements.

For years, IBM has seen Linux as an operating system with great market potential. It supports Linux solutions and gets involved in their sales and distribution. In the meantime, IBM has a 30 percent worldwide turnover share in Linux servers in comparison with the market leaders. IBM achieves about a third of this turnover in agreements with business partners.

To be able to offer our customers a wide product portfolio with affordable conditions, tarent has been an IBM Business Partner since March 2007.

Intersystems The Caché product of Intersystems, which permits a fast transaction processing by the internal architecture, has proven itself to us in practice. Intersystems likes to call its Caché database system "postrelational" to express that it is an evolutionary further development of relational DBMSes. This system is particularly wide-spread in the health industry. Technically, Caché has many advantages: During work with a Caché OODBMS, the application layer based on it can work with instances of classes saved in the database using "proxy objects"; for example, it can change the values of attributes or call self-defined methods for these objects, which are then executed in the addressing area of the server.

This considerably simplifies software development and results in an unbeatable performance in certain scenarios. In our projects with Caché, we have only had the best experiences.

Orbit For many years, tarent GmbH has been developing software solutions for the detecon subsidiary Orbit Gesellschaft für Applikations- und Informationssysteme mbH. On the commission of Orbit GmbH, we deal with customers like the Bauen Agrar Umwelt industrial trade union. In this case, we created and manage an application for the operation of the call center.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Free Software

Free Software is software whose source code has been released by the originator and provided to the general public. The licenses make it possible to use the software for any purpose, to change it, and to process it further, both in the original and in changed form. Software is free when it allows the following four freedoms:

• The freedom to use a program for any purpose.
• The freedom to see how a program works and use it for one's own purposes.
• The freedom to make copies for others.
• The freedom to improve the program and make these improvements accessible for the general good.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Free Software projects

The economic meaning of Free Software is still underestimated. In the process, we consider the savings in license costs that are generally listed as a reason for Open Source migration to be secondary. Decisive for us is primarily the strategic potential and the technological possibilities opened up to our customers and even us by our Open Business Strategy: expense efficiency, low tool cost threshold, the continued improvement of existing implementations, and the possibility to focus worldwide technological competence in solution-oriented manner.

The complexity of the business processes and thus the requirements on IT systems long exceed the possibilities of purely proprietary suppliers. The EU estimated the overall value of all sophisticated Open Source solutions was estimated to be EUR12 billion in the Merit Study. The amount the freely available code lines has been doubling at 1½ to 2 year intervals in the last eight years, tendency rising. We can freely use and reuse this know-how, supplement it with proprietary components, and adapt it precisely to the technical requirements of our customers.

With our licence strategy of "growing and reusing" we contribute that the pool of well-developed free software grows on our lixid platform as well as in the community of free developers. When possible and practical, we put the products of our work under free licence.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Open Standards

The wish for interoperability and the integration of external systems is always in focus, whether the customer is globally active or active only in Europe. To achieve this, systems are increasingly open instead of being shut off against each other. Open Standards structure these openings and guarantee a problem-free flow of information. These standards define what corresponds to the requirements for openness and what not.If these standards for openness are observed, various systems can interact with each other independently of their respective technological background.

As far as possible we use free and open standarts, as defined in the European Interoperability framework, in our software sollutions.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Open Source Strategy

The Open Source Strategy relies on open, transparent processes, target-oriented thinking, openness toward new ideas, knowledge efficiency, and the finding of solutions together with partners.

We are convinced that the future lies in integration and not in separation. The flexible utilization of components of different system origins and quick-reacting business processes are a decisive competitive advantage for companies.

IT architectures must be able to make it possible. We value Open Standards since these guarantee the necessary interoperability of the interfaces. We use the potential of sophisticated Free Software projects in a targeted manner because immense economical and technological resources lie here. For us, Open Source Strategy also means the pragmatic inclusion of proprietary elements: what cannot be implemented with Free Software, succeeds with a mix of free and proprietary software. We have done our work when you can work freely.

We see it as an important part of our business strategy to support the community of free developers. We work with like-minded partners, campaign for Free Software, and consciously seek exchange on open platforms.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.

Freedom

What does the word "freedom" mean within the context of business processes and IT? It means the availability of information, the possibility of access to the latest technologies, and the direct participation in scientific discoveries. Freedom also means using, adapting, and further developing what has been achieved until now and adding something new through reorganization. This type of freedom opens up space for innovative companies to act and ultimately makes them independent of individual technological scenarios in how they solve their technical challenges. Freedom makes flexibility, interoperability, independence, and future-proofness possible.

Enterprise Content Management

Data, information, knowledge. The connections between these terms are easy to recognize. Data forms the basis for information. Through organizational structures and intelligent questions, information can be derived from data. To derive knowledge from this information, the information must be contextualized. Knowledge can be derived from the networking of information and the study of information relationships.

Guaranteed knowledge is the basis of business actions. Data and information, however, can only be used to the full extent for the formation of knowledge if the tools used permit it accordingly.

The enterprise content management tools of tarent GmbH support you in structuring data and information and managing it efficiently. They let you gain secure knowledge, use it in your work processes, and disseminate it. Due to the various possibilities of the provided tools, relevant company knowledge can be made easily accessible to employees for their use. In the process, finely adjustable user concepts guarantee that sensitive data only falls into the right hands. In addition, ECM solutions of tarent can protect their content using digital rights management.