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Xref: sserve comp.unix.bsd:12162 comp.bugs.4bsd:1966 Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd,comp.bugs.4bsd Path: sserve!newshost.anu.edu.au!munnari.oz.au!news.Hawaii.Edu!ames!agate!howland.reston.ans.net!gatech!ncar!csn!csn!raven!rcd From: rcd@raven.eklektix.com (Dick Dunn) Subject: Re: 4.4BSD Release Message-ID: <1993Jul1.034113@eklektix.com> Organization: eklektix - Boulder, Colorado References: <20qdsj$6rt@agate.berkeley.edu> <20qq3p$ke6@wsrcc.com> Date: Thu, 1 Jul 1993 03:41:13 GMT Lines: 64 wolfgang@wsrcc.com (Wolfgang Rupprecht) writes: [Keith/Kirk letter on 4.4 availability] ... >Why are the Berkeley lawyers being such wimps?... How are they wimps? They've made a decision about what's the most reasonable approach while the suit is pending. It may be that they want to minimize the cost to the university in the (now increasingly unlikely) event they lose the suit--and that's good strategy. It may be that they don't see a major gain to the university in releasing 4.4-Lite sooner. (I'm not saying I agree with that, but it's a plausible line of reasoning.) >...What good are ones >attack dogs if they are afraid of the other guys attack dogs?... The university's "attack dogs" are probably mostly concerned with defense of the university. Unlike many large corporations, universities can't generally make money suing other organizations. But anyway... >...Can't BSDI's lawyers give Berkeley's some assertiveness training or >something? This is really the crux of the matter--the situation is very different for these two organizations, and the lawyers are behaving accordingly. BSDI: They have nothing to lose by selling/distributing their product. As long as they're not under injunction, the more they sell and the sooner they sell it, the better off they are. If they win the suit, it vindicates the decision not to hold back; if they lose the suit, they're just shut down, period. That's why they released 1.0 as soon as the injunction request was denied. UC Berkeley: They actually have nothing to gain by distributing early! It would be nice, and we'd all like to see it, but all they get is the chance to give something away sooner. OTOH, if they lose the suit, the penalty against the university may well depend in part on how they've acted in the meantime. Moreover, there's no reason for them to do things which might provoke more aggressive legal action from USL...the sooner the case gets decided, the better. It's really easy to get impatient with the process..."justice" in a big suit like this is unbelievably, unconscionably slow. Frankly, I think we should be glad that UC's lawyers are actually fighting this case instead of giving it up. They could well have said "we can't afford the time and expense of fighting this" and settled out of court--which probably would have meant no 4.4 at all. In fact, I seem to recall there was a point when it *did* look like they weren't going to defend against the suit, but either decided or were persuaded to continue. If UC weren't defending, BSDI would have a much harder (perhaps impossible) battle...and from there, it would get pretty grim--first for UC work and BSDI, but soon thereafter for the free efforts as well. As much as I'd like to see 4.4-Lite come out tomorrow, I think we're much better off with UC in the picture but moving carefully, than not having them involved at all. (And the worst of it is that nobody in power at USL seems to have a clue that this whole affair amounts to little more than a sales promotion effort for Microsoft...) -- Dick Dunn rcd@eklektix.com -or- raven!rcd Boulder, Colorado USA ...Simpler is better.