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From: jkh@sentnl.ilo.dec.com (Jordan Hubbard)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd,comp.os.386bsd.misc
Subject: Re: UCB and USL/NOVELL settlement
Date: 18 Apr 1994 16:39:27 GMT
Organization: Digital Equipment Corporation, Galway Ireland
Lines: 29
Message-ID: <JKH.94Apr18173927@sentnl.ilo.dec.com>
References: <cproto.765983338@marsh>
NNTP-Posting-Host: sentnl.ilo.dec.com
In-reply-to: cproto@cs.curtin.edu.au's message of 10 Apr 94 13:08:58 GMT
In article <cproto.765983338@marsh> cproto@cs.curtin.edu.au (Computer Protocol) writes:
So now NOVELL is the new "Deathstar". Lets boycot the bastards. I have to
decide on a major new enterprise wide network. IT WON'T BE NOVELL. I'm
considering BANYAN. Any ideas.
Just to set this particular record straight - in talking with Burt
Levine, who is USL's senior legal council, I have been very favorably
impressed with his willingness to negotiate with us, even to the
extend of spending reasonably large portions of his (what must be very
expensive) time to try and work out a reasonable compromise.
USL could have just put the boot down and said "HALT." They did not.
What they have done instead is talk to us (well me, anyway) about the
immediate and future needs of FreeBSD vs those of USL, and what kind
of arrangements might be made in order to keep both sides happy.
Considering that we're really nothing more than a group of guys who
bang this stuff out for fun, their willingness to treat us as
legitimate entities in our own right and negotiate with us at all is
somewhat surprising.
Needless to say, this attitude in any company, much less one the size
of Novell, deserves a certain degree of praise. They're not the
Deathstar, nor do I believe they can afford to be ("USL sues small
group of non-profit UNIX developers, claims UNIX is an Open System!
:-)") and I believe they know this.
Jordan