GROKLAW

'Groklaw' is a blog that was started May 16 2003 by paralegal Pamela Jones (posting as ''PJ'') at Radio UserLand. Groklaw's name derives from Robert A. Heinlein's neologism 'grok', roughly meaning "to understand completely", which had previously entered geek slang. The blog has extensively covered the SCO-Linux lawsuits, being critical of SCO.

Contents

Origins

Main focus

Awards

Neutrality

Additional Projects

Editorial policy

Criticisms

See also

External links

References

Origins

The blog had two purposes:
# To enable Jones to learn blogging software.
# To enable her to write on her favorite field — law.
The first article was entitled ''The Grokster Decision - Ode To Thomas Jefferson''. It was a serious article about the effect of P2P on the music industry, and the recent (at that time) court decision in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios, Inc., et al., Plaintiffs, vs. Grokster, Ltd., et al., Defendants, by Judge Steven Wilson in favour of the defendants. The article also covered the previous Napster decision, and why it was different causing the Napster system to be shut down. The article included a quote from Thomas Jefferson, and references to David Boies, who was Napster's attorney.
The second post on May 17 2003 also covered legal issues - it addressed the then new SCO v. IBM lawsuit (in full, "CALDERA SYSTEMS, INC., a Delaware corporation d/b/a THE SCO GROUP, Plaintiff, vs. INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION, a Delaware corporation, Defendant"), and was titled ''SCO Falls Downstairs, Hitting its Head on Every Step.'' It criticized Caldera Systems for the way they were handling the suit outside of court, and the article included quotes from Bruce Perens, Richard Stallman, Steve Ballmer, and Linus Torvalds. The article ended with this paragraph:
:David Boies has agreed to represent SCO. I am trying to remind myself that our legal system is predicated on lawyers sometimes representing people they don't personally admire, and the system really does depend on someone being willing to take on unpopular clients. I know Boies doesn't use email, or at least he didn't the last time I checked. So maybe he doesn't quite get the tech ... ah, hang it all, there's no way around it: I feel bad he's chosen to represent them, especially after I posted an Ode singing his praises, and I hope he loses.
The blog soon became a popular place for Free Software advocates to hang out; its popularity caused it to outgrow Radio Userland, and was transferred to ibiblio as a stand alone web site.

Main focus

The main focus of Jones's writing now became the Caldera Systems v. IBM litigation (note that Caldera Systems changed its company name to The SCO Group during this time). It has now expanded to include intellectual property and patent issues from Microsoft as well as issues with the GNU General Public License GPL. Jones is known among her audience for her ability to explain complex legal issues in simple terms and the research she used in putting together articles.
The blog website became a community effort. While Jones, as a paralegal, understood law, she was not a programmer. Many of her readers were, so, when technical issues arose, she had a solid backing from those who did understand them. This enabled her to solicit guest commentary on a variety of issues, such as:

★ Linux Kernel coding practices

★ C Language programming

★ Operating systems programming

★ Operating systems history

★ Standards Organizations
Each of these issues appeared to have some application to the case, and most would be revisited many times. Additional topics include later lawsuits by The SCO Group against Daimler Chrysler, Autozone, and Novell, as well as the countersuit by Red Hat, which appeared to be related to the original suit against IBM. The implications of these were also covered.

Awards

Groklaw has been cited by the attorneys for several firms in law journal articles. It has also won several awards:

★ 2007 Best FUD Fighter - Google-O'Reilly Open Source Awards

★ 2005 Best News Site - ConsortiumInfo
★ .org - Pamela Jones/Groklaw: Best Community Site or Blog (Non-Profit)

★ 2005 Dana Blankenhorn - Corante - PJ - Best Blogger of the Year

★ 2004 The Inquirer - Groklaw: Best Website of 2004

★ 2004 TechWeb Network Readers Choice Award - Best Independent Tech Blog

★ 2004 Linux Journal Editors' Choice Award - Best Nontechnical or Community Website

★ 2003 OSDir.com Editor's Choice Winner - Best News Site

Neutrality

Groklaw is the personal creation of one person, Pamela Jones, and Groklaw publishes articles (both news and opinion) from a self-described pro-FOSS, anti-FUD perspective.^[1] On ''SCO v. IBM'', Groklaw reports critically on SCO, and comments on Groklaw in regard to this lawsuit come from readers who are "overwhelmingly pro-Linux and anti-SCO."^[2] SCO executives Darl McBride and Blake Stowell (former director of corporate communications for SCO)^[3] have claimed that Jones works for IBM.^[4] Jones has denied this allegation,^[5] as did IBM in a court filing.^[6]
Maureen O'Gara, a writer for ''Linux Business News'', wrote an exposé aiming to unmask Pamela Jones' identity. The article included alleged but unverified personal details about Jones, including such items as the address of a woman who, according to O'Gara, was Jones' mother.^[7] After threat of legal action, harassment of advertisers, and a denial of service attack,^[8] ''Linux Business News''' publisher Sys-Con issued a public apology^[9] and dropped Ms. O'Gara and her ''LinuxGram'' column.

Additional Projects

Anticipating further legal threats against GNU, Linux, and the free software community, Pamela Jones launched Grokline, a Unix ownership timeline project, in May, 2004.^[10] One notable result of the Groklaw/Grokline effort was obtaining and publishing the 1994 settlement in ''USL v. BSDi'', which for over a decade had been sealed by the parties.^[11] The document was obtained through a California ''Open Access'' statute (the university being a publicly funded institution is required by law to make almost all of its documents public), and the release of the settlement answered many questions as to the ownership of the Unix Intellectual Property.
The Linux documentation project Grokdoc was started in 2004, with the stated goal "to create a useful manual on basic tasks that new users will find simple and clear and easy to follow."^[12]
Groklaw has also extensively covered patent problems with software and hardware, use of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) against FSF ideals, Open Standards, DRM, GPLv3, and has published Peter Salus's Unix/GNU/Linux history ''The Daemon, the GNU & the Penguin''.
MathFox assists as the webmaster for Groklaw and associated websites.

Editorial policy

Groklaw has comment guidelines that emphasize politeness and orderly conduct. Groklaw allows anonymous postings and does not screen comments before they are published. However Groklaw does reserve the right to remove or otherwise hide comments that are considered unacceptable. PJ has stated that two of her goals are to keep Groklaw acceptable reading for the legal profession and to supply a place where people interested in FOSS and Law can exchange views, ideas, and information.

Criticisms

The most significant complaint against Groklaw is that it often isn't used for discussion of law, but rather a pulpit for PJ to deliver her ideological opinions about open source software. This was highlighted most recently when PJ spoke out against Word import filters in OpenOffice, resulting in harsh responses from several Linux developers on the blog aggregator http://planet.gnome.org/. Miguel de Icaza wrote:

I would reply to each individual point from PJ, but she either has not grasped how open source is actually delivered to people or she is using this as a rallying cry to advance her own ideological position on ODF vs OfficeXML. [1]

Another critical complaint is that the articles and commentary are woefully inadequate once they stray outside Groklaw's core competency of legal explanations. The following quote is by Paul Hudson, author of several books on the PHP programming language and editor of Linux Format magazine:

But since the SCO case has quietened down, the site has started to post other “news” from the Linux world, and to be honest, now that it has strayed outside of its core competency of paralegalism, Groklaw is starting to suck. [2]

See also

★ SCO-Linux controversies

★ Weblog

★ Darl McBride

★ Ralph Yarro III

★ Canopy Group

★ Software patents and free software

External links

★ Groklaw

★ Grokline

★ Grokdoc

★ Linux Online interview with Pamela Jones

★ Lawyers Flock to Mystery Web Site's Coverage of SCO v. IBM Suit

★ Open letter to SCO

★ An accompanying research document for the Open Letter

★ 2007: Google-O'Reilly Open Source Awards

References

1. Groklaw Mission statement
2. SCO losses up, revenues not
3. Local News and Notes, ''Provo Daily Herald'', 2007-02-13.
4. Primary court document "Exhibit 18" filed by SCO 2/10/2006. Face to Face: McBride outlines SCO's lawsuit strategy, zdnet.com.Writing Linux History: Groklaw's Role in the SCO Controversy, linuxinsider.com.
5. Letter to the Editor: No IBM-Groklaw connection, zdnews.com. PJ Responds to the Smear Campaign Against Groklaw, Groklaw.
6. Primary court document "Exhibit 19" filed by IBM 2/10/2006
7. Interview with Fuat Kircaali, CEO of Sys-Con, ''Free Software Magazine''. Intimigation, Groklaw.
8. On Sys-Con and LinuxWorld.Com DoS (Again), Blog Home For Steve Suehring, 2005-05-14. Who is Pamela Jones? Tragic End to Jones-O'Gara Feud
9. ''To Our Valued Readers'', Linux Business News, posted 13 May 2005 (archived 16 May 2005 at the Internet Archive; message appears near top in box with a light yellow background)
10. http://www.grokline.net/ Grokline.net home page
11. The 1994 USL-Regents of UCal Settlement Agreement, Groklaw, 28 Nov 2004
12. Grokdoc Main Page