During the SCO vs Novell trial, last year, it was determined that Novell owned the copyrights to AT&T UNIX' source code and derivatives. Darl McBride, CEO of SCO speaking at the Novell vs SCO countertrial disagrees. He "stated that SCO holds the copyrights over UNIX", and that "many Linux contributors were originally UNIX developers.

Novell has moved to quell growing concerns that it has sold Linux out to Microsoft as part of its Attachmate deal. On Wednesday, Novell chief marketing officer John Dragoon issued a short statement saying that Novell – not Microsoft – owns the copyrights on Unix.

Novell's copyrights for the Unix operating system will remain under Attachmate's control as part of the companies' pending merger, a Novell spokesman has revealed.

The top two negotiators for Novell Inc. in its 1995 deal to sell the Unix computer operating system testified Wednesday their former employer believed it sold the copyrights to that software along with the entire Unix business.

"So Novell really does now finally seem to own the Unix copyrights. Linux finds itself on a high-ground pedestal of long-term, low-risk use (unless Microsoft buys Novell [should have when they could have, eh?]). And IBM and Novell are closer than ever."

Novell Inc. lied about owning the copyrights for the Unix computer operating system then collaborated with IBM to damage Unix owner The SCO Group, the latter's attorney told a federal court jury Tuesday.

SCO's new position is that UnixWare is just another interchangeable name for UNIX and that SCOsource was about UnixWare, not Unix System V, but here's some more evidence that they are not the same thing and that SCOsource was primarily about UNIX System V. In this article, I'll restrict myself to things SCOfolk used to say about what SCOsource was about. As you will see, before the Honorable Dale Kimball ruled in August that the UNIX copyrights didn't pass from Novell to SCO, SCO said SCOsource was about UNIX System V source code. Now that it's time to pay Novell for those System V licenses, SCO says they were really UnixWare licenses.

In the aftermath of federal district judge Dale A. Kimball's recent ruling, which determined that Novell, not SCO, is the rightful owner of the UNIX copyrights, the once-mighty proprietary UNIX vendor is on the verge of annihilation.

The judge gives UNIX to Novell, but it is worth remembering that Novell is up for sale and its assets are up for grabs