Will protect its Linux customers, defending them in court at HP's cost, will indemnify users buying servers, workstations if they are sued by SCO. HP is first major sever vendor to protect customer base on serious hardware. [The Register]

Main item of note for tour is premier sponsor: HP. Last week, HP jumped ahead of IBM and Dell to say it will protect users from SCO if they face court battle over Linux use, if they agree to use unmodified Linux versions. [The Register]

HP appeared as premier sponsor on SCO City-to-City Tour Web site, logo was displayed well and fully, showing their backing SCO October user conference tour. Then, a few hours later, HP banner vanished. [The Register]

Firm jumps into SCO legal maelstrom by claiming immunity from it; announcement cites 2001 business agreement with Caldera giving Lindows.com technology for product initiatives in return for considerations. [The Register]

Licensing Unix code from litigious SCO does little to allay fears that SCO is but a beard for Redmond. Microsoft was instrumental in SCO early growth, by selling Xenix. [The Register]

AP reports the 937 boxes of court-ordered documents from the Caldera vs. Microsoft DR-DOS antitrust lawsuit, that were stored since the trial, are being destroyed now by request of SCO; 40 boxes are in use by Sun. [The Register]

Army of paper shufflers working at SCO manages to unearth 1996 amendment potent enough to block some Novell Unix claims. SCO says amendment confirms Unix copyrights were safely secured. [The Register]

Novell has rebuffed SCO's claim to hold Unix copyrights and patents, claiming to hold them, and discloses SCO has been begging Novell for rights to IP that SCO claims it already has. [The Register]

SEC filing shows: SCO has already lost business from its loyal customer base; expects to lose more. [The Register]

SGI may join IBM on SCO list of intellectual property thieves. In recent SEC filing, SGI says SCO threatened to revoke SGI Unix license due to a breach of contract, similar to IBM complaint, to disrupt Irix sales. [The Register]