The dispute between The SCO Group and Novell, Inc. over the ownership of copyrights in the code to certain versions of the UNIX operating system, which started eight years ago, appears to have been handed its retirement papers by the Tenth Circuit. Yesterday, on the case’s second visit to the circuit, the court upheld the jury verdict in Novell’s favor on the issue of copyright ownership. The SCO Group v. Novell, Inc., No. 10-4122 (10th Cir. Aug. 30, 2011).

The case is important because the issue of UNIX copyright ownership underlies the copyright litigation campaign that SCO commented in 2003, targeting the LINUX open source operating system. When SCO filed multiple lawsuits claiming that the LINUX OS infringed its UNIX copyrights, it raised concerns that users of LINUX could be held liable for infringement, and subject to the payment of royalties to SCO. The ruling that SCO does not own the copyrights that it asserted in those litigations puts an end to that threat.

Despite the concerns raised in 2003 that the threat of copyright litigation and royalty payments would stall not only the adoption of the LINUX OS but also other open source software, users appeared to factor in the threat of future liability. Both LINUX and other open source software projects marched on as the SCO litigations ground on.

Last week, the LINUX OS turned 20. As this CNN article observes, LINUX is now invisible and ubiquitous. While its share of the desktop operating system remains miniscule, LINUX code is present in 30% and 43% of tablets and smartphones, respectively, as part of the Android operating system.  And LINUX code is present in the firmware of countless other devices, and is pervasive in enterprise data systems.

As for open source generally, as long as we’re keeping score, it’s a good time to note that the Apple operating system is based on open source code as well. In fact, it has the same roots as the code at issue in SCO v. Novell – the earliest versions of the UNIX operating system.

Notwithstanding that SCO may seek en banc review and even file a petition for certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court (it’s done that before), the SCO v. Novell case appears to be, finally, over. Ultimately, the related SCO litigations, including its copyright infringement case against IBM, will fold up as well.

There are a few lessons for technology lawyers in the SCO v. Novell litigation, which you can read about in our prior blog post.

The SCO v. Novell endgame doesn’t seem to have gotten a lot of press, at least so far. Perhaps this is because attention has already turned to the next big “open source” battle – the complex web of litigations involving Google’s Android operating system. This time, the battle isn’t for the desktop, it’s for mobile market share.