The recent financial results tell it all, and it is just as I feared, Novell is alive at the whim and mercy of Steve Ballmer, and will be used as their puppet in appealing Microsoft's EC Antitrust fines as well as as an 'inside man' within the Open Source community to spread Fear Uncertainty and Doubt.

(emphasis mine)

The Microsoft deal for Novell was about grabbing customers. "The whole goal of this relationship was to get customers. That was the whole intention, from a Novell perspective, was to gain customers, and obviously revenue in return for our shareholders. But we needed to make sure we're getting customers out of this relationship to measure success, and I do believe we're getting that," says Hovsepian.

Microsoft's deal for Novell generated $348 million in cash flow. Russell acknowledged that sum is roughly equivalent to Novell's total cash flow for the quarter.

I had earlier stated that the upcoming GPLv3 would let us all know just how beholden to Microsoft Novell has become, well I think these numbers have already proven the point.