Comment by sshine
2 days ago
Walk away.
Life is too short for lawsuits.
This comes from someone who dated someone for three years who was in a lawsuit when I got to know them, and was still in a lawsuit when we split. It affected them daily, hundreds and hundreds of hours were lost, thousands and thousands of dollars went to a nice, well-intended family lawyer.
But the best advice they could have got:
When given the chance, walk away.
Life is too short for lawsuits.
I’m almost 100% in agreement, but context matters, and attitude matters.
If you’re up against a behemoth, figure out how to get out ASAP.
But I’ve learned that small claims lawsuits can actually be quite fun! Earlier this year I sued a former landlord in small claims court. He had entered my rented space while I was away (without notice, multiple times) and then refused to return my security deposit when I moved out.
I went into it with a “let’s have fun and learn” attitude. I had never sued someone and I’d never represented myself in court. I read a lot, had some good conversations with LLMs (and then fact-checked them!) about the laws and case history in my area, then filed my suit.
After he dodged the summons three times, I discovered I could file a motion for alternative service (post on his front door, post in a newspaper, etc). When I went to court to argue for that motion, he actually showed up in court! So I asked the judge if he could be served right there, and he was!
Our trial was highly entertaining, I caught him in a bald-faced lie, then looked at the judge and said I’m not sure how both of these things he said could be true, I can’t figure out how it adds up but maybe you can.
I won the case, the judge awarded me less than I was asking for, but more than I was actually owed.
I was kinda hoping he would not pay (that’s common) in which case I was looking forward to learning about how to garnish his wages or put a lien on his property. But he’s actually paying me in monthly installments for the next very many months. He could pay me all at once so he’s being a bit of a jerk, but at least he’s paying.
All-in-all, I knew I had a solid case, had fun along the way, and didn’t spend more than a few bucks on court fees. In that specific context, it made sense for me and I’m happy I did it.
You are lucky that the incident caught you just when you were ripe for a new hobby.
Lawfare, a true American Hobby
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My elderly father paid a guy a $5K downpayment to re-pave his driveway. (For his driveway, most companies would require a $1K downpayment and charge $6K total). Well, the guy never showed. I read reviews and saw that he had duped a lot of folks, lost in court, but apprently never paid. I decided not to take him to court, and told my father to just take the loss. But after reading your post, I'm sorry I didn't give it a go. Great job!
You may have done the right thing.
There was a case before mine, an elderly couple swindled by a landscaper who took a bunch of money, did a tiny bit of crappy work, then disappeared.
Landscaper didn’t show up at trial and they won a default judgement; but good luck collecting from a ghost.
I've witnessed similar residential disputes brought to small claims court where the effort was in vain.
I'm happy it worked out for you, and that you had fun doing it. I could imagine going your route.
But for most people, sifting through legal papers and preparing for court is neither enjoyable nor affordable.
> Please tell us about the time you, cobbzilla, most successfully hacked some (non-computer) system to your advantage
> So I made my landlord pay me rent, with the help of some LLMs....
Had a very similar experience also with regards to deposit not returned. The person never showed up or did anything at all so I had the pleasure of picking the "repossession man" (for lack of a better word, it was in a country with a bit different system) from a list. I went with the one with the most ominously sounding name and he subsequently very effectively garnished the wages after adding his fees on top.
> I was kinda hoping he would not pay (that’s common) in which case I was looking forward to learning about how to garnish his wages or put a lien on his property.
If he has assets to his name and the action was against him, I don’t see him doing that. In most countries you can hire private recovery, so the process will be very fast to collect.
A good friend of mine always used to say "Once the lawyers are involved, you lose no matter what. Only the lawyers win." (paraphrased from memory).
I don't know if I agree that that is correct every single time, but it strikes me as a very useful heuristic at the least.
"Of course I've got lawyers. They are like nuclear weapons, I've got em 'cause everyone else has. But as soon as you use them they screw everything up."
Danny DeVito
My wife is a lawyer so I collect amusing statements about them ;-)
That's a very good saying. I keep that in mind.
The way I've heard it phrased is: billable hours always wins.
This has always been my (albeit limited) experience.
This is the side of lawsuits that you don’t see every time someone on Reddit or Hacker News confidently tells you to lawyer up and go to court.
Even seemingly simple issues can turn into never ending money pits that consume thousands of hours of your life spread over months or years.
If you’re really committed to something then you should evaluate how much time and money you’re willing to put into pursuing it. Unless both of those values are uncomfortably high numbers, just move on.
Which is exactly what those individuals and companies who act in bad faith but have deep pockets rely on. You’re right, but it’s still unfortunate.
Reading this,Patent trolls comes to my mind.
I think I have uploaded a hackernews post about the documentary about patent trolls but it of course didn't get any traction but its still worth a watch.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4NIFzG8NcU
Depends on your philosophy, honestly. If you're a hedonist, then yeah, get free from lawsuits as soon as possible and go back to munching candy. If you're am altruist, throwing yourself into the lion's den to eventually effect social good might be smart. If you're a nihilist, you can pick either, it's all the same when the sun goes supernova.
> it's all the same when the sun goes supernova.
We're already all dead in geologic time. Make the biggest ripples in the pond.
So... sue everyone you can?
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I empathise with the advice, even aspire to it. Despite that, I abhor a bully getting away with being a bully and would feel discontent not putting up a fight on principle.
In meditation, we learn to let go.
Attachment is discontent.
Tangential, but I’ve always found this hard to understand. Surely the things you value are worth hanging on to/fighting for?
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When the powerful is screwing over others, "letting go" is complicity, not a virtue.
Maybe, just maybe, it's time for the greedy rich to let go.
Choose peace or violence. Violence doesn't have to mean physical destruction or harm, it can mean self psychological harm as you put aside your comfort to further a goal or your values.
Peace is a perfectly valid option for people to pick. If they can master it, they can weather any depredation the world throws at them. Which may be many if society continues to slip slide into fascism.
However I believe most good things in the world came at the behest of violence - again not necessarily physical, but at minimum people sacrificing personal peace. Woman's suffrage, black suffrage in America, the civil rights act, LGBT rights in the UK, the overthrow of the kmt military dictatorship in Taiwan. Endless examples.
I'm still thinking about this all the time, I wrote about it a while back: https://blog.calebjay.com/posts/accept-or-reject/
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In the entire history of the world, not one single thing ever got better by accepting something as it is.
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Just because one ignores something, does not mean they've let it go.
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Life is too short for far more things than just this. It always strikes me just how much time we waste on stuff we won't care about in one year or five. Myself included. Time is by far our most precious commodity.
Everything we do right now is going to be dust in the wind given enough time, including ourselves.
I think we're just trying to keep busy on this lonely planet amist all these stars.
At the end, the only thing that ever matters is the good we tried to do and the love we shared between ourselves and strangers.
> At the end, the only thing that ever matters is the good we tried to do
But even this doesn't matter. If all goes to dust, even the good we do or the love we share. If we do evil, or if we hate the strangers, it makes no difference. We might as well do that if it satisfies us.
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lovely said! I think that's the right way to see things. somewhat forces me to give up on the mark, because nobody and nothing really cares about that in a few weeks, if not even days. On the other side, among the good things that you share while you are on this planes is making sure we live in justice. And I can't stop thinking about this being injustice. I could be entirely wrong though.
One alternative is to create a website that outs the company that is harming you in a way that is non-libelous and just tells your story, and then focus fully on SEO and GEO to ensure that the other company sees your site front-and-center when searching for their own.
You may get more attention this way, because it can affect the company more than the optics of a legal dispute. It’s not revenge, and you shouldn’t have that intent, if you want it to work.
However this method, and other similar methods used in the U.S. such as filing BBB complaints, are mostly used for harm done to consumers rather than businesses affected by disputes, so it may not be the best advice.
The more general principle is that people are too willing to adopt an adversarial mindset. In principle, there's a mutual win here if the VC company makes a substantial donation to the OSS product in exchange for the OSS project changing its name. Both parties will be better off in that scenario, relative to the lawsuit scenario.
"thousands of dollars went to a nice, well-intended family lawyer"
Sounds like it was maybe about custody for children?
Then it is hard to walk away, I think. What to do, if the other party does not cooperate and you still want to see your children?
Best advice for both sides still is obviously, avoid the need for lawyers in the first place and maintain basic level of communication.
Couldn’t agree more.
Besides money and hours, it will also affect your psychological wellbeing as it will dominate your mind every day.
Not worth it.
Indeed.
We met her ex once randomly on the street, and the first thing he asked was if she was still in her lawsuit.
Since the other part in the lawsuit lived in another part of the same house, you became paranoid about whether they would hear what you said through the walls, and you would be made painfully aware of the conflict every morning on the way to work.
It felt like a curse.
I would never wish for anyone to end up in a lawsuit.
Lawsuits in Europe are not as expensive as in the US, and they are a good learning experience as well.
I suppose this, again, depends on the country. They can get very expensive, especially if you're in a "loser pays" country. And a judge may even then divide the costs more fairly, and you find that your lawyer costs exceeded the monetary value of the judgement you won. That on top of potentially stressing years and years about it.
And then the loser may request a next level court to consider the case, potentially leading to more stressful years and a lot of additional financial risk.
That’s like Danny DeVito’s speech in War of the Roses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5XfYTgm4x8 (that’s only part of a longer scene, where he basically tells the guy not to proceed).
Literally one of the first things I was told when I started my law degree was “don’t ever go to court unless you absolutely have to”. :)
Similar to this advice, don't ask us.
This whole thread is a question for a lawyer.
But for real...just change the name of your project. It sucks, but the ruling was handed down, you lost the dispute.
Nobody's going to mind that the name changed. Firefox used to be called Firebird and changed due to trademark disputes. Dozens of open source projects have changed their names when they forked off of a corporate project, like LibreOffice and MariaDB.
I know that OP may be fond of the name but it's just a name.
> Firefox used to be called Firebird and changed due to trademark disputes.
It was first called Phoenix, then a trademark dispute forced them to rebrand to Firebird, then a trademark dispute forced them off that name too. Firefox was the third public name for that project. I'm surprised they didn't also get sued by Clint Eastwood[1] and have to change again.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firefox_(film)
Trademark rights are limited based on the category of goods or services. The Phoenix and Firebird disputes were with software companies.
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Can't agree more. Change your name to tikpeed and move on!
This name is perfect. I hope this gets traction.
My own family has been involved in an ongoing series of lawsuits against each other since 1989. Over an amount of money that is long since gone and they've kicked in even more in lawyers fighting over. None of us talk to each other anymore.
This is the best advice you can get.
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