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You can’t not allow settlements. The plantiff brings the case. You can’t tell a plantiff they are unable to withdraw their case, you’d be infringing on the righ

You can’t not allow settlements. The plantiff brings the case. You can’t tell a plantiff they are unable to withdraw their case, you’d be infringing on the rights of the plantiff. Yes it works against the creation of precedent, but the court system is meant to provide a resolution of dispute between parties. The creation of precedent is a side effect of that process, not it’s primary goal. Edit: And just to end on a note of positivity, the courts aren’t really the place to make changes like this anyhow, which is out of most people’s hands. Instead we can lobby our Congress people etc to make laws that can end these practices (which is where most of our consumer protections have come from).

eclipticplane 3y ago
What's stopping someone else from copying the lawsuit?
- darth_avocado 3y ago
  Settlements have clauses usually that prevent the same litigation from happening again. Otherwise it’s an infinite money glitch where people keep suing the same company again and again once it’s proven they’re willing to settle.
  - crazydoggers 3y ago
    You can always bring your own case as long as you were not a party to the settlement. Though for it to be successful you’re probably going to have to show you suffered more than the average class member. For instance you buy a dishwasher that is faulty. There’s a class action settlement, but for you, the dishwasher ruined your apartment and the neighbors downstairs. You can opt out and sue directly even if there’s been a class settlement.
- crazydoggers 3y ago
  If it’s class action, then you have to not have participated. If you didn’t, then you can bring your own suit. But in order to bring a suit you’d have to show you’ve been harmed, so you’d have to have been a customer of one of these printers.
- ipython 3y ago
  Probably the fact their printer is now bricked after attempting to use third party ink … (Sorry couldn’t resist)
the_lego 3y ago
On the other hand, there are laws against false advertising and (in this case) sabotage, where the action is illegal regardless of what a plaintiff thinks. If I went around offices and sabotaged their printers, the district attorney could prosecute me regardless of what the office owners thought (assuming they wouldn't lie and claim they authorized my sabotage). This case is exactly the same. Don't be fooled - despite HP's name on the printers, they're not HP's printers anymore - they sold them, and have no more claim to them than I. Tangentially, and orthogonal to the issue of if settlements should be allowed, undisclosed settlements should be banned. The public has a right to know what terms are reached through the threat of and with the sanction of the legal system. Because in a democracy, the public is ultimately responsible for reforming or maintaining that system, and how can they do that when they don't know how it's being used?
- crazydoggers 3y ago
  First the example you mention confuses civil and criminal proceeding. Sabotaging people’s private property is a criminal act. District attornies bring criminal cases, not civil. The government could bring a civil suit as plantiff, (like the attorney general’s office) but the government would have to show its been harmed. Perhaps for instance through cost of printers used in government offices, or if some specific statute was violated. Also regarding any settlement. If it’s class action it’s public. If it was from a private individual plantiff, then they have a right to privacy you can’t just ignore.
  - the_lego 3y ago
    > Sabotaging people’s private property is a criminal act. That's what happened here. Refusing to scan without ink is sabotage. > If it was from a private individual plantiff, then they have a right to privacy you can’t just ignore. And the public has a right to transparency in the legal system. The rights are in conflict, and given the obvious risks of a black-box legal system, the right to transparency should prevail.
    - crazydoggers 3y ago

eclipticplane 3y ago

What's stopping someone else from copying the lawsuit?

darth_avocado 3y ago
Settlements have clauses usually that prevent the same litigation from happening again. Otherwise it’s an infinite money glitch where people keep suing the same company again and again once it’s proven they’re willing to settle.
- crazydoggers 3y ago
  You can always bring your own case as long as you were not a party to the settlement. Though for it to be successful you’re probably going to have to show you suffered more than the average class member. For instance you buy a dishwasher that is faulty. There’s a class action settlement, but for you, the dishwasher ruined your apartment and the neighbors downstairs. You can opt out and sue directly even if there’s been a class settlement.
crazydoggers 3y ago
If it’s class action, then you have to not have participated. If you didn’t, then you can bring your own suit. But in order to bring a suit you’d have to show you’ve been harmed, so you’d have to have been a customer of one of these printers.
ipython 3y ago
Probably the fact their printer is now bricked after attempting to use third party ink … (Sorry couldn’t resist)

the_lego 3y ago

On the other hand, there are laws against false advertising and (in this case) sabotage, where the action is illegal regardless of what a plaintiff thinks. If I went around offices and sabotaged their printers, the district attorney could prosecute me regardless of what the office owners thought (assuming they wouldn't lie and claim they authorized my sabotage). This case is exactly the same. Don't be fooled - despite HP's name on the printers, they're not HP's printers anymore - they sold them, and have no more claim to them than I. Tangentially, and orthogonal to the issue of if settlements should be allowed, undisclosed settlements should be banned. The public has a right to know what terms are reached through the threat of and with the sanction of the legal system. Because in a democracy, the public is ultimately responsible for reforming or maintaining that system, and how can they do that when they don't know how it's being used?

crazydoggers 3y ago
First the example you mention confuses civil and criminal proceeding. Sabotaging people’s private property is a criminal act. District attornies bring criminal cases, not civil. The government could bring a civil suit as plantiff, (like the attorney general’s office) but the government would have to show its been harmed. Perhaps for instance through cost of printers used in government offices, or if some specific statute was violated. Also regarding any settlement. If it’s class action it’s public. If it was from a private individual plantiff, then they have a right to privacy you can’t just ignore.
- the_lego 3y ago
  > Sabotaging people’s private property is a criminal act. That's what happened here. Refusing to scan without ink is sabotage. > If it was from a private individual plantiff, then they have a right to privacy you can’t just ignore. And the public has a right to transparency in the legal system. The rights are in conflict, and given the obvious risks of a black-box legal system, the right to transparency should prevail.
  - crazydoggers 3y ago