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IMO it would be better if there was a general mechanism to prevent profiting from corrupt business practices. For example, a court could determine how much mone

by amluto 5mo ago

IMO it would be better if there was a general mechanism to prevent profiting from corrupt business practices. For example, a court could determine how much money Microsoft made by selling perpetual licenses that turned out to be a lie, add interest, add a 50% penalty, and require Microsoft to pay all of that into a trust to be collected by any customers harmed. The point would not be so much to help the customers but to cause the actual cost to Microsoft to be sufficiently high as to disincentivize corrupt behavior.

wmf 5mo ago
The general mechanism is lawsuits; in this case class action lawsuits.
- thayne 5mo ago
  And this mechanism is pretty ineffective. Class action lawsuits usually end up with settlements where the offender pays much less than the harm they caused, and those harmed get almost nothing. Even if it does go all the way to a court verdict, the sentence is usually insufficient. And the process is long and expensive. I don't really know what the solution is, but the current system clearly isn't working. And I don't think it was really designed for the scale of mega corporations with hundreds of thousands or even millions of customers.
anigbrowl 5mo ago
You can do class action litigation, but that takes years and the lawyers collect 30-50% of any settlement. The economics for customers don't make sense.
- codedokode 5mo ago
  The Office 2024 license quoted in comment [1] says that "class action lawsuits ... aren't allowed" (but only if you live in US). Truly free country where you a free to even waive your right to sue. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48341968 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48341968
  - simoncion 5mo ago
    > Truly free country where you a free to even waive your right to sue. Yep. It's difficult to say that the folks in the country are free when they often have to surrender their right to access the courts to get jobs, health insurance, medical care, access to telecommunications, shelter, delivery services, bill-payment services, etc, etc, etc, and obligate themselves to arbitration that nearly always gags both parties. AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion was a monstrous decision. Arbitration was always an option. If you have to force people to choose the dispute resolution option you claim is cheaper [0] and fairer, odds are good that it's neither of those things. [0] Remember when -IIRC- Doordash plead with Federal court to permit it to move its mass arbitration into court because the arbitration was too expensive (and how they got their ass kicked out of court)? Remember how like a month later, all the arbitration companies magically got a "We will handle no more than twenty complaining parties at once. All yall bitches got to get in line." clause in their rules governing mass arbitration? Yea, "good" times.
  - dangus 5mo ago
    Another option is to actually take them to arbitration. There are starting to be law firms that specialize in mass-filing multiple arbitration suits instead of class actions and they are pretty interesting because some companies are finding it more difficult to deal with than class action lawsuits. That said, EULAs are also often written in ways that are unenforceable. Just because a company says they get something doesn’t mean the law agrees. Does the judge in my small claims case give a shit about the EULA if the defendant fails to show up?
  - anigbrowl 4mo ago
    No surprise there. I'm not sure how binding that is, though; it strikes me as more of an assertion than a hard and fast rule. Contracts that require an individual to enter arbitration prior to litigation are one thing, seeking to foreclose a legal remedy for a whole cohort of potentially injured consumers strikes me as more of a reach.
- amluto 5mo ago
  Right. And IMO it works poorly. It’s extremely common to see a settlement such that the company still ends up ahead on its problematic behavior.
- mohamedkoubaa 5mo ago
  Not even as a deterrence?
  - amluto 5mo ago
    Go find some class action settlements. There’s a good chance the total damages (substantially) less than the profits from whatever behavior generated the lawsuit, and that’s not even accounting for interest. So, no.
    - thfuran 5mo ago
      And also not accounting for the other big factor: the probability of getting caught and reaching such a settlement/verdict. If the consequence is a thirty percent chance of paying thirty percent of the gains back in thirty years, malfeasance is just good business, not a credible risk. It needs to be unprofitable and pierce the corporate veil.

by amluto 5mo ago

wmf 5mo ago

The general mechanism is lawsuits; in this case class action lawsuits.

thayne 5mo ago
And this mechanism is pretty ineffective. Class action lawsuits usually end up with settlements where the offender pays much less than the harm they caused, and those harmed get almost nothing. Even if it does go all the way to a court verdict, the sentence is usually insufficient. And the process is long and expensive. I don't really know what the solution is, but the current system clearly isn't working. And I don't think it was really designed for the scale of mega corporations with hundreds of thousands or even millions of customers.

anigbrowl 5mo ago

You can do class action litigation, but that takes years and the lawyers collect 30-50% of any settlement. The economics for customers don't make sense.

codedokode 5mo ago
The Office 2024 license quoted in comment [1] says that "class action lawsuits ... aren't allowed" (but only if you live in US). Truly free country where you a free to even waive your right to sue. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48341968 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48341968
- simoncion 5mo ago
  > Truly free country where you a free to even waive your right to sue. Yep. It's difficult to say that the folks in the country are free when they often have to surrender their right to access the courts to get jobs, health insurance, medical care, access to telecommunications, shelter, delivery services, bill-payment services, etc, etc, etc, and obligate themselves to arbitration that nearly always gags both parties. AT&T Mobility v. Concepcion was a monstrous decision. Arbitration was always an option. If you have to force people to choose the dispute resolution option you claim is cheaper [0] and fairer, odds are good that it's neither of those things. [0] Remember when -IIRC- Doordash plead with Federal court to permit it to move its mass arbitration into court because the arbitration was too expensive (and how they got their ass kicked out of court)? Remember how like a month later, all the arbitration companies magically got a "We will handle no more than twenty complaining parties at once. All yall bitches got to get in line." clause in their rules governing mass arbitration? Yea, "good" times.
- dangus 5mo ago
  Another option is to actually take them to arbitration. There are starting to be law firms that specialize in mass-filing multiple arbitration suits instead of class actions and they are pretty interesting because some companies are finding it more difficult to deal with than class action lawsuits. That said, EULAs are also often written in ways that are unenforceable. Just because a company says they get something doesn’t mean the law agrees. Does the judge in my small claims case give a shit about the EULA if the defendant fails to show up?
- anigbrowl 4mo ago
  No surprise there. I'm not sure how binding that is, though; it strikes me as more of an assertion than a hard and fast rule. Contracts that require an individual to enter arbitration prior to litigation are one thing, seeking to foreclose a legal remedy for a whole cohort of potentially injured consumers strikes me as more of a reach.
amluto 5mo ago
Right. And IMO it works poorly. It’s extremely common to see a settlement such that the company still ends up ahead on its problematic behavior.
mohamedkoubaa 5mo ago
Not even as a deterrence?
- amluto 5mo ago
  Go find some class action settlements. There’s a good chance the total damages (substantially) less than the profits from whatever behavior generated the lawsuit, and that’s not even accounting for interest. So, no.
  - thfuran 5mo ago
    And also not accounting for the other big factor: the probability of getting caught and reaching such a settlement/verdict. If the consequence is a thirty percent chance of paying thirty percent of the gains back in thirty years, malfeasance is just good business, not a credible risk. It needs to be unprofitable and pierce the corporate veil.