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It's not ironic, it's the flipside of exactly the same reason. Bigcorps can steal with impunity because they have unlimited money to pay expensive lawyers. FOSS
by rossy 19d ago
It's not ironic, it's the flipside of exactly the same reason. Bigcorps can steal with impunity because they have unlimited money to pay expensive lawyers. FOSS projects do not, so they cannot.
- otterley 18d agoNo judge I’ve ever met gave a damn how much a party spent on legal resources. With rare exceptions, they care a great deal about achieving justice, and often bend over backwards to help indigent parties avoid prejudicing themselves. Keep in mind that there are no indigent parties in this debate; both major IP rights holders and the frontier AI companies are well capitalized. (I worked in a federal district court for a while.)
- voakbasda 18d agoThe problem is that money buys lawyers, and you need those to get justice. If the other side spends more, you are likely to lose.
- otterley 18d agoWhich of these parties doesn’t have lawyers? (I’m talking about bigcorps stealing from bigcorps here.) In a case where both parties have lawyers, having more and more expensive lawyers is not necessarily predictive of a case’s outcome. There are diminishing returns. What having more resources tends to do is force the poorer party to settle quicker. But that’s not necessarily a loss. Judges still have to approve settlements in the interest of justice.
- voakbasda 18d agoSettlements are not justice.
- cromka 18d agoNot everywhere is the US.
- mitxela 18d agoThe judge doesn't directly care, but paying more for lawyers gets you better legal arguments that are more likely to win.
- otterley 18d agoI don’t know. I’ve seen high quality work product from solo practitioners. Also, even the most expensive lawyer cannot make you win when the law isn’t on your side.
- mitxela 17d agoCan happen. Your chance is still much better if you pay more. Every plainly ridiculous precedent ever was set by the expensive lawyer side.
- otterley 16d agoFalse. A substantial percentage of ridiculous precedents resulted from the Government prevailing in a case—and DAs are not the best paid lawyers by far.