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Joe, You use "will" in your third paragraph a lot. Lawyers don't generally take cases for nothing just because a win is almost guaranteed (especially not over
by imajes 17y ago
Joe,
You use "will" in your third paragraph a lot. Lawyers don't generally take cases for nothing just because a win is almost guaranteed (especially not over copyright). They take cases pro bono when they either expect to get massive publicity or massive payout. (i.e. the ambulance chasers exist because they are almost always suing insurance companies who settle)
You also state that the company will pay costs + damages. Again, the judge can rule that they must, but it's incredibly hard to enforce. Looking at the names of the founders, at first guess i don't believe they are in the US. So to start, you'd have to do searches of various company databases to find where to even file papers. It's non trivial and will add up.
OP: remember, whilst you may have a very solid case to win an infringement, remember the old adage: "never sue someone who cannot pay". You may, however, be able to get a c&d out pretty cheaply, and this sometimes shuts people down fast enough when it's obvious there is infringement.
- SwellJoe 17y agoYou're quite right on all counts. I assumed a US violator. The game changes dramatically when things are outside of US jurisdiction. C&D probably is the best choice here. (You have to do that anyway as the first step in a lawsuit. You must act to minimize the damages as soon as you are aware of the violation.)
- imajes 17y agoJoe, Ignore this if you want, but - if you made $30k on the settlement, and legal fees on a reasonable case with a lawyer who will insist on doing discovery and prep can't be less than $20k, did that qualify as a win for you?
- SwellJoe 17y agoLegal fees were about 15k, due to a pre-existing relationship between my publisher and the lawyer. It never went to trial, however. It was settled rather quickly. It was a very clear case, and the companies legal staff pretty much just made some grouchy noises and then came back with a settlement offer. Yes, it counts as a win for me. It shut down the violations, and it cost an evil company time and money. Had it been a less egregiously nasty company, I probably would have been satisfied with a C&D. The violation in my case cost me very little (the materials in question were already available for free on the web, and their products were not competing with mine). So, maybe my own past experience, and the specifics of that experience, makes me more trigger-happy on the subject than is prudent.
- imajes 17y agoYeah. 15K to get out with a pre-trial deal, doing not much more than send letters back and forth, some discovery and agreeing a settlement deal. scratches head and wonders why he's not a lawyer
- SwellJoe 17y agoThe only lawyers I know wish they were building tech startups. Might be a symptom of the culture here in the valley.