Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

abovethelaw.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 172 posts

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#71

Post by omegant »

zem wrote: post #55
jarrett wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the other hand, it always, locally, makes sense not to challenge claims and let some other small company deal with it. I would argue in favor of fighting back in most cases, even from a local standpoint. "Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute." How you behave towards bullies sends a powerful signal to other bullies. Your response can either encourage more bullying, and thus a cycle that ends in your…

Kipling put it well: It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation, For fear they should succumb and go astray; So when you are requested to pay up or be molested, You will find it better policy to say: -- "We never pay any-one Dane-geld, No matter how trifling the cost; For the end of that game is oppression and shame, And the nation that pays it is lost!"

Awesome!, thank you.

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#72

Post by brown9-2 »

mherdeg wrote: post #60

There was a confusing bit in the "P.S." section in this letter which read like some kind of veiled threat to expose the city for tax fraud, or for some kind of tax-related misdeeds. What was that all about? Is it generally a good idea to put veiled threats in responses to cease-and-desist letters?

The joke is that he is demanding a refund of his property taxes without any evidence or argument just as the township lawyer was also issuing merit-less demands.

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#73

Post by danielweber »

vonskippy wrote: post #57

This is just another sad reminder of how broke the legal system is in the States. A simple fix, for this and many other types of legal bullying, make the protesting party pay ALL legal fees and a stiff penalty if they lose in court. Protects the clear cut owners who get infringed, yet weeds out bs cases like this one. Since it makes sense, is fair, and would simplify things - you know it will NEVER happen.

That's not strictly better. You can be discouraged from suing big parties because they may run up their own bills, which you would have to pay if you lost. And losing doesn't mean your case was without merit.

There is no perfect answer. It beats the old days where people would have to fight to the death to settle disputes, at least.

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#74

Post by RKoutnik »

mherdeg wrote: post #60

There was a confusing bit in the "P.S." section in this letter which read like some kind of veiled threat to expose the city for tax fraud, or for some kind of tax-related misdeeds. What was that all about? Is it generally a good idea to put veiled threats in responses to cease-and-desist letters?

The amount was the same as the town paid for their web site. ($5,000/yr for hosting? Ludicrous.)

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#75

Post by deepblueocean »

It's hard to talk about great C&Ds without mentioning Chilling Effects, http://www.chillingeffects.org/notice.cgi, a repository/database of many C&Ds and copyright claims, which receives copies automatically of many letters sent to large websites.

Some of the content in there is particularly golden for humor value (search "perfect 10"), but more importantly, it serves as a first step to quantifying how many of these letters get sent and how many of those are legitimate. Chilling Effects doesn't track what happens afterwards, but it's one step above anecdote, anyway.

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#76

Post by gcv »

vonskippy wrote: post #57

This is just another sad reminder of how broke the legal system is in the States. A simple fix, for this and many other types of legal bullying, make the protesting party pay ALL legal fees and a stiff penalty if they lose in court. Protects the clear cut owners who get infringed, yet weeds out bs cases like this one. Since it makes sense, is fair, and would simplify things - you know it will NEVER happen.

I'm sure tort reform will happen eventually — after we abolish the Electoral College and rewrite the tax code, it seems like a good next step for the legislature to consider. /s

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#77

Post by zem »

omegant wrote: post #71
zem wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kipling put it well: It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation, For fear they should succumb and go astray; So when you are requested to pay up or be molested, You will find it better policy to say: -- "We never pay any-one Dane-geld, No matter how trifling the cost; For the end of that game is oppression and shame, And the nation that pays it is lost!"

Awesome!, thank you.

welcome. leslie fish has a great musical setting of the poem on her "cold iron" album (highly recommended if you're a kipling fan at all). this one's not up on youtube, sadly, but http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gYvS8L0nDY is her (also great) setting of "rimini" from "puck of pook's hill", which should give you some idea of her style.

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#78

Post by Angostura »

samstave wrote: post #29
johnminton wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"ask who owned" not "ask whom owned". "whom" isn't just a word to put in to sound educated - it's used only when the "who" is an object. Here it is not.

Whomever you are, you sound condescending rather than helpful.

Whomsoever, surely

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#79

Post by GhotiFish »

hawkharris wrote: post #15

It's true that most cease-and-desist letters contain awful legalese, but here's a great example of a well-written, classy one: https://brokenpianoforpresident.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/...

wow. It's amazing how phrasing and tone can change your posture and make your compliant or resistant to demands.

A form of mental/monetary Judo. Thanks for the example.

Re: A Great Response to a Cease and Desist Letter

#80

Post by edwardy20 »

DanBC wrote: post #67
mitchty wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also unreadable where i work where scribd is basically useless. Would be nice if people linked to pdfs instead of scribd.

When someone submits a PDF to HN it'll be automatically changed to a scribd link, so that's why you see so many scribd links to HN. I know that doesn't help with this particular article.

Why? And what if the pdf doesn't exist on scribd?
Post reply on HN