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Fucking Sue Me (2011)

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Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#91

Post by throwaway1979 »

ganeumann wrote: post #79
jnbiche wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The job of an engineer is to take the cost of materials, the budget, the expected longevity of the bridge, the project schedule, the prevailing environmental and geological conditions of the siting, etc. and balance all of these different variable against each other to arrive at a solution I'm not a lawyer, but I would assume that a good lawyer adopts an analogous process: they take the value of the contract, the pr…

With lawyers, if everything goes perfectly then they just did their job. If anything goes wrong they're entirely blamed for it. Since they are paid by the hour, there is an explicit incentive to spend as much time as possible to make sure everything goes perfectly. Typical agency problem. It's up to the client to tell the lawyers when they are done. Now, the very very best lawyers, the ones who have a waiting list of…

Part of the situation is that the output of a lawyer cannot be measured clearly. The same is true for programmers but more people seem to be okay with shoddy code than with shoddy contracts. If the consequences of bad code were equally drastic as those of shoddy contracts, I'd imagine a lot more time being spent on code quality.

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#92

Post by workhere-io »

This lesson in total disregard for risk served me well. They say entrepreneurs are risk takers. I think of myself as too lazy and irresponsible to fully understand the risk.

This attitude works very well - right until everything goes horribly wrong and you wished you had tried to minimize risks.

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#93

Post by dreamfactory »

jasonkester wrote: post #39

There's a simple reason why this works for small businesses: nobody sues a guy with no money. So if you're a sole proprietor scraping by and you piss off a giant company with lawyers enough that they want to file a lawsuit against you, well, what's the upside for them if they win? Tens of thousands of dollars in expenses on their side, and roughly zero dollars in recovered costs from the business they destroyed or th…

It's why big companies often prefer to spend more money with big suppliers. It often gets mistaken as them being ripped off when in fact they have their eyes wide open.

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#94

Post by keithrl »

As a lawyer, that is a stupid attitude to have.

Having legal shit done correctly for start-up businesses is a lot like having insurance. You'd prefer not to have to pay for insurance and you'll likely never need it. But when you need insurance, you're glad you have it.

Same thing is true for having your legal ducks in a row. You hope you never get sued or embroiled in a lawsuit, but if you do, you'll be glad you had lawyers involved at the beginning.

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#95

Post by inovica »

crusso wrote: post #37

Like with a lot of advice on HN, take this article with a grain of salt and pursue a balance while trying to understand the competing forces at work. My experience with entrepreneurial legal paperwork was that I ignored it too much in my early days and it bit me in the ass. When the money starts coming in and egos grow large, people reach for their lawyers when there's too much ambiguity in business relationships. Yo…

Very well said. Everything went well for him in the deal and all was fine, but what if it hadn't? I know a few people who have had serious problems because of a lack of attention to detail with their legals (or just not caring) and one of them was put out of business by it. I also know another guy who is ruthless and enjoys the thrust and parry of suing people when they try to get our of his 12-month contracts. I personally would rather take a more cautious approach than rush into something. I sleep at night knowing that I have covered myself and my family as best as I can

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#96

Post by acjohnson55 »

workhere-io wrote: post #92

This lesson in total disregard for risk served me well. They say entrepreneurs are risk takers. I think of myself as too lazy and irresponsible to fully understand the risk. This attitude works very well - right until everything goes horribly wrong and you wished you had tried to minimize risks.

No kidding! Can you say, "survivor bias"?

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#98

Post by raldi »

tqi wrote: post #52

Isn't this a classic example of Survivorship Bias? i.e. you know who probably doesn't write a lot of popular blog posts? Unsuccessful entrepreneurs who's companies failed because of something in their contract that they didn't read. But as with many things, the smart path is probably somewhere in between the two extremes...

Bingo.

"Everyone says to wear seatbelts and buy homeowners insurance, but I never have and I turned out fine! I'm not sure what the lesson is here."

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#99

Post by ktran03 »

As a newish freelance/contractor, what stood out to me is that's a shit tonne of money made there. I wonder if there's contracts close to that floating around still.

Re: Fucking Sue Me (2011)

#100

Post by muzz »

dreamfactory wrote: post #93
jasonkester wrote: post #39

There's a simple reason why this works for small businesses: nobody sues a guy with no money. So if you're a sole proprietor scraping by and you piss off a giant company with lawyers enough that they want to file a lawsuit against you, well, what's the upside for them if they win? Tens of thousands of dollars in expenses on their side, and roughly zero dollars in recovered costs from the business they destroyed or th…

It's why big companies often prefer to spend more money with big suppliers. It often gets mistaken as them being ripped off when in fact they have their eyes wide open.

Yes, big suppliers do have "skin in the game" and also big companies have long relationships with big suppliers. Many have Approved Vendor Lists and to do business with them you have to be approved first.
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