Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
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Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
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Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#2Why did you take it down? And why did you apologize?
I think the threat to sue was posturing, the same way that legal charges are always trumped up to get you to accept a plea.
If you had let them see it through, and they intended to sue you, you could have churned up a horror-inducing PR nightmare of a shitstorm for them.
If someone is really as petty to light cash on fire suing a young person with no assets over baseless claims, let them do it.
Litigation is expensive, you could have qualified for a public defender while they burned company assets, or just have represented yourself.
I say this as someone who isn't a stranger to the courts and judicial system.
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#3A fancy funded company like Replit getting scared by an intern's weekend project is entertaining. If your moat is so low it can be replicated in a few days, I think this open source project is the least of their worries.
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#4Why did you take it down? And why did you apologize? I think the threat to sue was posturing, the same way that legal charges are always trumped up to get you to accept a plea. If you had let them see it through, and they intended to sue you, you could have churned up a horror-inducing PR nightmare of a shitstorm for them. If someone is really as petty to light cash on fire suing a young person with no assets over ba…
The premise of being sued should be enough to scare most people, whether they are right or wrong. As such it's not surprising.
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#5I used replit few times but now i'll remove my account there. srsly what a bullshit they try to do with taking down open source projects cause they feel threaten, pathetic.
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#6Are there any open source competitors to Replit that are seeking patrons? I have been encouraged by the rapid fire Show HNs of open source first startups [1], and this space seems ripe for such open tooling.
[1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=pastMonth&page=0&prefix=fa...
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#7If I’m reading those emails correctly, Amjad the CEO directly emailed you occasionally. It is pretty stunning that as the CEO of the company, he would stoop to what I interpret as pretty unprofessional communication and petty threats.
I also am failing to connect the dots about why Replit would even feel threatened - if you were as helpful of an intern as described, you’d think they would recognize that you had good intentions only when creating Riju - very odd behavior from Replit all around.
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#8That's really shitty. I wonder what the founders of Replit have to say about this? They're active on HN so I hope they can address this publicly...
EDIT: I mean the screenshots are irrefutable evidence of how bad this has escalated - it started as a normal convo and went downwards like the CEO was out to get some blood for no reason ... now I guess you're gonna get a lawyer threat letter to take down the whole blogpost because you've revealed private conversations without both parties' consent?
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#9A fancy funded company like Replit getting scared by an intern's weekend project is entertaining. If your moat is so low it can be replicated in a few days, I think this open source project is the least of their worries.
100% agree. If this threatened them, it means they are not doing well.
Re: Replit used legal threats to kill my open-source project
#10Why did you take it down? And why did you apologize? I think the threat to sue was posturing, the same way that legal charges are always trumped up to get you to accept a plea. If you had let them see it through, and they intended to sue you, you could have churned up a horror-inducing PR nightmare of a shitstorm for them. If someone is really as petty to light cash on fire suing a young person with no assets over ba…
Defense is a lot more expensive than offense in civil court. Complicated cases like these can be dragged for years and they'd have to pay for it. Intellectual property laws are very in the favor of whomever has the money to throw lawyers around.