Hacker News Reader

Comment by Neliquat | Hacker News Reader

It seems to me, that any decent Law firm would have told her not to tweet about it imho. /ianal

Disagree. Speaking up about Uber's conduct is a personal risk that Ms. Fowler has apparently decided to take, perhaps for reasons of personal integrity. A good lawyer would advise her of the scope and magnitude of risk, and then support her if she chooses to run that risk.

You are right. A lawyer's job is to minimize your legal risk. The least risky thing to do is to keep silent. That's what he'll reliably tell you to do.

It's your job to decide how much risk you are willing to take to speak out. Some fights are worth fighting.

Trying a case via the media to push a large company into a settlement is hardly a new strategy, especially with a company like Uber that's getting large amounts of bad PR.

> that's getting large amounts of bad PR.

Do you mean that is caught doing a lot of nasty stuff? The company has problems, it pushes against workers rights, it leaves towns that don't bow to their business tactics, it is sexist, etc. The "bad PR" is the symptom not the problem. Their actions are the problem.

The actions led to the bad PR. Without the bad PR, she wouldn't have spoken up on Twitter about it. I think we're all in agreement except in wording.

It's very well deserved bad PR, yes.

Under other circumstances I'd agree this is poor strategy w/r/t preparing for possible future legal defense. Detail here may be that Fowler may soon find herself gagged from disclosing further details, especially if surviving terms in her employment contract with Uber allow for it.

If Uber tries to use employee covenants to silence Ms. Fowler, what do you think the reaction is going to be? This is just the beginning. If the problems are as systemic as alleged by Ms. Fowler, the litigation will be working its way through courts for years to come.

It has to be this bad or worse! You dont hire ex attorney general who is corrupted on record (currently works for clients that he initally was investigating as GA and of course never got anywhere) if you dont need a player that has "get free from jail" card.

There does not appear to be genuine contrition, that is for sure...

It doesn't seem like a bad idea to me. If they're investigating her to mount a smear campaign, getting out in front of it sounds like a good idea. But I'm not a lawyer, so what do I know?

Under normal circumstances, yes.

However, in this case, it is already largely public and making Uber look the villain is a viable strategy given that Uber likely is the villain.

that, or they're giving her a sweetheart deal (i.e. low/no fee) because her case is high profile and they can write it off as an advertising expense.

Care to elaborate?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com