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Comment by rdiddly | Hacker News Reader

"Before they got to court, Bell offered Ramsay money to drop the case — $300, roughly the amount Ramsay estimated the telecom would be over-billing him for two years. He declined."

HA!

"Three weeks before the court date, Bell contacted Ramsay again. He was offered $1,000 to settle, but was required to sign a confidentiality agreement. Again, Ramsay declined."

<sarc>Wow, big spenders! They'll spare no expense! They'll stop at nothing! Would they have gone as high as $1,010? $1,050?!?!</sarc>

It's almost insulting. Good for this guy. If anyone wants to buy the abridgement of your free speech I hope you'll at least demand appropriate compensation. And I hope if anyone approaches me with that kind of offer, they'll at least have the courtesy not to insult me.

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George Bernard Shaw wrote: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

David Ramsay, the guy who sued Bell over this, is my kind of lunatic. Huzzah! Thanks, David, for being unreasonable.

Maybe in the other 9 instances that this happened before 1000 worked. Lawyers are not hiqh-quality PR people who understand that today the smallest thing can blow up in a multi-million dollar problem.

> They'll stop at nothing! Would they have gone as high as $1,010? $1,050?!?!</sarc>

The judgment against them was $1,110; how high do you think they should have gone with the settlement offer?

Well, if they'd gone high enough, neither you nor I would be sitting here right now reading this piece of negative publicity about Bell.

Given that they are now going to face a class action lawsuit and hundreds more of these, $30,000 would have been cheap for his silence.

The question isn't what he has to gain, it is what they stood to lose.

In most cases, they have very little. I may hate Comcast, but if I have the misfortune of moving into a place and they're the only game in town, it's basically tough luck. Could rant and rave all day about how terrible everything is, but I have to have internet for work either way.

Not counting damages to reputation

(1 - P) * 1110 + (cost of additional legal fees)

Where P is Bell's probability of winning.

The second offer included a "confidentiality agreement", which I would associate a large negative value with, personally. So the court's judgement was significantly higher than what the company wanted to settle for.

That's fair.

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