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Comment by lvl102 | Hacker News Reader

I just want to understand the problem: did HackerRank initiate the takedown? If so, that apology and $25K donation is not enough. They need to be sued with the help of NumFOCUS lawyers. My understanding is that they’ve done this many times in the past and used “third-party” as an excuse.

I’ve never used HackerRank but this made sure I will never use them in the future.

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_They_ didn't _do_ it per se, it was done by a third party (probably for hire) and it seems to have been the result of automation gone wrong (not an excuse IMHO). Of course they bear responsibility for the work they contract out and the third party bears responsibility for their automation being worse than ineffective. But the facts do not seem to point to an evil person in a basement initiating the takedown themselves.

> They need to be sued with the help of NumFOCUS lawyers.

This seems like it could be costly and quickly easily eat away at the small amount of revenue they take in (something like $5MM, mostly from grants and donations) compared to supporting open source projects that are desperate for support.

They've been doing this for years, it's hardly "automation gone wrong". They willfully abuse the DMCA system because they can't sell their puzzles to employers if interviewees publish their algorithms online.

Notice in the words of the CEO how he still doesn't think it's wrong to submit takedowns to code they don't hold any copyright over. At least he's honest about his bad intentions, so that's better than the drivel some tech companies come up with when they reach the front page of HN.

These guys are exactly what's wrong with copyright law and nobody has the time, interest, and resources to fight them.

It's pretty clearly automation gone wrong. I didn't specify if it's a matter of neglect or abuse.

> They need to be sued with the help of NumFOCUS lawyers.

The damages in this case are probably less than $25K.

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