-MIKE- wrote:
On 8/7/12 8:14 AM, HeyBub wrote:
John Grossbohlin wrote:
http://www.marke****ch.com/story/gib...me_latest_news

Yep. They caved and I lost all respect for the company.

They had, as best I understand, a defensible position on the merits.
I'd be hard-pressed to imagine a jury finding against them.

Secondly, had they just strung (no pun intended) things out for a few
months, it's possible a new administration would have dropped the
entire business.


It was three hundred grand... they probably considered it a bargain.
How many millions were they paying to their lawyers? How much would
would another 6 months cost them? When you're dealing with the DoJ,
who can just keep reaching into *our* pockets to fight in the courts,
most of the time it's better to settle and sacrifice principle for
profits.

Well, it sure cost them my business. And the business of millions of
right-thinking potential buyers the world around.

And the DOJ is not invincible. Back in the 60's, the DOJ sued IBM for
monopolistic and unfair trade practices. IBM had more lawyers on the case
that were in the ENTIRE anti-trust division of the DOJ. IBM strung out the
case for ELEVEN years.

Just to show you how stupid the DOJ was, they allowed CDC, Control Data
Corporation and a co-plaintiff, to do virtually all of the discovery.

IBM then reached a secret deal with CDC: IBM would pay CDC big bucks and
give them the Service Bureau Corporation to go away. In return, CDC had to
affirmatively destroy every scrap of discovery garnered over eleven years.

All this book-burning was done over a weekend. Tapes were degaussed, disks
deleted, paper records shredded, tape recordings destroyed. On Monday, IBM
announced ready for trial.