Tuesday, April 15th, 2008...1:29 pm
When they break down your front door, how ya gonna come?
A friend has just sent me a highly amusing response to a cease-and-desist letter (patent and trademark infringement). The recipient believes it’s a frivolous claim and draws on 19 years of litigation experience with which to say so. It’s on Consumerist and therefore probably all over the Internet, but let me just give you a taste:
It may be that my inability to see the pragmatic value of settling frivolous claims is a deep character flaw, and I am sure a few of the insurance carriers for whom I have done work have seen it that way; but it is how I have done business for the last quarter-century and you are not going to change my mind. If you sue me, the case will go to judgment, and I will hold the court’s attention upon the merits of your claims—or, to speak more precisely, the absence of merit from your claims—from start to finish. Not only am I unintimidated by litigation; I sometimes rather miss it.
Oops.
I’m working on real posts, I swear.
2 Comments
April 15th, 2008 at 5:46 pm
I actually found this letter somewhat irksome. The author has a really imperious attitude throughout, with his demands that Monster send him proof and verification, including their entire patent application file. They have to send him nothing at this point, and while he’s of course entitled to ask they’re under no obligation to respond in any manner.
His attitude implies that they need to explain what he’s doing wrong when in fact they don’t. If he’s infringing on their trade dress or their patents, they can sue without ever providing notification or factual background on their claims. The fact that they provided any notice or documentation at all could be seen as generous on their part. Their first contact with Monster could have been a lawsuit, not an invitation to negotiate a settlement.
Now, that being said, I’ve read that Monster basically trolls for settlements, sending letters claiming infringement to everyone hoping that some will choose to settle. If that’s the case, you might as well be as big an ass as possible in response. If, however, they have a valid claim, they’re going to be pissed as hell at his tone and the bad PR he’s dropped in their lap and sure as hell will want to carry the lawsuit forward, even if the financial benefit to them is minimal — you don’t want to encourage this sort of defiant response in the future. While he says Monster won’t win much if the case goes to a judgment, he may be right, but it’s also true that he’ll certainly win nothing if the case goes to court. A simple “No.” would have been equally effective without incurring Monster’s wrath. (MONSTER WRATH!)
On the other hand, the amount of positive PR his firm has received today has been tremendous and I’m sure it was financially a good move for them. That’s especially true considering the fact that I’d never heard of this company before and certainly wouldn’t have considered buying cabling from them before this. I still probably won’t, but at least now I’ve heard of Blue Jeans Cables (or whatever).
April 15th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
Oh, I forgot:
With my hands on my head or on the trigger of my gun.
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