Florida Citizens' Anti-trust Payout Dwarfed By Lawyers' 265
According to Robin "Roblimo" Miller's article on NewsForge, Florida residents are receiving word by electronic and postal mail about the likely outcome of that state's class action suit against Microsoft (last mentioned on Slashdot last September): the upshot is that Florida residents who purchased a Microsoft operating system or Microsoft Office would be eligible for a settlement payment (in vouchers) of $5-12; the lawyers involved are seeking $48 million in fees. The settlement terms have several interesting clauses; for instance, by accepting, you would be agreeing to "settle and release all claims, demands, actions, suits, and causes of action against Microsoft and/or its directors, officers, employees, attorneys, insurers or agents, whether known or unknown, asserted or unasserted, that any member of the Florida Settlement Class ever had, could have had, now has or hereafter can, shall or may have, relating in any way to ... any conduct, act or omission that was or could have been alleged in this case as the basis for any antitrust or unfair competition claims."
Mirror (Score:5, Informative)
What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Insightful)
In practice, it's rarely so simple, since for a company Microsoft's size, $202 Million (which sounds like "a lot" of money to any sane person) can not only be easily written off in any year's books, but probably doesn't even amount to the aggregate interest they earned on the licensing of the products in question.
We need a limit on legal fees (Score:4, Insightful)
I realize that the actual costs involved in suing a company like Microsoft can be astronomical, but for the legal firms in such a case to charge full rate for the entire effort is obscene. Their profit on such cases should be capped at something reasonable, like 5-20% of their actual costs (filing fees, supporting research, etc. and not the lawyer's time. Their time is what the percentage is to cover, not double-dipping as both an hourly employee and as a profit-sharing partner of the firm.)
Realistically if such limits were imposed across the board, 90% of the frivolous lawsuits in court would go away. It's the leeching lawyers who often advise their clients to continue, knowing full well that they're going to take the majority of the settlement as "legal costs".
Hmm - that sounds great! (Score:5, Interesting)
I have a great business deal for you.
You give me $10,000 and 1000 hours of work over the next 2 years. If the deal doesn't work out you get nothing. But if it does work out, I'll give you between $10,500 and $12,000 back.
Doesn't that sound great? It doesn't? Then why would you expect a lawyer to go for it? Your system means that no attorneys will take the risk, and so MS pays no penalty and the citizens of Florida don't even get their $12.
Re:Hmm - that sounds great! (Score:4, Informative)
20 lawyer firm at $150,000 per year, plus benefits probably runs more like $4,000,000. Count in another 20 paralegals and clerks at $40,000 a year each, plus benefits comes to approximately $1,000,000. Office space, supplies, furniture, telephones, computers, yada-yada for 40 people and the reams and reams of documents, about $1,000,000. Advertising costs, which are required in a class action suit, $1,000,000. Taking your $1,000,000 for direct court costs, we are already at $8,000,000 and we haven't even hired an expert witness yet.
No other industry expects to reap a 1100% profit on a two year effort.
It is not unusual for a case of this size to cost $10,000,000. Furthermore most of these cases fail.
Therefore the economics are:
1) Bring four cases at a cost of $10,000,000 each.
2) Lose three.
3) Win one to the tune of $48,000,000.
4) Profit $8,000,000 on a $40,000,000 outlay.
A %20 profit doesn't seem nearly as unresonable.
Re:We need a limit on legal fees (Score:4, Insightful)
What? Yes. That's right. There should be higher penalties for negligent and malicious companies who flagrantly defraud consumers and endanger employees. $200 million is nothing to Microsoft especially in vouchers. Some serious punitive damages should be doled out in such cases.
[rant]
I'm not so familiar with this case. $200*10^6 might be appropriate, but in cases where children are burned because of faulty gasoline canisters or Vinyl workers develope fatal cancers because of poor safety conditions, the punitive damages should dwarf the actual damages. No it is not okay that corporations continue to behave completely irresponsibly because it benefits their bottom line. Lets make responsibilty the first priority for them.
Re:We need a limit on legal fees (Score:3, Interesting)
I have no argument that law firms are businesses, like any other business. But typical businesses provide a product and/or a service for a certain price, paid for by the purchaser - and that's all there is to it. They "sink or swim" purely based on the perceived usefulness and desireability of the product or service offered.
Lawyers not only do this (by billing clients their hourly fees), but stand to be
Re:We need a limit on legal fees (Score:5, Insightful)
This is without question the most misquoted Shakespeare line ever.
You included the obvious link to the Seth Finkelstein interpretation (http://www.spectacle.org/797/finkel.html), so here is my counter-point on it:
http://firms.findlaw.com/UWLAlawreview/memo2
Essentially, Dick the Butcher and Jack Cade are nit-wit idiot thugs (who later do some murdering) in Henry VI. The line occurs in some banter about all the wonderful things Dick would do if he were king. Clearly, he is an idiot, and unfit for rule. The line "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers." comes along in a string of things he would do, if he were king:
-more beer for all
-free beer (as in free beer, not freedom)
-dead lawyers
-everyone will dress alike (the poor and the rich shall be equally well-clothed)
-there shall be no money
Shakespeare did take a gratuitous shot at lawyers, but there was more to it that this. He was making fun of the loud-mouthed rabble and their notion of what utopia would look like. Clearly, Dick and Jack are simpletons, and their view of the world defies reality.
Imagine, if you will, that Seth Finkelstein is right: suppose that the crowds did guffaw at the idea of "killing all the lawyers" when the passage was recited. Who do you think, really, was the butt of the joke? The lawyers or the people who, in a string of idiotic bread and circuses fantasies, also think that killing all the lawyers will solve their problems?
Of course, there is a third alternative, that being that a a joke is just a joke.
As for me, I think it is a complete fallacy that killing all the lawyers would solve any of society's ills. I likewise think it is amusing that people think that by doing so, that their lives will be improved. Maybe it's funny as a throw away like in a play, but if you take it out of that context and live by it, then you're in the same crowd that thinks that avoiding doctors will keep you from getting sick.
People get into enough trouble on their own without lawyers, and if they hooked up with a good attorney whose sevices they knew how to use effectively, most people would be much better off than someone who avoids the lawyer's office like a plague house.
GF.
Re:We need a limit on legal fees (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:We need a limit on legal fees (Score:5, Funny)
Are you playing Mad Libs?
I shouldn't have to have a doctor to keep me healthy. You shouldn't need 6 years of schooling to understand engineering. There shouldn't be a need for a profession based on the manipulation of data at all. In a perfect world, people would be well educated enough that we could live together and our computer networks could work without hinging on minutae.
GF.
Re:We need a limit on legal fees (Score:3, Interesting)
Basically, the legal system should be simple enough for your average well educated layman to understand without the need for a dedicated expert. It'd be cool if t
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Informative)
RTFA. It specifically and repeatedly says the coupons apply to a broad range of hardware and software, including Macs and Linux boxed sets.
It's still an outrage, but...
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2, Insightful)
Exactly how were these people abused the laywers? None of of the plaintiffs put any money towards the expense of filing and prosecuting the case. They merely signed their names to the action.
If they weren't satisfied with the potential payout or the lawyer's cut, they were more than free to not participate. They were also free to put hundreds of thousands of their own dollars towards their own suit.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Interesting)
Exactly how were these people abused the laywers?
Well, let's see, first of all, they didn't necessarily sign on at all, they are simply potential members of the class (that is, they are believed to live in Florida and have bought something from MS between 1995 and 2002) who may or may not have even known about the suit. In other words, it's a sort of opt-out legal spam.
One might expect a lawyer to seek just compensation for his client(s) for genuine harm done by the defendant (the fact that the 'clients' don't even get a choice until after the fact only increases that duty). Instead, either through the lawyer's incompetance or simple greed (note that the lawyers get paid in real money), they get what amounts to an advertising flyer in the guise of a court document. It's not even a really GOOD sale offer. I get better offers than that from the pizza place. MS might as well write it off as an advertising expense. What sort of settlement is THAT supposed to be?
In other words, this is the FIRST chance they've gotten to not participate, now that it's practically over and done.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Insightful)
See http://overlawyered.com/archives/01/mar2.html#031
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Insightful)
"But what are the lawyers going to do with $48 million dollars worth of retail coupons towards a Linux distribution purchase?"
That's the point. The lawyers would never think of accepting vouchers for their plaintiffs if they were being paid the same way.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2)
Where are my freakin' mod points when I need them?
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:3, Funny)
Hey, someone's finally figured out a workable business model for open-source software!
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2, Funny)
Move up the food chain and become script kiddies?
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2)
Oh my God! You've uncovered the laywer's secret. Now that they've been exposed to light, they should whither, burst into flame and then have their dust piles artistically blow away.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2)
There are _lots_ of perfectly valid lawsuits out there just waiting to be brought. But often the plaintiffs cannot afford the expense of bringing a lawsuit.
Some of these suits have the potential to yield substantial payoffs (although most do not have the potential, and those that do often don't work out in practice). In these cases, lawyers are willing to work for free, provided that they can get a cut of the amount awarded if they're successful.
This means the lawyers are taking all the risk
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2)
apart from that these are pretty much worthless if the lawyers are willing to bite on the bait.
anyways, how can they settle such a case even? ok i'm not from usa but this really doesn't fit in my sense of a working legal system. it's like i would get stabbed(and luckily i'd live) by a millionaire on a public place, and then the stabber would get away by just paying me? no, he should and would get charged with assault/trying of manslaughter/murder whatever the local phrase for such attack
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Informative)
It's a civil case, which operates under dramatically different rules than a criminal case operates under.
Basically, once the settlement has been reached, the plaintiff(s) file a series of motions for continuance and then when the settlement is consummated, they tell the judge that they're dropping the case. This is nothing close to a verdict; indeed, settlements have little to no effect on any other cases.
Far from it. A settlement is not considered an admission of wrongdoing or liability (unless one of the terms of the settlement is that the defendant make a public proclamation of such). Indeed, most settlements are in cases where the defendant has the far stronger case and the greater likelihood of winning. The plaintiff attorney's goal is to prevent the case from ever going to trial and instead get a settlement for his client(s); the odds are generally against the plaintiffs once it goes to trial. The defendant settles in these cases because, especially if they're a large corporation, it's cheaper to settle early rather than pay their lawyers' fees (especially if appeals and such are counted), to say nothing of the non-zero (though, on average, less than 40%) probability of them losing.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't be so sure. I got ~$300 in merchandise vouchers (third-party stuff, not just Toshiba hardware, though of course it came through their catalog so the actual "damages" to them were probably half that) from just such a settlement against Toshiba a few years back.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:2)
Was that for the absolutely sickening extortion because of the alleged floppy drive data corruption bug?
These class action lawsuits are completely out of hand. The lawyers are have recently been holding seminars on suing restaurants and food producers over high fat content.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure, it was a strange case. Toshiba caved to the tune of about $1 billion because they were worried about treble damages (to the tune of $9.5 billion) being awarded by an unpredictable Texas jury trial.
link [nytimes.com]
The kicker is that the suit is over a bug in a 10+ year old floppy drive controller chip manufactured by NEC, where neither NEC nor Toshiba ever received a single complaint of data corruption. No customer ever claims to have lost data because of the bug - not even the plaintiffs! The plaintiffs simply started the class action lawsuit because they were sold a "defective product". AFAIK the bug has only been reproduced in specific laboratory conditions and not the real world.
The lawyers were using Toshiba as a test case and then were going to go after HP, Compaq, etc. with similar class action lawsuits. I haven't tracked it, but I don't think they made much progress or we would have heard about it.
Should they have fixed the (known) bug? Probably. Was it worth a class action lawsuit, especially of this magnitude? Absolutely not. This is extortion plain and clear, and the scary thing is it's accelerating. If this keeps up it will eventually be impossible for any business to exist for more than a few years without being sued out of existence by corrupt, opportunistic, money-grabbing lawyers. The minute you make any kind of mistake they pounce, with grossly exaggerated damage figures that aren't even sane, but somehow actually get awarded--especially by jury trials--with an extremely low burden of proof.
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What's the point of these suits? (Score:5, Interesting)
Each member of the class gets a pittance, since usually the larger the claimed class, the more "clout" (define that as you will) wielded by the prosecution team. This is especially true with a low-Human-impact crime, like overcharging.
The end product is the same
I consider this kind of thing almost essentially out of the hands of the public. The lawyers have figured out how to ride to wealth on the backs of widespread small offences. I'd suggest that for a fix I'd say whyyyy there oughta be a law
The legal profession, the ultimate make wrk projec (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:The legal profession, the ultimate make wrk pro (Score:2, Insightful)
Most people won't, of course.
Re:The legal profession, the ultimate make wrk pro (Score:2)
Re:The legal profession, the ultimate make wrk pro (Score:2, Interesting)
When you join the class, you relinquish your rights to sue independantly. It's a classic trade-off. By joining the class, you get an immediate pay-off, however you lose the right to sue on your own.
If you avoid joining the class, you can sue on your own, but you stand a chance of losing a great deal of money if you don't win.
Nobody's forcing you to join the class though so...
Re:The legal profession, the ultimate make wrk pro (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:The legal profession, the ultimate make wrk pro (Score:2)
A lot of money, but... (Score:2, Insightful)
What's the Big Deal? (Score:2, Interesting)
Another slap on the wrist (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't this just yet another slap on the wrist for microsoft. It just makes them use their ill gotten gains from the monopoly, which probably has earned them quite a bit in interest anyway. I have a feeling this is a bit like the previous case, give them some punishment which "looks" big but doesnt actually have any affect on them.
Re:Another slap on the wrist (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Another slap on the wrist (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Another slap on the wrist (Score:5, Informative)
Anyway, this is indeed not the case. Timothy missed the part that states
Why is this a Surprise? (Score:5, Informative)
Of course the lawyers' payout will dwarf the payout of the individual class members - that's exactly why the class-action is structured this way. Individual claims are not worth enough to each member, considering the time, energy and money necessary to pursue an action. Aggregating the class makes this worthwhile, and attorneys take a percentage - and, often, these suits go nowhere, with a contingency of zero.
Re:Why is this a Surprise? (Score:2, Interesting)
In this case, as frequently happens, the class members get effectively nothing ($12 coupons) while the lawyers pocket their share in cash -- and the class members have to actively opt out.
Sorry, I just can not see why judges allow settlements like this to go through. Like someone else said, if the class members get $12 coupons, the lawyers should get a big pile of $4 coupons.
Re:Why is this a Surprise? (Score:3, Informative)
Judges have nothing to do with out of court settlements. A settlement is not the same as an award to the plaintiff. A settlement is basically one side agreeing to give the other side some money if they drop the lawsuit. See?
Re:Why is this a Surprise? (Score:2, Informative)
Settlements typically have to be approved by the judges -- judges can and will bar them if they feel they're not in the interest of the plaintiff or public. No doubt there are subtleties where a settlement doesn't require approval in some cases but I bet that's not what you're talking about.
Re:Why is this a Surprise? (Score:3, Insightful)
Settlements typically have to be approved by the judges -- judges can and will bar them if they feel they're not in the interest of the plaintiff or public. No doubt there are subtleties where a settlement doesn't require approval in some cases but I bet that's not what you're talking about.
Couldn't have said it better. Amazing how many otherwize intellegent and educated people don't understand that. Another point to make is that the vas
Risk and Reward (Score:2)
Think about your statement. A law firm "invests" probably ten million dollars in out of pocket costs to bring a suit of this magnitude. That money can't be recovered if they lose. They win the suit, and they should only expect coupons?
Would anyone run any business on those economics?
Any attorney who works on contingency is engaging in speculation. They won't undertake the risk unless the
Lawyers... (Score:3, Insightful)
Too many lawyer jokes can be inserted here.
Slightly misleading (Score:5, Informative)
If the Court approves the settlement, the Court will determine reasonable attorneys' fees and expenses to be awarded to Class Counsel. The attorneys' fees and expenses approved by the Court will be paid by Microsoft, and will not reduce, in any way, the amount of Settlement Benefits paid to Class Members.
So really, the people aren't getting stiffed, they're just getting gypped. However, the people of Florida will get some indirect benefits:
Microsoft will donate to public schools in Florida with at least 50% of their students qualifying for the federal free and reduced-price school lunch programs, 50% of the difference between the total maximum amount of the vouchers ($202 million) and the value of issued vouchers, if the settlement is approved.
So, while the settlement values seem extremely small, in reality, they're just small. At least the vouchers aren't for more Microsoft software.
Re:Slightly misleading (Score:2)
Can they do this? (Score:2, Interesting)
So everyone who's involved can *never* sue Microsoft again for anything related to Anti-Trust? They take their slap on the wrist, and go laughing all the way to the bank? I guess double jeopardy could be a factor, as subsequent lawsuits would be mostly the same, but this seems to go a tad too far.
Re:Can they do this? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Can they do this? (Score:3, Informative)
This does not cover any future wrongs they may do, just existing ones that you may or may not know about today.
Of course, the typical IANAL disclaimer applies.
Re:Can they do this? (Score:3, Informative)
No, it simply settles all claims there were, or could have been alleged. As stated in the article, the settlement provides that it bars any claim:
I love lawyer speak (Score:5, Funny)
ever had, could have had, now has or hereafter can, shall or may have
That sounds like an Eminem lyric to me.......bitch.
windows EULA (Score:2)
If only it'd been the other way around.... (Score:5, Funny)
No Settlement (Score:2)
How much did people expect? (Score:2, Insightful)
They're paying out $202 million. Admittedly, Microsoft still has plenty left over, but I'm dead certain they didn't want to pay even THAT much.
As for the attorney's fees, again, why should these people work for free? Can you imagine the expense involved in something as simple as photocopying the documents required in this case? It's enormously expensive to run a lawsuit
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it's a $300.00+ program, and that's not counting (the price of) the time and effort wasted using Microsoft products instead of better products that were forced out of the market by Microsoft's illegal business practices.
I'll stop complaining when the payout per-plaintiff is an appreciable fraction of the retail price of the software.
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:3, Insightful)
Sorry, I've got to quibble here. What product has been specifically cited as being forced out of business? Netscape? Sure, MS screwed them royally, but they did plenty to shoot themselves in the foot as well. If there were more clear-cut direct cases of people being run out of business by MS, the case would hav
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:2)
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:3, Interesting)
.
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:3, Informative)
The problem is the scale of the lawyer's cut. $48 million? One has to ask how many lawyers there were actually working on the case (i.e. real, hard work), what their expenses were, and what the (real) time put in was.
I'm willing to bet the end result is in excess of $300 net per man-hour of work. Consider that that's roughly FIVE TO TEN TIMES what most other highly skilled professions draw as a salary.
Do they deserve to be compensated? Of course! Just not to this extreme.
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:2)
If you have a choice between your job making $100/hr and a 50/50 chance of $1000, you should take the chance, if you look at the math.
Lawyers aren't going to want to take a chance of not getting paid their normal rate when they could work for someone else and be guaranteed just as much. Contingent fees have to be high enough to be attractive or no one will ever take a case o
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:3, Insightful)
It's valuable. A single Microsoft OS can cost you up to 199 to 299 IIRC. Yes, it's a measly computer program not worth the money you fork over to MS for it, but that's not what matters. The market value matters. Cash should be returned at the retail price of the OS in question, back when it was still available.
Yes, they do need to get paid reasonably. 600 dollars per hour is a bit too much isn't it? Have
Re:How much did people expect? (Score:3, Interesting)
interesting whatever (Score:4, Insightful)
how is that interesting? that's what a settlement IS--they give you something and you release them from any further liability. This whole reading-comic-books-between-the-lines editorializing is really getting old.
I am still waiting for my check from the RIAA (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:I am still waiting for my check from the RIAA (Score:2)
or as I like to call it just after Duke Nukem Forever comes out
IANAL... (Score:2)
Is this some sort of late April Fools' Day joke? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Is this some sort of late April Fools' Day joke (Score:5, Interesting)
Are you sure? [toastytech.com] I guess it was Chinese only, but technically Windows 3.2.
Not that interesting (Score:3, Informative)
By taking the settlement money, you've settled your claim with Microsoft. If you don't think this is a fair settlement, then don't take it and pursue your own case.
release clause isn't "interesting" (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm from Florida... (Score:4, Informative)
And let's face it folks, even though the settlement is given in the form of vouchers, we're geeks. Like it or not, we're going to buy computer equipment and/or software anyways within the next few years. The vouchers seem to be good towards almost anything of this nature, so it's really not as bad as you think it is. In principle, it's not as good as cash. But economically, it's exactly the same thing. And if not, there's always eBay.
Re:I'm from Florida... (Score:3, Informative)
"...a Class Member will be eligible to receive a voucher or vouchers in the amounts indicated below, which can later be redeemed for cash if the Class Member purchases, after April 15, 2003, Qualifying Hardware (including personal computers, Apple Macintosh computers, laptop computers and Tablet PCs), or Qualifying Software (including most generally available software made by any caompany for Qualifying Hardware)."
People with voucher totals
$5-12??? (Score:5, Funny)
I think that MS is openly admitting that their products only cost $5-12 dollars.
I would allocate that as:
Well... of course! (Score:2)
Judgements/settlements should be a percentage... (Score:5, Interesting)
Seems to me that the real problem is that the judgements are always in terms of dollar amounts. $200 million is a big chunk of cash to almost everyone -- except Microsoft. To Microsoft, $200 million is nothing, half a percent of the amount of money they have in the bank.
Similarly, the little guys often get judgements against them that are tiny in comparison to $200 million, but which easily bankrupt them because they aren't Microsoft -- they're just normal people with normal incomes (if that).
None of this would be a problem if judgements (and settlements) were forced to be expressed in terms of the percentage of the worth of the target. An individual who is forced to pay, say, 20% of their total worth in a judgement or settlement would be hurt pretty badly by it, but they'd almost certainly survive. And the same is true of a huge entity like Microsoft. But the dollar values would be much different. $20K (for instance) against the individual, and something like $20 billion against Microsoft. But those amounts would yield roughly the same effect, and it's the effect that's important in any judgement or settlement.
The bottom line is that, in my opinion, the people who judge these settlements or who create these judgements simply don't think properly about the problem. They're focused on the amounts and not the effects.
That's to be expected in a money-driven society, I suppose...
Re:Judgements/settlements should be a percentage.. (Score:2)
Re:Judgements/settlements should be a percentage.. (Score:3, Insightful)
A settlement is an agreement between the plaintiff and the defendant to a dollar amount that makes everyone "happy" enough to drop litigating the case. Here, Microsoft is essentially saying, fine, it's worth $202 million to us to be able to drop this case and the risk that we'd be adjudged against. The plaintiffs are essentially saying, $202 million takes care of enough of our "suffering" to make us drop this case AND the risk t
illegal claim acceptance terms (Score:2, Interesting)
I think lawyers should be paid in vouchers, too :) (Score:4, Funny)
Just a note (Score:2)
The Math Doesn't Support Blaming The Lawyers (Score:4, Insightful)
If the payout seems rediculously small compared to how much MS's actions cost consumers, then it's less the fault of the lawyers skimming the payouts and more the fault of the anti-trust system that allows MS to profit billions from it's illegal monopolies and only pay millions when caught.
On the broader topic of 'frivolous' lawsuits, I do deeply recommend to people that are interested in a fair society that they educate themselves about where that particular piece of memetic propaganda is coming from. It's not from anybody that has your interests as a citizen or consumer at heart.
Lawyers settled badly (Score:2)
The lawyers sucked in this case, and they shouldn't even have collected their 20%
Re:Lawyers settled badly (Score:2)
If you want a payout to the public, the government is the only entity that can sue on behalf of the public and get a payout to the public.
The lawyers sucked in this case, and they shouldn't even have collected their 20%
Because of the public thing? The
$12? (Score:2)
New payment method (Score:5, Insightful)
So that means the lawyers should get $120 worth of Microsoft coupons. That seems fair to me. Hell, I'd even be willing to increase it to 100x the individual payout, but the "in like manner" needs to stay. I've been screwed before with the coupon payouts (BoA many years ago), and won't have anything to do with class action lawsuits because of that.
Under the current system, the lawyer's only incentive is to enrich themselves, without regard to the clients.
Re:New payment method (Score:3, Insightful)
To put it simply, put up or shut up. Don't criticize unless you can offer a viable alternative.
Re:New payment method (Score:2)
You think you were "screwe
Subsequent lawsuits lawyered by dwarves (Score:2)
**Hug a dwarf**
When has it been cheap to sue MS? (Score:3, Interesting)
Second, the settlement is misquoted and actually says "Class Counsel will seek attorneys' fees in an amount not to exceed $48 million". Not to exceed $48 mil != $48 mil. But think about it: Putting a class action suit together involving potentially millions of class members, notifying all potential parties (by placing expensive newspaper ads, sending mailing and perhaps advertising on TV), meeting with class members, explaining their rights, dealing with tons of discovery material (from class members and MS), going to court, negotiating with MS, handling stonewalling from MS, taking the malpractice liability risk of a case of this magnitude against a company like MS... yeah, I bet the fees are going to be justifiably high!
Third, yeah, 12 bucks worth of vouchers sounds sucky... but how many of these class members used Windows for four years and now expect a full refund? Cut me a break! Talk about unjust enrichment!?! Really, what kind of individual recovery do you expect for software that is worth half the cost of what MS charges for it? Enough vouchers to buy a new G5!?!
Of the million or so class members in this suit, how many are "true" Opens Source users who the minute they bought a machine, completely deleted Windows and installed *nix. They deserve a full refund, but they are better recoving it on their own instead of a Class Action suit.
Grisham's book explains class action mania (Score:3, Interesting)
John Grisham's most recent book, The King of Torts, explains a lot about the mania for class-action lawsuits lately. While it's fiction, Grisham is an attorney, so he knows what he's talking about. He doesn't paint a pretty picture.
Class-action lawsuits are easy money for lawyers. Find a big enough "class" and you can soak the defendant for lots of money. The fees can be huge, especially if there's the typical "we get one third" sort of fee structure.
Because the lawyers are looking at huge bucks because of the sheer volume of plaintiffs, they don't necessarily care how big the individual settlements are. If you get $12, and they get $4... if the class has a million people in it, that's $4 million made without going to trial.
Anyway, it's a good book, but a scary one. I'll certainly never look at a class-action notice the same way again.
(I've been out of work for a while now, thanks to Global Crossing's bankruptcy. Slashdot won't accept links to Amazon Associate URLs in comments, but if you'd like to help me out and contribute to my book-money fund without raising your cost, you could buy the Grisham book through this URL: <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0385508042 /macwhiztechnolog>)
The release text quoted in the article... (Score:3, Insightful)
Incidentally, for those of you griping about the legal fees, keep in mind the lawyers get nothing if they don't win the case, have to pay support staff all through the suit (including multiple associates who themselves are making in excess of a hundred grand a year), not knowing whether they'll win or not, and have to justify every bit of their time to the Court down to each tenth of an hour (I left the computer industry, pissed about billing my time in 15 minute increments. Now I do it in six minute increments). $48 million, incidentally, while a large sum of money, is comparatively small in the world of class actions. There's one in the Third Circuit right now where the legal fees will likely reach $3 billion, spread among about 20 law firms.
I'm not a class action lawyer, and I don't make anywhere near a hundred grand a year. But I've seen these guys, and for the work they do and the risks they take, their fees, while high, are not outrageous. (Most contingency fees are in the neighborhood of 33-40% in the rest of the legal profession)
This is just Florida right? (Score:3, Interesting)
So if $200M seems like a small amount of cash to Microsoft, then how about 50-100*$200M. It is starting to sound like a lot of money even to Microsoft.
Re: (Score:2)