[conspire] Grsecurity maker finally coughs up $300k to foot open-source pioneer Bruce Perens' legal bill in row over GPL

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Ivan Sergio Borgonovo (mail at webthatworks.it):

> https://www.theregister.co.uk/2020/03/27/grsecurity_perens_gpl_settlement/

Yay.  I was going to say that Bruce gets to buy me lunch, now, but 
all the settlement money will go to pay legal and court fees (plus
interest).

Bruce has made two postings in the attached section of TheReg's comment
forum:


  This case was about my right to state my opinion.  We did not wish the
  court to rule on anything else, we did not ask them to do so, the other
  side DID.  The other side wanted the court to decide that they were not
  in violation of the GPL, in a defamation case, so that my statement
  would be an untrue fact.  But this was a crazy strategy, because even if
  the court _did_ decide, it would still not have been a litigated fact
  when I stated it.  And the court was, of course, smart enough to only try
  defamation in a defamation case.  IMO Mr. Chaabra, the attorney for the
  other side, never had a chance with this and should have known.  He also
  should have known not to bring a defamation case in a state with a
  strong anti-SLAPP law.  The court did what all of the experienced lawyers
  I know (and that's a lot) said it would.

  If you wish to dedicate the rights of your copyrighted work in Linux to
  be used in a copyright lawsuit, or if you wish to fund such a lawsuit,
  I'd be happy to hear from you.  I would of course work on such a thing
  for free.

...and...


  Actually, my attorney in the appeal, Jamie Lee Williams, stated that
  attorneys publish their opinions online all of the time and do depend on
  protection under the 1st amendment.  It's there in the appeal video, on
  Youtube.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ct-yUg0oUww&t=894s
  the court also discusses in detail when an opinion is protected and when
  it is not.

  The difference is that when they publish their opinions, they are not
  acting as _your_ legal counsel.


The mentioned US state with a strong anti-SLAPP (strategical lawsuit
against public participation) statute is California.  This law firm's 
site mentions that California has, actually, the strongest among the ~30
states with such statutes, and that there is no anti-SLAPP protection in
Federal jurisdiction:  http://californiaslapplaw.com/

The effect of anti-SLAPP statutes is to add to the rules of litigation
a 'special motion to strike', which in turn is an omnibus name for a 
menu of available anti-plaintiff motions (demurrers, motions for summary
judgement, motions for injunctive relief) that can be deployed if you 
are hauled into court merely for exercising your right of free speech
and participation in public affairs.

In short, Bruce's lawyers efficiently disposed of the nuisance lawsuit
against him brought by Open Source Security, Inc. / Bradley Spengler in
2018, by invoking California's anti-SLAPP protections.  It's just taken 
a while to get OSS, Inc. to cough up Bruce's legal fees.