When You Fail to Filter Your Clients You End Up SLAPPing Reporters on Behalf of Bad People From Microsoft in Another Continent
“American Psycho” at 25 (we've always been targeted by Americans who send threats)
American Microsofters are no joking matter. Some are outright lunatics, some are criminals, some are something in between.
Then there's London, a hive of law firms. Some are benign and well-meaning (some even did pro bono work for us). The worse ones cannot afford to keep standards high, so there's no vetting whatsoever of clients (even Russian war criminals are welcomed as clients!), so whatever they did, not a problem! Welcome! As long as you pay us, we'll bully people inside the UK for you! At your service!
No wonder they've earned terms or descriptions like "guns for hire". That's what many in the general public think of them. They tarnish the reputation of the entire occupation.
Would advancing pointless lawsuits lead to terrible reputation for the firm? For sure!
What if people start generalising*, wrongly assuming that every single law firm is a "Brat [sic] Wilson"?
They were probably ever more desperate to help their other client, who got sued by two people [1, 2] - belatedly and long overdue.
So either they didn't do their homework or they simply didn't care what they found, as their standards (quality) were already very low anyway and money in the bank was not far from overdraft (in addition to the debt). Their headcount decreased and many staff left. They perish.
What shocks us isn't just that some American (another country, not the same continent) from Microsoft was taken onboard as a client but one who was arrested and could not deny that. He was telling a woman whose father (a dentist) had committed suicide to kill herself, based on what she published 5 years ago (and he only got worse over time):
Would you take a person like this (left) as a client? What would that say about you?
This was years later (same page as above):
Now he's trying to blame me for the fact that he's unable to find a job. As one might say in American English, "Dude! Blame yourself for acting this way, not the person who merely reported - factually - about your behaviour."
Some bad people say the darnest things and then attack someone who merely quotes them.
If this is the sort of culture that's fostered if not encouraged in Microsoft/OpenAI/SF, then we must all dread the prospect of merely expressing honest criticism. Or, alternatively, we need to fight back against it. Don't let it be this way.
To the ambitious American SLAPPer we say, "go back to prison where you belong, leave us alone." Where does Microsoft hire/recruit such people? Friend brings a friend? That says a lot about the culture at Microsoft. █
This week: Released journalist: We will continue to amplify women’s voices
Following a decision made during a hearing at Istanbul’s 23rd High Criminal Court, journalist Necla Demir Arvas was released from Bakırköy Closed Prison on Monday.
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* We can honestly say some law firms are OK. Some are principled people.