Breaking: Internet Brands Files Lawsuit Against XenForo!
It looks like Internet Brands, the company that owns vBulletin is all set to stop XenForo from launching their software tomorrow. They have filed lawsuit against XenForo claiming the copyrights.
For those who don't know the background, let me explain it in brief:
XenForo developers, Kier, Mike & Ashley were the employees of Jelsoft Inc., the original owner of vBulletin software. Jelsoft was acquired by Internet Brands (IB), and thus the copyrights of vBulletin were acquired by IB. It's interesting to note that this trio was responsible for the most stable product vBulletin ever had - the vBulletin 3.x series.
After the acquisition, Kier, Mike & Ashley left the company. After few months of gap, these developers started working on their own forum software 'XenForo'. The developers claim that XenForo has been written from scratch and does not infringe any copyright owned by IB.
Now, as XenForo is ready for beta launch, IB has filed a lawsuit against XenForo and asked the company not to sell their product. It looks like IB's got the perfect timing to stop its rival.
In the mean time, XenForo community members (most of them are vBulletin customers) are cursing IB for their stand. The discussion thread on XenForo community has already received hundreds of responses against IB.
Here's the complete text of announcement made by Internet Brands: -
Internet Brands claims against Xenforo
Internet Brands today has commenced a lawsuit in the courts of England and Wales against Xenforo, and its founders, Kier, Mike and Ashley. The lawsuit is about these claims: infringement of our copyrighted intellectual property, breach of contract, and unfair business practices.
The suit is simple: we claim that Kier, Mike, and Ashley have infringed and violated contracts they signed with us to gain unfair business advantage. As such, Xenforo’s software unfairly stands on the shoulders of more than a decade of development by Jelsoft. Internet Brands owns this intellectual property.
In total, we are stunned by the actions of Kier, Mike, and Ashley and believe they must not fully understand the laws of copyrights, contract or business torts. Perhaps Kier and Mike think they have “refactored” enough of the code to skirt copyright law. Our analysis strongly indicates otherwise and we believe anyone skilled in understanding such things will concur. Perhaps they are of the misguided belief that because they created some of the vBulletin code as Jelsoft employees, they somehow have unique claims to that property. If so, that too is wrong. Kier’s and Mike’s work as Jelsoft employees was the exclusive property of their employer, and the former owners of Jelsoft not only paid Kier and Mike well during their employment, Kier was paid a handsome bonus when Internet Brands bought the business, although no such payment was required.
If the proverbial shoe were on the other foot and rather than buying vBulletin, Internet Brands had instructed our engineers to essentially copy the software, we would have been law breakers. But Internet Brands chose to play by copyright rules and bought the vBulletin intellectual property. And, in our opinion, no matter how Kier, Mike, and Ashley try to “spin” their actions, they have not. A key test for infringement is a determination as to whether a substantial portion of the underlying work amounts to an expression of the prior work. We believe we will be able to easily show that Xenforo is infringing under this test. We have numerous other claims against Xenforo that we believe are equally strong.
We trust that software purchasers understand the risks of infringement of copyright law and act accordingly. We have requested that Kier, Mike and Ashley refrain from selling the software while the issues, inclusive of our infringement claims, are heard in the courts. We intend to pursue our rights broadly and vigorously.
We consider Kier and Mike to be talented developers, but ones who potentially fail to grasp the implications of their actions.
We imagine that many of you in the community will have questions or concerns and we want to be as open and straightforward with all of you throughout this process as possible; however, since this matter is now being handled by the court system, we may be limited in some regards to what we can discuss.
Internet Brands
For those who don't know the background, let me explain it in brief:
XenForo developers, Kier, Mike & Ashley were the employees of Jelsoft Inc., the original owner of vBulletin software. Jelsoft was acquired by Internet Brands (IB), and thus the copyrights of vBulletin were acquired by IB. It's interesting to note that this trio was responsible for the most stable product vBulletin ever had - the vBulletin 3.x series.
After the acquisition, Kier, Mike & Ashley left the company. After few months of gap, these developers started working on their own forum software 'XenForo'. The developers claim that XenForo has been written from scratch and does not infringe any copyright owned by IB.
Now, as XenForo is ready for beta launch, IB has filed a lawsuit against XenForo and asked the company not to sell their product. It looks like IB's got the perfect timing to stop its rival.
In the mean time, XenForo community members (most of them are vBulletin customers) are cursing IB for their stand. The discussion thread on XenForo community has already received hundreds of responses against IB.
Here's the complete text of announcement made by Internet Brands: -
Internet Brands claims against Xenforo
Internet Brands today has commenced a lawsuit in the courts of England and Wales against Xenforo, and its founders, Kier, Mike and Ashley. The lawsuit is about these claims: infringement of our copyrighted intellectual property, breach of contract, and unfair business practices.
The suit is simple: we claim that Kier, Mike, and Ashley have infringed and violated contracts they signed with us to gain unfair business advantage. As such, Xenforo’s software unfairly stands on the shoulders of more than a decade of development by Jelsoft. Internet Brands owns this intellectual property.
In total, we are stunned by the actions of Kier, Mike, and Ashley and believe they must not fully understand the laws of copyrights, contract or business torts. Perhaps Kier and Mike think they have “refactored” enough of the code to skirt copyright law. Our analysis strongly indicates otherwise and we believe anyone skilled in understanding such things will concur. Perhaps they are of the misguided belief that because they created some of the vBulletin code as Jelsoft employees, they somehow have unique claims to that property. If so, that too is wrong. Kier’s and Mike’s work as Jelsoft employees was the exclusive property of their employer, and the former owners of Jelsoft not only paid Kier and Mike well during their employment, Kier was paid a handsome bonus when Internet Brands bought the business, although no such payment was required.
If the proverbial shoe were on the other foot and rather than buying vBulletin, Internet Brands had instructed our engineers to essentially copy the software, we would have been law breakers. But Internet Brands chose to play by copyright rules and bought the vBulletin intellectual property. And, in our opinion, no matter how Kier, Mike, and Ashley try to “spin” their actions, they have not. A key test for infringement is a determination as to whether a substantial portion of the underlying work amounts to an expression of the prior work. We believe we will be able to easily show that Xenforo is infringing under this test. We have numerous other claims against Xenforo that we believe are equally strong.
We trust that software purchasers understand the risks of infringement of copyright law and act accordingly. We have requested that Kier, Mike and Ashley refrain from selling the software while the issues, inclusive of our infringement claims, are heard in the courts. We intend to pursue our rights broadly and vigorously.
We consider Kier and Mike to be talented developers, but ones who potentially fail to grasp the implications of their actions.
We imagine that many of you in the community will have questions or concerns and we want to be as open and straightforward with all of you throughout this process as possible; however, since this matter is now being handled by the court system, we may be limited in some regards to what we can discuss.
Internet Brands
Replies
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Kaustubh KatdarePS: Internet Brand's Adrian Harris featured in our Small Talk : #-Link-Snipped-# -
Kaustubh KatdareUpdate: XenForo has announced that they are working on releasing the software however, it will not be released before UK business hours end for today.
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