🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1ii7alINNon4@controversy.math.lsa.umich.edu> spexet@math.lsa.umich.edu (D. Robert Spexet II) writes:

>While your situation is truly an unfortunate one, it only emphasizes the
>fact that one should take care of the "important" miscellaneous details
>of a project before committing such a vast amount of resources to it.  To
>be specific, it might have been easier for you in the end to get a
>*written* promise that the needed source code could and would be deli-
>vered.  This basically helps to CYA in case something goes wrong.

Not really. Even with a written agreement from a company the size of IBM
you have no assurance of fulfillment. If they don't want to do what they
contracted, they will simply not do it. What can you do? Sue? Sure,
but probably the copntract will read in fine print "we don't promise
to do anything". If indeed it does do that, they will simply reply that
the person signing the contract was not entitled to do it, and refuse
to deliver.

If you still sue, they will simply make sure that your lawyer bills
run several times the value of the suit. (At least larger than triple 
damages.)

You have to be a multi billion dollar company to play with a company the size
of IBM. I.e. they will deal with GM or Boeing, but not with you
or me or the University of Illinois. (Note: this applies to the
other very large computer firms too.) I've been there. Luckily my deal,
with a computer firm that has since fallen on bad times, was a two-way
street, so when they reneged on the contract, we (the U of I) reneged
on the payment, keeping the delivered hardware part of the deal 
without paying. There it died.

Doug  McDonald