Posted on the VB forum (Peggy said she couldn't acces it)
My own post.
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There is NO court case against XF.
1. The whole thing has to be assessed under UK law.
The XF developers are UK residents under UK law.
They were employed by Jelsoft (VBulletin) under UK law.
They have set up XF under UK law.
2. Under UK law the skills and information in an employee's head belongs to them, after they leave the employ of a company.
Work belongs to the employer while someone works for them.
2A. When an employee leaves that employment they may be required to sign a non-competition contract. This can only last for one year.
That is, UK law supports the right of a worker to use their skills to work.
A non-competition contract can only cover a "reasonable period" which is normally taken as one year.
3. Xenforo website did not go live for slightly more than one year after their developers left IB (jelsoft/ Vbulletin).
That fits with a standard one year non-competition contract.
After that the XF developers were free to use their skills as they wished.
4. A UK court case cannot have been "filed" as IB has claimed.
A UK court case is public information unless subject to a special gagging order such as in cases of child abuse or terrorism. As public information its outline details are publicly available.
That means there would be an official listing with the XF and IB/ Jelsoft name on it. There is none.
4A. This is also borne out by the way the IB / Jelsoft announcement merely REQUESTS the XF team not to publish XF.
If there were a proper court case starting they would have an injunction to block XF from doing business. That would have a reference number.
Or they would have a case number and would obviously quote it to strengthen their statement - make it look legal.
No such numbers have been stated or leaked.
4B. (ADDED here) If there was an official properly compiled case filed IB would REQUIRE the XF team to stop working.
They wouldn't bother with a piddling little announcement done on their own forum. There would be papers served on XF. Any announcement would give the legal references. None exist.
An injunction would stop XF operating and this site would immediately have to close down.
Clearly that hasn't happened.
5. The most that can have happened is that IB has perhaps MADE APPLICATION to file a case.
Their application will be assessed by the UK legal authorities to see if it meets basic legal standards.
This takes weeks, for a complex case, months or years.
Added here: Such applications are commonly used in business to bully someone legally. They mean very little except that IB has filled out a form and sent it into a court.
6. On the above points such an application does not meet legal requirements.
There will be no case.
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STOP PRESS!
The plot thickens. Apparently IB /VB are also in bad business trouble quite independently of XF because they are desperately trying to sell off their company in a cut price deal RIGHT NOW.
In other words they're trying to sell it quick and cheap because it's failing.
However - IB/ VB are under investigation for shady dealing about this.; They have not negotiated a fair price sale and therefore they have angered their own shareholders.
Not content with ripping off their customers, ruining a good product, driving away their best staff, they are now wrecking the rest of the company so are being legally investigated.
It will obviously be tricky for them that they are losing masses of customers to XF, due to XF being the better product. But partly because IB/ VB have themselves done their best to advertise XF to their own VB customers!
At this point in time the new buyer Hellman & Friedman Capital Partners may well smell rats and pull out.
That leaves IB having destroyed their product,
destroyed their customer goodwill,
lost a mass of customers,
lost the sale of their company,
and having strongly helped a new important competitor to succeed.