You'd be surprised how few people even read a resume before turning to intimidation - legal, physical, political or otherwise. It's amazing how often managers think they can bully someone, and then find out that their opponent discovered kryptonite a long time ago.

Probably because it works 99% of times you never hear about.

Monster Cable went after Blue Jeans Cable, a small boutique audio cable manufacturer in Seattle, threatening basically patent-driven extortion and licensing.

Except the guy that founded BJC was an ex-corporate lawyer. His response letter (https://www.bluejeanscable.com/legal/mcp/response041408.pdf) is full of zingers, but most appropriate for this exact point is this:

> After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1985, I spent nineteen years in litigation practice, with a focus upon federal litigation involving large damages and complex issues. My first seven years were spent primarily on the defense side, where I developed an intense frustration with insurance carriers who would settle meritless claims for nuisance value when the better long-term view would have been to fight against vexatious litigation asa matter of principle...

> If you sue me, the case will go to judgment, and I will hold the court's attention upon the merits of your claims--or, to speak more precisely, the absence of merit from your claims--from start to finish. Not only am I unintimidated by litigation; I sometimes rather miss it.

Thank you for sharing this, my smile got wider the more I read.

Loved this:

"RE: Your letter, received April Fools' day"

>Not only am I unintimidated by litigation; I sometimes rather miss it.

Oh, this is just great.

Here's the story, from Wired, back in 2003.[1]

[1] https://www.wired.com/2003/09/diamond/

Jewels don’t appeal to me or my partner at all. De Beers diamonds are a scam. After reading this, those diamonds grown in Boston sounds so friggin cool though. The amount of technological innovation behind it is incredible. Maybe I’m just wooed by science and human innovation.

Shoot, if I was in the unlikely fictional scenario where I even wore a diamond and someone asked about it, I would be THRILLED to get into the science of how it was grown in a lab. What a cool story. Instead of just going “yeah, thanks, it cost a fortune and three kids died pulling it out of the dirt”.