vBulletin vs. XenForo

[Nebulous's iconNebulous]

Article: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/04/vbulletin_sues_xenforo_again/

Internet forumware giant vBulletin has filed a second lawsuit against its former lead developer, who recently launched his own forum platform with the UK-based startup XenForo. With the new suit, vBulletin claims copyright infringement, breach of contract, and misappropriation of trade secrets.



XenForo and its lead developer, ex-vBulletin man Kier Darby, deny both suits in their entirety and expects the claims to be defeated.



Last month, just before the XenForo beta was set to go on sale, vBulletin and its parent company, Internet Brands, filed suit in the UK against XenForo and three former vBulletin employees: former vBulletin lead developer and product manager Darby; Mike Sullivan, another former developer; and former business manager Ashley Busby. Now, vBulletin has filed a similar suit in California that names XenForo and Darby.



The new suit claims widespread infringement and unlawful exploitation of vBulletin's copyrighted software and equally damaging misappropriation of trade secrets developed by vBulletin and its related companies through investments of millions of dollars over the last ten years. It alleges that before he left vBulletin, Darby increased his access to the company's confidential information and refused to return it when he resigned. Because of this and other reasons, the suit says, Darby breached his contract with vBulletin.



When they left the company, the suit alleges, Darby and Sullivan took with them virtually every type of document a competitor would need to enter the market and unlawfully create a competing bulletin board software program. vBulletin did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but it has previously discussed the first suit with The Reg, denying that the suit was timed to coincide with the launch of the XenForo beta.



After the California suit was filed, XenForo posted a message to its website alerting users. We deny these claims in their entirety, and have strong evidence to support our position, Darby wrote. We will defend our position, and expect the claims to be defeated.



Darby, Sullivan, and Busby split with vBulletin in 2009, roughly two years after Internet Brands acquired the forum-software company, which runs online communities on 40,000 sites across the web. A year after they left the company, the trio registered the XenForo domain.



In the past, Darby has said that the XenForo platform was built from scratch using the Zend PHP framework. After the first suit was filed, vBulletin sent a letter to XenForo requesting it halt the release of its product — it isn't a legal request per se, vBulletin told us — and XenForo ignored the request, launching its platform after only a slight delay.

Found blog post on this topic as well: http://vbtruth.com/vbulletin-v-xenforo-case-2/320/



What are your opinions on all this drama?

 

[awpoon]

If vBulletin wins, then their customers will just leave to some other Forum Software in disgust. If they lose, more people will convert to XenForo. Either way, vBulletin has (and does not deserve) no future in this market.

 

[TheVisitors]

From a PR standing point, this was a bad move for vBulletin. I'm surprised though that they have allowed their members to discuss this on their site (vBulletin.com). But not surprised that they have kept it private within the members area... so unless you are a paying customer, like myself... You are not aware of all the disappointed & upset users there are. Trust me... there are indeed a lot of members there who think this was a bad thing & a large group of them have bought XF, just to defy vB. though it is worth noting that IB/vB has hinted / threaten to also actively sue anyone in the future using XF or who have purchased XF... Should they win.

 

[Nebulous's iconNebulous]

though it is worth noting that IB/vB has hinted / threaten to also actively sue anyone in the future using XF or who have purchased XF... Should they win.

Really? Thats news to me. They can sue the company creating the software, but to sue all of its customers is another thing. They did not create the software and had nothing to do with its development. Surely if vB wins, XenForo would be required to send out a take down notice to all its customers / give them fair warning that its time to stop using the product.

 

[TheVisitors]

Really? Thats news to me. They can sue the company creating the software, but to sue all of its customers is another thing. They did not create the software and had nothing to do with its development. Surely if vB wins, XenForo would be required to send out a take down notice to all its customers / give them fair warning that its time to stop using the product.

That was basically the idea... That despite having paid for a copy, that users would be told that if they continued to use it... They would be sued.



Something like buying a house and then latter being told that your property is no longer yours, because the the guy that made the house... Lost some court case, that had nothing to do with you directly.