[alphazard]

I think we've made a mistake by linking our real world identities to the software we write. If the author released this under a pseudonym, and hosted the git servers in a country without strong copyright enforcement, there's very little Mazda could do to take it down. It's too late for that now since Mazda knows who he really is.

[shiroiuma]

It's not too late for that; the author just doesn't want to be bothered. If he really wanted to, he could move the code to that other country, and put it up under a pseudonym. If anyone asks, he can just claim he doesn't know who that person is, and he has nothing to do with it: how can they disprove him without literally spying on him? The code is open-source: literally anyone could have made a fork of the repo while it was still up, and then posted it somewhere else.

[alphazard]

It's too late for that to be a realistic defense. The Mazda legal team already has a target that they can go after for any further developments with the source code. This post acknowledges that he received the cease and desist letter. The issue isn't just whether you win in court, it's also how much of your time and money is wasted fighting a corporate legal operation. Arguably, a random person publishing the source code would create additional problems for him.

An effective defense has to protect your time and money. One such defense is to never let your real identity be plucked from obscurity and fixated on by a legal team.