[rwj]

Except that all the people using left-pad weren't paying for left-pad, and didn't have a contractual relationship with the author. IANAL, but I'm doubtful the courts would find there is enough of a relationship for the author to be liable.

[withinboredom]

That is what new laws are for.

[mjr00]

No, they aren't. Even in the most liberal interpretation of the new laws, there's nothing specifying that you need to continue making your open-source package continually and indefinitely available.

[withinboredom]

I don't mean THESE new laws, just new laws in general.

> nothing specifying that you need to continue making your open-source package continually and indefinitely available.

There's a difference between making it available, and deliberately causing harm and untold productivity loss in a single day. This was a case of the latter.

[mjr00]

Someone deleted a publicly accessible file off the internet, and it broke workflows of people with whom they have no existing contract. Good luck proving that was done to deliberately cause harm.

[withinboredom]

In this case, they freely admitted to doing it with the intent to harm. A person slapping me in the face doesn’t have a contract with me, but they are still liable for that harm. This isn’t rocket science.