Former Stardock Employee Apologizes For Lawsuit

[Andy Chalk]

Former Stardock Employee Apologizes For Lawsuit

A former employee of Stardock has dropped her sexual harassment lawsuit against CEO Brad Wardell and issued a written apology for filing it.

After nearly three long years, the ugly battle between Stardock CEO Brad Wardell and former marketing manager Alexandra Miseta has come to a very sudden and surprising end. The whole thing began in December 2010, three months after Miseta left the company, when she filed a sexual harassment suit against Wardell, claiming that he regularly spoke and behaved inappropriately around her; a couple of years later, in August 2012, Stardock fired back with a lawsuit against Miseta [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/119120-Stardock-Sues-Former-Employee-Over-Ugly-Elemental-Launch], alleging that a few weeks before she quit, she deleted all marketing materials, analytics, trade show data and other information related to Elemental: War of Magic, which contributed to its disastrous launch.

But now both lawsuits have been dismissed as part of a settlement between the two that will see no money change hands but required Miseta to write a letter of apology to Wardell, a copy of which was forwarded to Kotaku. "I very much regret any harm I may have done to you, your family or your company. I also regret any unintentional damage I may have caused when I departed," the letter states in part. "I appreciate the opportunity both you and Stardock gave me. I learned a great deal while there and I deeply regret the way events between us spiraled out of control. I would have handled things very differently if I could."

While Miseta declined to comment on the settlement, Wardell said he felt "vindicated" by the outcome. "Hopefully, when people read something ugly about someone in the Internet they'll be a bit more likely to reserve judgment," he said. "This was a difficult time for everyone involved. We hold no animus towards her and do not want to see her put into a bad light."

Source: Kotaku [http://kotaku.com/stardock-lawsuits-dropped-ex-employee-apologizes-1377925759]


Permalink

 

[Legion]

"Hopefully, when people read something ugly about someone in the Internet they'll be a bit more likely to reserve judgment," he said.

Hah, good luck with that. The tabloids make a living based upon this kind of thing and they sell millions of copies a day from it. People very much like passing judgement on things they know nothing about. I wouldn't be particularly surprised if this became the fuel for another gender debate, with people harassing her for doing it or him for "getting away with it", depending on what the person decides to believe.

Personally I am glad that it was sorted out civilly, rather than dragging it on and trying to extort money from one another. I am also pleased to see that he responded with a decent reply, rather than attempting to make himself look good and her look bad.

 

[Frankster]

I wouldn't be particularly surprised if this became the fuel for another gender debate, with people harassing her for doing it or him for "getting away with it", depending on what the person decides to believe.

Wasnt on this site but prior to the release of fallen enchantress i saw this incident bought up numerous times in other forums, usually as a reason as to why we should boycott stardock and anything Brad Wardell does or just proof stardock is a company that shouldn't exist in general.

Its rather refreshing to see something like this resolved in a civil manner, even if it took years to do so.
No parting sniping comment from either party pleases me greatly.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Wasnt on this site but prior to the release of fallen enchantress i saw this incident bought up numerous times in other forums, usually as a reason as to why we should boycott stardock and anything Brad Wardell does or just proof stardock is a company that shouldn't exist in general.

Not that anybody will apologize for voicing those opinions and being proven wrong; they'll either insist that it was some "hush-hush" deal behind the scenes to "shut her up", or they'll just go along their merry way without even thinking about how wrong they were.

 

[Abomination]

I wish I could sit back and say this was clearly a "misunderstanding" between parties but it stinks of Miseta using a flivorous sexual harassment claim as a pike to keep the destruction of company property suit at bay.

The reasons for her destroying the property is something I can not know but I suspect she was being let go from the job but "quit" instead.

 

[Angelous Wang]

The reasons for her destroying the property is something I can not know but I suspect she was being let go from the job but "quit" instead.

This is the worst way to destroy work you don't want the company to have.

The best way is to break your current computer/laptop about a week or two before you go (nothing major just break/crack the screen or something), get a new one from the IT department without copying any of the files you don't wan the company to have.

Then when you hand in your (new) laptop/PC to your boss when you leave. And the files are just lost to wherever the IT department sends the laptop/pc next.

Or alternatively if you are more technical put all the files on a shared network drive and then configure the folder so only you have access, then when you leave your account get deleted and folder becomes a non-accessible folder forever. The best the network team can do is delete it.

Ether way nether is legal you fault, other people are the ones caused the problems.

 

[Abomination]

The reasons for her destroying the property is something I can not know but I suspect she was being let go from the job but "quit" instead.

This is the worst way to destroy work you don't want the company to have.

The best way is to break your current computer/laptop about a week or two before you go (nothing major just break/crack the screen or something), get a new one from the IT department without copying any of the files you don't wan the company to have.

Then when you hand in your (new) laptop/PC to your boss when you leave. And the files are just lost to wherever the IT department sends the laptop/pc next.

Or alternatively if you are more technical put all the files on a shared network drive and then configure the folder so only you have access, then when you leave your account get deleted and folder becomes a non-accessible folder forever. The best the network team can do is delete it.

Ether way nether is legal you fault, other people are the ones caused the problems.

... thanks for the lesson in corporate vandalism?

You're not speaking from experience, are you?

 

[Angelous Wang]

thanks for the lesson in corporate vandalism?

You're not speaking from experience, are you?

Never need to do it myself, I mostly created and managed software programs (and people would notice if they went missing) in my previous jobs. Lots and lots of different ones.

However in my time doing that I've had full systems and process access to basically everything corporate HR wise for the company I worked ... and well I've seen how one could easily sabotage every function of corporate HR.

I'm an natural anarchist, you show me the blueprint for a shiny new tower and see some way to knock it down.

 

[RicoADF]

thanks for the lesson in corporate vandalism?

You're not speaking from experience, are you?

Never need to do it myself, I mostly created and managed software programs (and people would notice if they went missing) in my previous jobs. Lots and lots of different ones.

However in my time doing that I've had full systems and process access to basically everything corporate HR wise for the company I worked ... and well I've seen how one could easily sabotage every function of corporate HR.

I'm an natural anarchist, you show me the blueprint for a shiny new tower and see some way to knock it down.

A person in marketing couldn't do the network one, and the first option onky works if theres not auto backup (which there wasn't in this case)

 

[Ickorus]

The reasons for her destroying the property is something I can not know but I suspect she was being let go from the job but "quit" instead.

This is the worst way to destroy work you don't want the company to have.

The best way is to break your current computer/laptop about a week or two before you go (nothing major just break/crack the screen or something), get a new one from the IT department without copying any of the files you don't wan the company to have.

Then when you hand in your (new) laptop/PC to your boss when you leave. And the files are just lost to wherever the IT department sends the laptop/pc next.

Or alternatively if you are more technical put all the files on a shared network drive and then configure the folder so only you have access, then when you leave your account get deleted and folder becomes a non-accessible folder forever. The best the network team can do is delete it.

Ether way nether is legal you fault, other people are the ones caused the problems.

As an IT technician, everything would be backed off onto an external hard drive prior to any maintenance.

 

[Atmos Duality]

As an IT technician, everything would be backed off onto an external hard drive prior to any maintenance.

Took the words out of my mouth.

Also, so long as the physical drive the network map is on exists, it's possible (albeit very difficult, time consuming and pricy) to salvage that data. The best way to prevent data from going somewhere you do not want it to go, is to ensure nobody knows of its existence.

Which given Miseta's job, definitely wasn't the case.

 

[iniudan]

The reasons for her destroying the property is something I can not know but I suspect she was being let go from the job but "quit" instead.

This is the worst way to destroy work you don't want the company to have.

The best way is to break your current computer/laptop about a week or two before you go (nothing major just break/crack the screen or something), get a new one from the IT department without copying any of the files you don't wan the company to have.

Then when you hand in your (new) laptop/PC to your boss when you leave. And the files are just lost to wherever the IT department sends the laptop/pc next.

Or alternatively if you are more technical put all the files on a shared network drive and then configure the folder so only you have access, then when you leave your account get deleted and folder becomes a non-accessible folder forever. The best the network team can do is delete it.

Ether way nether is legal you fault, other people are the ones caused the problems.

Btw what kind of network drive/share ?

Has all those I can easily think of, I cannot think of a single way to completely lock out any access to a file, while not scrapping the system.

Just switching the file right to yourself, who you assume will be deleted, no competent IT delete user, you just go in the /nologin pile, until your UID/SID go through recuperation procedure, which is extremely likely to be never. Only thing required to easily recover file is just an active user with the same UID/SID, to get back access without even modifying files right or we could simply invoke root, who can give itself right, even where it has none, has it is god.

So basically you will have to make sure there is no one left with administrative right to the file system and administrative right to user and group right, along making root /nologin, destroying all recovery road possible through schrooting/mounting the file system, partition or drive. Making sure no one can schedule new task executed with administrative right that could permit repair. And I almost forgot, taking care of the log to cover all the crap you actually had to do to prevent reading of some folder.

And I am surely forgetting lot of other thing, never had to practically deal with anything close in complexity to what I am describing, has with that amount of administrative right and damage, vandal might has well save himself trouble and type dd if=/dev/null(or zero) of=/whatever/he/want (or the equivalent under Windows).