Class action suit

A class action suit is a lawsuit in which an entire group or class of people claims a similar harm has been done to them by the same party or parties. For example:

• The claim that pollution released upstream does harm to people downstream could be advanced by a group of people seeking compensation for health harms.

• The claim that Wikipedia violates GFDL could be advanced by a large group of GFDL contributors who feel that they are deprived of attribution, access to improvements (as required by GFDL or indeed any sharealike license)

• The claim that libel is propagated in the forums of Wikimedia, e.g. in the form of "outing" the real life identity of an individual otherwise known as 142.177.X.X, an alleged major troll on Wikipedia.

Rules for filing such suits vary by jurisdiction. In general the United States makes it relatively easy to file such suits. However, even where they are harder to file, such as in India or Ontario, there are sometimes rules favourable to plaintiffs: In Ontario, plaintiffs can sell shares in the eventual judgement damages, to finance the case itself; In a famous case against broker w:Nesbitt Burns, there were literally people lined up around the block to buy shares in the lawsuit against this infamous company which sold shares in w:Bre-X. Ontario also has quite lax libel and slander laws under which one can sue even when true things are being said - if they are out of context to the discussion or discourse and not relevant to the decisions being made. Which is the case for Wikipedia mailing list in most or all cases, it is simply a hate forum for the sysop power structure.