β play
π shuffle
Classic Cases
oracle's decade war, waymo's criminal referral, dominion's $787.5m door, epic's contempt play
Discovery
Zubulake v. UBS Warburg LLC
Yeazell Β· Ch. 9
S.D.N.Y. (Scheindlin, J.) Β· 2002β2005
Judge Shira Scheindlin
ββββΒ·
~35 min
2 forks
esi
cost-shifting
spoliation
legal-hold
adverse-inference
Laura Zubulake sued UBS Warburg for sex discrimination and retaliation. Key emails β which UBS's own employees had sent discussing her performance and termination β were stored on backup tapes never indexed for easy retrieval. Restoration would cost an estimated $175,000. Judge Scheindlin's series of five opinions (Zubulake IβV) established the modern ESI cost-shifting test, the litigation-hold framework, and the spoliation sanctions standards now largely codified in Rule 37(e).
OUTCOME SEALED β play the file
Waymo LLC v. Uber Technologies, Inc.
β (modern canon; Classic Cases set: Waymo) Β· trade secrets / spoliation & discovery sanctions
N.D. Cal. (Alsup, J.) Β· 2017β2018
Hon. William H. Alsup
ββββΒ·
~40 min
3 forks
trade-secrets
spoliation
ephemeral-messaging
criminal-referral
fifth-amendment
The trade-secret discovery war that produced a criminal referral from the bench in the middle of a civil trial. Uber acquired Otto β Anthony Levandowski's startup β after Levandowski downloaded roughly 14,000 Waymo files on his way out the door; Waymo sued to stop Uber's entire self-driving program. The drama lived in the discovery record: a letter from Uber's own security manager describing corporate espionage that Uber's lawyers held back, the company's use of self-deleting messaging, and a defendant's key engineer taking the Fifth on every question. Played across the preservation, disclosure, and settlement forks that decided the case before any jury could.
OUTCOME SEALED β play the file
docket β
Summary Judgment
US Dominion, Inc. v. Fox News Network, LLC
β (modern canon; Classic Cases set: Dominion) Β· defamation / actual malice, partial summary judgment & settlement
Del. Super. Ct. (Complex Commercial Div.) (Davis, J.) Β· 2021β2023
Hon. Eric M. Davis
ββββΒ·
~35 min
3 forks
defamation
actual-malice
partial-summary-judgment
discovery-record
trial-day-settle
The defamation case where discovery all but decided the merits. Dominion's texts-and-emails record captured Fox anchors and executives privately calling the stolen-election claims false while Fox aired them β making the New York Times v. Sullivan actual-malice question, normally a defendant's fortress, nearly indefensible. Davis resolved falsity against Fox as a matter of law and set actual malice for the jury. Then, at the courthouse door with the jury seated, Fox paid $787.5 million to keep its executives off the stand. A Delaware Superior Court case played on the FRCP-analog summary-judgment and settlement forks.
OUTCOME SEALED β play the file
Appeal & Preclusion
Epic Games, Inc. v. Apple Inc.
β (modern canon; Classic Cases set: Epic) Β· antitrust standing, dispositive findings & injunction enforcement
N.D. Cal. (Gonzalez Rogers, J.) β 9th Cir. β cert. denied (U.S.) Β· 2020β2025
Hon. Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers
βββββ
~45 min
3 forks
antitrust
manufactured-standing
bench-trial
anti-steering-injunction
contempt
Epic detonated its own App Store contract to pick this fight. It hid a direct-payment bypass in Fortnite, activated it knowing Apple would terminate the developer account, and sued the same day β manufacturing a live injury to litigate the 30% commission. Epic then lost nine of ten antitrust theories at a bench trial and won exactly one: the anti-steering injunction under California's UCL. Apple obeyed that one order so grudgingly β a scare-screen interstitial and a 27% fee on outside purchases β that the court found it in willful contempt and referred an Apple executive for criminal prosecution. Played from Epic's chair across the standing gambit, the dispositive findings, and the enforcement war.
OUTCOME SEALED β play the file
docket β
Copyright
Oracle America, Inc. v. Google LLC
β (modern canon; also Classic Cases set #10) Β· software copyright / fair use
N.D. Cal. (Alsup, J.) β Fed. Cir. (Γ2) β Supreme Court of the United States Β· 2010β2021
Hon. William Alsup (who famously taught himself Java); Justice Breyer (author, 593 U.S. 1)
βββββ
~40 min
2 forks
copyright
fair-use
api-declarations
two-federal-circuit-reversals
scotus-cert
The decade-long war over 37 Java API packages in Android. Two jury trials before a judge who learned Java to check the experts' homework; two Federal Circuit reversals each erasing a Google win; an $8.8 billion damages demand; and a Supreme Court decision that resolved the biggest fair-use question in software history while pointedly ASSUMING copyrightability rather than deciding it. Played from Google's chair: hold the fair-use verdict at the district court, then bet the company on cert.
OUTCOME SEALED β play the file
docket β
β«