Processing has stalled because of a problem. In 2005 the then class counsel, today know as A/B counsel because they represent the A and B category claims, posted advice on the settlement website for people who had syndicated their articles. In essence the advice said for each such article you only have one claim, but for amount paid to the author, which determines the compensation for B and C claims, the claimant should submit the total paid by all syndicating publications. It is know some claimants did this. I don't know how many.
Later, after all the appeals, the AB counsel agreed, at the insistence of the Defense, that the advice was wrong, inconsistent with the settlement. If they knew then (2013) that the claims database had a problem because of that advice, they didn't tell me.
I've discovered in the last month that there is a problem. For the people who submitted claims that way, the data base doesn't have the information necessary for proper presentation of claims to the Defense, so that process can't even start. That process, and the process of getting publisher and database money to pay claims, is an estimated six months mimimum.
There have been discussions about the problem, but no solution yet. The situation is testy because I think the AB counsel are responsible for the problem.
I'm presenting the problems to Judge Daniels immediately, but court processes are notoriously slow.
IF ANYONE KNEW ABOUT THAT SYNDICATION ADVICE IN 2005, OR USED IT, OR SPOKE TO CLASS COUNSEL ABOUT IT, PLEASE CONTACT ME.
CHALMERSCD@GMAIL.COM
