FUCK YEAH! (aka: FINALLY!)

Sorry to interrupt Jeff's "Please buy my shit so Edi doesn't eat my liver!" posts, but some good news here. As I mentioned already, the former Judge of the Marvel Class Action suit went bug-fuck insane and recused himself after the Appeal (Appellate? The law confuses me!) court told him he had to approve the Settlement

Well, we got a NEW Judge, Judge Khan (And dig, I get this image in my head of Bill Jemas shaking his fist at the sky, screaming, "KHHHHHHHAAAAANNNNNN!!!!") (I'm doing the obvious joke, so you don't have to)

Annnnnyway, Judge Khan signed off on the Settlement on Tuesday, 8/9, so we're basically a "done deal"

Apparently, the Settlement needs to be "entered" in the court (or something like that) -- basically, just the paperwork being routed where ever it needs to be in The System.

"How long will that take?" I asked. "Not sure" came the response -- apparently it usually just takes a couple of days, but could be 4-6 weeks if the wrong person is on vacation or something. I was told to expect "about a week"

Once the Settlement has been "entered", then it needs to be "Served" to Marvel, but my lawyers indicate that they believe that will be 24 hours from being entered, maybe within an hour or two (it is a short cab ride between legal offices!)

Once those two things are done there will be a 30 day period where the Settlement can be contested (by whom or what, I'm not sure, since both Marvel AND the Class have agreed on the Settlement). Once THAT period is finished, then Marvel has up to 30 days to pay the Class members. With any luck, they won't take the whole 30, but they do have the option.

So, if we were to pretend that the Settlement will be "entered" tomorrow, 8/12, and served on Monday, 8/15, then the 30 days to contest the Settlement would end on 9/15, and Marvel would have to make all payments in full by.... well, 10/15 is a Saturday, so Monday, 10/17. And, I suspect that "making payment" means "telling Diamond", and Diamond runs invoices on the weekend, so if they told Diamond on 10/17, the credits wouldn't show up until 10/26 invoicing. Marvel could make it before, if they so choose, of course, and I hope they release the credits on day #1 (9/16, in this example), instead of day #30.

I doubt that will happen, though :)

So that's what would happen if the Settlement were to be "entered" tomorrow -- the dates roll forward to when it ends up being "entered". Still, I feel pretty darn confident in saying that this will be 100% done with by Thanksgiving, at the outside, and it's possible it will be done before Halloween.

Hooray an' shit!

-B