Um, removing a person who’s giving a talk is a completely different action from the distribution of (potentially) unlicensed software.
DEFCON may well have many reasons and legal recourses to stop a talk from occurring. But if they do not meet the terms of the contract for the IP, then the author/developer/manufacturer is entirely free to pursue action against them.
Now it’s possible the developers had not watched Mike Monteiro’s “fuck you pay me” talk (https://creativemornings.com/talks/mike-monteiro--2/1), but assuming that the claims in this tweet are remotely accurate you can bet that - assuming they can get someone to do it at all - next years defcon badge will be produce by someone with a contract that has the only sane language: “no transfer of any IP or right to distribute occurs until receipt of full payment”
Minor addendum due to being outside of the edit window.
The “um,” start to this was unnecessarily shitty/passive aggressive and I just noticed it when I was checking for replies, so apologies for that attitude.
The issue I was wanting to address is that the reply was talking about removing the speaker as if that is relevant to the OP’s comment about IP, etc and in hindsight I guess I assumed a bad faith argument and responded to that assumed intent rather than the actual comment.
DEFCON may well have many reasons and legal recourses to stop a talk from occurring. But if they do not meet the terms of the contract for the IP, then the author/developer/manufacturer is entirely free to pursue action against them.
Now it’s possible the developers had not watched Mike Monteiro’s “fuck you pay me” talk (https://creativemornings.com/talks/mike-monteiro--2/1), but assuming that the claims in this tweet are remotely accurate you can bet that - assuming they can get someone to do it at all - next years defcon badge will be produce by someone with a contract that has the only sane language: “no transfer of any IP or right to distribute occurs until receipt of full payment”