We’ve been running this website for 16 years. In that time, we’ve published tens of thousands of reviews and written plenty of posts about installers and manufacturers. Shock horror, some have been critical.
We’ve seen every kind of response. From genuine, constructive engagement to personal threats to multi-page demands from top-tier law firms. I’ve had at least one death threat.
The legal threats are always interesting. Not because they scare us, but because of what they signal. A company comfortable with its product or ethics doesn’t reach for a lawyer when someone criticises it. A company that knows the criticism landed and wants to stop anyone else reading it does.
Which brings me to a story that’s been doing the rounds in the battery world.
In 2024, a Queensland YouTuber named Stefan Fischer published the results of testing lithium batteries made by Deep Cycle Systems1. His verdict: they were degrading faster than they should and weren’t fit for purpose.
DCS’s response was to sue him for defamation.
If your product is good and the review is wrong, you engage. You show your data. You provide your side of the story. You invite scrutiny. You don’t drag a bloke into the District Court of Queensland.
The lawsuit backfired about as badly as a lawsuit can. Fischer’s GoFundMe raised $150,000. His channel surged. Prominent YouTubers in Australia and the US covered the saga, racking up over a million views. More customers came forward with their own horror stories.
The case was dismissed in March 2025 because DCS wasn’t even eligible to sue for defamation2. Fischer has been awarded costs of six figures and had to apply to wind up the battery company to recover his money.
DCS’s lawsuit told you a lot more about DCS than Fischer’s video ever did.
I know this dynamic from the other side too – some of the best things we’ve ever built at SolarQuotes came directly from harsh criticism:
Some people hated that we forced three installer quotes on everyone, so we changed it to a choice: one, two, or three.
The Good Installer Guarantee came from customers telling us referrals alone weren’t enough.
Our vetting has got progressively tougher because people kept telling us it wasn’t tough enough. They were right. Harsh feedback, taken seriously, made us better.
So when I see a company respond to criticism with a lawsuit rather than a listen, I don’t just think they’re making a dumb mistake. I think they’re telling you exactly what kind of company they are.
Footnotes
- A company Ronald had reservations about in 2017 ↩
- One of the lesser-known aspects of Australian defamation laws is that companies with 10 or more employees can’t sue for defamation. They generally threaten you with ‘injurious falsehood’ instead, which sounds scarier but is actually harder to prove, since they have to show the statement was false, made maliciously, and caused real financial damage ↩
About Finn Peacock
RSS - Posts
It’s good business practice 101. Own your problems. Once you let someone else own them they get a life all of their own. And one that is now well out of your reach. You end up playing catch up
Oh – and thanks for update on case above. Lost track of it. Closure at last