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Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

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Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#101

Post by TheCondor »

kaladaraos wrote: post #3

Is there any reason not to be suspicious that Levandowski will just work on them unofficially?

It's worse than that, a lot.

Let's just assume that uber has some google technology. If they completely fire levandowsky, then he effectively becomes a third party in the case. Given the choice, google doesn't care about him, they care about uber beating them to market with their own tech. Google could drop him from the case in exchange for aiding in an uber loss. uber has to keep him close and happy, whatever that means...

Now if Uber really hasn't done anything wrong, and they may not actually know, but if we assume they are completely innocent then he can't directly hurt them if they fire him, he might sue them or collect a golden parachute but it makes uber look better.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#102

Post by [deleted] »

dmerfield wrote: post #78
sanguy wrote: post #52

Anthony is overrated and a complete psychopath. He doesn't understand it's basic right from wrong. In his mind IP is boundless and his, not Googles. This comes from 5 years of working in fairly close contact. Zero morals. He is what's wrong with Silicon Valley - on equal grounds to Travis from Uber. I can completely see this all being planned for years just like circumventing the iPhone App Store rules. As a Google s…

Do you really think he should be in prison for intellectual property infringement ?

[deleted]

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#103

Post by taneq »

arkitaip wrote: post #9
jacquesm wrote: post #2

That's just Uber trying avoid having their self-driving car department shut-down. But it could definitely still happen. Maybe Uber should apply to Google's 'PatentShield' program ;)

Maybe Uber has realized that this guy is toxic and can't be trusted handling "their" tech? If he spent a decade stealing Google's tech, are they willing to risk him treating Uber the same way? Especially since Uber's epic level of sliminess would make it even easier for Levandowski to rationalize theft.

Just like the old saying, "you lose 'em how you get 'em."

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#104

Post by dsacco »

artursapek wrote: post #53
encoderer wrote: post #32

Worth remembering that Google paid this guy over $120 Million in compensation. He is a tech "1%"er, which really is saying a lot. That is hedge fund money. I'm not certain, but I think the average engineer would feel more loyalty to a company that has given them multi-generational wealth. I'm all for engineers getting paid, but in this case the guy didn't even have to do what most wealthy engineers do: deliver an act…

I really don't understand how people get greedy after earning that much money. Is it just the high/excitement the comes from it? Seems like money would no longer be motivating.

Many people around the world would say the same thing about the lifestyle enjoyed by the average commenter on this forum, but most of us don't think of our incomes that way. The average American does not need to live in the home size that has become desirable; they do it because they can.

You can't set an arbitrary limit on when money ceases to be motivating. At $100M in net worth, you no longer need to compromise on a lot of things that people with a $1M net worth have to. But at a $1M net worth, you also do not have to compromise on a lot of things that people with a $100k net worth have to, and so on and so forth.

If I had a net worth of over $100M, I'd probably still do things that increase it. That doesn't seem any more inherently greedy than my seeking to increase my net worth now, when it's orders of magnitude lower. I'd do it because it's what I know to do, and because more resources is rationally better than fewer resources.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#105

Post by xkcd-sucks »

jonknee wrote: post #83
metaphorm wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

litigation is a civil complaint not a criminal one. nobody goes to jail for that. you may have some justified reasons for disliking him but you sound unhinged in this comment. get a grip.

If just a portion of what is claimed comes out as true there will be a criminal case as well. This sounds orders of magnitude more serious than what Sergey Aleynikov was claimed to have done to Goldman Sachs and he is about ready to be put in jail.

Sergey didn't have an equally large gorilla of a company backing him up...

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#106

Post by taneq »

nols wrote: post #20
dsr_ wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no reason to believe that Levandowski is an irreplaceable engineer, is there?

He's one of the top experts in self driving technology, a motorcycle he and a team built in college is in the Smithsonian. I can see Uber wanting to keep him on unofficially.

"He and a team" - I'd be curious to see the extent of his technical contribution, given that he's billed as the team leader and seems to be taking a lot of the credit here. In my experience, 'team leaders' who end up with the credit for the finished product do so because they spent all their time self-promoting rather than actually, y'know, building the product.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#107

Post by thesmallestcat »

Schwolop wrote: post #57
WillyOnWheels wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm all for engineers getting paid, but in this case the guy didn't even have to do what most wealthy engineers do: deliver an actual successful product to market. Anthony's efforts led to Streetview and Maps improvements. Waymo is still using his LIDAR research. I think Anthony is totally screwed with this lawsuit, but I wouldn't belittle his engineering accomplishments.

The guy built a self-driving motorcycle . I laughed at the first DARPA Grand Challenge when it travelled 30cm before falling over. I ate my words the next year when it made it most of the way. By comparison, after a year of learning to ride a motorbike I barely make it to work each day without shitting myself.

Why does he get all of the credit for this? He was part of a team.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#108

Post by hyperbovine »

waqf wrote: post #92
dmerfield wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you really think he should be in prison for intellectual property infringement ?

For nine-figure fraud? What would you propose instead? (It's fraud when you take advantage by ignoring the established legal rules that everyone else is playing by, however suboptimal those rules are.)

Exactly. People routinely get jail time for three orders of magnitude less fraud.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#109

Post by beedogs »

dmerfield wrote: post #78
sanguy wrote: post #52

Anthony is overrated and a complete psychopath. He doesn't understand it's basic right from wrong. In his mind IP is boundless and his, not Googles. This comes from 5 years of working in fairly close contact. Zero morals. He is what's wrong with Silicon Valley - on equal grounds to Travis from Uber. I can completely see this all being planned for years just like circumventing the iPhone App Store rules. As a Google s…

Do you really think he should be in prison for intellectual property infringement ?

Absolutely.

Re: Uber’s Anthony Levandowski out as Advanced Technologies lead amid legal fight

#110

Post by hyperbovine »

kinghajj wrote: post #96
mattmanser wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's much worse in terms of $$$ compared to most muggings, why shouldn't it be a long term sentence? This is one of the major disconnects in modern society, stealing huge sums of money by rich middle aged white guys is a minor slap on the wrists but stealing a few dollars by young, black guys is let's send them to the slammer and throw away the key. It's so blatant and ingrained in the system that you can't even see…

An obvious difference between IP theft and muggings, however, is that the later also entails threats of violence (and sometimes even assault & battery). That's why robbery is generally considered more heinous than burglary, where the victims are typically not present or asleep. I'd agree though that some sort of dollar figure should be attached to the psychological trauma of being mugged, so that great-enough white-c…

I'll bet if you asked most people what they would prefer less, getting beat up or losing $500 million, the would answer the latter.
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