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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

#121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GOOG and GOOGL are now shares in Alphabet. [1] We're all GOOG shareholders if we have a 401(k) with a large-cap index fund. As a GOOG shareholder, I want an Android phone that doesn't run out of battery after 8 hours of typical use, but I'm probably not gonna get it. 1. https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/GOOG?p=^GOOG

You might want to try a Pixel phone. I'm on my third generation of Google phones and this one has the best battery life of all.

It is a great phone, if you can track one down. Google isn't making enough of them it seems.

http://www.theverge.com/2017/1/18/14315458/google-pixel-xl-s...

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

#122
post #113
post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Here's Keynes with another perspective: > When the accumulation of wealth is no longer of high social importance, there will be great changes in the code of morals. We shall be able to rid ourselves of many of the pseudo-moral principles which have hag-ridden us for two hundred years, by which we have exalted some of the most distasteful of human qualities into the position of the highest virtues. We shall be able to…

I like that quote, but I disagree with it. I don't think "love of money as a possession" is a good thing, but I think it's pretty rare compared to the "love of money as a means to the enjoyments and realities of life."

One of the most life-changing experiences I've ever had was swimming in a bioluminescent bay in Puerto Rico. I've never seen so many stars overhead in contrast to absolute darkness (you have to be in remote darkness to enjoy the bioluminescence). The sky was absolutely clear and every sensory detail felt enhanced and euphoric.

That vacation was a relatively expensive week for me. It didn't have to be as expensive as it was, but it couldn't have been significantly cheaper either. With $100M, I could fly down to Puerto Rico and do that every weekend, weather permitting.

But here's the thing - I'm sure that experience can be had (in principle, not exact detail) in every country in the world. With $20,000, you can carefully plan a backpacking trip through Europe. With $100M, you can have virtually any experience in Europe with instant gratification. Have you ever looked at Myspace Tom's Instagram? All the man does is travel around the world to interesting places taking photos. He doesn't necessarily do things people can't do with significantly less wealth, but he 1) doesn't have to choose which things to do and 2) does them casually, because he is virtually immune to financial catastrophe.

Money is freedom, because you can (in limited effect) trade it for time. I think most people love money because they love the time it can buy them, not because it is an end in of itself.

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

#123
post #81
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…

My impression from working at Google was that lack of respect for property is unfortunately part of Google's culture. I've met this mindset on many occasions, so this whole lawsuit, as well as the fact that Levandowski was allowed to rise high at the company, doesn't surprise me a bit. It's just that in this case it was one of their own engineers using it against them, for a change.

I'm at Google too, and for what it's worth, I haven't seen that mindset at all. It sounds like you were on a team with some shitty people or something.

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

#124
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 ?

His theft (supposedly) amounts to nine figures.

The last time something on this magnitude happened was during the financial crisis, and people were (rightly or not) braying for bankers to go to prison.

Are you one of these people?

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

#125
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…

> As a Google shareholder I demand they litigate until Uber and Anthony are where they deserve to be; jail. Litigation is civil, not criminal.

There may be criminal charges brought though, and Levandowski himself seems to believe there is significant-enough risk of that to assert his fifth amendment right at a recent hearing.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/30/technology/uber-waymo-lev...

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

#126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Also, in a mugging, the mugged is deprived of whatever was stolen. With IP theft the victim still has use of their IP

There's a difference between illegally downloading a movie instead of paying for it, and stealing technology and using it to bring a competitor to market. The latter is actually taking market share away from the organization it was stolen from, so they are deprived of something tangible.

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

#127
post #111
post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.)

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

#128
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 ?

> intellectual property infringement?

I believe that's a deliberate attempt to illogically equate what Levandowski is being accused of, which is duplicitous, pre-meditated behavior to milk Google out of 100+ million dollars, then take Google's technology to a competitor for another multi-hundred million payout, with something like unintentional patent infringement.

I absolutely believe that if Levandowski is guilty of what he is being accused of that he deserves jail time.

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

#129

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.

I for sure would have remembered some rinky dink motorcycle lining up for the start in Primm in 2005. His team didn't make it past the NQE in LA, IIRC.

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

#130
post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression from working at Google was that lack of respect for property is unfortunately part of Google's culture. I've met this mindset on many occasions, so this whole lawsuit, as well as the fact that Levandowski was allowed to rise high at the company, doesn't surprise me a bit. It's just that in this case it was one of their own engineers using it against them, for a change.

I'm at Google too, and for what it's worth, I haven't seen that mindset at all. It sounds like you were on a team with some shitty people or something.

And you sound like a junior engineer with little visibility on what's really going on.
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