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Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

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Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#51
post #10
post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Open source tends to work great for re-implementing technology that is already understood. It tends not to work for exploratory research, since that requires risk and ingenuity, not a designed-by-committee approach. R&D of this sort is funded best with a strong profit motive, unless the government is willing to shell out for it.

I'm not sure how that follows. Most big open-source projects are in practice owned and controlled by a single company/entity, and the processes don't differ much from what you'd see in-house. What you're describing sounds more like how standardisation bodies work than the realities of functioning software projects.

I guess the corporation, in this case, is acting as a benefactor just as the government would be in other cases.

In order to work on pie in the sky ideas, you need to hire brilliant people for long periods of time, with low certainty of success. And this is expensive, and corporations will not generally do this out of the kindness of their hearts... the stars align sometimes where the private incentives and public interests are the same.

Xerox PARC, Google X, Bell Labs, and so forth meet this description just as much as DARPA.

But the traditional direct profit motive is an important piece of the engine of progress, and relying only on this other incentive structure would cause stagnation.

Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#52
post #13

Tesla is suing former employees for stealing its logistics (warehousing, inventory control, etc.) trade secrets. Tesla has to show that Zoox is using the information the employees allegedly stole. In a nutshell, Tesla would have to show similarities between its logistics processes and Zoox's. ( https://www.fenwick.com/FenwickDocuments/Trade_Secrets_Prote... for a good summary) But given the shitshow that is Tesla's l…

>If anything, Zoox used the information allegedly taken from Tesla as an example of what not to do logistically, and trade secrets law doesn't let you sue for that. Any other lawyer want to sound off on if this is right? Because it doesn't seem right. If I'm using stolen trade secrets to decide what not to do, I'm still making very good use of that information. Edit: added "other" to first sentence since original com…

Also an attorney and I read the statute differently than parent comment. The Economic Espionage Act[1] criminalizes the misappropriation of information, not the use of misappropriated information. In relevant part:

> (a) Whoever, with intent to convert a trade secret, that is related to a product or service used in or intended for use in interstate or foreign commerce, to the economic benefit of anyone other than the owner thereof, and intending or knowing that the offense will, injure any owner of that trade secret, knowingly—

>> (1) steals, or without authorization appropriates, takes, carries away, or conceals, or by fraud, artifice, or deception obtains such information; [or]

>> (2) without authorization copies, duplicates, sketches, draws, photographs, downloads, uploads, alters, destroys, photocopies, replicates, transmits, delivers, sends, mails, communicates, or conveys such information;

Edit: Just saw parent comment clarified they were discussing Zoox's liability, not the former employee. In that case, subsection 3 of the above excerpt would apply:

>> (3) receives, buys, or possesses such information, knowing the same to have been stolen or appropriated, obtained, or converted without authorization;

I still read the statute a bit differently from parent. Liability doesn't flow from whether or not the IP was implemented by Zoox but from whether or not Zoox knew the information was stolen. Tesla will have to prove Zoox intended to obtain the proprietary information and knew it was stolen.

[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1832

Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#53
post #13

Tesla is suing former employees for stealing its logistics (warehousing, inventory control, etc.) trade secrets. Tesla has to show that Zoox is using the information the employees allegedly stole. In a nutshell, Tesla would have to show similarities between its logistics processes and Zoox's. ( https://www.fenwick.com/FenwickDocuments/Trade_Secrets_Prote... for a good summary) But given the shitshow that is Tesla's l…

>If anything, Zoox used the information allegedly taken from Tesla as an example of what not to do logistically, and trade secrets law doesn't let you sue for that. Any other lawyer want to sound off on if this is right? Because it doesn't seem right. If I'm using stolen trade secrets to decide what not to do, I'm still making very good use of that information. Edit: added "other" to first sentence since original com…

[deleted]

Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#54
post #3

This might be unpopular here, but I kind of wish this and other similar systems were more open source, or even just shared between companies. If companies are going to be putting a system out there on the streets anyway, and Tesla's is comparatively more quality and perhaps thus safer (I'm not making a claim, just positing a hypothetical), then it would only be to everyone's benefit if every company didn't have to (o…

The minute anyone sells a self driving car it will be completely dismantled and quickly reverse engineered by every auto manufacturer, like they already do for every product their competitors put out. The reverse engineering even happens before your product is out. Go to any auto show and you will find employees of other companies taking measurements or scanning paint pigments of concept cars that will never even hit production. You loose your proprietary advantage the minute you sell your first product.

Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Strange legal choices wrt to the SEC? Just wait for the judge decision: the SEC is in a clear overreach here, as all the tweets they cited in their filing are non material. They even misquoted the tweet to say "500K" instead of " about 500K" and anyone can add up the previsouly published numbers to conclude the company should reach a runrate of 500K at the end of the year (Musk tweeted nothing new, it was already dis…

There's potentially a very large difference between the number of cars made in 2019, and the extrapolated production rate at the end of 2019 (e.g. number of cars made in the last week of December * 52). I could be wrong but I don't think that before the tweet there were any previous filings or announcements saying that Tesla would build 500,000 cars this year.

>I could be wrong but I don't think that before the tweet there were any previous filings or announcements saying that Tesla would build 500,000 cars this year.

I'm fairly certain that during the Q4 2018 earnings call they talked about expecting to deliver between 350,000 and 500,000 cars in 2019.

I'm not a lawyer, I don't know much about public companies or regulations, so I don't know if that counts or not (or if saying "500,000 in 2019" is hugely different than "between 350,000 and 500,000 in 2019"), but it's not like the 500,000 was never said before.

Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#58

Tesla is suing former employees for stealing its logistics (warehousing, inventory control, etc.) trade secrets. Tesla has to show that Zoox is using the information the employees allegedly stole. In a nutshell, Tesla would have to show similarities between its logistics processes and Zoox's. ( https://www.fenwick.com/FenwickDocuments/Trade_Secrets_Prote... for a good summary) But given the shitshow that is Tesla's l…

> But given the shitshow that is Tesla's logistics , that's extremely unlikely, as Tesla's logistics processes simply aren't valuable IP. Tesla has displayed a chronic inability to manage their own supply chain, especially during the period the employees were at Tesla. Hypothetically, what if their supply chain issues are caused by dogmatically following a flawed and proprietary supply chain algorithm? If their rival…

If their rival stole and use their logistics algo, that would probably be "use" of the trade secrets. It doesn't matter if the IP is good or bad, just that it was inappropriately acquired and then used by the defendant.

My point about the value of Tesla's logistics IP is that it doesn't make sense for anyone to use it because it's not valuable: Tesla has messed up on the basic logistics enough times that its clear they're not very good at logistics.

Re: Tesla sues former employees for allegedly stealing data, Autopilot source code

#60
post #22

Tesla is suing former employees for stealing its logistics (warehousing, inventory control, etc.) trade secrets. Tesla has to show that Zoox is using the information the employees allegedly stole. In a nutshell, Tesla would have to show similarities between its logistics processes and Zoox's. ( https://www.fenwick.com/FenwickDocuments/Trade_Secrets_Prote... for a good summary) But given the shitshow that is Tesla's l…

> Tesla has displayed a chronic inability to manage their own supply chain, especially during the period the employees were at Tesla. What do you mean by this? They seem to be hitting their delivery targets despite incredibly (and unpredictably) high demand.

They can't get repair parts out in a timely manner.
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