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Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

smartcar.com

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Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#221

Post by evanlivingston »

jwr wrote: post #218
ChuckMcM wrote: post #44

That is pretty egregious, and its also par for the course. And that is why startup companies go through all the hoops of being "stealth" and having NDAs and what not. There was a German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this. Clone a successful US company before it got to the European market. On the one hand it is great to have validation of the idea, on the other its a pain to have someone with more…

> its also par for the course No, it is not. The world would be a much better place if we all started doing what is right. This isn't difficult: stealing and copying API design and API documentation is wrong. Make a note of the company, people who work there, and VCs who invested. Computers are good at quickly finding information: one day you might want to do business with one of those people or VCs and digging up th…

Why is it wrong?

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#222

Post by jacquesm »

matz1 wrote: post #207
jacquesm wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Technically, yes. But practically, in cases so blatantly obvious it is fine to draw your own conclusion. In one court case - where a company I had a majority stake in was the plaintiff - the defendant basically had to admit that they copied the code and content of our website. Their defense: 'we did not copy it from them, we copied it from someone else' (without specifying what the 'someone else' was). Needless to sa…

Isn't that testament that their lawyer simply is not good?

Lawyers do not call the shots, clients do. So if a client wants to take a losing battle to court a typical lawyer will caution them but will not hand in their commission.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#223

Post by jcadam »

rat9988 wrote: post #139
joeax wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty egregious, but in reality the only thing that was copied was the docs for the API, not the API itself. The other company still has the write all the backend code, and given their track record of just ripping stuff off, may not have the engineering chops to pull it off. In addition, as Smartcar continuously improves their product and API, the other company can only react to these changes. If I was the O…

I'd take money over flattery any day though.

Money is flattering.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#224

Post by mikhailfranco »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #44

That is pretty egregious, and its also par for the course. And that is why startup companies go through all the hoops of being "stealth" and having NDAs and what not. There was a German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this. Clone a successful US company before it got to the European market. On the one hand it is great to have validation of the idea, on the other its a pain to have someone with more…

I think you are referring to these rip-off merchants:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/inside-the-clone-factory

https://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2014/07/31/samwer-broth...

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#225

Post by jacquesm »

xenophonf wrote: post #212
gnicholas wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> anything that allows large volumes of data to be moved around (copyright violation, child pornography, exfiltration of data from corporate networks) So could Mozilla be on the hook if people used Firefox Send to do any of these things?

They could be on the hook, except the ToS of Firefox Send includes this language: You hereby represent and warrant that your content will not infringe the rights of any third party and will comply with any content guidelines presented by Mozilla... We may suspend or terminate your access to the Services at any time for any reason, including, but not limited to, if we reasonably believe:... you create risk or possible…

The indemnification bit is pretty much testimony to the fact that Mozilla also realizes the abuse potential of 'Send', but it may not work out well for them if they end up as the defendant in some lawsuit and the party breaking the TOS is penniless.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#227

Post by matz1 »

jwr wrote: post #218
ChuckMcM wrote: post #44

That is pretty egregious, and its also par for the course. And that is why startup companies go through all the hoops of being "stealth" and having NDAs and what not. There was a German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this. Clone a successful US company before it got to the European market. On the one hand it is great to have validation of the idea, on the other its a pain to have someone with more…

> its also par for the course No, it is not. The world would be a much better place if we all started doing what is right. This isn't difficult: stealing and copying API design and API documentation is wrong. Make a note of the company, people who work there, and VCs who invested. Computers are good at quickly finding information: one day you might want to do business with one of those people or VCs and digging up th…

Right or wrong is relative. If to me this is not wrong then what are you gonna do about it.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#228

Post by coverband »

joeax wrote: post #100
ChuckMcM wrote: post #44

That is pretty egregious, and its also par for the course. And that is why startup companies go through all the hoops of being "stealth" and having NDAs and what not. There was a German VC firm that was, as I recall, very upfront about this. Clone a successful US company before it got to the European market. On the one hand it is great to have validation of the idea, on the other its a pain to have someone with more…

This is pretty egregious, but in reality the only thing that was copied was the docs for the API, not the API itself. The other company still has the write all the backend code, and given their track record of just ripping stuff off, may not have the engineering chops to pull it off. In addition, as Smartcar continuously improves their product and API, the other company can only react to these changes. If I was the O…

Agreed. It sounds like a case of "this looks good, let's follow their format" and revising words/paragraphs just enough so you won't be blamed for plagiarism. The API parameters are very generic so it shouldn't be considered cloning.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#229

Post by selectiveshift »

evanlivingston wrote: post #221
jwr wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> its also par for the course No, it is not. The world would be a much better place if we all started doing what is right. This isn't difficult: stealing and copying API design and API documentation is wrong. Make a note of the company, people who work there, and VCs who invested. Computers are good at quickly finding information: one day you might want to do business with one of those people or VCs and digging up th…

Why is it wrong?

Because people and companies who do this add no value to society. They are parasites.

Re: Otonomo, with nearly $55M in funding, is cloning our product

#230

Post by aflag »

dep_b wrote: post #73
bob33212 wrote: post #27

I expected this to be a " I had the idea first" post. But it is actually a copyright infringement post AND makes the offending company look like a bunch of hacks. If they don't have the engineering chops to build an API how are going to handle the ops of it.

Some people built the world's most popular operating system doing just that - copying Java's API.

What os is that?
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