341–350 of 637 posts
This is obviously frustrating, but do not focus on it. They were wrong and lazy to blatantly copy, but would it really make a difference if they spent an extra couple hours with a few copy/css changes to make it look more unique? Unfortunately, the market does not care about who had what first. This is a validation for you. Frustrating validation. You likely do not have the resources to fight them for anything meanin…
A lot of good advice on here. Let me add another point, maybe just consider negotiating an acquisition. Yes, it does kind of suck they stole your idea. But the fact that they have $55 million in funding, probably means they're willing to buy you out for a couple million. One, just to avoid any legal issues. Two, because you've already done a lot of work on the problem. Maybe it's worth fighting. But maybe it's also w…
If they go down this route, SmartCar should ask for at least their post-money valuation based on their last $10M raise back in March 2018[1], not just a "couple of million". [1] https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/smartcar#section-ove...
The smart car documentation is worth some amount of money. But there is no way in hell that it is worth 10 million dollars.
In law, there is this concept of "damages". Smartcar did not get lose 10 million dollars because a company stole their docs.
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> 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?
So inferior goods (using the economic term) can add low-cost options for consumers and are thus a social benefit.
While copying itself isn't bad, in practice those companies often releasing products that are unfit for sale or engage in deceptive advertising.
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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…
Given the current ruling in Oracle v. Google, though, I'd imagine Smartcar would have grounds for a legal case. If Oracle is awarded damages from Google for "copying" the Java API specification in Android, even with a different underlying implementation, then I'd imagine Smartcar can highlight the similarities to their own dispute with Otonomo. The tricky thing is it looks like Otonomo is an Israeli company so I'm no…
https://otonomo.io/about-us (see bottom of page)
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No he means "The Chinese". Not the people, the government. He was quite clear about that in the full quote . > The Chinese also do this. (As in, the government seems to encourage it outright.) Way to be outraged through your own selective reading.
Okay, to be fair, I wrote the comment, then immediately thought, okay that could be misinterpreted, then added the parenthetical right afterwards. I didn't do an "(EDIT:)" because I thought no one would have come in so soon. The poor sap might have fallen prey to my foolish decision to use an optimistic concurrency protocol.
I understand HN is a tech place, but since race can play a factor in practically all subjects, it can be a healthy discussion if spoken about maturely.
Several years ago, I hired a boutique Silicon Valley law firm to create some terms of service and privacy documents for my company. As part of their long list of questions about how we would use our customers data, they asked for a list of similar companies and competitors. I'd already reviewed all of our competitor's terms to get a sense of what other people were doing. So, when I reviewed the final documents that t…
On the other hand, I wonder what the job of lawyer should look like. Writing a similar document but carefully choosing different wording to avoid to be sued?
However, charging 5K for a copied document is just cheeky.
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Ah good old Rocket Internet. Used to deal quite a lot with them back in the days. For all the ethically ambiguous things they do, I still remember fondly their creative ways of using AdTech.
There is nothing wrong with competition. Read Smith.
Theft, sabotage, ad hominem attacks, even murder, could all be considered "competition" if your ethics and morals are on a different plane.
So saying there is nothing wrong with competition as a blanket dismissal is a bit myopic.
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No case are unwinnable. At least not with that attitude. Look at the O.J. Simpson case for example.
He lost the civil suit. And the only reason you bring it up is because it is exceptional. The general rule is that the courts tend to get it right but there are obvious (and glaring) exceptions. The quality of your lawyer will help in the gray areas, and may get you a reduced sentence in case of a criminal affair but in general you will lose if you go to court with a case where you were in the wrong. It's not a perfe…
>And the only reason you bring it up is because it is exceptional
So you need exceptional lawyer.
>The quality of your lawyer will help in the gray areas
An exceptional lawyer will make seemingly black and white situation to looks like grey.
> in general you will lose if you go to court with a case where you were in the wrong
Sure, the point of court is argue that meaning of "wrong"
Several years ago, I hired a boutique Silicon Valley law firm to create some terms of service and privacy documents for my company. As part of their long list of questions about how we would use our customers data, they asked for a list of similar companies and competitors. I'd already reviewed all of our competitor's terms to get a sense of what other people were doing. So, when I reviewed the final documents that t…
Sadly this is exactly what should be done in most contracts. (In a hypothetical alternate world where law worked more like OSS). Of course it was unethical for them to do it without telling you and trying to charge you $5k for it, but law would be a heck of a lot cheaper if openness and code re-use were the default.
I built a technology to make digital books from old copyright expired printed books in various less popular languages. After I put a lot of content online and getting decent traffic from google search I started receiving DMCA take down notices from an American company that had simply copied all my data to their website and claimed to google that it is their copyright. (Imagine the audacity to call Bible translation f…