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

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

#571

Post by pjc50 »

hunta2097 wrote: post #410
asveikau wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like some of these examples could be US-centric phenomena. We in the US tend to confuse brand names with product categories, and in other markets the Apple brand doesn't have the same dominance in most of these.

I was going to make this point. While having a huge market share, Apple doesn't dominate in the EU, so generic terms are more common. Here in the UK people just have "Smartphones" and "tablets" (tho I do hear people calling generic tablets "iPad" sometimes).

I wonder if in the UK the BBC's anti-branding guidelines make a difference; they will almost never refer to a phone as an iPhone unless it's specifically relevant.

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

#572

Post by jimjimjim »

da_chicken wrote: post #385
jaxn wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I tend to agree with the original comment, particularly for products that are still evolving. We have a competitor who copies our features, but they don't know why we built the feature. The result is they end up copying the wrong stuff or tweaking the feature in a way that completely misses the point. But, I agree with you in that creating a feature isn't an advantage in and of itself. Rather, it is the domain expert…

Apple is the perfect counter example here. Apple wasn't the first company to make an MP3 player, but the generic term is basically 'iPod'. Apple wasn't the first company to make a smartphones or touchscreens, but the generic term for a touchscreen smartphone is basically 'iPhone'. Apple wasn't the first company to make a tablet, but the generic term is basically 'iPad'. Apple didn't invent high resolution displays fo…

in your opinion though.

i've never heard anyone use iphone as a generic term. phone, mobile, cell, cellphone. these are the only terms i've heard.

and while i'm add it, mp3 player is what i've heard EVEN it is in reference to an ipod.

ipad? nah, generally i've heard tablet.

and finally, i've heard no one say retina, i have heard HD, HiDPI or 4k (even if it's not).

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

#573

Post by Scarblac »

intertextuality wrote: post #565
atq2119 wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how git works. The main point of putting something on GitHub is to allow people to git clone it. Every git clone is a fork of the project. If you don't want something forked, don't put it on GitHub.

I understand how git works. I'm discussing the edge case scenario where someone uploads something but doesn't add a license. In that case, forking and cloning should be disabled, at the least.

Does your computer's shell disable `cp -r` for directories that don't contain a license?

The point of uploading to a public Github repo is to let others clone it. Pure tech tools like that shouldn't implement features that require searching a repo for a file that could be a license and then determining whether the file gives others the right to do that clone. After all, letting others clone is the entire point of the tool. If it's not allowed, don't use the tool.

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

#574

Post by bigiain »

chipotle_coyote wrote: post #428
da_chicken wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple is the perfect counter example here. Apple wasn't the first company to make an MP3 player, but the generic term is basically 'iPod'. Apple wasn't the first company to make a smartphones or touchscreens, but the generic term for a touchscreen smartphone is basically 'iPhone'. Apple wasn't the first company to make a tablet, but the generic term is basically 'iPad'. Apple didn't invent high resolution displays fo…

I'm a long-time Apple user fully baked into the Apple ecosystem and have friends and acquaintances in the same position, and I'm not sure I agree with most of those. Maybe "Retina display," only because Apple arguably was the first company to give that a specific branding term. I don't even think iPod was ever a generic for "MP3 player"; it was far and away the most popular MP3 player, and I'm sure the dozens of peop…

> I don't even think iPod was ever a generic for "MP3 player"

It was generic enough to form part of the word "podcast", which has stuck around.

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

#576

Post by chii »

hota_mazi wrote: post #517
Gpetrium wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The reality is that if an idea is really good, the people who came up with it know it better than anyone and that gives them a tremendous advantage in terms of knowing what is important and what isn't. I have to disagree with you emphasizing this point. If someone/entity manages to get your idea or code, they may be able to sell the solution at a fraction of the cost since their R&D was lower than yours. When the en…

And this is exactly why software patents are not as evil as most people think. They are being abused, but if you can close that loophole (prevent non practicing entities from enforcing patents), then software patents are critical to protect innovation.

Only if the software patent is really an innovation, not just restating something already known in a different way.

Patents need fixing from both ends - the enforcement end for non-practicing entities, as well as the assignment end, where patents are examined under harsher conditions.

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

#577

Post by chii »

Sabinus wrote: post #527
shard972 wrote: post #515

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't hold my breath on law being disrupted, they are quite happy the way they are thank you very much.

You don't need the permission of encumbants to disrupt their industry. You just take their customers.

Cept as lawyers, they are in an exceptional position to sue you, as this is their battle ground, unlike taxi drivers or renters.

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

#578

Post by r3bl »

intertextuality wrote: post #565
atq2119 wrote: post #559

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how git works. The main point of putting something on GitHub is to allow people to git clone it. Every git clone is a fork of the project. If you don't want something forked, don't put it on GitHub.

I understand how git works. I'm discussing the edge case scenario where someone uploads something but doesn't add a license. In that case, forking and cloning should be disabled, at the least.

There's nothing stopping you from entering anything in the LICENSE file, including an open source license, a copyright notice, or something completely unrelated to the license of the project.

With that in mind, to enforce your argument, they would need to create a list of licenses that are okay to fork/clone. Why should they create a finite list of that?

I'm willingly using WTFPL[0] that can be summarized as "as long as you change the name, do whatever the fuck you want to". I know it's not a serious license (I only use it for non-important collaborative Markdown documents I've started), but thanks to its use of the word "fuck", I'm having hard time believing that it would find its way into any whitelist. FSF mentions it on their website, but GitHub doesn't list it as an option on choosealicense.com.

[0] http://www.wtfpl.net/

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

#579

Post by intertextuality »

soulofmischief wrote: post #569
arbie wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IIUC, you are suggesting that GitHub make new repos private by default, unless a permissive license is set. This seems a reasonable balance.

It's antithetical to their business strategy. They charge for premium accounts to give access to private repos. Nothing wrong with that, but OP should probably try out Gitlab if he wants an enterprise-level solution for free.

I'm not OP, I'm GP. Second, I fully understand git, github, gitlab, etc.

I'm specifically discussing a situation wherein someone has uploaded non-licensed code to github. I am not advocating for this. I am discussing what should be the default behavior for a repo if unlicensed. Another alternative is not having the repo be usable at all (so not private) if one attempts to bring it public without a license.

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

#580

Post by bob33212 »

dragos9191 wrote: post #575

Serious question here: how does this compare to what Google did in the Oracle vs Google java api copyright case?

Google was openly copying an API for compatibility. Similar to how a toaster company may make their toaster support bread exactly the same size as a competitor does. The toaster company would advertise the compatibility, not hide it.

In this case this company is being accused or taking the API design as well as the supporting documentation. Not for compatibility reasons but to represent the design as their own.

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