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Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

nytimes.com

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Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#21

Post by ChuckMcM »

dekhn wrote: post #6
jerf wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"According to the complaint, Mr. Levandowski, who worked on self-driving cars at Google, downloaded more than 14,000 files containing critical information about Google’s autonomous-vehicle research before leaving the company in 2016. He then made an unauthorized transfer of the files to his personal laptop, the complaint said." If the allegations are true (always important to bear in mind from a one-sided view of the…

levandowski never liked when rules got in the way of progress. his attitude was "whatever it takes to birth self-driving cars".

Sadly not an unusual attitude. I've known (and occasionally worked for) people who felt that rules were for chumps. Their reasoning was always a variation on;

"winning is good",

"chumps slow themselves down by following rules",

"in your evaluation at the end of the year the bonuses go to 'winners' not losers."

It is a rather narcissistic perhaps even sociopathic view of the world in my opinion, but it does exist.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#23

Post by svd4anything »

tempsy wrote: post #18

Interesting this is only against Anthony and not Uber this time. The stakes seem much smaller here. I would be surprised if he actually goes to prison for this. And max fine of $8 million or so is small for him

There have been a number of cases in the financial industry with trade secret theft and the perpetrator has been sent to prison. Why if he is convicted (likely imho) wouldn’t he also?

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#24

Post by asdfasgasdgasdg »

tempsy wrote: post #18

Interesting this is only against Anthony and not Uber this time. The stakes seem much smaller here. I would be surprised if he actually goes to prison for this. And max fine of $8 million or so is small for him

The maximum penalty is 250k per count or twice the gross gain/loss, whichever is greater. So the financial penalty could be quite significant.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#25

Post by throwaway_law »

dekhn wrote: post #6
jerf wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"According to the complaint, Mr. Levandowski, who worked on self-driving cars at Google, downloaded more than 14,000 files containing critical information about Google’s autonomous-vehicle research before leaving the company in 2016. He then made an unauthorized transfer of the files to his personal laptop, the complaint said." If the allegations are true (always important to bear in mind from a one-sided view of the…

levandowski never liked when rules got in the way of progress. his attitude was "whatever it takes to birth self-driving cars".

>never liked when rules got in the way of progress.

Yes, that seems to be the Silicon Valley Culture.

"Move fast and break things"

"Its better to apologize and seek forgiveness, than ask for permission"

"Though the most successful founders are usually good people, they tend to have a piratical gleam in their eye. They're not Goody Two-Shoes type good. Morally, they care about getting the big questions right, but not about observing proprieties. That's why I'd use the word naughty rather than evil. They delight in breaking rules, but not rules that matter."

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#26

Post by bduerst »

ummonk wrote: post #13

It doesn't change the criminality of his actions, but something I haven't ever seen any info about: were the designs he downloaded and took with him for LIDAR systems that he had played the primary role in developing while at Google or were the designs largely the work of other Googke employees?

Definitely the latter. Hundreds of employees worked on the LIDAR designs that Levandowski downloaded and took to Otto and Uber.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#27

Post by dmix »

AndrewBissell wrote: post #17
uuilly wrote: post #14

I used to work for Anthony at 510 systems. He tried to hire me for Otto as well. Watching this whole thing unfold from, obscure story in 2011 to the Waymo Vs. Uber trial to federal charges and national news is rather surreal. Anthony is one of the most creative, energetic thinkers I've ever encountered. If he stopped taking shortcuts he'd probably be the next Jobs or Musk.

Musk will be the next Levandowski.

People have such an impetus for Musk's downfall but a few off colour or poorly thought out tweets is nothing compared to something as criminal as downloading everything from your company before starting a competitor. Or worse while you work on the competitor on the side even before leaving the company.

Anthony should have known that files are easily tracked in a place like Google and that he'd put a giant spotlight on himself by competing with Google's future golden goose.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#28

Post by rhacker »

ummonk wrote: post #13

It doesn't change the criminality of his actions, but something I haven't ever seen any info about: were the designs he downloaded and took with him for LIDAR systems that he had played the primary role in developing while at Google or were the designs largely the work of other Googke employees?

That line of thinking may technically help him substantially. The actual document theft isn't something he can walk away from, but the amount of harm it caused can definitely be argued in court. It is public knowledge he worked on lidar systems prior to working at Google so the scope of the processes and ideas that went into the stolen documents may simply be refinements from his Darpa days. Those refinements could ultimately be argued to be worth a LOT, but it does help his case- IMHO.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#29

Post by Loughla »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #21
dekhn wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

levandowski never liked when rules got in the way of progress. his attitude was "whatever it takes to birth self-driving cars".

Sadly not an unusual attitude. I've known (and occasionally worked for) people who felt that rules were for chumps. Their reasoning was always a variation on; "winning is good", "chumps slow themselves down by following rules", "in your evaluation at the end of the year the bonuses go to 'winners' not losers." It is a rather narcissistic perhaps even sociopathic view of the world in my opinion, but it does exist.

Isn't that attitude what 'disruption' culture is all about?

Find a business that takes forever because of regulation, then ignore the regulation, and profit? Uber, that's an example of this. AirBnB in a lot of instances, too, I think.

Re: Anthony Levandowski Charged with Theft of Trade Secrets

#30

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

throwaway_law wrote: post #25
dekhn wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

levandowski never liked when rules got in the way of progress. his attitude was "whatever it takes to birth self-driving cars".

>never liked when rules got in the way of progress. Yes, that seems to be the Silicon Valley Culture. "Move fast and break things" "Its better to apologize and seek forgiveness, than ask for permission" "Though the most successful founders are usually good people, they tend to have a piratical gleam in their eye. They're not Goody Two-Shoes type good. Morally, they care about getting the big questions right, but not…

“move fast and hurt people”
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