Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads • Hacker News Board

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#51

Post by bagels » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:35 PM UTC

paxys wrote: post #45

bagels wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They definitely have existing products, knowledge and competency for building a twitter clone that could be adapted for this purpose (instagram/facebook posts & comment systems). Whether they did or not is maybe the question?

Knowledge is not automatically a trade secret. Skills from one job can be freely applied to another. The onus is on Twitter to prove that the employees took something specific (copyrighted code, a patented algorithm implementation, some other asset or IP) which is the property of Twitter and used it to build Threads. The last high profile lawsuit of this nature was Google vs Uber for stolen self driving tech, which h…

Sorry if I was not clear, I'm saying that without hiring any Twitter folks, the Instagram folks could easily create a Twitter clone. Instagram posts & comments could be adapted pretty easily.

The question is whether the Twitter employees actually brought and used trade secrets for this effort.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#52

Post by ncallaway » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:36 PM UTC

donmcronald wrote: post #43

paxys wrote: post #21

An entirely predictable turn of events. Next up: - The lawsuit is never actually filed. Turns out just like Delaware (and unlike the SEC), California courts aren't going to bend to Musk's will. - Twitter continues to bleed users and advertisers. Musk continues to double and triple down on his failed policies. - Musk declares that this was his intention all along with the purchase, and killing Twitter was a "5D chess…

> The lawsuit is never actually filed. If it were, who pays for the court costs? Is that something the taxpayers have to pay for in the US?

It depends what you mean by “court costs”. There are fees to file the case, but for the most part the judges time is paid for by taxpayers.

The vast majority of the expense in a court case will be the lawyers on both sides. These are, by default, paid by each party. There are some specific cases where the loser has to pay the winning side’s lawyers, but it’s pretty rare.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#53

Post by doublerabbit » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:37 PM UTC

And here we are today because of MySpace. Good ole' Tom.

MySpace concreted Web 2.0. Facebook came a year later.

MySpace sold, Facebook continues. Twitter and here we are today.

Nothing has changed in the grand scheme of things, well apart from your privacy and your data being sold as a commodity.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#54

Post by paxys » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:46 PM UTC

bagels wrote: post #51

paxys wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Knowledge is not automatically a trade secret. Skills from one job can be freely applied to another. The onus is on Twitter to prove that the employees took something specific (copyrighted code, a patented algorithm implementation, some other asset or IP) which is the property of Twitter and used it to build Threads. The last high profile lawsuit of this nature was Google vs Uber for stolen self driving tech, which h…

Sorry if I was not clear, I'm saying that without hiring any Twitter folks, the Instagram folks could easily create a Twitter clone. Instagram posts & comments could be adapted pretty easily. The question is whether the Twitter employees actually brought and used trade secrets for this effort.

The thing is these employees could have come in and directly used all the "knowledge and competency" they learned at Twitter to build Threads and it would still be 100% legal. There is a very high bar to proving whether any of it is actually a trade secret.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#55

Post by warunsl » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:47 PM UTC

paxys wrote: post #34

edavis wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the arrival of Threads is definitely an existential threat for Twitter I had a similar thought when I joined Threads last night and within 30 seconds saw the accounts of Adam Schefter, Adrian Wojnarowski, and Shams Charania all actively posting. If you follow NFL and NBA news you'll know these names but for anybody that doesn't, these insider accounts are firmly at the center of the NFL and NBA breaking news univer…

And the reason they are all immediately on Threads is that they saw the existential threat to their careers when Twitter went private and restricted their accounts to viewing 600/6000 Tweets last week. It's clear that with the daily random rule changes and service interruptions Twitter isn't the reliable platform that they need, and Instagram has a great track record of it.

I think these big accounts were given access to Threads much before the rate limiting debacle. And that was great tactic by Threads IMO. Having a lot of "Verified" accounts engagement on the app on day 1 when rest of the world joined gave it instant credibility.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#56

Post by meepmorp » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:54 PM UTC

3cats-in-a-coat wrote: post #11

minimaxir wrote: post #8

Between this and Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino's weird tweet about how great Twitter is ( https://twitter.com/lindayacc/status/1676965566597464065 ), the arrival of Threads is definitely an existential threat for Twitter.

I don't know Linda Yaccarino well, but so far all her statements, internal and public, read like cringe parody of corporate mediocrity.

They're corporate anodynes meant for a specific audience.

Her job is to be corporate and professional - she's there to get advertisers back onboard with Twitter. She's the grownup there to soothe their worries about the instability in the platform. Or she was, until Musk decided to randomly change the basic value proposition behind the site with no warning, undoing anything she'd already accomplished and making it plain that anything she promises can't be trusted because she's completely powerless figurehead.

For her sake, I hope she got her first year's salary up front.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#57

Post by danans » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 8:54 PM UTC

paxys wrote: post #27

tw04 wrote: post #14

>Spiro accused Meta of hiring dozens of former Twitter employees who “had and continue to have access to Twitter’s trade secrets and other highly confidential information.” So you fire 80% of your workforce claiming they're dead weight and completely unnecessary, while simultaneously suing their new employer because apparently they were vital cogs who somehow "continue to have access to trade secrets"? So vital you'r…

The firing is irrelevant. Noncompetes are unenforceable. It would be the exact same outcome if all of them voluntarily decided to leave Twitter and join Meta the same day. You have to prove to a court that these employees had access to some proprietary Twitter IP which they took to Meta and used to build Threads, which is not happening.

I think they are pointing out the chutzpah more than the lack of legal basis.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#58

Post by throw47474777j » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 9:01 PM UTC

The only thing this proves is that Elon thinks Twitter is threatened by Threads.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#59

Post by mrtksn » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 9:02 PM UTC

rumblerock wrote: post #26

tw04 wrote: post #14

>Spiro accused Meta of hiring dozens of former Twitter employees who “had and continue to have access to Twitter’s trade secrets and other highly confidential information.” So you fire 80% of your workforce claiming they're dead weight and completely unnecessary, while simultaneously suing their new employer because apparently they were vital cogs who somehow "continue to have access to trade secrets"? So vital you'r…

My question is – what trade secrets does Twitter even have that Meta didn't already have the existing infrastructure for, or competency to build themselves (probably better)?

My guess would be stuff like upcoming products, business connections, contract details, way of doing business etc.

However I doubt that Musk has any grounds for claiming that "the most useless employees" who weren't even treated with dignity upon firing them would have transferred those to Meta illegally.

IMHO this is just Musk freaking out that the next time Twitter doesn't work as expected or asks for money, people would have real alternative to move on.

Reddit needs something similar.

Re: Twitter is threatening to sue Meta over Threads

#60

Post by ksaj » Thu, Jul 06, 2023, 9:09 PM UTC

Threads is built on Instagram's code base, which is why you can't currently delete your account on one without deleting on both. So it'll be a tough fight for Elon to prove the code is stolen, since such a big chunk of it was already there for years.