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Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

ft.com

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Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#41

Post by [deleted] »

testfrequency wrote: post #34
reenorap wrote: post #10

Apple must have hard evidence on this. I can’t believe they would take it this far without already knowing they are going to win. If they have to fire a huge chunk of their hardware employees it’s going to throw their IPO plans into chaos.

You’re underestimating how much Apple Legal goes after anyone and everyone they feel a slight wrong sniff about. I know some insane stories that will never be publicly disclosed for one reason or another, and…it’s not a legal team I’d ever want to cross paths with. It’s also not the first time Apple has cried wolf at employees leaving the company to do bigger and better things, while trying to take responsibility for…

[deleted]

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#42

Post by camillomiller »

yomismoaqui wrote: post #18
JKCalhoun wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ha ha. Worked at Apple for over two decades—would not have stayed at a company I thought was evil for that long. A bully at times? I wouldn't argue with that.

A quick search: APP STORE, COMPETITION, AND MARKET CONTROL - U.S. Department of Justice antitrust lawsuit Accuses Apple of monopolizing smartphone markets and anticompetitive behavior. https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-sues-apple-monopolizing-smartphone-markets - EU Commission DMA breach The European Commission found Apple in breach of the Digital Markets Act regarding steering rules. https://digital-…

A list of very normal capitalistic practices. Borderline, sometimes ruthless, sometimes opportunistic. Evil is enabling genocide in Myanmar, which Meta provenly did. Evil is voluntarily steal millions of artworks for your own benefit, which OpenAI has provenly done. Etc…

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#43

Post by EPWN3D »

nba456_ wrote: post #32
JKCalhoun wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Especially since Apple has no history of doing this—suggests this is on another level of theft. (I worked at Apple and am aware of little "theft" incidents that came and went. Obviously those little incidents never made the news cycle.)

How could you have worked at Apple during the entire Samsung lawsuit and say Apple has no history of suing competitors over IP theft?

Because Apple didn't sue Samsung over IP theft. They sued them over copyright infringement.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#44

Post by seviu »

reenorap wrote: post #10

Apple must have hard evidence on this. I can’t believe they would take it this far without already knowing they are going to win. If they have to fire a huge chunk of their hardware employees it’s going to throw their IPO plans into chaos.

This is John Ternus having a beef with Tang Tan. It’s widely known they both competed for the role of CEO. Tim Cook would never have started this.

It shows a level of pettiness and arrogance which I never expected to see from Apple.

I can’t put myself in the mind of John, but he clearly hated Tang.

From outside and with a parent’s perspective this looks like my kids throwing a tantrum.

John must be thinking he is the new Steve Jobs (Steve would definitely do this)

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#45

Post by jamespo »

pembrook wrote: post #35
presbyterian wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't just them being scared of a competitor because they're able to outperform Apple, according to Apple they have proof of an active plan not just to poach talent, but to get that talent to syphon out information as they leave, as well as former employees keeping Apple hardware and using it to access confidential information. If what Apple claims is true, this is straightforwardly illegal. Could Apple be lying…

It totally could be illegal, and I don’t care. Those laws exist to entrench dominant incumbents, and make our economy less dynamic. The history of Silicon Valley and most of its innovation come from this kind of thing, and we eliminated non-competes in California for exactly this reason. Apple having a serious competitor in hardware would be a good thing for consumers all over the world. Apple’s overzealous secrecy c…

So we should "make our economy more dynamic" by encouraging IP theft which will simultaneously discourage genuine research & development?

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#46

Post by MattDamonSpace »

seviu wrote: post #44
reenorap wrote: post #10

Apple must have hard evidence on this. I can’t believe they would take it this far without already knowing they are going to win. If they have to fire a huge chunk of their hardware employees it’s going to throw their IPO plans into chaos.

This is John Ternus having a beef with Tang Tan. It’s widely known they both competed for the role of CEO. Tim Cook would never have started this. It shows a level of pettiness and arrogance which I never expected to see from Apple. I can’t put myself in the mind of John, but he clearly hated Tang. From outside and with a parent’s perspective this looks like my kids throwing a tantrum. John must be thinking he is the…

Agreed Steve would do this

But the iPhone is the most valuable consumer hardware product on the planet, and the accusations here is “conspiracy to steal” essentially.

Is it really that petty? Apple should be okay with theft of valuable secrets?

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#47

Post by moduspol »

teeray wrote: post #31
reenorap wrote: post #10

Apple must have hard evidence on this. I can’t believe they would take it this far without already knowing they are going to win. If they have to fire a huge chunk of their hardware employees it’s going to throw their IPO plans into chaos.

Makes you wonder if they’ll settle for bargain-basement token prices for Apple Intelligence.

This stuff happened years ago, right? Something tells me that discussion has already happened, and they went with Google.

Besides: Apple is a "real" company that will definitely still be around in five years. They've already fumbled Siri multiple times. IMO Google was certainly the right choice for actually executing well on Apple's own terms for the foreseeable future.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#48

Post by jonlucc »

seviu wrote: post #44
reenorap wrote: post #10

Apple must have hard evidence on this. I can’t believe they would take it this far without already knowing they are going to win. If they have to fire a huge chunk of their hardware employees it’s going to throw their IPO plans into chaos.

This is John Ternus having a beef with Tang Tan. It’s widely known they both competed for the role of CEO. Tim Cook would never have started this. It shows a level of pettiness and arrogance which I never expected to see from Apple. I can’t put myself in the mind of John, but he clearly hated Tang. From outside and with a parent’s perspective this looks like my kids throwing a tantrum. John must be thinking he is the…

It's interesting that you say they must have hated each other, but assume only Ternus is acting on that. What makes you think Tan's hatred of Ternus or animosity toward Apple for picking Ternus over him didn't lead Tan to do the alleged behavior?

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#49

Post by khalic »

plufz wrote: post #13
khalic wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

… so… you’re talking about OpenAI or Apple?

From what we know this far it’s quite easy to be on Apples side in this particular question, right?

Yes it was more of a jest than a critique, the comment didn't explicitly say which one it was. In this case, it seems quite clear that Apple has a case.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#50

Post by illliillll »

fsflover wrote: post #39
illliillll wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of this seems like it could reasonably be described as evil.

How about these? Apple knew a supplier was using child labor but took 3 years to fully cut ties (yahoo.com) 52 points by notRobot on Jan 1, 2021 | un‑favorite | 5 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25607386 Apple's Cooperation with Authoritarian Governments (jessesquires.com) 468 points by ig0r0 on March 31, 2021 | un‑favorite | 291 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26644216 Apple removes nearl…

Let’s try:

> Apple knew a supplier was using child labor but took 3 years to fully cut ties (yahoo.com)

Apple routinely terminates relationships with suppliers when they identify abusive practices, sometimes they’re slow about it.

> Apple's Cooperation with Authoritarian Governments (jessesquires.com)

> Apple removes nearly 100 VPNs used by Russians to bypass censorship (elpais.com)

Apple obeys local laws

> Apple's Browser Engine Ban Persists, Even Under the DMA (open-web-advocacy.org)

Apple chooses to maintain control over a specific implementation detail of their platform that a handful of nerds object to.

> Apple defined ICE as a "protected class" in blocking anti-ICE apps (boingboing.net)

The claim made in this headline is just straight up false.

I don’t know, I don’t think their less-than-ideal behaviour is anywhere bad enough to reasonably be described as “evil”. Otherwise, we’re probably all evil.

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