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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

#231

Post by thewebguyd »

glaslong wrote: post #187
ricardobayes wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AI model providers have zero "moat", clients change them as they see fit. This week ChatGPT, next week Claude. The real value is and going to be in hardware - as long as China doesn't enter the GPU/RAM race. I increasingly see AI investment, generally speaking, as a lost cause. It has very little chance to pay off.

Yup. Model capabilities seem to keep converging quickly, not leaders breaking away for long. Frontier labs are racing towards SaaS commoditization at incredible speed. And while there might possibly be $Trillions in productivity gained from their use, there's no reason to think those gains get captured by the model makers or inference providers at this point. Maybe the Claude or ChatGPT desktop apps will dominate as…

> there's no reason to think those gains get captured by the model makers or inference providers at this point

Yeah it almost certainly won't be captured by them. That value is going to be captured by the folks/companies that shrink wrap the capabilities into a nice SaaS or other tool, that a business can buy off the shelf and give to their employees.

The model makers are on a fast track to just becoming dumb pipes, not unlike ISPs.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#232

Post by tedggh »

ricardobayes wrote: post #162
Zigurd wrote: post #100

Everybody wants a platform but nobody wants to spend what it takes to make a platform. That includes things like Windows Phone, Fire Phone, all the glasses, Humane, etc. As much as everybody hates on OpenAI for chaotic management, they did buy Jony Ive and are presumably giving him everything he wants to build a platform for them. Even though it probably only buys them a 20% chance of success, they haven't doomed the…

AI model providers have zero "moat", clients change them as they see fit. This week ChatGPT, next week Claude. The real value is and going to be in hardware - as long as China doesn't enter the GPU/RAM race. I increasingly see AI investment, generally speaking, as a lost cause. It has very little chance to pay off.

Not to mention with each iteration of every model you get lower cost per token. It’s really a race to the bottom for hyperscalers and neoclouds at this point, with technically only two paying customers.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#233

Post by estearum »

dylan604 wrote: post #221
estearum wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't there like a hundred of them? And yeah, sure, it'll obviously be a collector's item. Provides no evidence to this discussion.

A hundred? That's a big run for Ferrari isn't it?

Yeah but thankfully it can be manufactured in a Hasbro factory, if need be

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#234

Post by samatman »

im3w1l wrote: post #213
shimman wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the US is actually unique in this position. It even has it's own name the "American Rule." In every other country, the loser pays the winner's legal fees.

Doesn't that mean that if you have a slam dunk case you can get a super expensive lawyer just to run up costs as much as possible? Hell, could you ask your friend to be your legal representative and have him charge you a gorillion dollar in legal fees? Then when you win you split the loot?

It does, and it absolutely has a chilling effect in countries which don't do things this way.

Sue someone who can spend millions of pounds (for the sake of argument) on defence? Better be certain you can win... against someone who can spend millions of pounds, and probably went to the same public school as the judge.

In America, legal fees can be awarded as additional damages. We should do it more than we do. But given those two options? I'm on Team American Rule, 100%

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#236

Post by tiahura »

deepwoods wrote: post #8

FT frames this as some aggressive escalation tactic, but document retention letters are extremely standard practice. At this point they're basically a formality, as any former Apple employee at OpenAI really ought to know by now that they could get dragged into this. Hold letters can be aggressive if you send them before you've even filed a complaint, but if anything, Apple is late to the party with these.

I routinely send them in whiplash and slip fall cases re surveillance video, phone records, etc.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#237

Post by digitalPhonix »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #115
staticman2 wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber was not forced to leave the self driving car market by Waymo's litigation. The litigation ended in February 2018 and Uber left the market in December 2020.

I think it’s fair to argue that Uber’s self-driving efforts never recovered after that trial.

Pretty sure it was the crash (same story with Cruise for that matter)

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#238

Post by tiahura »

im3w1l wrote: post #213
shimman wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the US is actually unique in this position. It even has it's own name the "American Rule." In every other country, the loser pays the winner's legal fees.

Doesn't that mean that if you have a slam dunk case you can get a super expensive lawyer just to run up costs as much as possible? Hell, could you ask your friend to be your legal representative and have him charge you a gorillion dollar in legal fees? Then when you win you split the loot?

No. The fees must be objectively reasonable and usual and customary for the effort and level of skill required. To get fees, you must submit an itemized billing statement that gets picked apart by the other side.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#239

Post by groby_b »

tedggh wrote: post #229
Zigurd wrote: post #100

Everybody wants a platform but nobody wants to spend what it takes to make a platform. That includes things like Windows Phone, Fire Phone, all the glasses, Humane, etc. As much as everybody hates on OpenAI for chaotic management, they did buy Jony Ive and are presumably giving him everything he wants to build a platform for them. Even though it probably only buys them a 20% chance of success, they haven't doomed the…

“ Or maybe it was a loose ethical environment in general” Altman doesn’t appear to be a beacon of corporate ethics. There has to be a reason why almost every single important partnership OpenAI had, abruptly ended, except for maybe Nvidia. Just recently Satya Nadella publicly implied that OpenAI should not be trusted. They are slowly becoming the STD of the AI industry, it’s like they think they are too big and aweso…

"Altman doesn’t appear to be a beacon of corporate ethics."

Do those exist? I'm usually happy to see a mild candle flicker in the ethics window.

Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters

#240

Post by runako »

nojito wrote: post #21
bix6 wrote: post #12

Predictions on who wins? Does Apple actually have a winnable case or are they just throwing a wrench in things?

Both parties will just settle. Apple already caught former employees accessing the Apple internal network with unreturned laptops after termination that’s pretty much game over.

People are forgetting that the kind of conduct alleged is also likely illegal.

In the not-so-distant past, Uber's head of self-driving was indicted and sentenced to jail time for similar conduct. The criminal case didn't start until ~2.5 years after the civil case was filed.

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