Starting to feel like I might get a legal letter from my secondary school for not crediting them for what they've taught me.
Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
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Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#282Apple 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.
They literally do have hard evidence. They have records of an employee (Chang Liu) who left for OpenAI copying dozens and dozens of files off of their server after he left.
Not to mention text messages to existing Apple employees saying he could still access Apple servers after being term'ed and bragging about it "lol"!
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#283How can I say this…? Some companies come across like a neon sign flashing "EVIL!". It's been nothing but warning signs from this company for at least a year now. I'm so happy to have nothing to do with them (having deleted my account a year or so ago). Their marketing dept is going to have to really dig to get them out of this hole they've made for themselves. The idea that I would trust any device they might roll ou…
apple tracks every binary you execute and run on macos and sends the hash of it to their systems. Do you consider that to be respecting your privacy?
It depends on how it is done.
No, seriously.
I worked at Apple on Schoolwork for the last few years of my career and saw firsthand how Apple handles data it gathers. As an example, every device was given a unique identifier that in no way identified the user of the device (I mean it was simply a UUID). Additionally, it was tossed and a new one recreated every 11 months.
Because I am inclined to give Apple the benefit of the doubt (your mileage may vary), I am assuming the binary hash they send is intended to protect users from malicious binaries (once their hash is identified of course). And if Apple in this case also rotates the UUID every 11 months, I don't have to worry about them targeting me and my habits specifically (well, not beyond 11 months windows in any event).
Additionally, when at Apple, we had privacy teams walk through things like error logs that our app and framework wrote—making sure there was no PID (personally identifiable information) in the logs. A naive engineer might, in a URL-fetch timeout, for example, log something like, "Timeout for URL request: 'myblog.blogsite.com'". Privacy would ask, "Is it important we log the full URL? Might we instead just log the domain?"
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#284Earlier quoted context omitted.
This seems like an important post. It looks like these letters are occasionally used to as a tactic, and i can see how such a tactic can really scare employees in a country where legal bills can climb really fast.
> in a country where legal bills can climb really fast Honest question: Are there countries where this is not the case? I'd be interested to read more about how that manage that. If it's some sort of "protecting the little guy"-type thing or a general suppression of legal costs. Or maybe I'm reading too much into your comment.
Regulated legal insurance market coupled with „looser pays all the costs“ system.
The insurance doesn’t mind fighting for you because they will get paid by the company making the frivolous suit. You don’t pay much, 10$/month.
Although in this particular case, you wouldn’t even need that, since either you took the documents and that is criminal fraud prosecuted by the state or you didn’t take the documents and then the company would be in hella trouble if they perjured themselves to the public prosecutor claiming you did.
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#285Earlier quoted context omitted.
being an exec at apple for decades you probably pick up on a few things, even if they're beyond your department
> being an exec at apple for decades you probably pick up on a few things, even if they're beyond your department It's also possible to lose touch (e.g., butterfly keyboards).
How is that losing touch?
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#286Earlier quoted context omitted.
The difference is Apple intentionally chose unrepairable design, despite much smaller companies offer repairable earplugs (See: PineBuds Pro).
Approximately no one ever breaks their AirPods, so the amount of waste eliminated through better repairability would almost certainly be non-existent.
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Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#287Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don’t think Cupertino will settle for stock. I think they’ll demand cash and an agreement that OpenAI abandon or reboot their hardware project. In the meantime, Apple gets an open kimono into everything OpenAI has planned. This could actually be the fuckup that kills OpenAI as an independent company. The threat of a cash judgement gums up not only an IPO, but also debt-based fundraising. (We equity guys are idiots,…
> reboot their hardware project This could go way beyond any potential hardware project, depending on whats actually true from the allegations and how much of Apple's trade secrets have been used or shared within OpenAI. There were rumors a while back of OpenAI building some integrations into macOS akin to the Shortcuts app, and who knows what other computer use type projects. They could very well have been using inf…
If OpenAI used any of Apple's secrets broadly, Apple could ask the court for an injunction to block the deployment of any software from OpenAI. If discovery proves the IP contamination spread into other areas within OpenAI, it could completely freeze all of their deployments.
I find this so funny. Can you share an example or two of where something like this has ever happened to one of the largest companies in the world? There is no universe where some judge orders that OpenAI can no longer deploy any software, for anyone (including huge swaths of the federal government) because of the alleged actions of a few people, and it’s allowed to stand. Zero chance.
I’ll say one thing for Sama: he might have a lot of haters, but it’s not that hard to prove them wrong with predictions like these.
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#288Earlier 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 because lawyer is a protected profession with regulated rates.
Unless your friend happens to actually be a legally licensed lawyer.
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#289Earlier quoted context omitted.
What do you mean "this far"? How far is this? Corps lose law suits all the time. They always have to go whatever "this far" is before it happens, surely?
The accusations are incredibly clear/defined (and serious!) and have a very simple burden of proof. These things either happened or they didn’t, and they have material evidence or they don’t. It’s incredibly unlikely that they filed such big, concrete accusations without concrete proof to back them up. And while I am far from an Apple fan boy, yes a lot of big corporations file frivolous lawsuits but Apple typically…
Apple doesn't engage in that behavior against other companies? Apple doesn't abuse the legal system for business gain?
Apple Computer, Inc. v. Microsoft Corp. and Hewlett-Packard Co. (1988–1994) -- Apple lost its ass on this one, entirely frivolous. Every single major claim failed.
Apple Inc. v. HTC Corp. (2010–2012) -- Apple patents wiped out over frivolity
Apple Inc. v. Motorola Mobility, Inc. (2010–2014) -- Mutually destructive patent fight, Apple's loss
Apple Inc. v. Samsung Electronics Co. (2011–2018) -- Pretty suspect. Lawyers still undecided
Apple Inc. v. Qualcomm Inc. (2017–2019) -- Apple settled, needed QC modems more than a win
Apple Inc. v. Epic Games, Inc. (2020–present) -- Apple was ordered to stop anti-steering rules, won little
Look, Apple sued Samsung over the corner radius on piece of hardware. It's currently suing a YouTuber for publishing renders of pre-release iOS.
And that's just the tip of the iceberg for Apple suits, many pretty unconvincing. Here are a few more.
Apple Computer, Inc. v. Franklin Computer Corp. (1982–1983) Apple Computer, Inc. v. Apple Corps Ltd. (1978–2007) Apple Inc. v. Psystar Corporation (2008–2011) Apple Inc. v. Corellium, LLC (2019–2023) Apple Inc. v. NSO Group Technologies Ltd. (2021–present) Apple Inc. v. Rivos Inc. (2022–2025) Apple Inc. v. Andrew Aude (2024–2025)
So don't tell us Apple doesn't abuse the legal system for business gain. It's obvious to anyone with eyes that it regularly does so.
Re: Apple targets dozens of OpenAI employees with legal letters
#290Earlier quoted context omitted.
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 B…
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Shallow dismissals like "straight up false" that contradict multiple reputable news outlets aren't "debunking".
Calling well-know human right activist NGOs "handful of nerds" is straight up misinformation.