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Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

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Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#181

Post by roenxi »

Super_Jambo wrote: post #177
dodobirdlord wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But moreover, it's totally unreasonable that anyone would have gone to jail as a result of this, except again, maybe the driver. The driver was literally being paid to monitor the vehicle. How is an argument that high profile executive types were engaging in criminal negligence going to fly, when the bar for legal driving is already that 1 person is in the car nominally paying attention?

Because the driver was given an impossible task in order to save money for the company. They were required to both fill in information on a tablet and monitor the car. It's not even clear that monitoring a semi-self driving car is even possible. Constant vigilance for the 2% of edge cases where it might crash is harder than just driving. Uber had previously used two people to do this task but had switched to one pers…

There are a bunch of incentives for them to get this right. Moreover there might be a reasonable argument that they are having a net positive impact even if their car was slightly less safe than most drivers - they are going to save people probably single digit % points of their life staring at a road.

If you think their car isn't safe; don't buy one and don't be driven in one. It isn't reasonable to say they can't have the occasional accident though.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#182

Post by martin_a »

dijksterhuis wrote: post #170
martin_a wrote: post #167

Outline link for anyone who is not willing to fight with techcrunchs cookie monster. https://outline.com/Lpu8GE

Failing to load for me on iOS...? Can’t stand the TechCrunch Cookie Monster.

Hm, sorry, works on my Desktop with Firefox.

Ah, take the text, it's not that long:

---

Anthony Levandowski, the engineer and autonomous vehicle startup founder who was at the center of a trade secrets lawsuit between Uber and Waymo, has been ordered to pay $179 million to end a contract dispute over his departure from Google.

Reuters was the first to report the court order.

An arbitration panel ruled in December that Levandowski and Lior Ron had engaged in unfair competition and breached their contract with Google when they left the company to start a rival autonomous vehicle company focused on trucking, called Otto. Uber acquired Otto in 2017. A San Francisco County court confirmed Wednesday the panel’s decision.

Ron settled last month with Google for $9.7 million. However, Levandowski, had disputed the ruling. The San Francisco County Superior Court denied his petition today, granting Google’s petition to hold Levandowski to the arbitration agreement under which he was liable.

Levandowski himself may not have to pay the money personally, as this sort of liability may fall to his employer depending on his contract or other legal quirks. However, Levandowski personally filed today for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, stating that the presumptive $179M debt quite exceeds his assets, which he estimates at somewhere between $50M and $100M.

A representative for Levandowski declined comment for this story.

Devin Coldewey contributed to this story.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#183

Post by [deleted] »

humanlion87 wrote: post #93
tomerico wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder how he doesn't have more assets after he sold his company to Uber for $680 millions

Or maybe he off-shored the rest of his money? This < $100mil are the assets that are under his name and the rest are in tax havens/under different shell companies? Not sure whether that is possible. But it seems like rich people always have multiple ways of hiding their money.

[deleted]

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#184

Post by joejerryronnie »

cft wrote: post #144
chongli wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And even in this case. Does Anthony Levandowski deserve to become homeless and destitute for what he did? No. This is going to hurt him far, far more than what he did could ever have hurt Google. Yeah, maybe Google would have lost more than this on paper, but definitely not in terms of marginal utility. Google remains an extremely wealthy and powerful company and now Anthony is broke.

Google's purpose was to set a ruthless precedent. It's a powerful reminder that once at Google, you're an employee and not an entrepreneur.

It’s kind of Google’s fault for continually buying companies he started while working there.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#185

Post by tyingq »

dodobirdlord wrote: post #145
cyphar wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That covers the civil side of things, but GPs point about criminal charges still applies. Yeah, they might have signed an NDA but I don't think those can restrict what can be uncovered during discovery (but I could be wrong -- IANAL).

Sure, but I'm sure some prosecutor took a look at it and decided it wasn't worthwhile. People get killed in accidents all the time, and frequently nobody gets charged with anything. A person being killed in a car accident while jaywalking at night because the driver wasn't paying attention particularly well is a story as old as cars, and usually doesn't result in jail time. Turns out, people are legally allowed to dr…

"some prosecutor took a look at it and decided it wasn't worthwhile"

Probably a prosecutor that works for some local government that could be also be liable for letting Uber operate that car in their jurisdiction. I imagine that discussion happened.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#186

Post by jasonvorhe »

anrmq7 wrote: post #82
xrd wrote: post #19

It's been amusing to hear his story. Starting a church/religion was my favorite part. I bet Google and a bunch of other companies are excited about the message this sends to other arrogant engineers who might be considering leaving and building new companies with ideas developed at their prior places of employment. That precedent is worth billions if not trillions.

This is harmful to innovation in the Bay Area. Big Tech eats up all the talent and now sends the signal that they can’t leave. The trial hasn’t even begun for this case - I think they’re still debating what constitutes a trade secret. This seems personal. Google got angry that one of their “own” went to a competitor. I bet this will make companies think twice about acquiring startups founded by Google employees.

Just don't copy privileged/proprietary data/code and you'll be fine.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#187

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

dang wrote: post #114
mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #16

Google has to get the Andy Rubin money back somehow.

Low-effort, low-information flamebait is not ok to post to HN, so please don't. It leads to flamewars, which are lame, tedious, and not what we want. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

This was not intended as flame bait, rather just to be overtly shaming towards Google, whose behavior had been unquestionably appalling.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#188

Post by agustif »

roenxi wrote: post #181
Super_Jambo wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the driver was given an impossible task in order to save money for the company. They were required to both fill in information on a tablet and monitor the car. It's not even clear that monitoring a semi-self driving car is even possible. Constant vigilance for the 2% of edge cases where it might crash is harder than just driving. Uber had previously used two people to do this task but had switched to one pers…

There are a bunch of incentives for them to get this right. Moreover there might be a reasonable argument that they are having a net positive impact even if their car was slightly less safe than most drivers - they are going to save people probably single digit % points of their life staring at a road. If you think their car isn't safe; don't buy one and don't be driven in one. It isn't reasonable to say they can't h…

The person who got hit probably didn't buy one or was driven by one. just hitted.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#189

Post by rwmj »

dodobirdlord wrote: post #145
cyphar wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That covers the civil side of things, but GPs point about criminal charges still applies. Yeah, they might have signed an NDA but I don't think those can restrict what can be uncovered during discovery (but I could be wrong -- IANAL).

Sure, but I'm sure some prosecutor took a look at it and decided it wasn't worthwhile. People get killed in accidents all the time, and frequently nobody gets charged with anything. A person being killed in a car accident while jaywalking at night because the driver wasn't paying attention particularly well is a story as old as cars, and usually doesn't result in jail time. Turns out, people are legally allowed to dr…

> Turns out, people are legally allowed to drive while being really shitty drivers

The UK actually has a law against this, see "Causing Death by Careless or Inconsiderate Driving (Section 2B of the Road Traffic Act 1988, amended by the Road Safety Act 2006, s. 20)" here: http://www.brake.org.uk/news/15-facts-a-resources/facts/497-...

It means you can be prosecuted for causing a death in a moment of inattention. It's a bad law from both sides: As you can see from the link above it doesn't satisfy the charity (who want stronger penalties), while at the same time being a catch-all law which could catch anyone out who drives, even if they are generally very cautious drivers.

By the way I should add there was already a separate law for causing death by dangerous driving.

One more reason why we need self-driving cars I suppose.

Re: Anthony Levandowski ordered to pay $179M to Google

#190

Post by xnyan »

roenxi wrote: post #181
Super_Jambo wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the driver was given an impossible task in order to save money for the company. They were required to both fill in information on a tablet and monitor the car. It's not even clear that monitoring a semi-self driving car is even possible. Constant vigilance for the 2% of edge cases where it might crash is harder than just driving. Uber had previously used two people to do this task but had switched to one pers…

There are a bunch of incentives for them to get this right. Moreover there might be a reasonable argument that they are having a net positive impact even if their car was slightly less safe than most drivers - they are going to save people probably single digit % points of their life staring at a road. If you think their car isn't safe; don't buy one and don't be driven in one. It isn't reasonable to say they can't h…

Thanks, I'll let Uber know I don't consent as my insides deform from impact of the hood striking my torso.
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