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Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

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Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#191

Post by alexasmyths »

londons_explore wrote: post #122

As a former insider, I can tell you likely pre-story which might cast a different light on this: * Google employee comes up with an idea. * They go and research the idea to check if there are any already existing companies which do it. * If any are found, they meet and decide if they should buy the company, reinvent the idea, or that it isn't relevant. * If, after investigation it is determined the company's tech isn…

'Clean room' development doesn't necessarily absolve them of IP issues, and of 'nasty tactics' that may not be illegal but which would be hypocritical of a company trying to promote a specific image.

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#192

Post by alexasmyths »

amcooper wrote: post #153
Normal_gaussian wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently turned down a job offer citing an overly broad IP clause. I had a call within minutes offering me a choice of how else it could be worded. I still turned it down and decided to go freelance instead because the contracts I had read had raised all kinds of personal questions.

I received a one-month contract—teaching, not developing—from a subsidiary of a large education company. I had to consult a lawyer and fight with them for a week over the contract's overly broad IP claims. They basically wanted ownership of teaching ideas I—or my partner (!)—came up with in perpetuity! I eventually got them to change it to my satisfaction, and had a great teaching experience with a cool group of stud…

Any ideas you disclose to your company while your an employee could surely belong to you, that's reasonably standard.

As for 'your partner' - that seems pretty crazy, and I don't understand how that would hold up for a second in court.

As for 'perpetuity' - meaning - ideas you had long after employment? Or - that they'd own the ideas you give them while employed, forever. If the later, well, again I think that's somewhere near standard. If the former, that's beyond crazy and I think not even enforceable.

But the 'partner' bit alone seems beyond creepy because their lawyers are not stupid, they must know it's a pretty wobbly thing not likely to stand up in court, ergo it's kind of a scare tactic.

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#193

Post by alexasmyths »

bitL wrote: post #164

Hmm, all these news just tell me the winning strategy is no longer being generous like it was in 00s, where free/open source/access exploded, rather selfishly secretively keep all information to your advantage to yourself. Not sure I'd like to live in such a society. Can't wait to have enforced-by-automation toxic daily life.

This is the way it has always been.

The Valley is a paradox of open/fsf types and mega corps which can simultaneously be very good and very evil.

Google's ownership of the web could enable them to do a zillion evil things if they wanted to, which they don't.

Google could easily control the outcomes of elections.

They could easily sell companies the ability to change how their company is perceived, rankings etc.

Granted some of that may actually be illegal, but I think if G were a regular corp they'd have tried to do some really bad things.

That said, I do think they do some bad things.

So it's a paradoxy kind of thing.

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#195

Post by Top19 »

paul7986 wrote: post #70
Top19 wrote: post #46

Wow this story is shocking. I want to point out it’s quite believable if you look at this situation historically. Microsoft was known for doing this exact same thing. Their tactic was to wine and dine startups, give them the “big megacorp company treatment”, ask them to divulge just a little of how they were doing what they were doing. Then they would go back to Seattle, put out an identical product 6 weeks later, an…

Google did something similar to me as I have detailed in this thread below.... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15422475 It's very relevant to this story and I think it's important for it to be told to warn other inventors how Google treats the little guy/girl!

Hey have read your story Paul and sorry about that. FWIW even Oracle tried to sue them, and Oracle has never been known for not going 100% ruthless or going cheap on their lawyers / law talent, and even they failed. The only one who can stop them now is the government. Democrats are already lining up against them, and in the congressional district I live in, even the very conservative Lamar Smith recently sent them an angry letter regarding various accusations. They are being hemmed in by both sides, and if politics gets better the cooperation of both parties will lead to their massacre, and if it gets worse, they’ll be the scapegoat likely and equally massacred. I hope that provides some solace. The breakup of Google and Facebook will also unleash a flood of talented engineers for places they are more needed than shitty advertising companies, maybe you can partner with one of them when the dam breaks.

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#196

Post by greglindahl »

corford wrote: post #128
greglindahl wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of your NDAs have you gotten huge silicon valley companies to sign? If you're a little guy, that never happens.

I know we're all speculating here but what is there to lose? Option 1: Sign my NDA or fuck off. Option 2: Show them everything and then they tell you to fuck off and steal your idea. At least with Option 1 you have some protection. Different equation if you need money/investment. But if you're already up, running and growing it's easier to play hard ball and demand an NDA.

I'm not speculating about my experiences working for a couple of startups in Silicon Valley... I signed a bunch of NDAs. I have no idea what happened to the author of this article.

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#197

Post by RaleyField »

tyingq wrote: post #185
godzillabrennus wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They did... Although I’m sure Zuck would have turned them down regardless.

Sure. Still seems an odd arbitrary criteria. Wikipedia seems to do fine with php, as do several other large sites. Would they pass up booking.com solely because it's Perl? The value there hasn't much to do with the plumbing.

Most PCs are doing fine with Windows.

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#198

Post by bitmapbrother »

paul7986 wrote: post #23

I had a similar experience with Google; a mutual NDA was signed as seen here https://goo.gl/K9Wd1U . - Feb 2013 created SpeakerBlast; turn multiple devices into one sync speaker via a URL - March 2013 Samsung released the Galaxy 4 with Group Play (same concept as SpeakerBlast) - April 2013 Google/Motorola emails/calls me asking would I sell SpeakerBlast for inclusion into the Moto X - May 2013 Fly out from Baltimore…

Why don't you reverse engineer the Chromecast technology and build a case for yourself that's backed by evidence instead of continually regurgitating the same story over and over again?

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#199

Post by NiveaGeForce »

RaleyField wrote: post #197
tyingq wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. Still seems an odd arbitrary criteria. Wikipedia seems to do fine with php, as do several other large sites. Would they pass up booking.com solely because it's Perl? The value there hasn't much to do with the plumbing.

Most PCs are doing fine with Windows.

Because Windows isn't bad

https://np.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/74xc2z/windows_an...

Re: Google accused of racketeering in lawsuit

#200

Post by rurban »

eternalban wrote: post #183
rurban wrote: post #43

I call this bullshit. > "Project Genie to educate Google about his proprietary ideas and techniques so they could develop a working proof of concept of his Engineered Architecture technology" Parametric design and integration into AEC is industry standard since the 80-ies, and a long-time goal of virtually all design software manufacturers. Everybody had a take on this moonshot, and eventually it will get there. It s…

They were not "recursive", as I recall. Care to share a few patterns?

Here is a newer book about such patterns: http://buildz.blogspot.de/2010/12/parametric-design-patterns...

Recursive pattern expansion is the most powerful. Think of Lindenmayer L-Systems to generate plants or fractal image compression. Graphical pattern matching would be a breakthrough way to simplify usage if such a tool. This was studied in the late 80ies.

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