Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

blogs.marketwatch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

21–30 of 142 posts

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#21

Post by horridrats »

downandout wrote: post #8
Permit wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that clear? I haven't followed the case, but it seems as though he copied important intellectual property (HFT code) when he left the firm. I'm sure if a developer at Apple or Microsoft downloaded the Windows or OS X kernel code when they left that they would face charges of some kind as well.

I read the original (very detailed) article. According to it, everything he copied was non-proprietary. Almost all of it was open source stuff.

Not according to Goldman Sachs: "While some of those files included open source software, the Court determined that 'a substantially greater number of the uploaded files contained proprietary code.'"

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#22

Post by mehwoot »

pvnick wrote: post #12
vinkelhake wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things always appear clear to conspiracy theorists. Do you have facts to back this up? People join and leave jobs in the financial industry every day. Is Goldman Sachs special in this regard?

Ok can we please stop with the "conspiracy theorist" label/ad hominem attacks? After the NSA revelations have shown things to be a lot worse than even the more paranoid conspiracy theorists thought, folks with an eye for corruption have earned a little wiggle room to be taken seriously.

After the NSA revelations have shown things to be a lot worse than even the more paranoid conspiracy theorists thought

Really? Even the more paranoid conspiracy theorists didn't think that the Government could read the address and subject of your emails? The same people that think the Government did 9/11 and faked the moon landing?

Don't even get me started on chemtrails...

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#23

Post by Amadou »

melling wrote: post #17
downandout wrote: post #5

It's very clear that Goldman is trying to punish him for leaving, while sending a message to their other programmers that if they leave, their lives will be ruined. Even if this guy ultimately wins the state trial, he will never get back the years he has spent fighting it. Goldman has already won, and in this case that is appalling.

No, it's very clear what he did was wrong. He works in an industry that does not allow you to email code home or copy it off of company computers. Goldman might be a little different, but where I've worked, this was definitely a no, no, and you could easily be fired for doing it.

Fired is one thing, but malicious prosecution is completely out of proportion to a rules violation.

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#24

Post by VladRussian2 »

jaryd wrote: post #3

For those that are interested in the backstory: http://www.vanityfair.com/business/2013/09/michael-lewis-gol...

> during which time he sent himself, through a so-called “subversion repository,”

i just can imagine how every FBI agent jumps when reading that there is a whole repository of subversion (or subversions?) out there.

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#25

Post by jamesaguilar »

pvnick wrote: post #12
vinkelhake wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things always appear clear to conspiracy theorists. Do you have facts to back this up? People join and leave jobs in the financial industry every day. Is Goldman Sachs special in this regard?

Ok can we please stop with the "conspiracy theorist" label/ad hominem attacks? After the NSA revelations have shown things to be a lot worse than even the more paranoid conspiracy theorists thought, folks with an eye for corruption have earned a little wiggle room to be taken seriously.

No, we can't really. Being right once doesn't mean you get to throw around wild accusations without proof and avoid being called on it.

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#27

Post by HelloMcFly »

bsimpson wrote: post #11
Permit wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that clear? I haven't followed the case, but it seems as though he copied important intellectual property (HFT code) when he left the firm. I'm sure if a developer at Apple or Microsoft downloaded the Windows or OS X kernel code when they left that they would face charges of some kind as well.

There was a really well-written feature on the case. As I recall, he used and modified open source code in his system. He tried to push his changes upstream, but ran into political pressure from inside of Goldman, so he tried to make a personal copy of the libraries he modified. You can certainly make the case that Goldman paid for that code, and if they didn't want it pushed upstream that's their prerogative, but it…

The article you reference is linked to within the posted article.

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#28

Post by Amadou »

horridrats wrote: post #21
downandout wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read the original (very detailed) article. According to it, everything he copied was non-proprietary. Almost all of it was open source stuff.

Not according to Goldman Sachs: "While some of those files included open source software, the Court determined that 'a substantially greater number of the uploaded files contained proprietary code.'"

Sounds like two different definitions of the word "proprietary" are involved here:

(1) Mechanical changes specific to the company -- this could be as simple as hardcoded hostnames that match the deployment environment.

(2) Implementations of algorithms. In this case it isn't the code that is proprietary so much as the algorithm that the code is an expression of.

I suspect that downandout is talking about defintion #1 and the court is talking about definition #2. Hard to say without seeing the code itself.

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#29

Post by dllthomas »

anonymoushn wrote: post #18
dllthomas wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"while license explicitly said if you modify it for commercial product you must make your contributions public" I hadn't heard this part of it - what was the license in question?

I'm also curious about this. Not even AGPL would have such a requirement.

Not unless they were using it to offer some service electronically - which is conceivable, but doesn't seem hugely likely.

Re: Russian programmer fights Goldman Sachs and wins one round

#30

Post by poof131 »

Question: does anyone know if software patents were declared null and void, would this case still exist? It seems he only took snippets of code and not the entire system for profit. How would this case differ if software was copyrightable but not patentable (i.e. Either you stole the manuscript or you didn't)?
Post reply on HN