7 ms·

A couple of benefits in no particular order: It casts doubt/worry/issues on the legal legitimacy of Uber's tech. Employees/Researchers won't want to become emb

A couple of benefits in no particular order: It casts doubt/worry/issues on the legal legitimacy of Uber's tech. Employees/Researchers won't want to become embroiled in this, if they ever want to license the tech I'm sure "what about google?" will come up and need to be mitigated. It gets Alphabet and the newly founded Waymo a lot of "free" publicity, helping to form their public image as a car company. (Wronged by the evil uber) Maybe a little vindictive, but I'm sure their lawyers would rather his compensation burn than be used against them.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
linkregister 9y ago
> It casts doubt/worry/issues on the legal legitimacy of Uber's tech. Employees/Researchers won't want to become embroiled in this, if they ever want to license the tech I'm sure "what about google?" will come up and need to be mitigated. Why would an employee ever fear another entity personally suing them? Was there a mass exodus from Google or Samsung after Apple's successful infringement suit in 2012? Why would an employee performing genuinely novel work worry about her work being discredited? I would expect a culpable employee to divest before his organization got caught. Some members of the Enron C-suite sold their stock before the debt hiding scandal broke. Maybe this is happening in Uber's Otto division; has anyone seen anything like this?
- ajdlinux 9y ago
  You wouldn't want to be the employee or manager who made an IP decision that landed your company on the wrong end of an Alphabet lawsuit.
valuearb 9y ago
If Levandowski downloaded 14,000 documents I'm sure Google believes he stole from them and is using those docs at Uber, whether it's true or not. He might be using those docs from his personal laptop to help build Uber's product, or he might just been doing a build at home for Google in his last days there. I don't trust that Googles lawyers descriptions (or Ubers lawyers descriptions), so it will take until the full evidence is out before we can know for sure.
- kbenson 9y ago
  > or he might just been doing a build at home for Google in his last days there. If you look at the details of that allegation, that's not really a feasible assumption (depending on how much stock you put in the details presented). According to Google, he installed custom software to access the files, and the files where in a data store he had no normal access to. From the filing[1]: In December 2015, Mr. Levandowski specifically searched for and then installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop in order to access the server that stores these particular files. Once Mr. Levandowski accessed this server, he downloaded the 14,000 files, representing approximately 9.7 GB of highly confidential data. Then he attached an external drive to the laptop for a period of eight hours. He installed a new operating system that would have the effect of reformatting his laptop, attempting to erase any forensic fingerprints that would show what he did with Waymo’s valuable LiDAR designs once they had been downloaded to his computer. After Mr. Levandowski wiped this laptop, he only used it for a few minutes, and then inexplicably never used it again. 1: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...
  - jacquesm 9y ago
    I wonder if Google can pull that kind of detail up on just their employees or if they're capable of doing this for anybody they care enough about.
    - linkregister 9y ago
      In the expert witness testimony, they just pulled it from the laptop's hard drive. I'm guessing just some run-of-the-mill file carving software. Google Drive logs file downloads, so that's how they got those records. Plenty of enterprises have certificate-based access to their employee network, none of this seems particularly creepy on Google's part. Testimony: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-of-Gary-Brown-PUBLIC.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-...
  - linkregister 9y ago
    That file is a document filed by Waymo. We should expect that the Waymo attorneys present their case in a manner that makes it appear that Uber and Levandowski are liable with 100% certainty. The expert witness report is much less cut and dry: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-of-Gary-Brown-PUBLIC.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-... I don't think the expert witness report necessarily demonstrates Levandowski intended to steal the Google/Waymo project files. The Goobuntu distro was installed, which necessitates a reformat from NTFS to ext4 or whatever filesystem it uses. It sure as hell looks like Levandowski meant to steal the files, especially with his copious 5th Amendment testimony refusals, but it's possible he didn't.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

linkregister 9y ago

> It casts doubt/worry/issues on the legal legitimacy of Uber's tech. Employees/Researchers won't want to become embroiled in this, if they ever want to license the tech I'm sure "what about google?" will come up and need to be mitigated. Why would an employee ever fear another entity personally suing them? Was there a mass exodus from Google or Samsung after Apple's successful infringement suit in 2012? Why would an employee performing genuinely novel work worry about her work being discredited? I would expect a culpable employee to divest before his organization got caught. Some members of the Enron C-suite sold their stock before the debt hiding scandal broke. Maybe this is happening in Uber's Otto division; has anyone seen anything like this?

ajdlinux 9y ago
You wouldn't want to be the employee or manager who made an IP decision that landed your company on the wrong end of an Alphabet lawsuit.

valuearb 9y ago

If Levandowski downloaded 14,000 documents I'm sure Google believes he stole from them and is using those docs at Uber, whether it's true or not. He might be using those docs from his personal laptop to help build Uber's product, or he might just been doing a build at home for Google in his last days there. I don't trust that Googles lawyers descriptions (or Ubers lawyers descriptions), so it will take until the full evidence is out before we can know for sure.

kbenson 9y ago
> or he might just been doing a build at home for Google in his last days there. If you look at the details of that allegation, that's not really a feasible assumption (depending on how much stock you put in the details presented). According to Google, he installed custom software to access the files, and the files where in a data store he had no normal access to. From the filing[1]: In December 2015, Mr. Levandowski specifically searched for and then installed specialized software onto his company-issued laptop in order to access the server that stores these particular files. Once Mr. Levandowski accessed this server, he downloaded the 14,000 files, representing approximately 9.7 GB of highly confidential data. Then he attached an external drive to the laptop for a period of eight hours. He installed a new operating system that would have the effect of reformatting his laptop, attempting to erase any forensic fingerprints that would show what he did with Waymo’s valuable LiDAR designs once they had been downloaded to his computer. After Mr. Levandowski wiped this laptop, he only used it for a few minutes, and then inexplicably never used it again. 1: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k/view https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7dzPLynxaXuQjY3dkllZ2ZKb0k...
- jacquesm 9y ago
  I wonder if Google can pull that kind of detail up on just their employees or if they're capable of doing this for anybody they care enough about.
  - linkregister 9y ago
    In the expert witness testimony, they just pulled it from the laptop's hard drive. I'm guessing just some run-of-the-mill file carving software. Google Drive logs file downloads, so that's how they got those records. Plenty of enterprises have certificate-based access to their employee network, none of this seems particularly creepy on Google's part. Testimony: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-of-Gary-Brown-PUBLIC.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-...
- linkregister 9y ago
  That file is a document filed by Waymo. We should expect that the Waymo attorneys present their case in a manner that makes it appear that Uber and Levandowski are liable with 100% certainty. The expert witness report is much less cut and dry: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-of-Gary-Brown-PUBLIC.html https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3515476-Declaration-... I don't think the expert witness report necessarily demonstrates Levandowski intended to steal the Google/Waymo project files. The Goobuntu distro was installed, which necessitates a reformat from NTFS to ext4 or whatever filesystem it uses. It sure as hell looks like Levandowski meant to steal the files, especially with his copious 5th Amendment testimony refusals, but it's possible he didn't.