4 ms·

Keivan obviously got screwed. Having worked at Microsoft, and seeing the nature of the bureaucracy, the only advice I would give for next time is... Just real

by ijidak 6y ago

Keivan obviously got screwed. Having worked at Microsoft, and seeing the nature of the bureaucracy, the only advice I would give for next time is... Just realize you can't set terms with a large company like MSFT unless you get lawyers involved early. Stealing from you outright is simply too tempting, given their resources. I noticed there were some conditions Keivan tried to set regarding the future evolution of the technology before joining MSFT. In a large company like MSFT, there were bound to be large internal email threads relaying a play-by-play of negotiations with Keivan to: inside legal counsel, developers who already gave t-shirt sizes for building the tech in-house, product managers, and dozens of others. No matter what they tell you, they're internally weighing - Should we just rip him off? - Should we hire him? Would that be better or worse for liability? - How IP protected is this? How much can we "borrow"? - Is it worth the hassle of dealing with an aqui-hire we can't control? Would that expose us to even more IP risk, or less? Once companies reach this size, they simply can't be trusted to handle a negotiation transparently and in good faith, unless you have well paid lawyers fighting for you, or well established IP protection. I guess what I'm saying is... When dealing with any large tech company with near infinite resources -- like MSFT, GOOG, etc --, find a legally defensible upper hand, and assume they are weighing the cost-benefit of screwing you. (Sadly, this is exactly why lawyers make so much money.)

akdor1154 6y ago
I am interested (and kind of depressed) to think - is there actually a legally defensible upper hand that exists here?
- chx 6y ago
  If WinGet contains AppGet code and they didn't credit him then yes, absolutely, moral rights in copyright (attribution, right of association, integrity) cannot be transferred during the lifetime of the owner and yes MSFT can be sued for breaching them. It is extremely likely the penalties meted out by a judge wouldn't cover the costs of a lawyer. Not that anything like this would ever see a courtroom, MS will offer a settlement which in this case will be on the magnitude they gave to Mike Rowe for MikeRoweSoft.com (which was an xbox and some travel vouchers and such). If they stole his unpatented ideas then there's nothing.
  - 908B64B197 6y ago
    In this case the author claims he could have obtained a patent and that code was copied. Both of these claims are pretty easy to dismiss by simply looking at the respective repositories. They share nothing.
    - efreak 6y ago
      > In this case the author claims he could have obtained a patent and that code was copied. No. From the source: > the core mechanics, terminology, the manifest format and structure, even the package repository’s folder structure, are very inspired by AppGet. In the update it's slightly more vague, but there's no claim of coffee being copied there either: > Code being copied isn't an issue. I knew full well what it meant to release something opensource and I don't regret it one bit. And continues to be more explicit about his complaint: > What was copied with no credit is the foundation of the project. Lastly, looking at the repo really doesn't tell you if you could get a patent on it.
      - 908B64B197 6y ago
        In the update and the responses/interviews the author gave he clearly states that Microsoft copied his source, an absurd claim considering both repos are public. He goes to say that "If I were the patenting type, this would be the thing you would patent. ps. I don't regret not patenting anything." I mean come on. Every package has a .yaml manifest where there's a download link for every architecture, a hash, a version and an installation recipe. There's nothing to patent here. It would be extremely hard to argue there's no prior art, considering most languages and distributions have been shipping with package managers built just like these for years. Even my text editor has one! Realistically, the author managed to get a lot of attention for his other startup for almost no cost. By bashing the company that's trendy to bash right now.
tener 6y ago
This is interesting perspective. Do you think this have the potential to negatively affect responsible parties on MSFT side given the negative PR generated?
ximeng 6y ago
Hopefully they also weigh in the fact that screwing developers over is terrible publicity. Assume 100k developers see this and are slightly less inclined to trust MS in future, this bad publicity could easily cost them 1mn USD plus. A good will gesture of 100k USD at the start for consulting could have saved everyone a lot of trouble. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23332123 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23332123 elsewhere in this thread for an example of the consequences. The cost of GitHub to MS was around 250 usd per user. If 4000 users leave that’s already a million USD.
- tarsinge 6y ago
  I find MS seems quite immune to terrible publicity in the recent years. "But it's not the same company as before! They are doing open-source now!" yada yada
  - ximeng 6y ago
    Well 1mn usd of PR damage is not a big problem when you have 100bn usd plus annual revenue. But for an individual employee it’s a bad reputation hit.
  - fastball 6y ago
    I mean, isn't that because they haven't been screwing people over (that we know of) recently? If more stories like this one come out I'm sure the goodwill turns fast.
  - robertlagrant 6y ago
    Lots of open source services springing up...that only run on CosmosDB.
  - pgt 6y ago
    They are not immune. As someone who has been supportive of Microsoft getting their act together, and who recently spoke at a Microsoft-sponsored conference, this stuff makes me hesitant to give any Microsoft-owned properties money and discourages me from trying new Microsoft products.

by ijidak 6y ago

akdor1154 6y ago

I am interested (and kind of depressed) to think - is there actually a legally defensible upper hand that exists here?

chx 6y ago
If WinGet contains AppGet code and they didn't credit him then yes, absolutely, moral rights in copyright (attribution, right of association, integrity) cannot be transferred during the lifetime of the owner and yes MSFT can be sued for breaching them. It is extremely likely the penalties meted out by a judge wouldn't cover the costs of a lawyer. Not that anything like this would ever see a courtroom, MS will offer a settlement which in this case will be on the magnitude they gave to Mike Rowe for MikeRoweSoft.com (which was an xbox and some travel vouchers and such). If they stole his unpatented ideas then there's nothing.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  In this case the author claims he could have obtained a patent and that code was copied. Both of these claims are pretty easy to dismiss by simply looking at the respective repositories. They share nothing.
  - efreak 6y ago
    > In this case the author claims he could have obtained a patent and that code was copied. No. From the source: > the core mechanics, terminology, the manifest format and structure, even the package repository’s folder structure, are very inspired by AppGet. In the update it's slightly more vague, but there's no claim of coffee being copied there either: > Code being copied isn't an issue. I knew full well what it meant to release something opensource and I don't regret it one bit. And continues to be more explicit about his complaint: > What was copied with no credit is the foundation of the project. Lastly, looking at the repo really doesn't tell you if you could get a patent on it.
    - 908B64B197 6y ago
      In the update and the responses/interviews the author gave he clearly states that Microsoft copied his source, an absurd claim considering both repos are public. He goes to say that "If I were the patenting type, this would be the thing you would patent. ps. I don't regret not patenting anything." I mean come on. Every package has a .yaml manifest where there's a download link for every architecture, a hash, a version and an installation recipe. There's nothing to patent here. It would be extremely hard to argue there's no prior art, considering most languages and distributions have been shipping with package managers built just like these for years. Even my text editor has one! Realistically, the author managed to get a lot of attention for his other startup for almost no cost. By bashing the company that's trendy to bash right now.

tener 6y ago

This is interesting perspective. Do you think this have the potential to negatively affect responsible parties on MSFT side given the negative PR generated?

ximeng 6y ago

Hopefully they also weigh in the fact that screwing developers over is terrible publicity. Assume 100k developers see this and are slightly less inclined to trust MS in future, this bad publicity could easily cost them 1mn USD plus. A good will gesture of 100k USD at the start for consulting could have saved everyone a lot of trouble. See https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23332123 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23332123 elsewhere in this thread for an example of the consequences. The cost of GitHub to MS was around 250 usd per user. If 4000 users leave that’s already a million USD.

tarsinge 6y ago
I find MS seems quite immune to terrible publicity in the recent years. "But it's not the same company as before! They are doing open-source now!" yada yada
- ximeng 6y ago
  Well 1mn usd of PR damage is not a big problem when you have 100bn usd plus annual revenue. But for an individual employee it’s a bad reputation hit.
- fastball 6y ago
  I mean, isn't that because they haven't been screwing people over (that we know of) recently? If more stories like this one come out I'm sure the goodwill turns fast.
- robertlagrant 6y ago
  Lots of open source services springing up...that only run on CosmosDB.
- pgt 6y ago
  They are not immune. As someone who has been supportive of Microsoft getting their act together, and who recently spoke at a Microsoft-sponsored conference, this stuff makes me hesitant to give any Microsoft-owned properties money and discourages me from trying new Microsoft products.