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reads to me like "our lawn is for everyone as we want to see the technology succeed, but those who try to crap on it will be asked to leave." what's wrong with

by a-dub 3y ago

reads to me like "our lawn is for everyone as we want to see the technology succeed, but those who try to crap on it will be asked to leave." what's wrong with that?

Veserv 3y ago
Because it states, "patent or other intellectual property right" for Tesla, but only "patent right" for everybody else. If you are really "opening" your patents or intellectual property then you would just have a symmetric agreement like patents for both, or intellectual property for both. You would not have a ridiculously asymmetric agreement that legalizes your usage of industrial espionage or counterfeiting. For that matter, the pledge is transitive, but only uniquely privileges Tesla intellectual property rights: "(i) any patent or other intellectual property right against Tesla" "(ii) any patent right against a third party for its use of technologies relating to electric vehicles or related equipment" See how they clearly highlight different rights. The second term is a symmetric patent pledge, everybody equally agrees to not sue each other or others over patents. But the first term says Tesla is more equal than others and you can not sue them for anything even if they steal your trade secrets or literally make counterfeits of your products.
- a-dub 3y ago
  you are correct that it is not symmetric, but i suspect they wanted to avoid weird situations where they find themselves publicly obligated to pull patents as a result of non-trivial non-patent ip disputes between third parties.
  - Veserv 3y ago
    That does not even make sense. That might be why they would not transitively require non-enforcement of all intellectual property. It does not support uniquely granting themselves massive additional rights to commit intellectual property infringement against all other signatories. Your logic would only be sound if Tesla agreed to symmetrically not enforce any of its intellectual property rights if others would not enforce them against Tesla, while still only requiring transitive non-enforcement of patent rights. That would trivially carve out third party disputes on non-patent IP while still holding Tesla to a higher standard (and others against Tesla only). Instead, the pledge as written grants Tesla a level of privilege that is hard to overstate with respect to intellectual property. This is not some sort of oopsie oversight. Tesla has tons of highly paid lawyers that can work out clear terms and Elon Musk personally proposed the idea and signed off on that wording while actively marketing Tesla as taking some sort of moral high ground. The specific wording of that pledge is a inexcusable, scummy, deliberate betrayal of the spirit of a patent pledge. They deserve negative morality points for their intentional deception and misuse of terminology meant to imply a moral stance they deliberately betray.
    - a-dub 3y ago
      they want to protect their brand, but they don't want to get into the business of protecting those that belong to others, from others. they are not going to engage in malfeasance, they have spent too much building the brand that they seek to protect. i'm not a huge elon fan, but this seems pretty obvious to me.
      - Veserv 3y ago
        What you are describing are the standard protections of trademarks (brand protection). You get those if you do not waive your trademarks which is the default. The Tesla patent pledge requires everybody to explicitly grant Tesla, and only Tesla, the right to violate their trademarks (and all other IP) freely without repercussion. Tesla is not “protecting” themselves with that clause, they are giving themselves a unlimited malfeasance license. This is a “oh by the way, I am allowed to unilaterally steal all your stuff” clause. There is zero justifiable reason for such wording. They can just not give themselves that additional power. If they had even the slightest intention of a fair pledge they would have only needed to have clause (ii). They deliberately chose not to. Their patent pledge is a disgrace.
        a-dub 3y ago
        "good faith" has meaning in the california business code and it would not stand up in court if they attempted to abuse semantics in the absurd way you describe. their text is abundantly clear: you can use the ideas in their patents if you are using them in good faith and are not law trolling.
        tovej 3y ago
        The "you can use Teslas ideas" part of the contract is not what's being discussed. What parent is talking about is the rights you must give up in order to gain this right.

by a-dub 3y ago

reads to me like "our lawn is for everyone as we want to see the technology succeed, but those who try to crap on it will be asked to leave." what's wrong with that?

Veserv 3y ago

Because it states, "patent or other intellectual property right" for Tesla, but only "patent right" for everybody else. If you are really "opening" your patents or intellectual property then you would just have a symmetric agreement like patents for both, or intellectual property for both. You would not have a ridiculously asymmetric agreement that legalizes your usage of industrial espionage or counterfeiting. For that matter, the pledge is transitive, but only uniquely privileges Tesla intellectual property rights: "(i) any patent or other intellectual property right against Tesla" "(ii) any patent right against a third party for its use of technologies relating to electric vehicles or related equipment" See how they clearly highlight different rights. The second term is a symmetric patent pledge, everybody equally agrees to not sue each other or others over patents. But the first term says Tesla is more equal than others and you can not sue them for anything even if they steal your trade secrets or literally make counterfeits of your products.

a-dub 3y ago
you are correct that it is not symmetric, but i suspect they wanted to avoid weird situations where they find themselves publicly obligated to pull patents as a result of non-trivial non-patent ip disputes between third parties.
- Veserv 3y ago
  That does not even make sense. That might be why they would not transitively require non-enforcement of all intellectual property. It does not support uniquely granting themselves massive additional rights to commit intellectual property infringement against all other signatories. Your logic would only be sound if Tesla agreed to symmetrically not enforce any of its intellectual property rights if others would not enforce them against Tesla, while still only requiring transitive non-enforcement of patent rights. That would trivially carve out third party disputes on non-patent IP while still holding Tesla to a higher standard (and others against Tesla only). Instead, the pledge as written grants Tesla a level of privilege that is hard to overstate with respect to intellectual property. This is not some sort of oopsie oversight. Tesla has tons of highly paid lawyers that can work out clear terms and Elon Musk personally proposed the idea and signed off on that wording while actively marketing Tesla as taking some sort of moral high ground. The specific wording of that pledge is a inexcusable, scummy, deliberate betrayal of the spirit of a patent pledge. They deserve negative morality points for their intentional deception and misuse of terminology meant to imply a moral stance they deliberately betray.
  - a-dub 3y ago
    they want to protect their brand, but they don't want to get into the business of protecting those that belong to others, from others. they are not going to engage in malfeasance, they have spent too much building the brand that they seek to protect. i'm not a huge elon fan, but this seems pretty obvious to me.
    - Veserv 3y ago
      What you are describing are the standard protections of trademarks (brand protection). You get those if you do not waive your trademarks which is the default. The Tesla patent pledge requires everybody to explicitly grant Tesla, and only Tesla, the right to violate their trademarks (and all other IP) freely without repercussion. Tesla is not “protecting” themselves with that clause, they are giving themselves a unlimited malfeasance license. This is a “oh by the way, I am allowed to unilaterally steal all your stuff” clause. There is zero justifiable reason for such wording. They can just not give themselves that additional power. If they had even the slightest intention of a fair pledge they would have only needed to have clause (ii). They deliberately chose not to. Their patent pledge is a disgrace.
      - a-dub 3y ago
        "good faith" has meaning in the california business code and it would not stand up in court if they attempted to abuse semantics in the absurd way you describe. their text is abundantly clear: you can use the ideas in their patents if you are using them in good faith and are not law trolling.
        tovej 3y ago
        The "you can use Teslas ideas" part of the contract is not what's being discussed. What parent is talking about is the rights you must give up in order to gain this right.