4 ms·
I started my career in 2001 at a small company in flyover country. We had a first-class product, localized in five different languages, millions in revenue, an
by hello_computer 2y ago
I started my career in 2001 at a small company in flyover country. We had a first-class product, localized in five different languages, millions in revenue, and very profitable. One day a couple California guys swung by to sue us for patent infringement on our own implementation--which the boss never even dreamed of patenting, since it was such a common-sense approach, and with prior-art out the wazoo. We take it to the lawyers. They were confident that they'd win the case, but the legal bill would have been close to a million. With that sort of estimate, it would be cheaper for us to change the product and pay back royalties, so that's what we did. It was an early lesson on how, at the end of the line, power is all there is. Add another rule, another agency, another check, another balance... it's really just kicking the can down the road. When the people aren't hungry for justice, you're on your own.
I'm not in SV, but I'd think long and hard before generalizing Eric Schmidt to any large group. He is a particularly nasty piece of work.
- marssaxman 2y agoI had a similar experience at the beginning of my career, about a decade before the story you relate, and it left me with a cynical outlook on the moral legitimacy of the legal system and a general skepticism of "intellectual property" as a concept. The facts of the case did not matter, because the preliminary injunction which "temporarily" halted sales of the product we'd poured so much work into killed the startup, just like that. There was no trial, and no chance to demonstrate that the claims were bullshit, because there was no revenue, and thus no way to fight. The company who had sued us then released their inferior version of our product, almost a year later.