12 ms·

Microsoft rips off Plurk

581 points by abraham 17y ago

phreanix 17y ago
Incredible, I guess in their culture this is ok (or has become so commonplace as to be ok), but shouldn't Microsoft have some sort of measures against it in their own workplaces?
- archon810 17y ago
  My guess is the Chinese team was facing strict deadlines and in the act of desperation they ripped off the code and layout from Plurk. It's outrageous and MS needs to straight up get sued for this. Plurk has a very small team of less than 10 guys and in my eyes this is nothing less than MS bullying. This is not right.
  - mikeryan 17y ago
    I don't know if I can lay all the blame on Microsoft for this. The dev's knew what they were doing but I doubt the rip-off percolated very high up. As a SW manager I'm not sure how I'd know that this was ripped off wholesale if I wasn't very familiar with the ripped off site. Don't get me wrong, this is bad. But expose it to MS and let them clean house. I don't doubt that they will.
    - mbreese 17y ago
      I'm fairly certain that the higher-ups probably weren't aware of this. However, the company is responsible for the actions of all of it's employees. I mean, sure, Balmer had no idea about any of this is, but that doesn't mean that Microsoft isn't responsible... even if it was done by subcontractors. They are responsible for what they publish on the web, just as anyone else is.
    - potatolicious 17y ago
      > if I wasn't very familiar with the ripped off site. Considering the ripped off site is a chief competitor of this software, I suspect the rip-off was aware at least by mid-level managers. Well, either they were aware of the rip-off, or they were wildly incompetent to the point where they didn't even know their chief competitor's site.
      - winner123 17y ago
        I know the web world is different, but a couple of years back nobody from my product group was allowed to install a competitor product and play with it as it would cause IP prior art issues. Most of the developers did it anyhow, they just would not admit to it. However, I did not know of a single manager who really did it. So I would not be surprised if the managers had an executive policy which did not allow them to see other products. This was at a three lettered big company and not MS though.
      - riobard 17y ago
        Plurk is blocked by the Great Firewall in mainland China, so the guys at MS China have a good excuse insisting they did not know it before, though I would guess they have VPN to get over with the firewall ...
- axod 17y ago
  By "their culture' do you mean China, or Microsoft? I really don't think for example Google China would do this.
  - luchak 17y ago
    Something like this did happen at Google China a couple of years ago: they released a Chinese IME that contained a dictionary taken from Sohu. Sohu demanded a public apology, which Google issued a couple of days later, along with a version that did not contain the stolen list. http://www.webmonkey.com/blog/Google_Apologizes_For_Poaching_Rival_s_Code http://www.webmonkey.com/blog/Google_Apologizes_For_Poaching... http://bit.ly/5zIVYl http://bit.ly/5zIVYl Edit: for what it's worth, I personally agree with the theory that this was probably done by a local team that was under a lot of pressure but wasn't getting enough oversight.
  - ericb 17y ago
    China has some odd laws in terms of how Chinese subsidiaries work from what I understand. It is isn't quite like opening a subsidiary in say, England. I think there is a rule about a local chinese partner company being involved where you get your employees through that chinese partner company. In the example I witnessed, it was difficult to dictate culture in the chinese office as they were working through an intermediary. Can anyone else with more experience on this comment?
    - gommm 17y ago
      There are two kinds of subsidiary in China for foreign companies: - Representation Office - WFOE: Wholly Owned Foreign Enterprise In the case of a representation office, employees are hired through a Human Ressource company (eg: FESCO) but not in the case of WFOE (which requires quite a bit more capital to open though: around 45 000$ minimum invested over a period of 2 years in Shanghai) I'm just starting here, so I'm not exactly sure yet of the limitation of FESCO contracts in term of how much of the culture you can dictate in the chinese office...
  - potatolicious 17y ago
    As a Chinese guy, I have to say that the above comment is generally correct - there is fundamentally a different awareness of the concept of IP in Asia. More frankly, this concept doesn't really exist. It's not that the culture is more tolerant of ripping others off, but rather that when it comes to creative works, it's not seen as ripping off. Being able to take, adapt, and re-release the work of others, even for-profit, is a matter of course for the majority of the population. Many are not even aware of the moral issues surrounding it, and as far as they are concerned, none exists. In all likelihood this wasn't so much a team under pressure and stealing out of desperation - in all likelihood someone just did it without very much thought... and it flew under the radar of those who know better.
figital 17y ago
If you're going to worry about that you should have obfuscated your junk.
- archon810 17y ago
  You've got to be kidding me. And this justifies Microsoft, right?
  - dschobel 17y ago
    He does have a point (one which merits better than his -4 fate). If your biggest asset is your UI, not only do you have to appreciate you have a tenuous competitive advantage but you should have a battle plan, both technical and legal, for when the theft invariably does happen. They got lucky that it was a big operation like MS with a public reputation to maintain (laugh all you like) rather than some no-name. It's easy to put public pressure on the Apples, Google and MS' of the world.
    - mattmanser 17y ago
      Did you actually read the article? They ripped off the code as well as the UI.
      - dschobel 17y ago
        You're playing semantic games. js code is still UI.
        WesleyJohnson 17y ago
        Why, because it's client-side? Categorizing all JavaScript as UI is simply wrong.
- axod 17y ago
  Read the article. They did.
amix 17y ago
Being the co-founder and lead dev of Plurk I can tell you this sucks :-( But we are looking at our legal options, thought legal war with Microsoft and especially legal war at Microsoft in China would require a lot of resources. I think this will become a major concern for all startups that are doing lots of client-side stuff. If people have determination they can copy your code (even if all your code is obfuscated, which Plurk's is). And I don't know what the solution is - other than stronger IP laws in emerging countries.
- mustpax 17y ago
  You are clearly in the right. But a bit of advice: skip the whole look and feel issue* and stick to copyright infringement. Their code is exactly the same or highly derivative of Plurk code. This is pretty well-worn copyright territory, I don't think it would take much for Microsoft to back down. * Apple sued Microsoft back in the day for stealing the look and feel of Mac OS, and failed. So that argument can be very hard to make.
  - padmanabhan01 17y ago
    So, how does this work? Will everything be fine if they maintained the same look and feel and intentionally obfuscated/added more junk to their code to make the code look different?
    - ajross 17y ago
      No. The Apple v. MS and Lotus v. Borland "look and feel" results were about the interface, not implementation. If you steal code (or other copyrighted content) from someone, no amount of obfuscation will "make it OK" legally (though I guess it might make it impossible to detect). But simply cloning a user interface is legal, at least in US case law.
      - deleted 17y ago
        [deleted]
      - pavs 17y ago
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
credo 17y ago
Microsoft should be held accountable for this, but assuming the blog is correct, I'm assuming that the deliberate ripoff (described on plurk's blog) wasn't a high-level Redmond decision.It was probably a decision taken at the junior management levelin Microsoft, China. It will be interesting to see Microsoft's response, but suspending the MSN club service is probably the best immediate response, if plurk's blog is correct.
- davepeck 17y ago
  Precisely. This was a junior dev somewhere far away from Redmond making a terrible mistake. It's about to get thrown up to the highest level, and I can pretty much guarantee you that MSFT takes the site down.
  - dangrossman 17y ago
    It wasn't even that. It was a third party contractor hired by the Chinese company Microsoft partnered with to create "MSN China". So this was beyond just a hierarchical separation within the company, it was several degrees separated from the company itself. Only through contract is this even owned by Microsoft.
ideamonk 17y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft Plurk should sue and win. If M$ could have had issues over phonetically rhyming domain name and take the kid to court, why not plurk taking microsoft into court for something serious. You just can't excuse yourself by saying someone in my company's xyz office is responsible.
- nsoonhui 17y ago
  The problem is that the case might have to be heard in China, whose judiciary system is not something that I can trust.
barredo 17y ago
Offtopic: Is really Plurk #1 microblogging service in Asia?
- barredo 17y ago
  Didn't remember it was greatfirewalled in China: http://blog.plurk.com/2009/04/27/china-bans-plurk/ http://blog.plurk.com/2009/04/27/china-bans-plurk/
ratsbane 17y ago
This reminds me of the Kayak/Bing Travel issue from July and similar incidents before that. It's easy enough to blame some contractors at a distant outpost but the frequency with which these things happen around Microsoft certainly leads to the conclusion that they are bad actors and poor citizens.
- likpok 17y ago
  Kayak/Bing Travel wasn't Microsoft, IIRC. They acquired another company who copied the look and feel of Kayak.
  - sachinag 17y ago
    They acquired Farecast.
  - ratsbane 17y ago
    Farecast had a very different UI when MS bought them. The transition to the copy of the Kayak UI happened well after Kayak rolled theirs out and also well after MS bought Farecast. The scenario/timeline you outline above is reasonable enough to assume - as is the idea that, as Farecast came out before Kayak, that Kayak was actually copying Farecast. What actually happened though is different. Farecast had a completely different model - they were banking on their ability to forecast whether or not you were likely to get a cheaper fare for the same route if you waited. Their original UI was based around that idea and it didn't go over incredibly well. After the Microsoft purchase and before the launch of Bing Travel they did a major redesign and got rid of most of the old Farecast. The old Farecast price predictor idea is reduced to one line at the top of the flights list on the page center. I wrote about this and posted to HN shortly after Bing Travel went live and because of that I've been introduced to more information about the whole situation than I had when I originally brought it up. In a nutshell, the Microsoft team blatantly copied Kayak's UI and has pretty much gotten away with it.
kogir 17y ago
I'm speculating, but I'd guess this was the fault of poor management of an external contractor or partner. We don't know for sure who actually developed the code, just who's hosting it. It's not like similar things haven't happened before: http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/11/microsoft-pulls-windows-7-tool-after-gpl-violation-claims.ars http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/11/microsoft-pull... I'd personally never heard of Plurk until now, and wouldn't have known myself that a contractor had ripped it off had I commissioned the work. It's still an egregious violation, but I doubt this will even need to go to trial. Microsoft stands to gain little from alienating startups in this manner. If it comes to it, I'm sure aggressively shaming them publicly will be far cheaper than suing and eventually as effective.
moeffju 17y ago
The JS code was obviously unpacked/prettified. All internal vars have shortnames like B, C, D, etc. Everything that interacts with the outside has long names, as in the minified plurk code. Astonishing.
jot 17y ago
MS seem to be doing this quite a bit. Remember Bing copying Kayak back in June: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=674123 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=674123
johnrob 17y ago
Interesting how javascript is turning source code theft into copyright infringement (a civil matter), when traditionally it would be trade secret theft (a criminal matter).
- falsestprophet 17y ago
  View > Page Source does not a trade secret make
  - falsestprophet 17y ago
    In general, there are three factors that characterize a trade secret: * is not generally known to the public; * confers some sort of economic benefit on its holder (where this benefit must derive specifically from its not being generally known, not just from the value of the information itself); * is the subject of reasonable efforts to maintain its secrecy. Javascript code fails all three tests
voyagerfan5761 17y ago
I can't say I'm surprised that Microsoft has stolen yet another idea, but I am astonished that they didn't go to more effort to obfuscate that fact. I'm publicizing this through my networks. More people need to know that the 's' in 'Microsoft' is really a '$'.
- kyro 17y ago
  I've always found the use of $ when referring to Microsoft to be really really childish, and weird when I see people here, who are presumably mature adults, doing the same.
jonmc12 17y ago
Not condoning MS, but does anyone else find it ironic that a chinese company is accusing MS of piracy?
- bigbaray 17y ago
  I find it very ironic!! I feel bad for these guys but before you get my full sorrow, Mow your grass!!
- potatolicious 17y ago
  Not condoning the crime, but does anyone else find it ironic that a black guy is accusing someone of robbery? Yes, because ignorant stereotyping is fun! Remember kids, it's not racism if it's not targeted at a member of the List Of Races We Should Be Sensitive About!
  - jonmc12 17y ago
    uhh.. its not stereotyping - comment was directed at a government policy that has fostered piracy at all levels in China. The comment is a characterization of policy, not a characterization of people.
- alttab 17y ago
  Your comment is both funny, and correct! At least, I think so. But I seem to understand that here, that type of humor seems to be discredited even if its insightful (especially if its not).
  - ericd 17y ago
    a) It appears to be inaccurate based on a number of comments here saying that Plurk is Canadian. b) The comment is not adding anything to the conversation, it's just snarky. HN values insights, not snark. There are plenty of places on the internet for trading snark, this isn't intended to be one of them.
- thelibrarian 17y ago
  Plurk is Canadian, not Chinese.
joblessjunkie 17y ago
Chinese software piracy: if you can't beat it, join it.
extofer 17y ago
why doesn't this surprise me
_pius 17y ago
Stunning.
mattiss 17y ago
This is incredible. Have there been any other documented cases where a MSFT,GOOG,etc. has been caught stealing code red handed?
joubert 17y ago
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html?tag=newsEditorsPicksArea.0 http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html?tag=newsE...
pyre 17y ago
Plurk's blog page doesn't like being viewed at 1024x768 in Chromium... the left sidebar cut-off by the left side of my screen and the top-right Plurk logo is cut-off by the blog post.
prawn 17y ago
No surprises here - knew as soon as I saw the story that it was going to be something created by a contracted third-party and that Microsoft/MSN would not have recognised it as a rip-off. "According to a source familiar with the situation, the Juku application was created for MSN China, which is a joint venture between Microsoft and a Chinese company. However, the source says the application was not designed by Microsoft or the joint venture, but rather by a third-party Chinese vendor hired for the task." http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html
awa 17y ago
They have taken down the site and are investigating the incident. The blame apparently lies with a third party vendor contracted for the job. http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415483-56.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415483-56.html
vitobcn 17y ago
At this point, Microsoft issued a press release and took the site down while investigating. PR: http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-14Statement.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-14Sta...
- asmosoinio 17y ago
  Wov, that was fast! This seems like a positive thing for Plurk, let's see how it plays out in the end.
- jarsj 17y ago
  That's nice. MSFT should take action against the vendor and come clean out of this.
- jrnkntl 17y ago
  Basically they just subcontracted the whole MSN Juku thing and nobody at MS ever had a real look into it or didn't know about Plurk?
  - ironfrost 17y ago
    Plurk is blocked in China, so it's not so surprising that staff at MSN China don't recognise its UI.
- alecthomas 17y ago
  And an update: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-15statement.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-15sta...
est 17y ago
1. Plurk is blocked in China 3. MSN.cn outsourced the microblogging to an independent vendor.
geedee77 17y ago
Whilst this really does suck, I think it's valid to mention here that Microsoft have now said that the coding was 'done' by a 3rd party developer so all the comments that MS have done this are no longer valid. Having said that though, someones head should roll at MS for not checking this out properly before go-live and I'm pretty certain MS themselves are ultra embarrassed and will try to solve this as soon as possible. I hope that the Plurk guys get something worthwhile out of this ... maybe even more than the copious amounts of free advertising they're currently seeing.

581 points by abraham 17y ago

Incredible, I guess in their culture this is ok (or has become so commonplace as to be ok), but shouldn't Microsoft have some sort of measures against it in their own workplaces?

archon810 17y ago
My guess is the Chinese team was facing strict deadlines and in the act of desperation they ripped off the code and layout from Plurk. It's outrageous and MS needs to straight up get sued for this. Plurk has a very small team of less than 10 guys and in my eyes this is nothing less than MS bullying. This is not right.
- mikeryan 17y ago
  I don't know if I can lay all the blame on Microsoft for this. The dev's knew what they were doing but I doubt the rip-off percolated very high up. As a SW manager I'm not sure how I'd know that this was ripped off wholesale if I wasn't very familiar with the ripped off site. Don't get me wrong, this is bad. But expose it to MS and let them clean house. I don't doubt that they will.
  - mbreese 17y ago
    I'm fairly certain that the higher-ups probably weren't aware of this. However, the company is responsible for the actions of all of it's employees. I mean, sure, Balmer had no idea about any of this is, but that doesn't mean that Microsoft isn't responsible... even if it was done by subcontractors. They are responsible for what they publish on the web, just as anyone else is.
  - potatolicious 17y ago
    > if I wasn't very familiar with the ripped off site. Considering the ripped off site is a chief competitor of this software, I suspect the rip-off was aware at least by mid-level managers. Well, either they were aware of the rip-off, or they were wildly incompetent to the point where they didn't even know their chief competitor's site.
    - winner123 17y ago
      I know the web world is different, but a couple of years back nobody from my product group was allowed to install a competitor product and play with it as it would cause IP prior art issues. Most of the developers did it anyhow, they just would not admit to it. However, I did not know of a single manager who really did it. So I would not be surprised if the managers had an executive policy which did not allow them to see other products. This was at a three lettered big company and not MS though.
    - riobard 17y ago
      Plurk is blocked by the Great Firewall in mainland China, so the guys at MS China have a good excuse insisting they did not know it before, though I would guess they have VPN to get over with the firewall ...
axod 17y ago
By "their culture' do you mean China, or Microsoft? I really don't think for example Google China would do this.
- luchak 17y ago
  Something like this did happen at Google China a couple of years ago: they released a Chinese IME that contained a dictionary taken from Sohu. Sohu demanded a public apology, which Google issued a couple of days later, along with a version that did not contain the stolen list. http://www.webmonkey.com/blog/Google_Apologizes_For_Poaching_Rival_s_Code http://www.webmonkey.com/blog/Google_Apologizes_For_Poaching... http://bit.ly/5zIVYl http://bit.ly/5zIVYl Edit: for what it's worth, I personally agree with the theory that this was probably done by a local team that was under a lot of pressure but wasn't getting enough oversight.
- ericb 17y ago
  China has some odd laws in terms of how Chinese subsidiaries work from what I understand. It is isn't quite like opening a subsidiary in say, England. I think there is a rule about a local chinese partner company being involved where you get your employees through that chinese partner company. In the example I witnessed, it was difficult to dictate culture in the chinese office as they were working through an intermediary. Can anyone else with more experience on this comment?
  - gommm 17y ago
    There are two kinds of subsidiary in China for foreign companies: - Representation Office - WFOE: Wholly Owned Foreign Enterprise In the case of a representation office, employees are hired through a Human Ressource company (eg: FESCO) but not in the case of WFOE (which requires quite a bit more capital to open though: around 45 000$ minimum invested over a period of 2 years in Shanghai) I'm just starting here, so I'm not exactly sure yet of the limitation of FESCO contracts in term of how much of the culture you can dictate in the chinese office...
- potatolicious 17y ago
  As a Chinese guy, I have to say that the above comment is generally correct - there is fundamentally a different awareness of the concept of IP in Asia. More frankly, this concept doesn't really exist. It's not that the culture is more tolerant of ripping others off, but rather that when it comes to creative works, it's not seen as ripping off. Being able to take, adapt, and re-release the work of others, even for-profit, is a matter of course for the majority of the population. Many are not even aware of the moral issues surrounding it, and as far as they are concerned, none exists. In all likelihood this wasn't so much a team under pressure and stealing out of desperation - in all likelihood someone just did it without very much thought... and it flew under the radar of those who know better.

figital 17y ago

If you're going to worry about that you should have obfuscated your junk.

archon810 17y ago
You've got to be kidding me. And this justifies Microsoft, right?
- dschobel 17y ago
  He does have a point (one which merits better than his -4 fate). If your biggest asset is your UI, not only do you have to appreciate you have a tenuous competitive advantage but you should have a battle plan, both technical and legal, for when the theft invariably does happen. They got lucky that it was a big operation like MS with a public reputation to maintain (laugh all you like) rather than some no-name. It's easy to put public pressure on the Apples, Google and MS' of the world.
  - mattmanser 17y ago
    Did you actually read the article? They ripped off the code as well as the UI.
    - dschobel 17y ago
      You're playing semantic games. js code is still UI.
      - WesleyJohnson 17y ago
        Why, because it's client-side? Categorizing all JavaScript as UI is simply wrong.
axod 17y ago
Read the article. They did.

amix 17y ago

Being the co-founder and lead dev of Plurk I can tell you this sucks :-( But we are looking at our legal options, thought legal war with Microsoft and especially legal war at Microsoft in China would require a lot of resources. I think this will become a major concern for all startups that are doing lots of client-side stuff. If people have determination they can copy your code (even if all your code is obfuscated, which Plurk's is). And I don't know what the solution is - other than stronger IP laws in emerging countries.

mustpax 17y ago
You are clearly in the right. But a bit of advice: skip the whole look and feel issue* and stick to copyright infringement. Their code is exactly the same or highly derivative of Plurk code. This is pretty well-worn copyright territory, I don't think it would take much for Microsoft to back down. * Apple sued Microsoft back in the day for stealing the look and feel of Mac OS, and failed. So that argument can be very hard to make.
- padmanabhan01 17y ago
  So, how does this work? Will everything be fine if they maintained the same look and feel and intentionally obfuscated/added more junk to their code to make the code look different?
  - ajross 17y ago
    No. The Apple v. MS and Lotus v. Borland "look and feel" results were about the interface, not implementation. If you steal code (or other copyrighted content) from someone, no amount of obfuscation will "make it OK" legally (though I guess it might make it impossible to detect). But simply cloning a user interface is legal, at least in US case law.
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
    - pavs 17y ago

deleted 17y ago

[deleted]

credo 17y ago

Microsoft should be held accountable for this, but assuming the blog is correct, I'm assuming that the deliberate ripoff (described on plurk's blog) wasn't a high-level Redmond decision.It was probably a decision taken at the junior management levelin Microsoft, China. It will be interesting to see Microsoft's response, but suspending the MSN club service is probably the best immediate response, if plurk's blog is correct.

davepeck 17y ago
Precisely. This was a junior dev somewhere far away from Redmond making a terrible mistake. It's about to get thrown up to the highest level, and I can pretty much guarantee you that MSFT takes the site down.
- dangrossman 17y ago
  It wasn't even that. It was a third party contractor hired by the Chinese company Microsoft partnered with to create "MSN China". So this was beyond just a hierarchical separation within the company, it was several degrees separated from the company itself. Only through contract is this even owned by Microsoft.

ideamonk 17y ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_vs._MikeRoweSoft Plurk should sue and win. If M$ could have had issues over phonetically rhyming domain name and take the kid to court, why not plurk taking microsoft into court for something serious. You just can't excuse yourself by saying someone in my company's xyz office is responsible.

nsoonhui 17y ago
The problem is that the case might have to be heard in China, whose judiciary system is not something that I can trust.

barredo 17y ago

Offtopic: Is really Plurk #1 microblogging service in Asia?

barredo 17y ago
Didn't remember it was greatfirewalled in China: http://blog.plurk.com/2009/04/27/china-bans-plurk/ http://blog.plurk.com/2009/04/27/china-bans-plurk/

ratsbane 17y ago

This reminds me of the Kayak/Bing Travel issue from July and similar incidents before that. It's easy enough to blame some contractors at a distant outpost but the frequency with which these things happen around Microsoft certainly leads to the conclusion that they are bad actors and poor citizens.

likpok 17y ago
Kayak/Bing Travel wasn't Microsoft, IIRC. They acquired another company who copied the look and feel of Kayak.
- sachinag 17y ago
  They acquired Farecast.
- ratsbane 17y ago
  Farecast had a very different UI when MS bought them. The transition to the copy of the Kayak UI happened well after Kayak rolled theirs out and also well after MS bought Farecast. The scenario/timeline you outline above is reasonable enough to assume - as is the idea that, as Farecast came out before Kayak, that Kayak was actually copying Farecast. What actually happened though is different. Farecast had a completely different model - they were banking on their ability to forecast whether or not you were likely to get a cheaper fare for the same route if you waited. Their original UI was based around that idea and it didn't go over incredibly well. After the Microsoft purchase and before the launch of Bing Travel they did a major redesign and got rid of most of the old Farecast. The old Farecast price predictor idea is reduced to one line at the top of the flights list on the page center. I wrote about this and posted to HN shortly after Bing Travel went live and because of that I've been introduced to more information about the whole situation than I had when I originally brought it up. In a nutshell, the Microsoft team blatantly copied Kayak's UI and has pretty much gotten away with it.

kogir 17y ago

I'm speculating, but I'd guess this was the fault of poor management of an external contractor or partner. We don't know for sure who actually developed the code, just who's hosting it. It's not like similar things haven't happened before: http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/11/microsoft-pulls-windows-7-tool-after-gpl-violation-claims.ars http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2009/11/microsoft-pull... I'd personally never heard of Plurk until now, and wouldn't have known myself that a contractor had ripped it off had I commissioned the work. It's still an egregious violation, but I doubt this will even need to go to trial. Microsoft stands to gain little from alienating startups in this manner. If it comes to it, I'm sure aggressively shaming them publicly will be far cheaper than suing and eventually as effective.

moeffju 17y ago

The JS code was obviously unpacked/prettified. All internal vars have shortnames like B, C, D, etc. Everything that interacts with the outside has long names, as in the minified plurk code. Astonishing.

jot 17y ago

MS seem to be doing this quite a bit. Remember Bing copying Kayak back in June: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=674123 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=674123

johnrob 17y ago

Interesting how javascript is turning source code theft into copyright infringement (a civil matter), when traditionally it would be trade secret theft (a criminal matter).

falsestprophet 17y ago
View > Page Source does not a trade secret make
- falsestprophet 17y ago
  In general, there are three factors that characterize a trade secret: * is not generally known to the public; * confers some sort of economic benefit on its holder (where this benefit must derive specifically from its not being generally known, not just from the value of the information itself); * is the subject of reasonable efforts to maintain its secrecy. Javascript code fails all three tests

voyagerfan5761 17y ago

I can't say I'm surprised that Microsoft has stolen yet another idea, but I am astonished that they didn't go to more effort to obfuscate that fact. I'm publicizing this through my networks. More people need to know that the 's' in 'Microsoft' is really a '$'.

kyro 17y ago
I've always found the use of $ when referring to Microsoft to be really really childish, and weird when I see people here, who are presumably mature adults, doing the same.

jonmc12 17y ago

Not condoning MS, but does anyone else find it ironic that a chinese company is accusing MS of piracy?

bigbaray 17y ago
I find it very ironic!! I feel bad for these guys but before you get my full sorrow, Mow your grass!!
potatolicious 17y ago
Not condoning the crime, but does anyone else find it ironic that a black guy is accusing someone of robbery? Yes, because ignorant stereotyping is fun! Remember kids, it's not racism if it's not targeted at a member of the List Of Races We Should Be Sensitive About!
- jonmc12 17y ago
  uhh.. its not stereotyping - comment was directed at a government policy that has fostered piracy at all levels in China. The comment is a characterization of policy, not a characterization of people.
alttab 17y ago
Your comment is both funny, and correct! At least, I think so. But I seem to understand that here, that type of humor seems to be discredited even if its insightful (especially if its not).
- ericd 17y ago
  a) It appears to be inaccurate based on a number of comments here saying that Plurk is Canadian. b) The comment is not adding anything to the conversation, it's just snarky. HN values insights, not snark. There are plenty of places on the internet for trading snark, this isn't intended to be one of them.
thelibrarian 17y ago
Plurk is Canadian, not Chinese.

joblessjunkie 17y ago

Chinese software piracy: if you can't beat it, join it.

extofer 17y ago

why doesn't this surprise me

_pius 17y ago

Stunning.

mattiss 17y ago

This is incredible. Have there been any other documented cases where a MSFT,GOOG,etc. has been caught stealing code red handed?

joubert 17y ago

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html?tag=newsEditorsPicksArea.0 http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html?tag=newsE...

pyre 17y ago

Plurk's blog page doesn't like being viewed at 1024x768 in Chromium... the left sidebar cut-off by the left side of my screen and the top-right Plurk logo is cut-off by the blog post.

prawn 17y ago

No surprises here - knew as soon as I saw the story that it was going to be something created by a contracted third-party and that Microsoft/MSN would not have recognised it as a rip-off. "According to a source familiar with the situation, the Juku application was created for MSN China, which is a joint venture between Microsoft and a Chinese company. However, the source says the application was not designed by Microsoft or the joint venture, but rather by a third-party Chinese vendor hired for the task." http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415298-56.html

awa 17y ago

They have taken down the site and are investigating the incident. The blame apparently lies with a third party vendor contracted for the job. http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415483-56.html http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10415483-56.html

vitobcn 17y ago

At this point, Microsoft issued a press release and took the site down while investigating. PR: http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-14Statement.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/Presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-14Sta...

asmosoinio 17y ago
Wov, that was fast! This seems like a positive thing for Plurk, let's see how it plays out in the end.
jarsj 17y ago
That's nice. MSFT should take action against the vendor and come clean out of this.
jrnkntl 17y ago
Basically they just subcontracted the whole MSN Juku thing and nobody at MS ever had a real look into it or didn't know about Plurk?
- ironfrost 17y ago
  Plurk is blocked in China, so it's not so surprising that staff at MSN China don't recognise its UI.
alecthomas 17y ago
And an update: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-15statement.mspx http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2009/dec09/12-15sta...

est 17y ago

1. Plurk is blocked in China 3. MSN.cn outsourced the microblogging to an independent vendor.

geedee77 17y ago

Whilst this really does suck, I think it's valid to mention here that Microsoft have now said that the coding was 'done' by a 3rd party developer so all the comments that MS have done this are no longer valid. Having said that though, someones head should roll at MS for not checking this out properly before go-live and I'm pretty certain MS themselves are ultra embarrassed and will try to solve this as soon as possible. I hope that the Plurk guys get something worthwhile out of this ... maybe even more than the copious amounts of free advertising they're currently seeing.