1. Everyone who gets sued by a patent troll is going to complain about the validity of the patent. Even when the patent is, in fact, completely valid.
2. Patent troll + Law firm is not a "dangerous new breed". This has been happening for a long while now.
3. It seems strange to complain about the being sued for patent infringement while owning '150' patents. Do you agree with patents or not? If you agree, then being sued for patent infringement is part of it. If you disagree, why invest so much? I understand the argument of patents being defensive, but, does that really help in a world of patent trolls? More likely, a company eventually goes under and the patents are acquired on the cheap - by a troll.
4. I think the "we will pay you a bounty to help make our problem go away" approach is interesting and I hope it works. ...but it's very self serving. Maybe just pay a law firm $50,000 to invalidate the patent rather than making a contest out of it.
To be fair, I really don't understand the concept of a software patent. If I can implement it then it is fair game.
I think this is the trouble with being an entrepreneur. You are crazy right up until the moment you are proved right. At which point, the idea is ‘obvious to everyone’.
Of course, most ideas fail. Most entrepreneurs are just proved crazy.
It is a lonely existence where even other entrepreneurs are unsupportive.
These guys have a nice PR piece on the BBC. That will give them a big temporary boost in traffic. Maybe not so crazy?
I realize I am biased, but I don't get it. Notepad++ and other tools are not designed around viewing log files. They are text editors. People use tools like Notepad++ to view log files because, traditionally, there hasn't been anything better.
Remote access is a good example. I am actually working right now on getting tail for remote servers working in [redacted]. FTP tailing a file is a special feature because you do not want to redownload a 1GB file every 3 seconds. The idea of a forward read-only file is a special concept. If I am using Notepad++ as a text editor, I want it to download the whole file because there may be important changes to the beginning of the document. If I am using it as a log viewer, then I need to provide a special configuration to the FTP agent. Not impossible, but the overlap in behaviour for the tool can be confusing. The additional configuration makes it harder when using it as a text editor and harder when using it as a log viewer. It starts to make the tool less useful for both tasks.
Now add additional features like grep, merging files, very large files (4 GB+), etc and it becomes clear that Notepad++ is a text editor. It is a fantastic tool, but not fit for every task.
I think Tesla have a lot to answer for here. They are pushing the limits of a technology which Google has said, "needs to be 100% autonomous". No steering wheel. Tesla knows this, but branded their car as 'auto-pilot' anyway. When it became clear from early youtube videos that people were not using the technology 'correctly' Tesla did nothing more than issuing a statement.
They should be considering a recall. It is not good enough that Tesla PR is 'sad' that someone died. What are they doing about it?
This was an exaggeration that I did not think would be taken literally. We had updates as the case progressed. I would guess about once a month. These updates were on the corporate intranet home page which generally contained about 5 links to 'external news' or something.
>He WAS absolutely trying to steal code. Goldman high-frequency code isn't great...
You have written this in a weird way. I agree he was trying to steal code. The quality of what he stole is not relevant. The way you have written this, it could be read: "He tried to steal high-frequency code". This is very much debatable. I could easily argue that Log4J is part of Goldman's high-frequency code.
He did try to cover his tracks. What he did was wrong and he knew at the time it was wrong. Six years later, does the punishment fit the crime?
>He wasn't planning on selling it. He was planning on taking it to Teza
Yes. This is the interesting point. He wasn't planning on selling it because there is no market for it. By this, I mean that there is no place he could list the code for purchase because:
1. It would be illegal and other companies frown on that kind of thing (at least on paper).
2. The code would not be worth much without an understanding of what it does in the wider ecosystem.
Point two is key. Sergey understood the code. He was uploading it to help him remember the work he had done at Goldman's. There is very much a market for, "I did XYZ at Goldman's, I can do it for you too." I have no doubt that he would have been able to do it again without the source code, but he wanted his 'notes'.
GS didn't want him to apply his trade at another firm. Hence the 'vindictive employer' remark.
How long before another developer gets harassed by Goldman's because they printed off some technical documentation before leaving? What if the documentation is printed a month before leaving? ...a year? ...where is the line, exactly?
No. The most interesting part is that this is an example of a vindictive employer ruining someone's life.
I used to work at Goldman's and can tell you that they are paranoid about this kind of thing. They are trying to make an example out of Sergey. We used to get daily updates (on the corporate intranet) about the progress of the case. There is no telling how much money Goldman's has spent going after this guy. Both directly and indirectly through lobbying. You have to ask why, after a year in jail with no conviction, the government still trying to prosecute him? Could it be because Goldman has a very powerful lobbying arm which is particularly strong in New York?
If you are leaving your employer, don't upload any code. Sure. ...but that was over 6 years ago and the guy has already done time. Try getting a job with a prison record. I can tell you that in the banking industry it will not happen.
I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they keep coming after him. Poor guy.
One last point. There is no market for stolen code. If I stole Google's search algorithm, who would I sell it to? Microsoft wouldn't be interested and it is not like you can take out an ad on ebay. Who would have the brains to figure it out? If you had those brains, wouldn't it be easier to just write it yourself? What is true for Google's code is also true for any complex system such as trading software.
One of my great epiphanies as an American expat is that Americans have a tendency to be extreme. They often have one thing that they use to define themselves. They are driven to be the best at their 'one thing'.
- People who go to church on Sunday feel the need to tell you about it on Monday.
- The guy at work who runs marathons, is running all the time. He never comes to lunch because he is doing a practice run.
- People who are fat. ...well, I am sorry, but if it was genetic then there would be 500lb people in Europe too.
- People who work, work and work and work. A lot of Americans fall under this category.
I think taking pride in your work is a good thing. Knowing when you could do better is a good thing. Building your sense of self around any one aspect of your personality is a bad thing.
Aim to be more well-rounded. Try to find lots of things you like doing. Moderate your activities. Live a less extreme life.
(I have obviously made some assumptions here. This post probably applies more to me than anyone else. :)
First: I find it worrying that Google has enough power to dictate the direction of the internet is such profound ways. Remember when people would get up in arms when Microsoft created de facto standards?
Second: Doesn't this change only effect 'mobile searches' ? Reading the blog post [1] that is how I interpret it. I think the article could make this more clear.
My experience with TDD is that it is very helpful from a design perspective because it gets you to think about the code before you write it. How is the API going to work? What should I name this method? As an industry we use to dedicate too much time to this (RUP, etc). Now, we don't think about it enough.
As far as actually improving code quality... not so much. For the money, I would much rather see an hour of functional test development rather than an hour of unit test development (and I put TDD in the unit test category). I think functional tests provide more value and our industry has put way too much emphasis on unit tests.
100% unit test coverage says nothing about code quality. 100% functional coverage does. Functional tests also tend to be less brittle – which is a nice bonus.
2. Patent troll + Law firm is not a "dangerous new breed". This has been happening for a long while now.
3. It seems strange to complain about the being sued for patent infringement while owning '150' patents. Do you agree with patents or not? If you agree, then being sued for patent infringement is part of it. If you disagree, why invest so much? I understand the argument of patents being defensive, but, does that really help in a world of patent trolls? More likely, a company eventually goes under and the patents are acquired on the cheap - by a troll.
4. I think the "we will pay you a bounty to help make our problem go away" approach is interesting and I hope it works. ...but it's very self serving. Maybe just pay a law firm $50,000 to invalidate the patent rather than making a contest out of it.
To be fair, I really don't understand the concept of a software patent. If I can implement it then it is fair game.