I Can Wait
Reminds me of the prisoner who, when allowed to pick his method of execution, pointed to a seedling and said "Hang me from that tree. I can wait."
Anthony Levandowski, the top engineer who pleaded guilty to stealing self-driving car trade secrets from Google, was sent down for 18 months in the US on Tuesday. Levandowski, who was sentenced by federal district court Judge William Alsup in San Francisco, must also cough up $756,499.22 in compensation to Google and a fine of …
Didn't he steal the programs on how Google used lidar/radar?
Clearly what he needed to do was steal the bit that dealt with the brakes. Because Uber's implementation of that was so pisspoor that they had to disable it, lest its constant slamming on of the anchors rattle the "safety driver's" teeth out. And who needs a self driving car that can stop? Pointless luxury I say!
John Brown,
Nope. You’re right that they did disable the auto-braking on the Volvo, so as not to interfere with their testing. But they also disabled the emergency braking mode on their own fucking system - because it was so shit that it was randomly triggering. So their own system would slow down for junctions or other cars, in normal operation. But if it saw something that it didn’t understand, it would sound an alarm for the "safety driver" to decide whether to brake. As happens, the report on the crash showed that their system was so shit that it detected the cyclist it ran over, but was unable to classify what she was and so just ploughed into her anyway, while it was deciding.
Are you sure? He stole tech that allowed him to found a company and sell it about a year later for $700m! Surely stealing $700m worth of some company's intellectual property is worth jail time anwhere?
I'm sure Uber over-valued it, because they were only spending their Venture Capitalist backers cash (something they do an awful lot of) - but even so he stole IP worth hundreds of millions.
If I agree it is only on the narrowest of grounds (which means I don't).
In fact, respectfully, you almost make my point for me. If he banked $700M then why were the damages nowhere that much?
The article itself says "prosecutors failed to produce explicit evidence that any of Waymo’s technology had been used". So......?
More to the point :
1. He was a hot shot, with existing skills and knowledge, when he was recruited. Who did he, and Google, rip off while he was there?
2. The IT Security guy who allowed this to happen should be fired.
3. The executive who decided to make the report should be fired : the next time a hot shot turns up in Google HR he is going to think "They do not want me for my looks. They will leech my skills and knowledge then either I am unemployable or in jail. Sayonara."
Lose - lose.
Putting aside any subjective feelings about this specific case, I don't understand America's interpretation of "cruel and unusual punishment" which is accepted to include banning humiliating punishments, yet I frequently see US judges meting out 'creative' sentences like this clearly intended to humiliate the culprit. I sometimes get the impression that US judges are free to dream up any punishment they like - surely there's some form of control here?
Of course the baying mobs love this stuff, and retribution is always going to be a part of punishment, but I'm not sure that humiliating punishments belong in civilised society.
Community Service is pretty common over here. And while lots of ordinary people get litter-picking or helping old people with their shopping - I don't think it's unusual here to have the celebs do awareness campaigns against drink driving (or whatever it is they did).
That's not actually the correct order. Besides that, by the time of the American Revolution the sentence as practised was not the same as the sentence as dictated. An Irish cousin of mine was sentenced to the full works for high treason three decades later, but the actual execution was carried out as hanging followed by beheading.
You sometimes do. Back in the early 90s a US man came to our school in the UK, I can't remember if he was in prison in the UK or in the US, it was for drugs. Anyway, he convinced us it wasn't nice. One story was:
"I could hear a guy screaming in his cell, then he proceeded to crawl out on all fours with a broom handle stuck up his arse that another inmate had forced up there as punishment".
Grime.
I'd quite like him to win that case against Uber. So long as he then has to pay all the money to Google and the courts.
I've no idea of the merits of the case you understand, I just like to see Uber losing money.
Obviously this means I'm normally a very happy man...
[Oi! El Reg! Where's the Postman Pat icon?]