Google Sued for $1B Over Outlook Migration Tool 332
A two-count lawsuit filed by Chicago company LimitNone alleges that Google misappropriated trade secrets and violated Illinois' consumer fraud laws when it developed "Google Email Uploader" which competes with LimitNone's "gMove" application.
"Google claims its core philosophy is 'Don't be evil' but, simply put, they invited us to work with them, to trust them — and then stole our technology,'" said Ray Glassman, CEO of LimitNone, in a prepared statement.
The lawsuit was filed by Kelley Drye & Warren LLP, the same commercial litigation group which challenged Google over the company's online advertising system.
My philosophy (Score:3, Funny)
Don't be first post.
Re:My philosophy (Score:5, Funny)
Dear Anonymous Coward,
The author of popular first-posting tool Bone-O-Rama, cyborg_monkey, has filed a lawsuit against you individually and against any entity under which you conduct business alleging infringement of Bone-O-Rama technology.
cyborg_monkey holds that you invited him into a technology sharing agreement the terms of which prevent you from independently using, allowing others to use, or cause to be use, any first posting technology, whether derived from or distinct from, that same technology as used by Bone-O-Rama. Further allegation include but are not limited to: Repeated inappropriate remarks by you about Bone-O-Rama placed on popular blogs, your garbling of the Bone-O-Rama trademark "First Post!" (such garblings include "fr0st ps0t!" and the like), and also cyborg_monkey has a general dissatisfaction with the way you conduct yourself just in general, and we think you registered the Slashdot account cydorg_money, which is obviously trademark dillution.
You'd be wise to post a retraction while there is still time, and apologize for your affronts to decency.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
why are you suing yourself and me?
"Don't be evil" (Score:4, Insightful)
When in reality it's chapter 6 of their Corporate Philosophy page, titled "You can make money without doing evil" -- outlining what kind of advertising you should use.
They aren't even talking about themselves; let alone their business model.
So why not give them some slack, everybody. They never claimed they are saints. (Although IMHO they are one of the better behaved companies out there.)
Re:"Don't be evil" (Score:4, Informative)
And the preface and conclusion of their code of conduct. [google.com]
Details, details.
The Amazing Karnak (Score:5, Insightful)
.... says that the majority of posts will be about which side is screwing who despite no one on Slashdot having any clue about what happened at the meetings between the two companies.
Check back later for the results of the prediction.
Re:The Amazing Karnak (Score:4, Insightful)
You must be new here, of course thats whats going to happen.
Some of us will get witty replies in, we'll probably get a couple "In Soviet America" jokes, a few flamers talking about privacy invasions and at least one sad, months-late attempt at a Rick Roll.
Re:The Amazing Karnak (Score:5, Funny)
Some of us will get witty replies in, we'll probably get a couple "In Soviet America" jokes, a few flamers talking about privacy invasions and at least one sad, months-late attempt at a Rick Roll.
Re:The Amazing Karnak (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Two words, only smucks sue for billions when their product is worth thousands. They might have legitimate claims, but a billion dollars? Come on, these guys are just looking for easy money.
Re:The Amazing Karnak (Score:5, Funny)
Two words, only smucks sue for billions when their product is worth thousands.
Two questions:
What were the "two words".
And is a "smuck" one who makes Smuckers jelly?
That's plausible (Score:4, Interesting)
I mean it only makes sense that the large company employing the best engineers in the world would risk everything to steal a product they could write in a day, right?
Re: (Score:2)
Risk everything? How's this risking everything? Google's worth $170B, if they lose this case and have to pay $1B (unlikely that the penalty for stealing some minor software idea will be that large), they will be mighty annoyed, but that's about it. They'll have to make a press release about how they don't accept the verdict, they didn't do anything wrong, but want to put the case behind them and
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Google is *valued* at $170 billion. What they are worth is less clear. They could certainly manage a $1 billion payout, as they are pulling in a multiple of that each quarter and they have $12 billion just sitting around, but it would do more than leave a bad taste in their mouth.
Whats their contact information? (Score:5, Funny)
Perhaps I should sue them for selling a product that did what the Perl script I wrote to import ten years' worth of archives into GMail did several months before the beta was even open to anyone but friends and family of people at Google.
You know, because its really a non-obvious idea.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
1) an offer must be extended
2) the offer must be accepted
3) there must be an exchange of consideration
Without these three elements, you've got squat. In your scenario, you've got an offer and acceptance - "I'll set up the Pizza Hut, and you'll do marketing and advertising." "Okay." - but if you don't contribute anything to the pot, the contract isn't in-place yet
trade secrets? for moving email? (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not a programmer... but It doesn't sound like something that would justify $1B in losses.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I'm not a doctor but I can't see why people can't just grow back their arms when an alligator eats it off.
I mean lizards grow back tails all the time.
I don't see what the big problem is.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I'm sure it was a piece of cake to write. Microsoft's proprietary API's and file formats are all easy to use and designed for maximum interoperability with third-party software.
I Love Lawyers! (Score:2)
But of course they're well-compensated for their service! They spread all that money around, socking 20, 30 or 40% of it away for themselves, ensuring that the health of their own profession remains robust so that they can continue in this vital function.
Like the Dean of the Duke Law School said several years ago in an interview, when asked "aren't we gett
Re:I Love Lawyers! (Score:4, Insightful)
They contribute so much to our free economy!
When I got divorced, I was damned glad I had a good lwayer. When I subsequently filed bankrupcy, again I was glad I had a good lawyer.
When my then-wife ("Evil-X" for those of you who have seen the Paxil Diaries) was hit by a city truck that ran a red light, well, her lawyer sucked but the medical bills got paid. I was glad she hired the same guy for the divorce.
When your incompetent doctor who has lost his license in seven states (but there's no way for you to know that) leaves a sponge in your gut, you are going to need a good lawyer.
I guess your idea of a "free economy" is allowing me to steal from your store.
If you have injury and disease, you're going to need doctors. If you have computers, you are going to need programers. If you are going to have engines, you are going to need engineers. If you are going to have laws, you are going to need lawyers.
BTW, IANAL.
Overture (Score:2)
Isn't this like the Overture thing all over again?
Settlement or dismissal (Score:2)
Just a hunch. Looks like Google acted like dicks here and released a free, competing product for something they'd previously partnered with LimitNone to promote (according to the article).
On the other hand, Google could pay them off easily, and if there's a contract between the companies that doesn't stipulate non-competition, well then they can eat a dick. And theft of trade secrets? For a tool that uploads Exchange stuff to gmail? Horseshit.
Sounds Bogus (Score:2)
Having written many Outlook Add-Ins, exporting Outlook to almost any format would be pretty trivial.
Typical Large Company (Google's PR)? (Score:5, Interesting)
I have to admit if the allegations are true then Google probably has one of the best Marketing/PR departments in the world.
I've been in the IT industry for a long time and I can still remember Microsoft's public image was similar many, many years ago! (anyone remember a small company called 'Stac'?) and it's now happening again, same 'strategy' - different company!
Initially I was skeptical when I started reading the article (I know, I know I have just broken a Slashdot cardinal rule) when I read this:
"..the potential for 50 million users - was "just too big to come from someone else" and that "this is how Google operates.."
quoted from Scott McMullan, a senior executive in the Google Apps partner program
Moral of the story?
It's ok to be a 'partner' to a large company as long as your product is not *too* popular or successful.
Anyone partnering with a large company should learn lessons from this - remember a large companie's main responsibility is to it's shareholders - they are the people who want a return on thier investment and usually at any cost!
Re: (Score:2)
No offense or anything but the day I buy an email migration tool...I think a lot of people feel the same way. 50 million paying users for an email migration tool? That many people haven't sprung for WinZip in its entire history, and winzip is vastly more useful.
I think they are dramatically overestimating the amount of marketshare that they could have captured.
LimitNone = :'( (Score:5, Insightful)
I was sitting in on a product development meeting a few months back and the discussion came up on how to be viable in today's market. One of the big questions in online application entrepeneuring is: How can we remain viable against companies like Google?.. Companies like Google that can cook up the same product with all the same features in a fraction of the time. It seems that if LimitNone had applied some common sense to its product lines, it wouldn't run into the problem of oh, say, Google extending the functionality of one of its already existing applications. Whoops.
Trade secrets? What trade secrets? Google can't write a migration suite for its own email service? Geeze.
This is ust another case of litigation over innovation. I mean, I'm no IP law expert or anything, but a client migration tool? This could have easily have been some kind of open source project..who would LimitNone have sued then?
Re: (Score:2)
"The article cites that LimitNone claims that the 'gMove' application was a trade secret..it wasn't even patented."
Quick, anyone: Can you have a patent on a trade secret? Or a trade secret on a patent?
all the best,
drew
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
I didn't see anywhere in the press release where they claim that; if the press release is true, then the issue isn't whether Google couldn't cook one up on its own, but rather that they didn't--instead of that they made a deal with this company to use their product instead.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Trade secrets are very rarely patented (and the patent application would end a piece of IP's status as a trade secret as it functions as a public disclosure). Most often, trade secret protection is used on IP that is not patentable and covers any IP that derives value from its secrecy (e.g. customer lists, secret formulae, etc). Trade secret protection is implemented by securing (most often throu
This is surreal (Score:2)
So, where's the NDA and NCA (Score:4, Interesting)
Sure, a smile and a handshake is fine if you're doing a $300 quick job with a repeat customer, but if a billion dollars is on the line there needs to be paperwork. Now, if it is reasonable to presume that there wasn't much to be made on this at the beginning, then it is also reasonable to believe the change of heart on the part of Google is based on "new" information as to the viability of the product. If there are trade secrets involved, there should (must?) be an NDA, or it's not really a trade secret. And where do consumers come in this (i.e. the consumer fraud complaint)? It sounds like the consumers are going to make out to the tune of $29 per user.
Re: (Score:2)
I'm sure there is. What I think a lot of slashdotters don't seem to realize is a "contract" can take many forms, both written and non-written. An e-mail chain can be considered a written contract, for example, if enough information is contained in aggregate.
If there are trade secrets involved, there should (must?) be an NDA, or it's not re
Re: (Score:2)
As with anything legal, there are gray areas. If verbal agreements and emails were all that were necessary, though, we wouldn't have the aforementioned instruments. Verbal agreements are hard to make stick for large and/or significant disagreements. Again, a handshake and a nod will probably work for a nominal amount in small claims court, and you can find cases of larger settlements, but this smacks of a collaborative deal that didn't pan out.
Industrial espionage is quite different from two partners sharin
What a half-assed press release (Score:2, Insightful)
they invited us to work with them, to trust them - and then stole our technology..."Google Email Uploader" steals gMove's look, feel and functionality
So, they didn't steal technology, they developed a clone from scratch (apparently).
the other party is a small software company that built its business specifically to help Google sell its existing and future products
Right. They didn't build the business to make money, they did it to help Google.
Google did not have a workable way to enable Microsoft Outlook users to easily migrate their email (called gMail), calendar and contacts to Google's platform.
So, Outlook email is called "gMail"?
Are you kidding me? (Score:2, Insightful)
Sounds like Google made their product successful (Score:2, Insightful)
As with everyone else here, I have no idea what actually went on in the meetings between Google and this company. However, their lawyers description of events goes something like this:
- Google launches service
- Google notices small company's product complements service
- Google aggressively promotes company's product
- Google starts providing similar product as part of service
It sounds to me like this is a "sour grapes" lawsuit. The company likely benefited tremendously from Go
Better posting on CNET (Score:5, Informative)
CNET is also covering this at http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9976405-7.html [cnet.com]
It provides additional details, including: "And in May 2008, Google changed its user interface, breaking gMove compatibility and forcing the company to provide customer refunds."
captcha: nonzero (that's almost like LimitNone)
I don't get it (Score:3, Interesting)
TFA does not say there was a "non-compete" agreement which would be crazy to agree to, since in fact this is easy to duplicate. It talks vaguely of "assurances". The CEO claims their technology was "stolen" but then the article says a competing product was released, not theirs.
Looks like they had the benefit of big-time promotion *for almost a year* before Google had anything else to show. They made quite a bit of money they wouldn't have otherwise I am sorry... sounds like someone was hoping for a payday and is just angry now.
Re-used code (Score:2)
Googles Rep (Score:2, Interesting)
I just wanted to point something out. This is the difference of Googles rep and MS's rep. If MS did this, we'd be all over them searching for everything we could slant in their favor.
Google Reality Check (Score:3, Insightful)
Making money for their stockholders.
Despite all the happy horse hockey about "Do no evil", Google needed to amend it's mission statement once it became a publicly trade company to "We do less evil than everyone else"
Google is going to do what is best in their corporate interest. Surprised? Don't be. It's business
LimitNone's only hope (Score:3, Interesting)
LimitNone's only hope is language in a written contract promising that Google won't compete with their product. Absent that, they're toast. Let's face it, their product isn't much. There's nothing in it that hasn't been well-known and in wide use for the last 30 years, and thus can't be a trade secret. Google obviously knows their own formats and APIs for loading messages into gMail. In fact they had to have created them before LimitNone's product existed, if they hadn't LN couldn't have created their product at all. The file formats and things like Exchange server APIs aren't exactly secret. Copying all messages from one to the other is the same basic copy loop that's been used for 40-some years: open input; while not eof(input) do read(input); write(output); done; close input. A loop to iterate through folders and some recursion to handle subfolders, I was doing that in high school. Look and feel? LimitNone's probably using the standard tree-view widgets provided by the system, so yes Google's app will look like theirs because both of them look like the standard system widgets. That's assuming the apps allow message-level selectivity, if they limit it to folder-level or "everything on this server", the UI's even more generic. And the concept of importing mail messages from an old client into a new one? Hardly new. Mail clients have been importing other client's mailboxes since as long as there've been mail clients. Thunderbird has been doing it IIRC for a couple years now, well before LimitNone's product was created.
LimitNone's problem is that they're trying to charge $29 for a basic one-shot function that comes standard with most mail clients and that frankly could be hacked up by a single programmer in a few weeks of full-time work.
Re:You've got a little evil there on your mouth... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:You've got a little evil there on your mouth... (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, you think Slashdot editors actually read the article? I'd say "you must be new here", but then somebody with a 4-digit UID would be legally obligated to come over and bitch-slap me.
Re:You've got a little evil there on your mouth... (Score:5, Funny)
*slap*
You're welcome.
Re: (Score:2)
You must be n...
oh shit
Re:You've got a little evil there on your mouth... (Score:4, Funny)
Damn, you beat me to it. And I really needed to slap someone today. ;-)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
It's a news story, and I know there's not a lot of information there, but remember Slashdot is a discussion site. I'm sure we'll be able to introduce tome interesting analysis ourselves rather than being spoonfed content by the news media.
If you're not sure where to start, how about looking at how hard it would be to export Outlook emails, and whether it would be particularly challenging to develop an app like this.
Re: (Score:2)
It is a news story in the same way that Taco Bell's new additions to their Extra Value Menu is a news story.
I'm going to start submitting links to all the cool banner ads I run across. Next up on Slashdot: Dude You're Getting a Dell!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
To make it clear, since the summary is also misleading:
KD&W are not suing Google.
LimitNone is suing Google, and have retained KD&W as counsel.
I understand that many slashdotters (and people in general) have a distrust/dislike/hatred of lawyers, but is an important distinction to make.
KD&W was counsel for the other lawsuit mentioned in the summary, but they did not in fact sue Google
Re: (Score:2)
Thats a pretty big IF there buddy. Lets put it this way. Google donates lots and lots of code. Why the hell would they take a little utility like this when it is giving away dev time for free?
Re: (Score:2)
Just because Google does some good works doesn't mean that they are always right. From the press release, its not really an article, it looks as though Google gave the impression that they were pushing LimitNone's product to their users and that there was an understanding that they wouldn't release a competing program.
That said, unless LimitNone's product keeps someones gMail and Outlook accounts in sync, this looks like an excessive amount of money for a trival tool.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
You really should have read the article. If what's said in the article is even partially true, it sure looks like Google acted in a pretty sleazy fashion. Apparently they were willing to boost this company's product until they realized how much money could be made from it, at which point they decided to build their own clone and give it away for free. It's like Netscape/IE all over again.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Funny)
Product Analyst: "Look at this gMove product, they are selling hundreds, maybe even thousands of copies. They're making a lot of money! We should do something about it."
VP of Development: "Okay, let's develop our own."
Accountant: "How much should we charge for it?"
Product Analyst: "Well, the makers of gMove believe that they could sell 50 million copies for $29.99- that's like 1 billion dollars!" (said while holding pinky finger to mouth, of course)
VP of Sales: "We could probably sell even more copies if it was cheaper"
Accountant steps out to go to the bathroom.
Product Analyst: "Imagine how many copies we could sell if it was free!!"
VP of Development: "Okay, let's do it! That'll really show 'em!"
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
It's not free. It comes with targetted adds and gets you hooked onto other google services that also come with targetted adds.
Plus, they get to undercut and destroy their competitors on the cheap (spend $200,000 now), since they don't need another potential Youtube situation (pay $3,000,000,000 to buy out a competitor later). Nipping competition in the butt is where it's at.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
Bud.
Nip it in the bud.
Before it develops.
Like a flower.
Flowering plants have buds.
Bud.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, you are correct
Better yet, your comment was
Almost a haiku
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
1. It's press release by the plaintiff's lawyers.
2. "until they realized how much money could be made from it, at which point they decided to build their own clone and give it away for free." WTF? That doesn't even make sense. We could make a fortune if we had this product, lets give it away for free and we'll all be rich!!! No. I'm not sure if Google cares _how_ the conversion is done, just that the users come to Google at some point in the transaction. A converter, while convenient if it's free, is just as valuable if somebody else sells it...as long as it it used.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, it's a press release, which is why I said "if it's even partially true", which it may not be.
As for what Google gets out of it, if they want people to use a converter obviously giving it away for free will result in a far higher adoption rate. They may also have wanted to add it as a free feature of their Premium service to make that service more attractive to potential customers.
The whole thing could be frivolous, but if the facts are as stated in the article (press release), then it's a sleazy thing
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
As you point out, Google's profit interest is in more migrations from Outlook. That means that anyone offering a Outloog migration tool is to Google's good. However, someone offering a converter for $$$ raises a barrier: some people won't pay for a converter; if they can't migrate for free they won't use Gmail. How do you overcome that barrier? Offer a converter for free. Yeah, the guys trying to sell their converter get shafted. But Google wins by getting more users who migrate off of Outlook.
That's the motivation point you seem to be neglecting. That's the ??? before "Profit!". In your words, that's WTF.
And yeah, I know, that's the story according to the plaintiff's legal team. We've unofficially heard one side of the story. (Yeah, unofficially. As you point out, it's a press release, not the actual filings.) So, there's obviously a lot more story to come. I hope Groklaw follows this one.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, since LimitNone's own website says that they are "...a leading provider of applications that leverage the revolutionary iPhone and other mobile devices to deliver communication solutions and GPS location-based services to mobile workers." this seems to be a bit of a failed business agreement rather than a stolen core of their business plan. Is it kind of sleazy to steal somebodies idea and make it better? Perhaps, but it depends on a lot of other factors. The talks sounded like they started over a year ago. That's a long time on the internet - maybe Google needed it done now. And conversion software isn't exactly a "novel" idea.
They may be truly wronged, but my money is on the likelihood that they put in the order for the new yacht and private plane before they had shipping product and paying customers and now they're figuring to get the phantom money they might have had by fishing with expensive lawyers.
Re:Get Rich (Score:4, Insightful)
1. It does not appear to be their corporate face (they do iPhone stuff)
2. They worked with Google for a year, then things went sour (Google made their own and LimitNone has no boxed product)
3. They suing for a Billion dollars, as opposed to, say, expenses (time and materials) during the working period, likely in the high-6 to low-7 figure range.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Unless google actually stole their CODE i don't see how there's much merrit here. I mean 'new or innovative' certainly doesn't apply to the concept of importing information from one email client to another.
Furthermore, it's google API's in gmail and the interaction with them is obviously standardized same with MS and exchange APIs. So yes, your method is going to be very similar to any competition by design.
At a guess things probably went more like
'hi google we're company XYZ and working on this nifty ex
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
2008-L-006828 LIMITNONE LLC GOOGLE INC 06/23/2008
https://w3.courtlink.lexisnexis.com/cookcounty/Finddock.asp?DocketKey=CAAI0L0AAGICI0LD [lexisnexis.com]
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Insightful)
Sleazy? Maybe. That depends on the he-said she-said details of the "I promise I won't" allegations. The only thing that matters is in the third to last paragraph of the press release:
Microsoft proved you can't steal look and feel (from Apple, anyway). Stealing functionality sounds like reverse engineering to me.I think it comes down to a quote from Richard Marx:
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Interesting)
Emphasis mine. How much money would Google make from their free product? Of course, reading more finds that the claim is that Google is integrating this into their paid product (Google Apps Premier) rather than giving it away for free. Perhaps you knew that, but it wasn't evident in what you said.
Incidentally, there is a better written article at http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9976405-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20 [cnet.com]
In particular, that article points out that LimitNone is claiming that it divulged technical secrets to Google that Google then used in making its own product. Also, Google apparently changed its Google Apps interface in May of 2008, which caused the gMove product to break. That's apparently the violation of Illinois consumer laws.
Is that related to the differences between Standard and Premier? Apparently Standard does not allow for third party integrations but Premier does. [google.com] Did Google tell LimitNone that the free version would always support gMove? If so, that will be interesting, as it will help to set expectations around how long Google, eBay, Amazon, etc. have to maintain API compatibility when they want to break it. All of them offer programs like this that allow third party developers to create apps that integrate with their platform. How long are those integrations warranted to work?
The real problem here is not in the relationship between Google and LimitNone but between Google and users of Apps standard edition. Google had been encouraging its users to pay $19 for this product but the functionality no longer works. Further, it apparently stopped working as a result of changes that Google made. If it turns out that it stopped working because Google started charging for something that it previously offered for free, should Google pay back the $19 to users?
Talk about a knee jerk reaction... (Score:5, Insightful)
If even half of their claims are founded in truth then this is a worthy lawsuit and Google acted in an 'evil' manner. I'll clue you in on something: not all lawsuits are bad. The mechanism exists for a reason.
Then again at least you admitted that you are totally uninformed on the subject since you didn't read the (short) article.
Re:Talk about a knee jerk reaction... (Score:5, Insightful)
You do realize you didn't read an article either, right?
Its a press-release. By the lawyers. Who are filing the lawsuit. How much of that $1B do you think they'll keep?
Re: (Score:2)
Yes I did read the short article and yes it was a press release. As I said, IF even HALF of what they claim is true then they seem to have a very good case.
Tort reform is another topic entirely and we might even agree on that.
Re: (Score:2)
use your brain (Score:2)
The fact that people can only say that "there is an equal chance it may or may not be right" shows how little information is truly there. Not even a slight lean that it's incorrect or correct or even factual. This is speculating on 0 information whatsoever.
Migrating people to gmail from any competitor makes sense for google, and it's good and all that but really there's no reason google can't offer their own migration tool (as is what it really sounds like). No reason this guy can't offer his own too. I don
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Maybe next they should sue Mozilla because Thunderbird can convert email from Outlook...
Re: (Score:2, Redundant)
It's not an article, it's a press release from the plaintiff's attorneys.
I mean, I guess press releases are sort of formatted kinda like news articles, but that doesn't mean they count.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Interesting)
A successful lawsuit against Google could be like the small pebble that causes a landslide.
$1B is a ridiculous amount of money for this lawsuit, but even at $10M, a successful suit would bring more lawsuits out of the woodwork.
And I'm willing to bet that once it happened, Microsoft would be more than happy to finance as many as possible.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
50 mil * $19 = $950 million
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Absolutely not. (Score:2, Insightful)
$1B is a ridiculous amount of money for this lawsuit, but even at $10M, a successful suit would bring more lawsuits out of the woodwork.
If it were only $10 million, Google would just take it out of their toilet paper and soft drink budget and forget about it and it would be business as usual: $10 million is nothing to a big monster mega-corp and it doesn't get any headlines like a BILLION DOLLAR award does. In other words, it only cost $10 million, shit! Let's do it again. Paying off a $10 million lawsuit
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
~$1B == 50,000,000 users * $19 per user.
50,000,000 users == the number of potential users, according to the "Google Exec" in the press release.
$19 per user == the price the plaintiff was going to sell the product for.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Insightful)
Obviously, the product is interesting if Google supposedly wanted to steal it.
Re: (Score:2)
You are being a bit dramatic.
There is really very little stopping one entity from suing another for any frivolous thing. Or from making a habit of it. So we get articles like this, or like the one not too long ago where that judge sued the dry cleaner for losing his pants, and people get really worked up about the litigation culture we have.
The problem is that few people pay attention long enough to see who wins what. While there are no doubt silly awards handed out every day, and even sillier settlements o
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
McDonalds had been warned several times by the FDA to lower the temperature of their coffee, as several people each year were severely burned by it. The woman was in the passenger seat, her son was driving, and they had pulled off to the side of the drive-thru so she could put sugar in the coffee. When opening the lid, the cup slipped and spilled on to her lap.
The woman suffered third degree burns over her thigh and groin area, totaling to be about 20% of her body, and second degree burns in her groin area.
She then contacted McDonalds, explaining the situation to them, and asked them to reimburse part of her medical bills (for burn treatment and skin grafts). They offered her $500. Since her bills were quickly climbing into the high tens of thousands of dollars, she sued for the cost of her medical expenses.
It was the jury that decided medical expenses were not enough, and awarded her punitive damages (to punish McDonalds) totaling one day's revenue in coffee sales. McDonalds appealed the decision, and an appellate judge overturned the punitive damages. She ended up getting somewhere around $200,000, which barely covered her medical expenses up to that point.
Sorry, that was very off topic, but that case is misused as an example for tort reform so often I felt it needed to be stated. There are other ridiculous cases, sure, but that really isn't one of them. More info here. [centerjd.org]
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Actually she got a total of $640,000 including cost of punitive damages. Her award for compensatory damages were reduced because, she was found partially at fault.
Honestly though, many people only take their coffee piping hot. And if every Tom, Dick, and Harry sued because something was too sharp, too hot, too cold, too blunt, too fast, too powerful, where would we be now. I should sue VW because I got a ticket for going 100mph.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Interesting)
McDonald's put special holes in their building to sell stuff to people in cars. The put scalding-hot coffee in flimsy, slippery cups with flimsy, slippery lids, and then give you cream and sugar separately. And they do this to early-morning, pre-caffeine zombies. It should not take a rocket scientist to figure out that if you do this millions of times a day, some people are going to end up in the hospital without expecting it.
VW plans for normal operator error in a host of ways. Good visibility. Good lights. Good user feedback through gauges, car feel, and road feel. Brakes and steering built to handle emergencies. Seat belts, frames, air bags, and a bunch of other little touches optimized for survival after error.
McDonald's, on the other hand, even after being told that they were putting people in the hospital unnecessarily, shrugged and carried on.
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There was one case (in Mississipi I think) where the dolts on the jury
added an extra zero to the amount requested by the plaintiffs. Pretty
much everyone objected to that verdict but it ultimately stood up
because that's what the jury wrote on a small piece of paper.
None of the appeals judges were willing to slay that sacred cow...
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The woman suffered third degree burns over her thigh and groin area, totaling to be about 20% of her body, and second degree burns in her groin area.
I'm not a doctor by any means, but I have had some biology and physics courses. There just isn't enough stored energy in a cup of coffee to do this.
A first degree burn has redness, swelling and sensitivity (think sunburn); A second degree burn shows blistering; third degree involves destruction of the outer layers of skin and charring of the flesh. At worst
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
You can, of course, look up the facts of the case and make sure I read them correctly, but third degree burns were cited as an injury.
In fact, during testimony, one of the Doctors brought in as an expert witness stated that at just ten degrees cool, the burns would have been very mild.
Re:Get Rich (Score:5, Informative)
1 second exposure to 160 degree water = third degree burns:
http://www.tap-water-burn.com/ [tap-water-burn.com]
McDonald's coffee was 185 degrees:
http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm [lectlaw.com]
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Rule 1 of Slashdot:
Do Not Post before determining that serum caffeine level is above minimal acceptable values for brain function
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Google gets sued by $foo_small_co:
Random Slashdotter: Damn legal system makes everyone thing they can ge rich by suing.
Microsoft gets sued by $bar_small_co:
Random Slashdotter: See?! I told you M$ was teh evil look how they tried to step on the small guy and squash them like a BUG under their giant boot of Orwellian global dominance!!!!
Slashdot gets sued by Random Slashdotter:
*World implodes*
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I love some of the Britishisms I see on the internet! In this case, though, Google failed me (Your search - arsewaddles - did not match any documents).
I love that new word, what does it mean?