Since when are ideas copyrighted?
Marc used HIS code and HIS resources (the only illegal thing he did was breach of contract), WTF were the legal basis of the twin's lawsuit beyond entitlement and Ivy League connections (wanna bet a normal person with no money submitting this lawsuit would have been laughed out of the courtroom?).
How's this not straight up extortion?!!
For someone like Zuckerberg, the amount is nothing compared to the risk.
There was no "contract" to beach by any reasonable standards, but what if they just happen to pick a jury that sympathizes with the good-looking fratboys and hates the weird-looking nerd guy? Zuckerberg could lose billions as well as, much more importantly, control of his own creation.
If there's even a 5% chance the Winklevii could pull it off, that'd amount to a risk worth maybe $100million to a multibillionaire
In short, they settled rather than accept the risk, however tiny, that the Winklevii might actually win (even though there's also the chance, much better than average, that the Winklevii would then lose on appeal - there was no contract under US law).
I'm not saying Zuckerberg should've taken his chances in court (he was wise to settle). I'm just saying a system where such possibility is real enough to force a settlement sucks (wanna bet selected jury members would be computer illiterate yahoos likely to vote for Kanye West for president?)!!!
shareI'm not saying Zuckerberg should've taken his chances in court (he was wise to settle). I'm just saying a system where such possibility is real enough to force a settlement sucks
Ideas are always copyrighted. In essence, everything that is copyrighted is an idea.
shareIdeas are always copyrighted. In essence, everything that is copyrighted is an idea.
That's straight up BS!
To be patented and thus copyrighted, you have to present an implementation (even if theoretical only) of the idea.
Otherwise, anyone could go ahead and copyright any possible future toy or device or application (time travel device, space travel ships, flying boards, cyborgs, etc) and extort the people whom actually make these things possible.
You're confusing copyrights and patents. I can't decide right now to copyright interstellar travel and extort its future inventors, but when Gene Roddenberry created the Starship Enterprise, that ship was immediately copyrighted.
To be honest, I don't know what classification Facebook would have, but I don't think it matters since this is not a copyright lawsuit but a suit against Mark for breaking their informal contract.
You would defend a snake like him. So he steals someone else's idea and stalls it to make his own.Then he tries to screw over his first investor that got his stolen idea off the ground. This guy is a sociopath and a thief. The Bernie Madoff of the internet world.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
So he steals someone else's idea
You had friendster but nothing about the whole social network for college kids to communicate.The twins had the basic design,right?He just needed to code. Yea,they did steal your idea if they came to you to code the website and then you create your own website with their exact idea, while stalling their website.He also tried to screw over his first investor. A real bastard.Of course there are a lot of snakes like him in business.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
You're still not getting it. Millions of college kids could think "we need a social network to communicate". The idea itself is worthless. "He just needed to code." THAT IS THE WHOLE PRODUCT. There's no such thing as "just" coding.
Ideas are worthless in business. Their implementation is everything.
Did he use any of the Winklevosses' design ideas? No.
Did he use any of their code? No.
Did he violate a written contract specifying exclusivity? No.
Was the product (vague as it was) patented? No.
The Winklevosses' idea was a dating site for Harvard kids. That's not what Facebook was ever intended as.
Their idea was vague and stealing it is impossible.
Mark might be a jerk but the Winklevii had no case against him. They were just bitter he could do what they couldn't.
So he just happened to have the same idea around the same time when they presented it?Whether its within the law or not, I could care. He still stole the idea.And he tried to screw over his first investor. Are you his publicist? Stick up for thieving pieces of crap.Its funny he never had the idea for so called facebook any other time but after he met the twins. The twins did a piss poor job of protecting their ideas that's for sure. They should have put a lot of contract in place before revealing anything.But he is still a thief.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
He didn't steal their idea. He took their original idea and made it better. What they had in mind for "Harvard Connection" was essentially an online Finals Club. If they had succeeded in implementing it as described, it would have only been used by Harvard students and alumni. Even if similar websites had taken off at other schools, it wouldn't be anywhere near what Facebook is now.