John Carmack Uses Mac Only Under Duress

FrgMstr

FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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The team at UpLoadVR has some coverage on the ZeniMax vs. Oculus case working its way through the process here in north Texas. While there is little to actually report on, this tidbit posted is at least worth a laugh, maybe.

A MacBook was brought up during questioning as well, with the lawyer asking why it was never wiped, with Carmack responding: “I am not a Mac user unless under duress.”

I am sure that many of us here understand Carmack's feelings, however I would not have made that call considering all his past Apple love.
 
wasn't doom 3 developed on Mac?

anyway, lots of people (myself included) have moved away from Apple in the past few years so it's not too surprising..
 
Aspyr did the mac port of Doom 3 (after the windows version came out).
 
Zepharus said:
This guy is guilty as fuck. Love or hate the corporate system you cant take your shit with you when you go
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That's really what the case here boils down to. Did he do Oculus work while at Zenimax on Zenimax machines. If they prove he did, Facebook will probably lose this one.

At the company I work for (oil and gas equipment manufacturer), we had an engineer leave for a competitor and basically raid our engineering drawing library. He didn't just make copies of his designs. He made copies of everything. We couldn't prove it though and just had to defend their strangely similar designs through patent law. A huge amount of security was added after that. All drawings were moved to digital with tons of tracking ability and hard copies moved behind lock and key, only top executives having access.
 
Zepharus said:
This guy is guilty as fuck. Love or hate the corporate system you cant take your shit with you when you go
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I wouldn't go so far as to call him "guilty as fuck" but I think the people saying Zenimax is just fishing for money are dead wrong. Yes, the restitution they are going for is well above what they would deserve or get, but that's typical in cases like this. Similar cases often settle for 10% or less of face value. The reasoning makes sense - utilizing resources to create that kind of wealth removes that possibility from the original company which could be untold billions. Actual valuation is for the court to decide. More importantly, the laws are pretty straightforward for this, and the evidence Zenimax is providing - most of which is sealed so as to make a settlement more attractive to the other side - is pretty solid from a legal standpoint. If you hate Zenimax, this kind of lawyering, or dispute how the legal framework works for issues like this, that's fine, but that doesn't change the fact that in the current situation their claim is far from weak. IMHO from the few courses of contract law I had at university, a settlement with only $ details released is a likely outcome if Zenimax has what I think they do.
 
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I love this. What a totally awesome answer.

"One line of questioning asked whether Carmack knew about a “secret meeting” in a hotel room with Oculus co-founders Nate Mitchell and Palmer Luckey, to which Carmack responded “No I didn’t, it was a secret.”

http://uploadvr.com/john-carmack-oculus-zenimax-oath/

John Carmack is the man. Drop the mic and move along, John.
 
Burticus said:
I love this. What a totally awesome answer.

"One line of questioning asked whether Carmack knew about a “secret meeting” in a hotel room with Oculus co-founders Nate Mitchell and Palmer Luckey, to which Carmack responded “No I didn’t, it was a secret.”

http://uploadvr.com/john-carmack-oculus-zenimax-oath/

John Carmack is the man. Drop the mic and move along, John.
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Yeah, that one gave me a chuckle too.
 
Yeah, the premise of the whole thing was that the dialog between Carmack and the attorney got rather heated.

I'm most definitely going to use that one for myself sometime though :)

I'm interested to see how this will play out as well. There are some points that fall towards Oculus' and Carmacks favor, especially the bit about how Carmack attempted to convince Zeni to invest in Oculus or allow him to create a headset for the company, which they refused. This one also doesn't seem so cut and dry with an employer owning the employees ideas due to a contract Carmack had in place with them which only pertained to certain things.

https://uploadvr.com/zenimax-case-oculus-complaint/
http://uploadvr.com/oculus-statement-zenimax-lawsuit/
 
Burticus said:
I love this. What a totally awesome answer.

"One line of questioning asked whether Carmack knew about a “secret meeting” in a hotel room with Oculus co-founders Nate Mitchell and Palmer Luckey, to which Carmack responded “No I didn’t, it was a secret.”

http://uploadvr.com/john-carmack-oculus-zenimax-oath/

John Carmack is the man. Drop the mic and move along, John.
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That is fucking sig worthy!
 
sboucher said:
Yeah, the premise of the whole thing was that the dialog between Carmack and the attorney got rather heated.

I'm most definitely going to use that one for myself sometime though :)

I'm interested to see how this will play out as well. There are some points that fall towards Oculus' and Carmacks favor, especially the bit about how Carmack attempted to convince Zeni to invest in Oculus or allow him to create a headset for the company, which they refused. This one also doesn't seem so cut and dry with an employer owning the employees ideas due to a contract Carmack had in place with them which only pertained to certain things.

https://uploadvr.com/zenimax-case-oculus-complaint/
http://uploadvr.com/oculus-statement-zenimax-lawsuit/
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but that isn't how it works. If you work for Nintendo and they half make a Mario game and decide fo scrap it that doesn't mean that you can take it, finish it on your own and release it as Super Mario Bros 4. Also if you are being paid to work and instead use the company computer to make a game, getting others in other departments to make you stuff for the game Nintendo can say that they have ownership of the game.

same here. If ID was working on a VR headset and the bosses weren't interested in seeing it through the rest of the way after putting X amount of money into it, you can't just say well they don't want it but I do and take it with you when you quit. Because no matter what, that is their device.
 
well i think what happened was he was so used to being able to do whatever he wanted, he just used what was in front of him. probably didnt even think about it like this really.
 
Exavior said:
but that isn't how it works. If you work for Nintendo and they half make a Mario game and decide fo scrap it that doesn't mean that you can take it, finish it on your own and release it as Super Mario Bros 4. Also if you are being paid to work and instead use the company computer to make a game, getting others in other departments to make you stuff for the game Nintendo can say that they have ownership of the game.

same here. If ID was working on a VR headset and the bosses weren't interested in seeing it through the rest of the way after putting X amount of money into it, you can't just say well they don't want it but I do and take it with you when you quit. Because no matter what, that is their device.
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But you can take the knowledge and what you learned with you. You just can't take the IP that was developed (even partially). Unless they have a strong non-compete with our projects (scrapped or not) in place.
 
Spidey329 said:
But you can take the knowledge and what you learned with you. You just can't take the IP that was developed (even partially). Unless they have a strong non-compete with our projects (scrapped or not) in place.
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But that isn't what this case is about. This case is about him actually taking files off of the computers and taking those with him. He even supposedly came back a week after no longer being employed by ID and took files from them. So it is about him taking the actual IP with him.
 
Totally agree with him. I only use the fracking things at work when I have to help the poor bastards who they make use them. :vulcan:
 
Nauseous said:
well i think what happened was he was so used to being able to do whatever he wanted, he just used what was in front of him. probably didnt even think about it like this really.
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I think this is really the heart of the issue. I believe, if I read it correctly, that Carmacks employment agreement had a rather narrow focus on what would be considered Zeni IP. Although it sounds as though Carmack was using company computers for what he didn't consider Zeni's IP due to that contract, because that is just what was in front on him. Like how many of you have company computers, or phones, that you take home or use? Seems Zeni is holding onto the perspective that because it was on their company assets, it belongs to them.
 
Exavior said:
but that isn't how it works. If you work for Nintendo and they half make a Mario game and decide fo scrap it that doesn't mean that you can take it, finish it on your own and release it as Super Mario Bros 4. Also if you are being paid to work and instead use the company computer to make a game, getting others in other departments to make you stuff for the game Nintendo can say that they have ownership of the game.
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Except that is not what happened here.

Take for example, I work in Warehousing and Inventory management. On the side, I take up some computer programming and write some software that could be useful in my line of work. I offer to license or sell it to my employer, which they decline. So I show it to a different software company that decides they like it, and to hire me. Now in my previous position, software programming wasn't something I was hired to do or part of my job description. Does that company own any of the rights to the software I wrote, even if it was inspired from my experiences working for them? Probably not. But what if I wrote the software on the company issued laptop, on my own time?

It's an interesting case..
 
Interesting change of heart. Back in the day the original demo of Quake 3 was only available on the Mac. He later wrote the first X windows port to OSX.
 
sboucher said:
Except that is not what happened here.

Take for example, I work in Warehousing and Inventory management. On the side, I take up some computer programming and write some software that could be useful in my line of work. I offer to license or sell it to my employer, which they decline. So I show it to a different software company that decides they like it, and to hire me. Now in my previous position, software programming wasn't something I was hired to do or part of my job description. Does that company own any of the rights to the software I wrote, even if it was inspired from my experiences working for them? Probably not. But what if I wrote the software on the company issued laptop, on my own time?

It's an interesting case..
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What do you mean that isn't what is happening here? ZeniMax is suing Oculus for theft of their code and IP. The entire lawsuit is about ID software and Zenimax working on VR technology. it not making it all the way to production and then the people working on it leaving and go to Oculus where they made a VR headset. ZeniMax is claiming that these people stole code from their job at ID working on this technology, and tried to delete stuff off of the servers. Do you not understand that actual basis of the lawsuit?

Also for your example. Depending on what your terms of employment state they might own the rights to it. If you work for a game studio and work on a game on the side, depending on your contract they might own the rights to it. In some cases terms only state that you have to give them first dibs at licensing whatever you make outside of work if it is within the same area that they produce products for. And in some cases whatever you do is your own. However none of that applies to anything you do on the clock at your job and when being paid to do something. If you are being paid to develop VR technology that is not yours.
 
Exavior said:
What do you mean that isn't what is happening here? ZeniMax is suing Oculus for theft of their code and IP. The entire lawsuit is about ID software and Zenimax working on VR technology. it not making it all the way to production and then the people working on it leaving and go to Oculus where they made a VR headset. ZeniMax is claiming that these people stole code from their job at ID working on this technology, and tried to delete stuff off of the servers. Do you not understand that actual basis of the lawsuit?
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There is a lengthy discussion going on in the Oculus forums (no surprise) about this.

This post I came across sums it up rather nicely:

"Everywhere Zenimax says "Zenimax IP", they are actually referring to Carmack's personal knowledge and work he did on vr which he released publicly, not just to oculus. Zenimax has no IP at all related to the rift. Carmack worked on it, not zenimax. The word proprietary is stressed by zenimax all over, but they don't seem to get that carmack was publicly giving knowledge away, not just giving to oculus. Public knowledge is not proprietary.

As for any zenimax resources used by Carmack for his moonlighting, zenimax allowed them the leeway because the alternative was firing Carmack and losing him or reigning him in and watching him quit. Zenimax purposely allowed Carmack to work on personal projects. That negates any claim they have to anything Carmack did that wasn't specific to a zenimax project. The work that Carmack did for Armadillo Aerospace while in the id office backs this up. Zenimax doesn't claim to own that work.

Nor did Oculus LCC or anyone else ever seek knowledge from zenimax, they seeked knowledge from Carmack. The lawsuit keeps laughably using the word "zenimax" in place of "carmack".

The Palmer NDA and Zenimax's own failed vr research are just left over artifacts from the time zenimax thought they were going to pursue VR. They stopped pursing it. For zenimax to dig up an old NDA for a relationship zenimax abandoned is laughable.

Palmer's rift prototype came after zenimax gave up and included nothing from zenimax. Palmer had to go it alone because companies like zenimax that he tried to work with all abandoned the project. Carmack's help came after this point, carmack's help was not tied to any zenimax projects."
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Exavior said:
Also for your example. Depending on what your terms of employment state they might own the rights to it. If you work for a game studio and work on a game on the side, depending on your contract they might own the rights to it. In some cases terms only state that you have to give them first dibs at licensing whatever you make outside of work if it is within the same area that they produce products for. And in some cases whatever you do is your own. However none of that applies to anything you do on the clock at your job and when being paid to do something. If you are being paid to develop VR technology that is not yours.
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And this is precisely what happened here, Carmacks employment contract apparently had a narrow focus with regards to Zenimax projects. Also, we have no idea whether or not Carmack did anything for Oculus "on the clock". Carmack is not your typical low level flunky here boys, he's the kind of guy that works where and when he wants and as stated in the post I quoted above by 42LifeEverything in Reddit, ZeniMax took no issue with him working on other side projects such as Armadillo Aerospace.

As for Carmack attempting to delete stuff off servers. That has yet to be proved, and I would suspect there is a whole lot of hyperbole here, which is pretty typical of a high stakes case like this.

So yes, my understanding of the basis of the lawsuit is pretty clear. And honestly I think the only thing ZeniMax has going for it, is that they filed it in the state of Texas.
 
purefun65 said:
I called this in another thread; having served on civil jury trials before.
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You were saying Carmack copied files illegally, but it seems as though he did nothing wrong and it was Luckey that made the boo-boo... unless I'm reading the article incorrectly?
 
Youn said:
You were saying Carmack copied files illegally, but it seems as though he did nothing wrong and it was Luckey that made the boo-boo... unless I'm reading the article incorrectly?
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Exactly. No mention of Carmack whatsoever in the verdict, only Palmer and Iribe. Oculus intends to appeal, Zenimax is threatening to file for injunction..

I anticipate this is going to go on for awhile, and in the end, the only money exchange will be between these two companies and their lawyers.
 
$500-mil because Carmack was too lazy to bring in a personal laptop with his VR hobby files and made the mistake of letting them touch his company PC.
 
DPI said:
$500-mil because Carmack was too lazy to bring in a personal laptop with his VR hobby files and made the mistake of letting them touch his company PC.
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sorry but Carmack was a Zenimax employee the minute he sold id software to Zenimax back in 2009.

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2009/06/bethesda-softworks-parent-zenimax-media-acquires-id-software/

Whatever Carmack develops as an employee of Zenimax at Zenimax offices using their infrastructure is the sole property of Zenimax. If Carmack wanted to have full ownership of the VR stuff he was developing he needed to do it at his home using his personal computer. In fact ideally he should have not discussed anything about the VR stuff he developed with Zenimax if he wanted full ownership of it .
 
Half a billion here, half a billion there. Sooner or later it starts to be real money.
 
So have they proven anything used by Oculus was developed/stolen by Carmack (developed when he was at Zenimax)?

Or is this NDA 500 million just the judge getting greased?
 
raghu78 said:
Whatever Carmack develops as an employee of Zenimax at Zenimax offices using their infrastructure is the sole property of Zenimax. If Carmack wanted to have full ownership of the VR stuff he was developing he needed to do it at his home using his personal computer. In fact ideally he should have not discussed anything about the VR stuff he developed with Zenimax if he wanted full ownership of it .
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He must of skimmed through that part of the contract and blindly signed it... it happens to rookies, this is like the second company he worked for.
 
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