Class action - evidence rulings

Yeah they all seem to have stopped exploding and running away and breaking the lightspeed barrier and all those other things that never really happened.

 

That's because GM are now number 1 again and back in profit!

 

"But Toyota attorney Lisa Gilford said some of the information that will be placed in evidence at trial is extremely sensitive and any leaks could severely damage Toyota's competitiveness."


What could there be about the car that's secret? How could there be anything about it that hasn't been reverse engineered? I seem to recall stories about Detroit manufacturers who took early hybrids to pieces, right down to each individual screw, estimated the cost of every tiny bit, and then spread stories about how no one could sell that much car that cheap, and therefore Toyota was taking a loss on each car they sold for the sake of the publicity the car brought.

 

Once each side has gather all the evidence it can and each side had assessed it's risks/rewards time/efforts they'll look at each other and say..'So whatya wanna do now?' ( from the article years and years ). Then each will argue that the other side will lose everything ( more years probably ). Then one side will blink and a solution will be offered and negotiated ( more years probably )..then accepted as an out of court settlement with neither side able to officially declare victory.

Most damning for the the plaintiffs IMO is the fact that after the few CTS pedals were 'fixed'...nothing, not a word has been heard on this matter since April 1st. Did all the vehicles suddenly cure themselves of these phantom electronic ailments?* Omigosh it's a miracle!!!!!!! Call Rhonda Smith.
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*Actually what has occured is that on any new complaints Toyota and the Feds are swooping in immediately and investigating each one, hoaxers and scammers and blame deflectors are laying low since Sikes, the Harrison Housekeeper and poor old Myrna from Milwaukee.

 

It still leaves me wondering what could possibly be in there that the big three don't already know about. Maybe some of the code?

 

It also could be the Toyota has agreed to keep thousands of jobs at New United Motor in Fremont. Fremont is home turf for the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, the powerful Fortney "Pete" Stark, and Dianne Feinstein.

 

GM is #1 ? ~ Welll . . . . maybe not ~ For the last whole year (2009) it seems VW passed both Toyota AND GM. But that's just the way it seems to be with GM & truth.

http://usnews.rankingsandreviews.co...-Toyota-s-Crown-as-World-s-Largest-Automaker/

Though GM now advertises they are again #1 ... you have to get a red flag when GM says anything. Sad thing about GM ... if/when you dig deep enough, you find what they REALLY mean, when they double speak. Take their famous "We Paid Back our Loans" commercial. Um, not exactly:

FOXNews.com - GM Could Be in Hot Water With FTC Over Truth in Advertising

Of course it's not likely that either the FTC or SEC will sue GM for false advertising that causes folks to buy GM stock. After all, the Fed's still own the Lion's share of GM. And that'd be silly for the Fed's to sue the Fed's. And since we the Fed's own most of GM, it's kind of like the Fed's advertising GM grey truth's. And we're all used to that any way.

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I think they are talking about the ECU software. There is a big difference between reverse engineering something by some company, which fact they have to keep secret and making trade secret information public. So Toyota would like to keep its trade secret -- a trade secret. Not everything a company designs is covered by a patent. By definition a patent is public, so that everyone know that they can’t make something similar. But a trade secret is not divulged to anyone, because it keeps them ahead of the game if no one knows about it or how it is done. Besides software reverse engineering is no that easy to do. I really doubt that anyone has bothered to do it. It takes a lot of resources and time, and probably not beneficial.

 

My assumption has been that people reporting issues have declined to comment as they would not want to run the risk of compromising their case through possible mis-statements. But, IANAL.

 

Actually, at least as of a few years ago (and I presume it continues), the (former) big-3 each disassembled a whole variety of vehicles in the normal course of business.

Some were their own vehicles after being driven a number of miles -- to check for adverse wear on parts, etc. Others were competitor cars. The teardowns in many cases were indeed to the last nut and bolt. Pieces were laid out attached to panels -- so that someone could follow how, say, an alternator was put together and with what components. This was a regular part of the business, not an on-and-off again practice.

Engineers and others from all around the company could come for the teardown itself (tedious) or for seeing the results. Due to an email-group mix-up which put me on the notice list, I received invites to these (though my function had nothing to do with it).

 

Patents are public because they're supposed to form a repository of knowledge for engineers to work from - known solutions to problems. You don't have to spend vast amounts of time re-engineering things that have already been done. In return for publishing the details, the inventor is supposed to be modestly compensated for his efforts. The invention is supposed to have an inventive step so that the patent library isn't cluttered with useless inventions and so that people are rewarded for some serious effort, not just something that anyone could have thought of.

The patent system has been perverted to the extent that people and companies have to spend vast amounts of time re-engineering it to avoid the patent minefield. In addition the patents are written in lawyerese rather than engineering language so it becomes impossible for an engineer to determine accurately whether this is actually a useful technique, or whether he will infringe. Finally, the ruling that triple damages apply if the infringement was 'wilful', which has been judged to mean that he read the patent in question, means that engineers do not read patents for fear of punitive treatment. 'Modest' compensation is frequently misjudged by the patent owner (Qualcomm reportedly wanted many times the amount for their two patents they claimed H.264 infringes on, than all the rest of the patent holders put together.)

The system is flat-out not doing what it was designed for, not fit for purpose, and should be overhauled if not scrapped.

Reverse engineering is not terribly difficult, it's just time consuming. I've worked around some manufacturers' APIs on a handheld computer where there were nasty race conditions, going right down to the OS level to avoid them. It's much less time-consuming if you have a good decompiler such as IDA Pro. It supports the V850 microcontrollers (formerly from NEC, now Renesas) that Toyota use in the HV and Engine ECUs.

 

I mainly agree about these lawsuits, but Toyota has really stepped over the line in confidential information. Most things that are really confidential can be redacted. Information about reports of safety defects seem to be included in Toyota's idea of what is confidential. They also have argued that what the black box records is confidential. At least the laws are changing so they can't keep that confidential trade secret.

The numbers are quite clear that toyota must have been losing money in the beginning years of the prius. There is nothing wrong with that. Those losses helped provide information for the profitable well engineered car it is today. I doubt the article was even true when the article was published. Car companies often make money losing cars to test out new technology or to drive people to show rooms. And opposed to what the article said, the sucess of the prius may be pushing those sustainable technologies of plug-in hybrids and EVs.