On Friday, Waymo filed a list of 461 questions it intends to ask Anthony Levandowski — a former employee it's accusing of downloading 14,000 proprietary files and bringing those trade secrets to Uber — during trial this fall.
Note: Waymo, Alphabet's self-driving car unit, notes in the document that this is a preliminary list as it's still waiting to receive additional documents from Uber to review. It also expects Levandowski to plead the Fifth in response to many of these questions.
Google and Facebook are set to join a "day of action" next week opposing the proposed rollback of Obama-era net neutrality rules. Their planned activities remain unknown. The list of companies participating in the action includes Netflix and Amazon.
Why it matters: Tech companies were a major force pushing for these rules, which were approved in 2015. This is a sign that the two biggest players on the internet are willing to put their weight behind keeping them in place — at least to some extent.
Alphabet's self-driving car unit, Waymo, has asked a court to dismiss three of its four patent infringement claims against Uber, according to new court documents.
Waymo is currently suing Uber, claiming that the ride-hailing company is using stolen trade secrets it acquired when it bought a company last year founded by former Waymo employees.
Note: While Waymo is permanently dropping these three claims over one of Uber's sensors, Fuji, it's not doing so for the Spider — a sensor design Uber began to work on but says it has abandoned. Waymo wants to reserve the ability to bring up this claim again should Uber decide to begin using the sensor again.
The story has been updated to clarify which sensor specific the changes apply to.
Comma.ai, a San Francisco autonomous driving startup, is taking the next step in its strategy to gather data about as many car models as possible through its customers — a critical step to make its software universally compatible and allow any car to drive itself.
"If we wanna make a car self-driving, we need a way to talk to it," founder and CEO George Hotz said in an interview. "We need to be able to control your car."
So far, Comma.ai has been gathering data about roads and human driving through its Chffr dashcam app and OpenPilot software, which works with its Neo device. Now it's releasing two new products — its Panda car dongle is now publicly on sale and can be used with its new analytics software, Cabana — to get more information on cars themselves.
President Trump, currently in Germany for the G20 summit with other global leaders, tweeted Friday that "everyone here" is talking about how John Podesta (former chairman of Hillary Clinton's campaign) didn't turn over the DNC server to the FBI after it was believed to be hacked by the Russians:
"Everyone here is talking about why John Podesta refused to give the DNC server to the FBI and the CIA. Disgraceful!"
Earlier this week, Podesta told Fox News that it was the DNC's responsibility to hand over the server, and that he fulfilled his obligations by turning over Clinton's private servers. The DNC also emphasized today that Podesta "never ran the DNC."
Why it matters: President Trump will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin this afternoon, and the meeting could get awkward if they focus on Russia's alleged hacking of the 2016 election — especially if all of the other leaders are talking about it.
