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Heise.de: NVIDIA’s new NDA attacks journalistic work

llien

Member
NVIDIA only gave 2 days to journalists to sign new NDA. The document describes how confidential information should be used by journalists and other parties. The German website Heise.de, claims that the new document attacks journalistic principles. In fact, their legal team ‘has clapped their hands over their heads as they read the document’.

The new NDA does not refer to any particular product, such as upcoming GeForce. It does, however, outline how new products or events should be reported — and here’s the real problem.

NVIDIA’s new NDA basically says that any confidential information provided to the party must be used solely for the benefit of NVIDIA‘. This could be understood in many ways, but for a journalist sharing confidential information does not always mean reporting in favor of the new product, sometimes it is the opposite. So does criticism break new NDA? Heise.de is worried this could prevent journalists from writing whatever they want.

Furthermore, new NDA also imposes 5-year expiration on confidential information. Journalists from Heise are concerned this could keep their mouth shut for 5 years should they decide to sign it.

NVIDIA’s new NDA also mentions trade secrets, which are never to be talked about. This could theoretically prevent a journalist from sharing confidential information gathered from other sources. Especially when the same documents prevents journalists from posting ‘hypothesis’ or ‘predictions’ based on confidential information.

The Heise.de team has decided not to sign the document. This will prevent them from obtaining samples for future products.

 

Ar¢tos

Member
AMD must be doing something well, if Nvidia is at this stage of desperately trying to control the media.
 

Nikodemos

Member
Doesn't surprise me. Jen-Hsun Huang has always been a shitbird.

Remember when Detonator drivers had cheat code which made synthetic benchmarks put up higher numbers than ATI?
 

LegendOfKage

Gold Member
NVIDIA’s new NDA basically says that any confidential information provided to the party must be used solely for the benefit of NVIDIA‘. This could be understood in many ways, but for a journalist sharing confidential information does not always mean reporting in favor of the new product, sometimes it is the opposite.

"After signing the NDA, we tested Nvidia's new product, and it sucks. It's crap, and AMD's new video card is way better. We tell you this, solely for the benefit of Nvidia, so they'll be encouraged to stop making crap video cards, and being a crap company, with a crap NDA that is completely anti-consumer garbage."

Do you think that would work? I'm guessing not, but whether an action is to the "benefit" of someone is pretty darn subjective.
 

LordOfChaos

Member
Nvidia with a strong market/performance per watt lead is worse than Sony. Balls sake.

The best way to fight this is a strong competitor, come on Navi, don't be a turd. Heck, it's why I welcome Intel to the GPU space in case AMD shits the bed.
 

Dunki

Member
here is the part I do not understand ANY journalistic site or organisation should NEVER sign these kind of contracts. to make clear they are independent. Signing such NDA's are not consumer friendly nor do they help with the credibility of the site.
 

diablos991

Can’t stump the diablos
This looks like a standard NDA.
This reeks of “journalists” not understanding boilerplate NDA language or grasping for a story.
 

klosos

Member
See am ready to change from Nvidia back to AMD , this anti consumer bollocks needs to stop, the only way they will learn is to hit them in the pocket.

all AMD as to do is bring out a card which performs well against Nvidia , then i will go back to AMD maybe even buy a new freesync monitor as well.
 

LordOfChaos

Member
Ironically, nvidia DOES have a strong competitor product.

They've been riding more above than historical average, on market share at any rate.

jpr_q3_2016_amd_vs_nvda_SHARES_575px.png
 
I have no sympathy for journalists since they're responsible for this, I have no sympathy for dumbistanese (americans) since they have no rights or laws protecting them by their own fault and cowardliness, but if ever Nvidia was to try to do something like that in civilised places that matters, European or Asian countries oh yeah that would be a problem...quickly fixed by the common sensed laws so...
 

A.Romero

Member
This looks like a standard NDA.
This reeks of “journalists” not understanding boilerplate NDA language or grasping for a story.


It reads exactly like a regular NDA.

Most agreements will read something like this, it doesn't mean it is enforceable or even if companies bother to try to enforce it.

That said, I also think Nvidia is trying the wrong things. I'm glad they decided to reverse their push to remove gaming from AMD products.
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
It reads exactly like a regular NDA.

Most agreements will read something like this, it doesn't mean it is enforceable or even if companies bother to try to enforce it.

That said, I also think Nvidia is trying the wrong things. I'm glad they decided to reverse their push to remove gaming from AMD products.

Standard NDA’s force you to say only good things and apply for years AFTER the product is public? Really?
 
Standard NDA’s force you to say only good things and apply for years AFTER the product is public? Really?

It's only referring to confidential information per the way it is worded. So, a journalist could very well say a card is terrible, so long as they don't also reference any confidential information when they do it. So basically, they can't get an early look at some new tech and write something negative about it. They can go and get a card from a store once it is released (or reference publicly available information at that time) and say whatever they want about it.

As others have said, this kind of thing is fairly common when dealing with tech. I think this is blowing up and people are having kneejerk reactions because of the other shitty things Nvidia has done (and yes, they certainly have done shitty anti-competitive and anti-consumer things).
 

A.Romero

Member
Standard NDA’s force you to say only good things and apply for years AFTER the product is public? Really?

Standard NDA's do say that you can only use the information to benefit of the brand holder. It's pretty standard. However, this tends to be very difficult to enforce.

From this article: https://www.forbes.com/sites/allbus...ts-of-non-disclosure-agreements/#10403474627d

In business, there are numerous instances in which you may want to share confidential information with another party. But the key to doing so safely is making sure that the other party is bound to respect the confidential information you provide them and not use it to your detriment.

The same about the length the NDA is supposed to be valid, it varies depending the case (as well as the scope) but yes, it can be 5 years.

From the same article:

Most agreements that I see (if they have a term) have a time limit of two to five years. But your NDA also needs to say that, even if the term is ended, the disclosing party isn’t giving up any other rights that it may have under copyright, patent, or other intellectual property laws.

I found this in a 30 seconds Google Search. If their legal team is appalled by those terms then they are probably not a very good legal team and the NDA is the least of their problems.

This is something that anyone that has participated in any beta, has read the NDA and paid attention should know. The same for anyone working with for example IT or buying/selling tech stuff. At least that's where I got this information as I'm not a lawyer.

That said, journalism should not be tied to an NDA, simple as that. They sign it because there are perks about being on the good side of the big brands like receiving early prototypes. They can continue reporting on any issue they want without signing anything. However, people in the industry love to call themselves journalists but are not ready to behave like one.

Isn't that what Kotaku did? Just never sign any NDA because they won't commit to hold any information? I don't like Kotaku but in my mind it's the only stance a true independent media channel can take. The moment you sign an NDA and have to play by the rules of the companies or people you are trying to report on, you stop being a journalist and become a marketing channel.
 

joe_zazen

Member
here is the part I do not understand ANY journalistic site or organisation should NEVER sign these kind of contracts. to make clear they are independent. Signing such NDA's are not consumer friendly nor do they help with the credibility of the site.

Well now you know any site getting Nvidia sample cards is a POS site with no morals.
 
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joe_zazen

Member
It's only referring to confidential information per the way it is worded. So, a journalist could very well say a card is terrible, so long as they don't also reference any confidential information when they do it. So basically, they can't get an early look at some new tech and write something negative about it. They can go and get a card from a store once it is released (or reference publicly available information at that time) and say whatever they want about it.

As others have said, this kind of thing is fairly common when dealing with tech. I think this is blowing up and people are having kneejerk reactions because of the other shitty things Nvidia has done (and yes, they certainly have done shitty anti-competitive and anti-consumer things).

You a lawyer?
 

Panajev2001a

GAF's Pleasant Genius
It's only referring to confidential information per the way it is worded. So, a journalist could very well say a card is terrible, so long as they don't also reference any confidential information when they do it. So basically, they can't get an early look at some new tech and write something negative about it. They can go and get a card from a store once it is released (or reference publicly available information at that time) and say whatever they want about it.

As others have said, this kind of thing is fairly common when dealing with tech. I think this is blowing up and people are having kneejerk reactions because of the other shitty things Nvidia has done (and yes, they certainly have done shitty anti-competitive and anti-consumer things).

Again, applying for years after the product is public? What does it mean criticising yes but without using specific information... that part is semi standard yes and while you could talk about it’s enforceability I see a case a judge would not throw out of court and a lot of money being spent by a site much much smaller than nVIDIA to defend itself (not the first case of the ol’ “will sue you until you give up” tactic if you even have a modicum of a leg to stand on at all).

“So basically, they can't get an early look at some new tech and write something negative about it.” hence sites receiving cards and doing previews before launch are to be assumed to be anti consumer hype driving machines trying to get you to buy something and gain clicks/ad money in the meantime by definition. Not a rumor, not speculation, but a clear fact.
 
Again, applying for years after the product is public? What does it mean criticising yes but without using specific information... that part is semi standard yes and while you could talk about it’s enforceability I see a case a judge would not throw out of court and a lot of money being spent by a site much much smaller than nVIDIA to defend itself (not the first case of the ol’ “will sue you until you give up” tactic if you even have a modicum of a leg to stand on at all).

“So basically, they can't get an early look at some new tech and write something negative about it.” hence sites receiving cards and doing previews before launch are to be assumed to be anti consumer hype driving machines trying to get you to buy something and gain clicks/ad money in the meantime by definition. Not a rumor, not speculation, but a clear fact.

That’s exactly it. If all these so called “journalists” would refuse to sign it, then it wouldn’t be an issue - Nvidia would still want the press hype cycle, and would have to adjust. Unfortunately, there are not many “game journalists” that are actually journalists - they have no idea what journalistic integrity is. Most of them are at best hobbyists (and some are even worse - fanboys) that get paid to write articles. And many of them have to know that they are simply cogs in the hype machine.
 

The_Mike

I cry about SonyGaf from my chair in Redmond, WA
So the cycle continues.
AMD are fighting an uphill battle when people think like you and ignore all the anti-consumer practices they employ.

I'm sorry but it's their own fault. I've burned my hard earned money too many times on AMD graphic cards
 
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