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Samsung Vs. Apple Tit-For-Tat Down Under
New submitter GumphMaster writes "In the latest edition of the Apple vs. Samsung patent fight, the ABC is reporting that Samsung has filed in Australian and Japanese courts seeking an injunction to halt sales of the iPhone 4S for alleged 3G patent violations. It remains to be seen whether Samsung has any better luck with the retaliatory strike in Australian and Japanese courts than it did with courts in the Netherlands. Unfortunately, I expect that Samsung will fail partly because of overseas precedent, but mostly because their patents are sane, technical and narrow in scope (unlike the patent-a-rectangle nature of the opposition). If this stupidity ever stops, then millions of dollars, euro, or Won that are being spent on lawyers might actually go into the innovation that patents are meant to promote. Who knows where that might lead?"
Not going to let Samsung do that, too...
At least Apple didn't try to patent wireless data transfer.... Samsung has a patent (of course invalid) that covers pretty much all radio communications.... There is not good or bad, they all are bad, and lawyers win as usual....
Can we have a description that isn't plainly biased toward either Apple or Samsung with these patent lawsuit stories?
As previously stated, it's not a patent on round-rects:
Well, MS wasn't 'wrong' in the 80's; Apple just wrote a poor contract that technically allowed them to use a desktop-style OS... after having paid Xerox for it in stock. MS just used shrewd business practices. IMO, they were unethical, but perfectly legal. Samsung, on the other hand, doesn't have such a contract, so I'm not sure how they're going to get away with this. I'd hate to see computing go straight from the MS dark ages to the Android dark ages.
> Except nobody bar a few design students with incredible vision (but without the support of large companies) knew it at all. If it was obvious then early 1990s tablet PCs would have soon had the same design.
Oh you mean like the PADDs in STNG or the ones in all sorts of other SciFi since the 80s. They are the ones with the vision, the SciFi writers, producers and set designers. Apple just managed implementation.
I'm so glad to see Slashdot his picked a side in this patent battle. I guess we'll just safely assume that Samsung only tried to submarine the entire 3G standard in retaliation of Apple's legal moves and would have never pulled that shit with less than noble intentions. I guess whenever Apple gets mad because one of their biggest business partners is aping their design cues and ripping off their trade dress, that they are trying to patent rectangles and smother innovation.
Got it.
Maybe if you actually read the patent and had some imagination you'd realize that there are different ways of doing things.
Apple's design process: let's do lots of research as to what works and doesn't, both in software and hardware.
Samsung's design process: let's copy Apple's.
Can Samsung's UX team point out exactly how they designed all of Samsung's hardware and software? Why do their icons look that way? Why have the sheen/gloss instead of a flat look? Why not make the icons circular vignettes instead of rounded squares? Why taper the back of your device just so?
They can't, because their work is basically Apple's work.
Samsung's UX and R&D team are sitting in Cupertino inside 1 Infinite Loop. Their secondary teams are in a Samsung facility sitting around and changing some little things here and there.
Have you ever seen any interviews with their design and UX teams? No. That's because they don't exist.
Have you ever heard the name of their head UI person? You'd think that, given the success of the Samsung tablet, that the person would be giving interviews left and right. Anyone? Anyone?
Here's an analogy that even a closed-minded geek can understand. You have a Wii, XBox 360, and a PS3. Which one of them looks like the other? They all have an optical drive and a bunch of A/V output ports. Could you, at a glance, mistake one for another?
You do realize that the iPad's shape is hardly unique, I mean for god's sake there's one in 2001 a movie that predate's the iPad by literally decades.
Trademarks are not patents. Patents are not trademarks. You'll have a hard time getting a patent on a rectangle, but getting a trademark on an iconic design that just happens to be rectangular? Sure. Trademarks are there to protect the look and feel of products from copies, knock-offs, and imitations, and to ensure that consumers don't confuse products they see with one another. People, including the summary, keep referring to this as strictly a patent battle, but trademarks are playing a large role as well, and the "rectangle" complaint the submitter made is referencing trademarks, not patents.
Speaking personally, I'm a dyed-in-wool Apple fanboy, but even I didn't think too highly of Apple's recent complaints and lawsuits. That is, I didn't until I went into a Best Buy a few months back, walked up to what I thought was an iPad display next to the Apple section of the store, activated the device, and discovered it was a Galaxy Tab. If I got them confused both at a distance and up close, what hope does a typical consumer have? Trademarks are designed to prevent that sort of confusion, and I honestly think it's justified here.
You mean the one with an asymmetric bezel, 10 buttons, and a completely different profile?
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Patent the wheel?
Already been done
dnuof eruc rof aixelsid
Secondly, "Desktop style OS" existed in 1984 on UNIX too. It just wasn't "popular".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Window_System
Far be it from me to defend an Apple fanboi, but the Apple Lisa predates this, being released in 1983. Everything, of course, stemmed from PARC, and a rather inexplicit agreement to "look" at Xerox's operations in return for Apple stock didn't give Apple IP rights to all GUIs (and thank god, too!)
If it wasn't for Apple's iPad and iPhone, Samsung's tablets and phones would look like this [askdavetaylor.com] and this [mobilegazette.com].
Either that or... form follows function. Capacitive screens and more robust OSs have killed the need for buttons. This limits the design space available. A modern tablet (with or without Apple) would eventually have turned into a nothing but a face and a screen. All of those buttons on your cherry-picked photos are completely superfluous thanks to better technology (which Apple didn't invent). The only choice is the size of the screen, the color of the flat space around it, and whether to round your corners or not. Black is a normal color for these things, as well. Go to your local electronics store and see what the popular color for all gadgets currently is... You'll be shocked to learn that its black. Further... icons in a grid... really? I've have icons in a grid long before anyone even thought of smart phones. I've have hand-held devices (back when they were called PDAs) with icons in a grid. Actually a grid is the most sensible way of arranging small squares... Go figure.
I don't have a horse in this race. Both Apple and Samsung are behaving badly. But at least Samsung actually is using patents that DO something, which isn't nearly as dangerous as the shit Apple is pulling.
This is true, since there existed flat objects with rounded corners, and a centered touch sensitive screen before the iPad, or iPhone.
Unless the argument is that Samsung should have been forced to stick superfluous buttons on their modern devices, since obviously Apple is special.
Further, icons in a grid
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
I like that trick of having all the "pre" iPad stuff oriented one way, then having the iPad and everything following oriented another, in the hope that people don't notice that most tablets don't use the iPad aspect ratio. Any time people resort to trickery, it means they know their main point is questionable.
Also, tying into a comment I made above: what if you had all vehicles "pre" Model T and "post" Model T? How do you think that would look? Why do you think that is?
I didn't used to disdain Apple products until I started noticing that exposure to them really does seem to erode critical thinking skills.
What on earth is the value of a smaller or larger bezel? When is it no longer an infringement? When it is 1mm wider? 3mm? 60cm? Fact of the matter is that a square without buttons is not unique nor new. My Navigon GPS has no buttons, it's square, has a touch screen and existed before the iPad. It can run multiple programs (picture viewer, handsfree kit and moving map navigation).
Claiming rights on a rectangle is stupid.
To Terminate, or not to Terminate, that's the question - SCSIROB
No. While they are both fighting each other (although Apple seems to have the better lawyers after a few salvo exchanges),
Apple doesn't have the better lawyers, they have the better case.
Fandroids hate facts.
Xerox didn't agree, sued and lost. Your point? The X Window System is not, and never was, a "Desktop Style OS".
The point here is that Samsung is deliberately trying to clone the iPad, even down to the shape of the dock connector and the styling of the charger. I'm not sure about the validity of some of Apple's patents, but I think it's ridiculous for people to imply that Apple shouldn't be trying. I would think any decent company, in their position, would try to take action against a company of Samsung's size and influence blatently bringing out clone products.
Anyone who talks about a company "stealing" something as vague as the look-and-feel of an interface has obviously never invented anything. Inventors usually stand on the shoulders of inventors before them, making small improvements and combinations of several existing ideas. It's a much more evolutionary process than a spontaneous leaps-and-bounds process. Example: Does your website use a menu bar on the side or top of the screen, instead of a bunch of hypertext links in the main body of the page? Did you invent that concept, or "steal" it from someone else?
I don't think that's quite true. Apple has initiated all of this and Samsung has retaliated quite reluctantly. I have been wondering why Samsung didn't launch this action months ago. Samsung doesn't seem to want to stifle competition, because they make money from phones Apple sells.
I think Apple's initial claim was valid... its obvious the Samsung product in question would never have existed if not for iPhone. Don't get caught up over rectangles, Samsung is clearly and without any duplicity whatsoever attempting to take advantage of iPhone's popularity by releasing a product that superficially looks identical to Apple's. You seem to be of the opinion "I'm suing you because you're suing me" is a perfectly valid legal strategy. If it is, then sure... Samsung is just doing what it can not to get caught under the deadly wheels of Apple's crushing anti-competitive practices as it chews up and digests industrial giants on its way to world domination.
The Admin and the Engineer
Have you ever even looked at the evidence against Samsung? I'm guessing not since you posted Anonymous. They copied the design, the icons, the packaging, even the power adapter is identical. This isn't some 'vague look and feel', but pretty much straight clone. It is an obvious attempt to cash in on customer confusion.
http://copyrightcommerceandculture.com/2011/05/12/did-samsung-copy-apples-iphone-ipad/
http://www.idownloadblog.com/2011/09/29/apple-samsung-copycat-2/
How can you look at the above links and call it 'vague'? Hell they even got caught using iPhone graphics on their own webpage.
http://feeds.appleinsider.com/click.phdo?i=d1a78f8d91e14e80da004b76d84dbe93
I mean seriously?
That's a big post full of ad hominem, so I'll respond to the meaningful parts:
i actually thought ... that was a real ipad in that movie and they just took decades to release it.
The point of a trademark or design patent is to establish a distinctive appearance, so that it is clear at a quick glance what product you're seeing. It could be the logo, or the shape of a bottle, or something more general, like a color or a particular plaid. In essence, a trademark protects a distinctive aspect of a product, and a design patent protects a distinctive product in particular.
The entire point of this thread is to point out that the design patent for the iPad really only applies to the iPad, and the Galaxy Tab is clearly a copy. The "prior art" in 2001 is so different, even from a large distance, that it is not enough to invalidate the design patent.
So we see a difference between the ipad and the 2001 device, which we accept differentiates them. We also have the beveled edge which differs significantly between the ipad and the galaxy, yet only you fail to accept that as a difference.
It's certainly a difference, just not one that matters. The Galaxy Tab is also missing a large apple on the back, but nobody's going to notice that when walking past a user on the street. Similarly, the only way to notice the different bevel is a close comparison. The appearance of an iPad is iconic. The different bevel does not significantly differentiate the two. Yes, a blind person could tell the difference, but the iPad isn't being heavily marketed for blind people, is it?
i was saying there is a very obvious difference in profile between the 2001 device and the ipad just as there is a very obvious difference between the aspect ratio of the ipad and galaxy.
This is actually the first time I realized they had different aspect ratios. Thanks for the information. Given that it's taken over a year for a potential customer (who was looking into buying a tablet this past spring, then decided against it) to notice, I'm going to go ahead and lump this in the "subtle difference" category as well.
it's a square on the button, not a fucking house you blind idiot
Oh hey, it is. Sorry about that. The extent of my Apple product ownership is an iPod Touch that I keep out in my car. I've used an iPad, and as mentioned earlier I was looking at buying one. I must not have been paying close attention to the exact picture used, and my references from this thread have been found through Google.
Again, that's the whole idea behind a patented design: A potential customer should be able to recognize the product by its appearance from a casual glance.
The point is...
The point is there are a number of similarities and differences between the two real devices, but on the whole the differences are far smaller than the similarities. The similarities outweigh the differences so much that the two are indistinguishable at a distance of only 10 feet. Conversely, the differences between the modern devices and the tablets from 2001 are much more pronounced, to the point where even from 10 feet away they are clearly not the same product.
It's not a question of whether there are differences or not. It's a question of whether the differences are significant enough to distinguish the pro
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
than Samsung spends on R&D. Do you think that the iPhone and iPad just fell from the sky? There's a huge amount of R&D (probably more D than R, but still) that goes into those things.
What difference does it make if Apple acquired some IP by purchasing other companies--they are still paying for it, right? That's still an R&D expenditure.
What's more, Apple's never tried to submarine their patents into some global telecommunications standard (which required RAND terms, btw) and then came back a few years later and started extorting from licensees in a decidedly discriminatory fashion.
What the hell are you talking about?