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Motorola Ordered To Recall Android Phones and Tablets In Germany
puddingebola sends word of a German court decision yesterday which found that Google's Motorola Mobility must recall all of its Android tablets and phones that infringe on Apple's patent for "rubber-band" scrolling. From the Guardian:
"The dramatic decision, the latest in an escalating war between Apple and the smartphone and set-top box company MMI, follows earlier cases in which Apple had to disable automatic "push" delivery of email to its iPhone and iPads after MMI won a separate patent fight in Germany. The recall will not take effect immediately because Apple will have to request a ban on specific products and provide a €25m (£20m) bond, while MMI can appeal. However, the court indicated that it was unlikely that an appeal against the validity of the patent would succeed. MMI, with Google's backing, is expected to continue the appeal. The court also ruled that MMI owed Apple damages for past infringement."
Get a clue people. Apple just wants to corner the market and stop consumers of having choices, that are cheaper than theirs. WAKE UP STUPID PEOPLE!...
Stop buying Apple products...
So they are forced to recall their devices because of a GUI animation effect? How the hell is that proportionate? Was that a major advertised feature or something?
Taking the phones and tablets out of people's hands. That's one way to kill the competition, also any good will towards your company too.
Crawl back under your bridge, Apple!
Would they send cops after them like they do for stolen stuff?
Obama's legacy: (N)othing (S)ecure (A)nywhere and (T)error (S)imulation (A)dministration
I'm pretty sure this means they have to recall the phones from stores and other sales channels, not customers who have already purchased one...
Owning one would not be a crime.
All your phones are belong to us!
Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing ever happened.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gpc5_3B5xdk (non-rickrolling, promise. But not far behind...)
They just have to remove that rubber-band scrolling with a firmware update.
Any engineer worth his salt was taught about the time response of second order linear systems - spring, mass, damper. The scroll bounce is just the transient response of such a system to a step function when tuned to be slightly underdamped (light blue line in the figure).
It's obvious as hell and the only reason I can fathom why it's being upheld is because its merits are being judged by people who are clueless about math or engineering. This is as bad as the XOR cursor patent, which was also a patent on the graphical representation of a function widely known and commonly used in the respective industry.
Would that not mean that cell phone providers would be obligated to discontinue carrier service to customers who had purchased one through them?
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
It's a little known fact about patent law that merely using a patent infringing device is itself patent infringement.
However, this is a civil matter so the police wouldn't be involved. Apple could sue you personally (and win) for using an Android tablet but the negligible damages and appalling publicity mean it's really not worth their while.
I'm curious how this came to be. I thought Germany had no software patents?
They'll send soldiers around at night to bust into your home and take it.
Well, Apple did do that in the US, so it's not out of the question.
Geeze, first I thought I had to buy Samsung products to support them in their fight against Apple, now I have to buy MMI products too? I'm going to go broke trying to support companies that anger Apple. Maybe it's cheaper and easier to just go to the dark side and buy an iPhone and move into the Apple Ecosystem.
I shouldn't take so much pleasure from Moto's misfortune, but fuck it. Motorola are evil bastards, and they deserve to burn for their crimes against Android and humanity. A company that burns with such pure evil, Google's had to send in the entire Vatican several times to try and exorcise the company's senior management... and had to guarantee the Pope himself tickets to Google IO for the next 5 years to get them to come back after the casualties they suffered during last month's attempt.
I'd be *thrilled* if there were a recall of my old Photon. It's been dead to me since Motorola cruelly locked its bootloader back in May, and I'd love to get a forced refund to buy some nice, new toys for my new, open, non-bootloader-locked Galaxy S3.
And if Apple tried to force the recall of my reflashed S3, they'd have to pry it from my cold, dead hands.
Apple's looking much less interesting to me since their IPJ (Intellectual Property Jihad) began. Honestly, even the fanboi hordes are starting to wonder what Apple is afraid of. Cross-license and move on..
Organization? You must be joking..
Nobody is going to bother to try to track down the users. Technically, though, those users really would be violating the patent every time they scroll, and there's no other party to indemnify them. Theoretically, should one of them ever anger a Power, the power could point them out to Apple and get sued.
I honestly believe Apple would not follow through, though: the PR hit would be too damaging. Even Apple's evil has practical limits. Threatening users is for companies that have no other business plan (e.g. SCO), and Apple makes serious money in legitimate (if distasteful) sales.
"Believe me!" -- Donald Trump
The recent version of firefox has this on by default. Should every Firefox user be forced to return their computer now?
"Look at the patent IS question."
Maybe if this bullshit continues, the cell phone carriers will eventually decide to make the first boot of the phones out of the box a barebones linux distro like busybox. Configure it to do nothing on first boot but download an OTA update that installs their flavor of Android. This separates device sales from software sales and allows them to claim they aren't profiting from the infringement.
They'll send militia wearing brown shirts.
Just a sec. I think I hear Mr. Godwin knocking on my door.
Have gnu, will travel.
All these microscopic patents on tiny "innovations" are preventing the positive evolution of excellent devices. Our devices should be getting better (easier to use, more capable, etc) by using the earlier innovations that truly work better. Yet these copyright battles force companies to create clunky workarounds... Windows GUI is a great example. Why can't we find a way to credit the creator, and still make the best and widespread use of the innovation? Gaah!
To use a car analogy, It's like going back in time 100 years and patenting [...] "automobiles that exhaust fumes to the air"
Except George Selden patented exactly that.
While we're at reforming copyright and related rights, might as well reform patents, especially software patents, registered designs, and any other kind of IPR-related name-it-and-there-is-some-right-for-it as well. Consumers are the ones losing out here, lawyersharks and the "pilot fish" around them for the smaller scraps the only winners.
When the copyright term is "forever minus a day", live every day like it's the last.
I don't believe that is true. You can violate a patent by making an infringing product, but can you really violate a patent by using a device someone else made and which you bought?
It just seems completely irrational the end-user could be violating a patent they know nothing about and had nothing at all to do with violating.
Just like if someone violated Amazon's one-click patent nobody would start suing the customers of whoever violated it.
But, it's patent law ... for all I know someone could construct an argument that says the individual users infringed on the patent.
Me, I wouldn't give a second thought about it as it affects an end user -- "your honor, why should I know or care about such things? I bought this at Wal Mart. It's not my problem if they have a legal dispute between themselves."
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I doubt I can take much more of all this bullshit. who want s to invent anything anymore?
since it's made out of glass and all.
Software patents suck, but even if the patent system can't be changed and even if their patents are found valid, the patents Apple is using to litigate are extremely easy to work around or have already been worked around in the latest versions of stock Android. Then what will they do?
So, in the end, Apple is spending a lot of money in lawyers, in counter-lawsuits and damaging it's own image and brand (even if only in vocal minorities) trying to fight a situation that will obviously be impossible to revert (Android overtaking the market and becoming the leader in innovation), and Google is coming out as the clear winner because of all the free press where it appears as a victim.
I'm pretty sure that Apple has realized this and is trying to negotiate behind the scenes, but for companies like Samsung or Google it will end up being cheaper to pay Apple whathever the courts say than negotiating an agreement where they give Apple access to patents or pay them fees for them.
I sounds pretty trivial, something we could all do without and barely even know the difference!
re: subject
This isn't about Samsung.
Even if Apple removed every competitor from the market, I'm not buying any of their products. I don't want to turn into a moron.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Become a poisonous drug. Need to add cobra or rattlesnake to their logo.
I don't believe that is true. You can violate a patent by making an infringing product, but can you really violate a patent by using a device someone else made and which you bought?
If you couldn't, then you could get around any patent by setting up a company that creates the infringing product, sells it to you, and goes bankrupt. But as an end user, you may not actually be infringing. For example, a customer wouldn't be infringing on Amazon's one-click patent.
Actually, I think you can, there is a lot of concern right now over something very similar in the brick and mortar stores.
Basically, if a store in the US buys a product from a Chinese manufacturer (or some place where a patent would not be needed) and that product used a patent of a US business then the patent owners want to be able to sue the stores/warehouses/distributors, since they know they can't sue the manufacturer. This was making the news a few years back, don't know how far it has proceeded, but I'm guessing it is coming... :(
So I see a lot of people who are pissed off at Apple. When you break it down though, they are just following the systems and processes in place. They are only one part of the problem, and this should really fixed further up the chain. There are plenty of companies that enforce their patents in an way that is bad for the consumer. Let's take Monsanto who somehow thinks it can patent nature. Well it can, because they are awarded nonsense patents. Patent offices are an arm of the government, and hence you the voter is what is supporting this behaviour. You want it changed, call you elected officials and voice to them how this stifles true innovation. Look at drug patents...how is that good for the actual citizens? It protects big corporations that is all.
In a sane world, all Motorola 'should' have to do is firmware update the "rubber band" effect to a different effect, like a hard stop (that isn't patented, I hope) or a changing of screen color when the page ends it's travel. These worldwide nitpicking lawsuits/verdicts have really gotten re-gosh-damned-diculous.
And Apple took all those ideas from devices I have seen, used, or played with from the 80's. Nothing they are doing is new, or even imaginative, tablets (big ass ones, but tablets) have been around for niche items for MANY MANY MANY years in manufacturing and production.
Of course, some of them had wires attached, or had even more intuitive interfaces for a particular job, or were built into controls but the simple fact is they existed, they were just not called tablets. Touch screens, gestures, GUI elements, etc that exist on the iXXX devices existed before in other products, so what makes giving it a new product name worthy of patent protection?
I wish MORE people would get a clue and buy MORE Apple products.
If you want your shit to break buy that Android.
If you want your shit hacked please go back to Windows.
Only stupid people DON'T buy Apple products and then complain about it.
Of course I ONLY allow Apple products in my house.
It has NOTHING to do with the fact that I've made MILLIONS on their stock.
LOL -- actually, it has a lot to do with it. Their stuff really does "just work".
May their stock rise and rise. I figure I'm due to make another 3-4 million before I pull out. Suckers.
Doesn't that bond seem rather low for the damages apple is causing this company if by some chance it falls through? It's supposed to cover damages if the companies devices are unrightly banned or recalled, correct? So... I would think that that bond should be MUCH higher. Though I guess since it's only Germany that is deciding this that the sales volume wouldn't be that much (still a large amount though), I dunno.
This is just getting to be a circus, they should just make a new reality tv series named something like "who want's to be the next Apple lawsuit victim?" Perhaps grab a random person or company person off the street and then Apple gets to sue them for all the ridiculous patents it claims to posses and we get to see each episode how many millions and billions it can milk out of just ordinary people walking down the street... sounds fun! actually seems like it would be more interesting than a lot of stuff on tv today.
hell, Apples Co-founder (the one with brains.. jobs was good at marketing though) stated that even he thought Apple was being absolutely ridiculous with it's constant lawsuit/patent trolling it's doing....and probably thinks (my thoughts) that all that money they are paying in court fees and lawyer times and everything else for these idiotic lawsuits would be better spent actually improving their own products and technologies.
I think the Iphone5 is a prime example of this. First I don't know what is going on, but I assume they will be sued soon by Samsung in regards to it's use of LTE, resulting in a possible ban in the U.S. and probably large chunks of Europe as well. Unless something happened that let them skirt around this, it seems like a pretty big deal that with all their patent suing they would bother to check their own products 0_o /facepalm.
Then for what should be the next generation with the latest and greatest tech from apple you get basically the same thing as the iphone 4. Even Apple fans are going WTF is up with this screen and the resolution?! And instead of using a standard connector like the rest of the world, they had to go spend who knows how much money on a silly dock connector that no one else uses or can use and costs an absolute fortune for cables using it. like $30+ for a 0.2 meter data/charging cable. And lets not forget that Apple said they would sue anyone (basically it's supporting companies) who made any 3rd party devices or cables using it's new cables, connector or port... way to play nice there!
Smartphones are so mainstream now a days it's like tv's and cars. They should all just forget about the patents and work together on super next gen tech or something.
I wonder if it will be a crime to resist the recall, since the owner of the phone is in this case a disinterested third party to the lawsuit. Will they force people to hand them over?
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
- E. Debs
Owning one would not be a crime.
Owning one is punishment enough.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
They'll just use their new iDrone UAVs* to neutralize any of these unsanctioned patent-violating terrorist devices. Not many collateral casualties are expected, and frankly, it's a small price to pay to safeguard Apple's patent integrity.
*I'm surprised this product announcement got overlooked. But the iPhone 5 was pretty big.
Wouldn't it be better to get them to push an update that disabled the scrolling? A recall would get back devices still at the retailers, but I doubt people who already own one will be returning them voluntarily,
For the phones and for tablets connected to the cell network, all they have to do is order the carriers to block the IMEIs. After that it will work as a regular recall - you don't *have* to return it but since it will not work properly most people will choose to do so for refund or for exchange with a different phone/tablet that is not subject to the penalties.
Think different.
Think BETTER.
Think Apple!
Is this guy a for-real Apple lunatic, or an anti-Apple troll doing his darnedest to show up the brainless fanatical side of Apple cultists?
Either way, I'm loving it!
Keep on "Winning", man!
We weren't talking about iTunes.
It did exist before apple made it.
It existed in the real world, and i bet you , if you searched all 10000 games made over 20 years, you will find some game there that had some weird menu or interface that had the same scrolling.
It doesnt have to be touch screen based, but any human input, ie, mouse + button press + move mouse Y coords, same as any input.
Btw, didnt the Wii do this too ?
And the early xbmc + dashboards for chipped xboxs.
Implementing the law of physics in a GUI doesnt deserve a patent.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
All 3d games, simulate a real world in 3D.
Pressing a REAL button , ie a console with a big red button called, "self destruct".
Of course it will animate, because it will simulate real life.
ie the 3d object called button, has a 3d virtual spring underneath it.
Let them patent their source code, but any deviations by one line, should not violate the patent.
Descriptions of the end result should not be patentable, stupid patent lawyers. Dumbasses.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Imagine that, apple wins, and gets every single android phone to be kicked of 2g/3g networks.
1, it would never happen, and 2, there would be riots burning down all apple stores.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Does that mean everything I code daily, I have to consult an army of lawyers to see if I am not accidentally violating one of a billion patents out there?
How do I know some tcp comms methods arent a patent by cisco, or MS ?
You cannot patent ideas.
Else I could patent everything in startrek that doesnt exist, and hope it violates patents in 20 years time.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
The amiga did scrolling smoothly, made the PC look like shit.
Nothing like accurate interrupts synced to screen refresh or using vblank signal.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
This was already done last year in 4.0, and the "glow" effect actually looks pretty elegant, in my opinion.
I bet the act of updating software remotely that violates a patent so that it doesnt not violate a patent, is in fact a process that probably has a patent for it.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
This is dumb. Way dumb. But if the braindead judge is requiring a recall, why don't they just issue an OS patch via their own network or at shops? It doesn't make any sense in the world even for no-brains (oops zombies ate my brain) judge to order a physical recall for what is just a visual effect. That the effect is actually just a portrayal of how a spring works, which is why the whole physical gadget must be scrapped for what could be hundreds of millions of dollars is like really, really dumb. DUMB!
Apple's trying to punish Motorola, not get their own employees assaulted or killed by angry Android users.
If Apple pulled a stunt like that in the US against anyone with a Samsung phone, how many hours do you think it would be until some furious (if slightly unhinged) guy showed up at his nearest Apple store (if not Apple HQ in Cupertino) with enough weapons to conquer a small island nation and opened fire?
Finally... i could get those droid RAZR MAXX at reasonable price. They priced that phone for $ 545. Hopefully it going down to $ 400 because of this. Got my xoom at $ 350 (32G + 3G) add another $ 26 (32G Class10) and i got my perfect rig.
Recall ALL devices? Yeah, unless they break the door down and take it from me, not gonna happen. I guess if you don't return it, they will simply block the IMEI number so your phone won't work.
Nobody is going to bother to try to track down the users. Technically, though, those users really would be violating the patent every time they scroll, and there's no other party to indemnify them.
That may be the case in the US - but it certainly isn't in Germany. Private, non-commercial use of a patent is exempt.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
We weren't talking about iTunes.
Exactly - that's why I said what I said.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
They really were able to time the release of iPhone 5 well with their patent victories and probably will create a dearth of options and lots of FUD at the EXACT time their new UberPhone launches.
Really incredible patience and a savvy move for them, regardless of what you think of it morally or technologically.
And I still don't own an an Apple product.
Um, more like blue shirts, no?
I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog
Brown shirts.
What does a recall imply.
Am I as a user obligated to do anything?
Do I get a full refund?
Do I get an iPhone in exchange?
If this was in the states what does this mean for locked in
plans. Do I get to switch to Verison from AT@T....
Is my unlimited grandfather data plan null and void?
Do I have to restart the multiple year lockin clock with
a new POS phone?
Heck I cannot get a software update from AT&T when it
is clear that an update would take advantage of the existing
hardware where the OS on it now was clearly rushed out
and half baked in light of what is known today.
It is true that half baked cookie dough is tasty but it is
still half baked and may still have raw egg -- can you
say salmonella. Who knows what 'virus' might be lurking.
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.