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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
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.
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.
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?
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!
I think Germany still has its own patent system. There are no software patents in the EU system, but there are in Germany. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
.: Semper Absurda
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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
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,
You're wrong. Germany and other EPC signatories gave up their independent patent systems in 1977. However, EPC patents are enforced and/or revoked on a national basis.
Furthermore, software patents are allowed in Europe if they contain a "technical contribution" as opposed to performing a business task.
.: Semper Absurda
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!
In theory, pure software patents do not exist in Germany as well as the rest of the EU. However, computer implemented inventions are recognized as long as they contain a physical component. An ABS is the prime example of what this regulation was intended for.
The regulation provides a large enough loophole to patent any kind of software and the EU patent office is happy to exploit that. While you can't patent algorithm A, you can patent running algorithm A on a computer (physical device). Sadly, the Landgericht München, which sits close to the EU patent office in Munich, has started to recognize this line of reasoning.
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.
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
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.