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Apple Sued an Independent iPhone Repair Shop Owner and Lost (vice.com)
Jason Koebler, reporting for Motherboard: Last year, Apple's lawyers sent Henrik Huseby, the owner of a small electronics repair shop in Norway, a letter demanding that he immediately stop using aftermarket iPhone screens at his repair business and that he pay the company a settlement. Norway's customs officials had seized a shipment of 63 iPhone 6 and 6S replacement screens on their way to Henrik's shop from Asia and alerted Apple; the company said they were counterfeit. Apple threatened to take action, unless Huseby provided the companies with copies of invoices, product lists, and a plethora of other things. The letter, sent by Frank Jorgensen, an attorney at the Njord law firm on behalf of Apple, included a settlement agreement that also notified him the screens would be destroyed. [...] Huseby decided to fight the case. Apple sued him. Local news outlets reported that Apple had five lawyers in the courtroom working on the case, but Huseby won. Apple has appealed the decision to a higher court; the court has not yet decided whether to accept the appeal.
Apple, if you want the general public to care about "counterfeit" parts, make your production operations completely domestic.
Don't sue the little guy for your IP leakage problems in China. He's just trying to make a living, and there's no reason you should control the repair market.
What is a counterfeit screen? Something that made look like a screen, but doesn't actually works? If not that, then it is third-party replacement screen, and Apple has no business telling anyone what parts to use.
He does not operate an authorized repair shop.
Why be happy that they won this case?
Because Apple outsources manufacturing to China. They deserve all the consequences and cheap knock-offs.
Those also the ones sending out copyright infringement notices for some unknown movie and offering to settle if for ~$100.
So I'm not surprised that things went sideways for Apple - they should be more selective in their choice of law firms.
Because otherwise, this is a criminal act *by Apple*.
Everybody should watch this:
Lessons from fashion's free culture - Johanna Blakley at TEDxUSC
It makes clear how pointless copyright is.
I know this is /. but you should read the article before you comment.
From the teaser of the article:
"Apple said an unauthorized repair shop owner in Norway violated its trademark by using aftermarket iPhone parts"
unauthorized repair shop, not apple licensed and blessed center.
Considering how wrong you are in your first assertion, what makes you think that you are right in your 2nd one that they defrauded their own customers?
"The shop agreed to be licensed as an Apple Authorized repair center."
Authoritative source needed, because that's not at all what the article says. The article says it was an "independent" and "unauthorized" repair shop. It also says "PCKompaniet does not pretend or market itself as Apple authorized and does not give any indication that the repair comes with an Apple warranty.â
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
I am always happy to hear when a small businessman stands up to big corporate bullies and wins. Apple has gotten greedy and it's good to see them get kicked in the balls once in a while.
How did this get modded up. It's like the first paragraph of the article that the is not an authorized repair shop, never claimed to be an authorized repair shop, and doens't want to be one. More importantly he imported refurbished Apple parts but never tried to sell them as OEM parts but a generic after-market parts.
Is there a single statement there that you didn't just make up?
How can you read the first posting with its false claims, ignore all the replies calling out the falsehoods in the first posting and then post your agreement with the falsehoods?
"Apple said an unauthorized repair shop owner in Norway"
See that: "unauthorized". It's right there in bold in TFA.
Try to not be such an Apply fanboy in the future.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
A quote from the Motherboard article, by the judge who ruled aainst Apple:
"It is not obvious to the court what trademark function justifies Apple’s choice of imprinting the Apple logo on so many internal components"
It is, although, obvious to Apple's marketing team: 90% of their revenue, including hardware sales and repair are due to branding appeal and not quality or technological appeal (despite it actually existing), and thus, Apple wants to protect that brand in every single way by printing it everywhere, and preventing repairs that might tarnish that brand (as they can be lower quality, but don't necessarily mean they are...).
The judge though, noted very well that this trademark/brand protectionism goes against basic rights of repair - Apple doens't own your phone after you buy it - and consequentially, it cannot apply their trademark rights OVER repair rights.
Ask a broken iPhone owner if he would rather have the screen repaired with the logo: he would obviously say he prefers to fake it, but that's his choice and his wrongdoing. Ask the same person he has to pay 300 to have the logo, or 30 bucks to get a no logo, fully-functioning screen, and the branding thing will go down the drain pretty fast. But obviously, since Apple does not produce nondescript versions of their spare parts, you will never have sub-300 bucks, official iPhone X screens and that's just the life for an iPhone buyer that doesn't want to break the law. I feel for you
It's one thing to repair with non-OEM parts. It's another to use COunterfeit screens that claim to be apple screens. Let's not make this about a something other than what it is. Headline seems to mislead
Um, no. They were sold as 3rd-party displays, not as OEM-parts, so no, they weren't counterfeit-screen according to court.
I found this little bit of logic to be the most interesting.
The judge took that into account and noted that since the logo was not visible it was not considered to be counterfeit. The users did not know the logo was on the parts.
He neatly closed off that line of argument from Apple since he's saying the printing on the internal parts is irrelevant to whether or not they infringe. That's a lot of leg to cut out from under them in their case.
Imagine buying a Ford and being sued for using after market products on your car. That is exactly what Apple seeks on its products. The idea that a company can control a product after they sell it is absurd. You buy it. You own it. You do what you please with it! Maybe it is time for end users to sue when a product is made difficult or expensive to repair. A class action suit might be a real eye opener.
Thanks, Fake Tim Cook for your definitive analysis. I'm sure we're all smarter for having read your non-misleading analysis.
As detailed by the article, this shop was non-authorized. In other aftermarket situations, like many other manufacturers, Apple does nearly everything in their power to make it hard for consumers to repair equipment on their own terms -- everything from using stupid special screws to refusing to publish board schematics (even to authorized shops) so customers are forced to make full board replacements. I wouldn't be surprised if they routinely pull this shakedown practice on other non-authorized shops.
As a former electronic repair tech, I've worked on LOTS of equipment where the manufacturer wouldn't release complete schematics, sometimes even to Authorized Service Centers. Also, many manufacturers require "board-level" replacement, especially under warranty. So, that's not out-of-line for the electronic repair industry, especially as the complexity of the devices goes up.
And there are no "Special Screws" that Apple uses for which you can't find appropriate drivers.
Huseby does not claim to be an authorized repair shop, nor has he misrepresented his service, nor does he submit invoices to Apple.
The original Motherboard article is quite clear on this point. Huseby bought OEM refurbished parts. They had an Apple logo on them because they were, in fact, Apple parts originally. Since the refurbishment was done outside of the Apple monolith those parts had the logos inked out. Fact is, Huseby and his parts suppliers all seem to be operating responsibly and 100% within the law.
Also, there's this tiny little matter that Huseby won the court case and Apple lost. Yes, Apple is appealing, but in the meantime Huseby is the winner.
Also, as a fundamental and practical matter, does the owner of a phone actually control the phone? You know, as the owner, of property, that they purchased? Apple does not lease or license these phones. They sell them.
Tim Cook talks about how he supports his users by not selling their information, by supporting strong encryption, and by standing up to the government. Whenever I hear him talk about this, I pause and almost consider buying an Apple product. But then things like this happen, and I am reminded that Apple provides a walled-garden store, fights interoperability, and uses the intellectual-property stick to harm their own customers. Tim Cook can claim a clean conscience on some fronts, but is downright evil on others. There is hope for Apple, but there is much that needs to change.