back to article Chinese tablet maven threatens iPad suit

A Chinese company is crying foul in one of the sillier "We were here first!" disputes that The Reg has seen in quite some time. "I was very angry and suprised two days ago when I saw the news of the iPad presentation," the president of Shenzhen Great Loong Brother, Wu Xiaolong, told Spanish news site El Mundo, according to …

COMMENTS

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  1. E 2

    I call BS

    Most of the differences are function of OS, not design or, god help me or the US Patent Office, new ideas.

  2. It wasnt me
    Thumb Down

    Youre spot on ....

    ..... with this article. On a first look they do appear to be the same design. But any judge will surely throw this out when he notiices the weight discrepancy.

    Well noticed.

  3. Sordid Details
    FAIL

    Battery life?

    "P88: claimed battery life of 1.5 hours" - see icon (left) for details.

  4. 4Reeel

    A frankfurter is long ...

    a hamburger is round. Other than specifications, the Ipad looks nearly identical to the P88 tablet PC. Go Apple for stealing another idea and marketing it as their very own.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    big iphone

    or, the fact the ipad looks like a big iphone, so unless the P88 predates the iphone....

    well done, on the publicity front by the P88 peeps

    I cant believe you went the the extent you did to compare these devices.... maybe you need to license that irony logo 'el reg' wrote about a week or two back?

  6. Andrew James
    WTF?

    surely...

    Common sense must prevail here. A silver frame, a black border and a touch sensitive screen. This is "identical" in the same way that the black Porsche that drove past me this morning is the same as my black Renault. Wheels, check, colour, check. Must be the same!

    No view of the rear of the device at all.

    "Apple stole the appearance of my device, which i blatantly copied from the appearance of their iPhone" should be his complaint.

  7. I know better
    Jobs Halo

    Gotcha!

    In other news, Moses comes back from the dead to sue a Chinese company for patent infringement on his device from "thousands of years ago". "It's the bloody same!" an unnamed source quoted the rehabilitated Moses.

  8. bluesxman
    WTF?

    I'm no fan of Apple, but...

    ... one could easily believe that the designer of the P88 was "inspired" by the aesthetics of iPhone and scaled simply scaled it up to tablet proportions. Small wonder then, when Apple latterly kick out an iPhone scaled up to tablet proportions, that it has a similar look about it.

  9. dreadful scathe
    FAIL

    bizarre

    identical, eh? hmm, i expect <insert laptop manufacturer here> will have every previous manufacturer proclaiming they are "very angry and suprised" when their new laptop comes out with an IDENTICAL keyboard, and a screen THAT ICONS APPEAR ON, and ports SO YOU CAN PLUG THINGS IN...my goodness me....the horror. Similarities there are obviously some, but rip off? er...no!

  10. Daniel Bentham
    Pirate

    But the chinese iflab is just a fat iphone

    The cheek of the chinese iFlab maker, its just a fat iphone hes ripped off . Now hes trying to rip off the people hes already ripped the design off in the first place, nevermind they probably ripped it off someone else. Heck hang on it a rip off iFlab merry go round

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    Similarities

    Beijing are prosecuting me because I put a wall around my garden and they claim I stole the idea from TV coverage of the Great Wall...

  12. Monty Cantsin

    The iPad might be derivative, but not of this yoke

    But the iPad is the same basic design as the iPhone and iPod touch (just bigger), both of which were released long before this yoke. Shenzhen Great Loong Brother is a great name for a company, though - I wish the place I work for had such a cool name.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Chinese dont like it when people copy them....

    ... but the other way seems just fine, funny that.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      let alone

      Falsify the CE certification

      1. Haku

        CE certification

        Isn't that just part of the decorative design of products now? like go faster stripes on cars etc.

  14. Paul 4

    I call troll

    Good on him. A bit of free advertising. Fair play to him.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hang on a minute...

    When Apple were in conflict with MS over the 'look and feel' and functionality of their competing Operating systems wasn't there a similar argument......

    Oh, Apple lost that one though...

    1. JasonH
      WTF?

      Re: Hang on a minute

      I seem to recall they didn't lose - Microsoft settled out of court (investing a tidy sum into Apple in the process) and agreeing to continue to develop and support MS Office for Mac.

      One of Steve Jobs's first wins after returning to Apple.

      Now, what you haven't commented on is Apple (allegedly) copying and building on the Xerox PARC work, but I'll leave that for the fanbois to argue over (to be fair, there are many versions of this story).

      All from memory, and I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong on this.

  16. Svein Skogen
    Flame

    Yet another marketing disaster

    Why on earth would he claim those to be identical? That's the most stupid thing to say, when HIS PRODUCT is CLEARLY the superior one.

    The iPad (how long will that name last, since it's a registered trademark of another corp?) should be named the "iSucker" with the tagline "now everyone can see what you are".

    Sheesh!

    --anon (to avoid the rabid iCultists)

    1. James O'Brien
      Paris Hilton

      Umm to clue you in

      You forgot to tick the Anon box.

      That is all.

  17. Giles Jones Gold badge

    Give me a break

    There's only so many ways to produce a tablet shaped device.

    The fact that the Chinese unit has ripped off Apple's iPhone styling (chrome effect trim) makes their claims seem rather stupid.

  18. Piro Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Uhh, at least the chinese copy has features

    I'd take it over the iPad

    1. Andrew James

      You’re logged in as Andrew James.

      Good luck trying to use those features with a 1.5 hour battery life.

  19. Lars Silver badge
    Thumb Down

    This all started in the USA

    I have a feeling all this suing for this and that ridiculous reason started in the USA and will not disappear until the USA wants to stop all this stupidity in their own legal system.

    1. peyton?
      Grenade

      Famous quote

      Movie: Star Wars

      Actor: Alec Guinness

      1. Sarev
        Joke

        quote

        "an elegant weapon for a more civilized age". Eh?

        1. peyton?
          Coffee/keyboard

          lol

          that's awesome - completely overlooked that one =D

  20. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Not a copy

    There are major differences between the two:

    P88 can multi-task, iPad cannot

    P88 can run Flash, iPad cannot

    P88 has USB ports, iPad does not

    P88 has an industry-standard CPU, iPad does not

    P88 has an ethernet connection, iPad does not

    P88 has VGA-out, iPad does not

    P88 works with standard external devices (e.g. keyboard), iPad does not

    You can install what you like on the P88, on the ipad you must conform to the Rule of Jobs

    So it cannot be a copy. The P88 is way more feature-rich than the iPad will ever be.

  21. Ian Davies
    WTF?

    Move along, people...

    ...nothing to see here.

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    What would be really funny..

    .. is to find out that his device is not even using legal copies of windows.

    1. 1of10

      but...

      for sure seems more useful than iPad

  23. Matt Bucknall
    WTF?

    Who cares?

    Given that there is rarely any need for a touchscreen to be anything but rectangular, I think it is fairly safe to assume most touchscreen devices are going to look like a rectangular screen in a box. They all look the same!

    Now if 'Shenzhen Great Loong Brother' had developed XP and for some inexplicably insane reason Apple had decided that XP's UI was worth ripping off, then they might have had a case. Of course SGLB didn't develop XP and Apple didn't rip it off, so this is all nonsense.

  24. adam payne
    FAIL

    Two words

    Publicity stunt.

  25. Carl Deaker

    iMac "homage"

    If you look at Great Loong's web site they have an All-In-One PC (called Product-31 and Product-30) computers that look suspiciously like really cheap iMac knock-offs (see picture all-in-one PC with the yellow Ferrari displayed). Shame about the hideous LED clock in the bottom stand. Perhaps Apple can counter sue?

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Jobs Horns

    Apples so screwed!

    Apples about to get right royally screwed once a Chinese court gets this in the dock. Can just see it now, Chinese company v Big Evil American Company....they're soooooo sunk!

  27. Andrew James

    easy

    Nice quick work around for this "identical" problem. Apple markets in china with a white border around the screen instead of black. Tadaaa!

  28. Lewis Mettler 1
    Stop

    are not all laptops the same?

    Are not all laptops the same? And desktops? And pads?

    The problem here is crediting Apple with anything. Sure the ipad may look nice. And it may actually do something. But, it is hardly a unique product. Heck, it is an incomplete product at best.

  29. Ascylto
    Big Brother

    I'm with ...

    the Chinese on this one.

    After all, the Chinese have NEVER copied anything manufactured or designed elsewhere.

    Blig Bluvver for obvious reasons.

  30. The First Dave
    Flame

    "You can't buy that kind of worldwide publicity."

    So I take it that El Reg didn't get a bean out of passing on this nugget?

    Shame, it had to at least be worth a review machine, on permanent loan.

  31. Melanie Winiger
    Paris Hilton

    Poor men learn rich men's habits quickly?

    The Chinese have cottoned onto the old Western adage

    "All publicity is good publicity"

    Congrats to Great Loong for millions of dollars of free advertising.

    Paris - because she knows the Adage very well indeed :-)

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