...not again.
Somebody just shoot Apple. Seriously, Anything pre Android 3????. Talk about sour grapes where Apple are squabbling for every little scrap from other companies.
Samsung Galaxy products which run Android 2.2.1 to 2.3.7 - the Galaxy S, SII and Ace - have been banned in the Netherlands after a Dutch court ruled that the devices infringe an Apple scrolling patent that relates to how a user swipes through photo galleries. The court said that Samsung's pre-Android 3.0 gear is using the …
What's actually happening is more realistic, and hats off to the Reg for keeping their end up. It's been proven this kind of behaviour actively drives customers away, so the last thing Apple want is their desperate bullying being kept in the headlines so much. Notice too the surface area shrinks with every new lawsuit - this time it's only pre-3.0 Android devices. Samsung/Google are no mugs. They know exactly what they needed to do to avoid these gullible courts bending to Apples whim on such pointless trivia. They have made sure a day will come when Apple can't keep squabbling over a bit of the next fucking picture being shown when you scroll, or whatever bollocks they paid the corrupt patent authorities to let them claim to have invented. On that day, Apple will have to innovate for real. The best they'll be able to do is just clone a current Android top end handset - they know it, you know it but most importantly the market knows it.
You've been rumbled, Apple - time to Think Different.
The dude posts a lot - not hard to do if you must give an opinion about everything lol.
Missed any email El Reg sent ->ancient board email has been deactivated till the spammers update their lists - updated now heh.
Fatal flaw in El Reg's software though, if you change your board username, it resets your postcount. Discovered this a year ago when going from 'Yeehaw' to '404'. Hell, I've been here since late 90's - got a Reg pin in fact (Lester was being a prick and John hooked me up - Thanks John!).
In any case, we doan' need no stinkin' badges!
;)
Gold badge awarded for click-bait, I see! :D
Some companies and commentards can't see the difference between the law and what is right and wrong.
Apple is disliked here not because they are apple (the iphone isn't a terrible device) but most of us think that apple's patents and registered designs are not worthy of the legal protection they receive. When we see the nexus 4 next to the iphone 5 we see just what those spurious legal protections are going to cost us personally and we don't like it. Apple aren't trying to protect their invention, they are trying to make android a risky business proposition.
I suspect this is all going to backfire on apple:
- they are gaining antipathy for their legal shenanigins
- high profits on current devices hides the loss of market share issue which will bite them later
- attacking older versions of android will force faster upgrades (and the desire to be able to push upgrades faster) and push vanilla android over 3rd-party extended versions. That means the much cheaper nexus 4 et al which will further cut their market share. At the moment S3 vs iphone 5 is fairly even. Nexus 4 vs iphone 5 is not much of a contest.
Can't believe people actually support Samsung when a court finds they have infringed yet attack Apple for winning - yes the burglar is ok for robbing your house - you are the crim for trying to prosecute them.
Samsung PR Dept and Fandroid Zealots may downvote at their leisure.
This case sounds like being seriously petty on the part of Apple. But this:
"Samsung said that it had already dealt with that issue... But the court's panel of judges said that the firm had failed to provide them with evidence of the change "
Seriously, Samsung? You claim you fixed it way back and yet you can't show it in court? Don't even have a sample handset behaving in the non-infringing way.
I call double-fail !
This mad dog will not stop biting until people stop buying Apple products and services. Once their market share degrades to the point where they are forced to become decent corporate citizens then, and only then, will things change. It is starting to happen now, but more folks need to jump ship so their cash reserves start slipping.
Cupertino is a bunch of bullies and the USPO spineless weenies trousering the cash from idiotic "patents" that never should have been.
Apple can patent whatever the hell they want. They will never see a single pound of mine in their pocket.
"This mad dog will not stop biting until people stop buying Apple products and services"
But they won't and they aren't. Your average Joe neither knows nor cares about Apple's lawsuits and their products still command an aspirational status.
We've just renewed our company mobile contract - essentially because the directors all had Blackberries which they hated and couldn't wait to be rid of. The contract, normally handled by me at management level, was handled personally by the FD (with the purchasing manager) who secured iPhones for all the directors and the purchasing manager. The sales team were to be given low end Blackberries and everyone else cheap Droids. Then one of the sales manager's found out that the purchasing manager had got himself an iPhone 5 whilst he was only getting a mere Blackberry and kicked off about it. Slowly word spread and others started to mutter about it too.
What they don't yet know is that the order placed was actually for 6 iPhones when only 5 were needed. It was considered giving it to the sales manager that had kicked off but then they realised that giving one to one sales manager but not the others would lead to even more trouble. I'd already declined it so was asked to offer it to my assistant who also declined it so it's now just sitting in its box in a safe and not mentioned because if word gets out that there's a spare iPhone everything will kick off again. So, away from techies, Apple love is still very much alive and well though the purchasing manager's eyes did widen somewhat when he saw the HTC One X I'd got myself.
"Dutch court ruled that the devices infringe on an Apple scrolling patent that relates to how a user swipes through photo galleries.
The court said that Samsung's pre-Android 3.0 gear is using the patented Apple way of scrolling through a photo gallery, which lets you see a bit of the next image before it bounces back. The photo-scrolling patent is covered by European Patent 2 059 868."
So either Samsung release an OTA update to not show a bit of the next image or upgrade people upto Android 3/4.
But seriously Apple? Its an application and I for one fail to see how a UI enhancement is patentable - which is no different to Ruby or other various window effects in Linux/Windows/etc...
Apple really scraping the barrel. Its this sort of attitude that just winds me up...
Well - when I get a bit more cash for a smartphone I can say it certainly WON'T be Apple - and neither will rest of family.
....but the longer Apple insists on continuing their patent wars, the less likely I become to proselytize that love. Indeed, I find myself starting to grow somewhat embarrassed that I like their products so much. Still a load better than using Windoze though.
You've heard of hyperlinks I take it? Click on the one in the article and you'll be taken to the actual patent in question. It's for a "PORTABLE ELECTRONIC DEVICE FOR PHOTO MANAGEMENT" and describes a number of scenarios related to how photos can be managed on small form factor devices with limited screen sizes. You'll note that it's nothing to do with software, it's all about the device and how it manages certain interactions. You may even, if you read the article, notice that it's a European patent and thus, presumably, is valid under EU law or it wouldn't have been granted.
Oh, and if you're about to use the "Apple paid the corrupt system to grant this patent", please don't - it just sounds childish. If the patent is invalid, you'd think Samsung's legal team could get it invalidated.
The alleged infringement would seem to be related to one or more of the many examples of how the device will function (there's quite a list).
I know that as soon as the Reg prints an "Apple sues X" piece almost everyone jumps onto the comments and tells everyone else how evil Apple are and how they'll never buy another iDevice, etc. and how anyone who says differently is an Apple fanboi and can't be believed because they're on the kool aid but really, if you can't even be bothered to read the article and get your facts straight you just look like a fanboi from a different church.
B.S.
It's just software. Apple could release iOS 6.1 and completely change how it works.
It's just an app, built into iOS but still just an app. There are no rubber bands, springs, or even transistors that manage the interactions.
This is no different then how MS Word, or Firefox manage certain interactions.
They could indeed change how it works, but then it would no longer be covered by the patent in question, assuming the patent is valid in the first place.
I'm not saying I agree with the patent, or the case, or that I even like Apple. All I'm saying is that the patent appears to be related to a portable device used to manage photos and goes into some detail about how certain elements of such management would be implemented, taking into account the screen size and other limitations presented by working on a mobile device as opposed to a workstation. It appears that the contention is that Samsung has used one or more of the methods described in the patent.
IANAL and to me it does seem that what Apple has done is attempt to gain a sort of software patent by describing methods of operation on a physical device that would obvioulsy be implemented in software. Whether that is valid is for the courts to decide and, if it is invalid, then I hope Samsung's lawyers will pursue that argument strongly. Not being a lawyer, I'm not sure where the distinction between describing a method for doing something that requires software and an actual software patent is drawn.
A more interesting point to me is how do you protect a novel way of handling interactions on a device? You seem to be saying that software is just, well, software so it's fine if someone takes my novel approach and just uses it without any reward for my work in coming up with said approach?
"Maybe Samsung will soon start to think of new, original stuff to put into TouchWiz instead of ripping everybody else off badly."
Maybe. On the other hand my Sammy works without having to be held in a special way, and my Google Maps work a treat. Oh, and it was hundreds of quid cheaper because I wasn't paying Apple's stupidity tax.
.........Take a look at the "age" of what Cupertino has succeeded in banning as a result of their "victory" - Sammy can take a very chilled attitude to this. It is old news - if this is the best that the iFruit company can do then it suggests that the high water of Apple's judicial assault on the industry is beginning to recede. I suspect that in a year or so we will look back on this and say "that was the moment at which it turned". These thrashings and twitchings are residual responses. I genuinely do not believe that Apple can pursue this for very much longer and the sooner they realise that the better for all concerned including their own customers.
"ripping off each other's work by being too cheap to licence it properly"
What? Like Apple ripping off the Swiss Railway's clock face design?
Or the wholesale ripping off of the look of Braun's products from he 60's?
If you think Jony Ive is original with his designs then you've strayed too far into the reality distortion field.
I've said it before.
Go throughy the entire Braun design catalogue and find more than 2 items that look remotely like anything Apple.
You can't.
I've done it and there are only 2. A loudspeaker (a minimalist rectangular box) and a table-top cigarette lighter (also a minimalist box) both designed by Deiter Rams.
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