Posts by Callam McMillan

What a ridiculous situation

This whole issue annoys me. While Microsoft may have been engaged in some less than legitimate behaviour in the past, forcing them to promote other vendors browsers seems like a punitive measure based more on revenge than protecting the consumer from any threat, either real or perceived.

Imagine if you will you walk into a Ford dealership and you say to the salesman, yes I like the Focus very much, but is there any chance you could put in the engine from a Vauxhall Astra? Once the salesman had finished laughing his arse off, he'd kick you out. That doesn't mean you couldn't go and do it yourself, but you wouldn't expect to buy it in that situation.

What I don't get is why it should be any different in software. If you buy Windows, you get IE. If you like IE then you can stick with it. If you don't, you can go and download and install the browser of choice. If you don't know what you're doing with computers then you shouldn't be worrying about alternative browsers.

It annoys me that the EU seems to associate success with anti-competitive behaviour, just look at how they seem to be out to get Google (Why the hell should Google have to promote their competitors?) Yet at the same time seem to ignore Apple who seem equally happy to force you into using certain software (sometimes) without choice.

This sounds like a way of soliciting new stories for the Bastard Operator from Hell series!

Ridiculous to the point of Insanity

Where to start with this one...

Appearance

The Apple iPad has a black bezel around a 10 inch screen and a physical button. It has an Apple logo on the back.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab has a black bezel around a 10 inch screen, no physical buttons, oh and it says SAMSUNG on it.

I'm fortunate enough not to be dyslexic, but I'm fairly certain you're not going to get the two names confused.

Packaging

Having seen pictures of the packaging, I can see the similarity, you open a box, and there's a tablet, underneath that there are the accessories. But, one box says SAMSUNG, the other says APPLE and both of them should be looking at Dell, because the laptop I bought 10 years ago came in a box, which had a laptop on top and all the accessories below.

Software

Ok, I'm bored of this now, both have icons on a screen, you can click on them and they do stuff, just like you can in Windows, Linux, OSX and just about every other graphical operating system from the last 20 years.

A solution?

Aside from machine gunning the hoardes of zombie patent lawyers that seem to roam the various courts of the world I would like to put forth a solution.

Copying is wrong, that's why I agree with design patents and patents to protect innovation. I don't agree with software patents though since algorithms shouldn't be patentable and the implementation of an algorithm should come under copyright.

I would therefore like to propose a functional requirement which has to be exceeded in a novel way before a patent will be granted. For a tablet computer this will consist of:

1. The device will be based around a screen consisting of 2 pairs of paralell edges with corner angles of 90 degress.

2. The screen will be enclosed by a bezel of an undefined width

3. The bezel may contain a camera and/or major user controls such as buttons (Either touch or capactive)

4. The screen is covered by a glass or plastic surface with touch sensitivity.

5. The rear of the screen is protected by an enclosure to be made of plastic or metal. The edges of the enclosure are to consist of two paralell edges with corner angles of 90 degrees.

6. Edges of the enclosure may be rounded.

7. Secondary controls and ports may be mounted on the enclosure.

That should pretty much describe every tablet on the market today, and as such nobody should be able to sue over appearances. If however somebody comes up a clever new glass covering or a shape which isn't described above then they can still patent the design.

Job done!