Samsung Vs. Apple Tit-For-Tat Down Under 313
New submitter GumphMaster writes "In the latest edition of the Apple vs. Samsung patent fight, the ABC is reporting that Samsung has filed in Australian and Japanese courts seeking an injunction to halt sales of the iPhone 4S for alleged 3G patent violations. It remains to be seen whether Samsung has any better luck with the retaliatory strike in Australian and Japanese courts than it did with courts in the Netherlands. Unfortunately, I expect that Samsung will fail partly because of overseas precedent, but mostly because their patents are sane, technical and narrow in scope (unlike the patent-a-rectangle nature of the opposition). If this stupidity ever stops, then millions of dollars, euro, or Won that are being spent on lawyers might actually go into the innovation that patents are meant to promote. Who knows where that might lead?"
MS Stole Apple's Lunch Money in the 80's (Score:4, Interesting)
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Apple stole Xerox's lunch money.
how can a person take sides in a matter between companies they don't work for? i suppose there's always Apple stock, but surely if that were the case you'd just buy up big when the press is bad and sell at launch dates?
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"The first successful commercial GUI product was the Apple Macintosh, which was heavily inspired by PARC's work; Xerox was allowed to buy pre-IPO stock from Apple, in exchange for engineer visits and an understanding that Apple would create a GUI product."
I wish people would steal from me and offer pre-IPO stock...
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It was a negotiated deal. Nothing was stolen.
Re:MS Stole Apple's Lunch Money in the 80's (Score:5, Informative)
Please read this article. It's not very long.
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/05/16/110516fa_fact_gladwell [newyorker.com]
Apple asked Xerox politely if it could have its lunch money and Xerox handed it over willingly in exchange for lunch... futures.
Look, I don't know about making this a metaphor. Point is that the "Apple stole from Xerox" thing is basically a myth. It was all above board. Xerox may seriously regret giving away the idea of the century in exchange for basically nothing but that doesn't change what happened.
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If you read the article, you'd see that you're wrong. Jobs charged Xerox for the discounted shares in order to see what was going on at PARC, Xerox did not give Apple a license to use the look and feel or any of the IP. Later after Apple sued MS for stealing the look and feel, Xerox sued Apple for stealing the look and feel. Ultimately, the Xerox suit was thrown out on a technicality, but that whole business hardly sounds like an above the board deal.
Re:MS Stole Apple's Lunch Money in the 80's (Score:4, Informative)
What the... there's nothing about lawsuits in there. It just talks about the negotiations between Xerox and Apple, and how Apple didn't just copy what they saw, but tweaked and expanded on it massively until it was a completely different product.
Xerox's claims were dismissed because the claims they made were not actual violations of law. The court also didn't uphold any of Apple's claims vs Microsoft either, other than some silly stuff about a trash can icon, so it's not like Xerox lost out because they didn't dot their 'i's while mean old Apple Legal raped and pillaged.
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Many devices including the iPhone and iPad have moved away from the "overlapping windows" metaphor, so who cares anymore?
On second thought, perhaps the author of the good old Unix "screen" utility should start to sue some companies.
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I keep hearing people claim that Apple didn't steal their desktop style design from Xerox and that they paid for it, but it never happened. Apple paid to take a look at what Xerox was doing, and was ultimately sued for stealing the look and feel from Xerox. That isn't exactly the sort of thing you'd expect if Apple had really licensed the look and feel. It did turn out to be a moot point when all was said and done because you can't copyright it, but still.
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I keep hearing people claim that Apple didn't steal their desktop style design from Xerox and that they paid for it, but it never happened. Apple paid to take a look at what Xerox was doing, and was ultimately sued for stealing the look and feel from Xerox. That isn't exactly the sort of thing you'd expect if Apple had really licensed the look and feel. It did turn out to be a moot point when all was said and done because you can't copyright it, but still.
Of course Xerox' case was dismissed because Apple had licensed the GUI (not to mention that what Apple did didn't look much like what Xerox did). So much for that little debunking of what "didn't happen".
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stealing the look and feel from Xerox
What look and feel did they take from Xerox? Menu bar? Nope, Apple created that - Xerox had some free-floating things that looked a little bit like menus. Overlapping windows? Nope, they weren't present at Xerox. The desktop metaphor with the trash can? Nope, that was Jef Raskin (working at Apple).
The case was dismissed because, other than having white rectangular windows with black borders, the Apple look and feel was nothing like the Xerox one.
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Re:Hey, buddy. (Score:4, Informative)
Have you ever even looked at the evidence against Samsung? I'm guessing not since you posted Anonymous. They copied the design, the icons, the packaging, even the power adapter is identical. This isn't some 'vague look and feel', but pretty much straight clone. It is an obvious attempt to cash in on customer confusion.
http://copyrightcommerceandculture.com/2011/05/12/did-samsung-copy-apples-iphone-ipad/ [copyrightc...ulture.com]
http://www.idownloadblog.com/2011/09/29/apple-samsung-copycat-2/ [idownloadblog.com]
How can you look at the above links and call it 'vague'? Hell they even got caught using iPhone graphics on their own webpage.
http://feeds.appleinsider.com/click.phdo?i=d1a78f8d91e14e80da004b76d84dbe93 [appleinsider.com]
I mean seriously?
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God forbid any company besides Apple be allowed to make a desktop-style OS.
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God forbid any company besides Apple be allowed to make a desktop-style OS.
God forbid you guys ever drop the hyperbole (or actually understand what this is about). Apple only sued over GUI elements that were copies of theirs - and not copies of Xerox' while we are at it). Just like Apple doesn't sue over tablets that aren't copies of the iPad.
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Already been done [newscientist.com]
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Secondly, "Desktop style OS" existed in 1984 on UNIX too. It just wasn't "popular".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Window_System [wikipedia.org]
Far be it from me to defend an Apple fanboi, but the Apple Lisa predates this, being released in 1983. Everything, of course, stemmed from PARC, and a rather inexplicit agreement to "look" at Xerox's operations in return for Apple stock didn't give Apple IP rights to all GUIs (and thank god, too!)
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Xerox didn't agree, sued and lost. Your point? The X Window System is not, and never was, a "Desktop Style OS".
The point here is that Samsung is deliberately trying to clone the iPad, even down to the shape of the dock connector and the styling of the charger. I'm not sure about the validity of some of Apple's patents, but I think it's ridiculous for people to imply that Apple shouldn't be trying. I would think any decent company, in their position, would try to take action against a company of Samsung'
If Apple and Samsung are fighting it out (Score:2)
Wouldn't that just open a market for knockoffs?
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No. While they are both fighting each other (although Apple seems to have the better lawyers after a few salvo exchanges), be assured that should another phone enter the marketplace, these two would just as quickly turn on it in unison and then resume their own spit once the new player was out of the equation.
Whoever or whatever started it, both these companies are trying to really dig their heels in to be the ONLY smartphone company - they just happen to be each others biggest rivals at the moment.
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Re:If Apple and Samsung are fighting it out (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't think that's quite true. Apple has initiated all of this and Samsung has retaliated quite reluctantly. I have been wondering why Samsung didn't launch this action months ago. Samsung doesn't seem to want to stifle competition, because they make money from phones Apple sells.
I think Apple's initial claim was valid... its obvious the Samsung product in question would never have existed if not for iPhone. Don't get caught up over rectangles, Samsung is clearly and without any duplicity whatsoever attempting to take advantage of iPhone's popularity by releasing a product that superficially looks identical to Apple's. You seem to be of the opinion "I'm suing you because you're suing me" is a perfectly valid legal strategy. If it is, then sure... Samsung is just doing what it can not to get caught under the deadly wheels of Apple's crushing anti-competitive practices as it chews up and digests industrial giants on its way to world domination.
Re:If Apple and Samsung are fighting it out (Score:4, Insightful)
No. While they are both fighting each other (although Apple seems to have the better lawyers after a few salvo exchanges),
Apple doesn't have the better lawyers, they have the better case.
Well, it depends (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Well, it depends (Score:5, Insightful)
"At least they didn't try"? Are you serious? How much money does Apple spend on such R&D please? How much Samsung, owning core 3G patents (and that worldwide, not US where you can patent basic ideas) and what not spends on it?
Apple "develops" in-house brilliant "design patents" like rectangle with rounded corners. Apple BOUGHT company that had multi-touch patent. Apple BOUGHT company that has developed Siri (former appstore app, now withdrawn)
Samsung spends money on real R&D.
Apple spends more on snacks (Score:3)
than Samsung spends on R&D. Do you think that the iPhone and iPad just fell from the sky? There's a huge amount of R&D (probably more D than R, but still) that goes into those things.
What difference does it make if Apple acquired some IP by purchasing other companies--they are still paying for it, right? That's still an R&D expenditure.
What's more, Apple's never tried to submarine their patents into some global telecommunications standard (which required RAND terms, btw) and then came back a few
Re:Well, it depends (Score:4, Interesting)
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It depends on which case you're talking about, because they are different in different countries. The very first injunction they've had (in Germany) was about design patents, yes. The one in Australia is about multitouch gestures instead, and could be applied to pretty much any non-iOS device. Specific patents that Apple has used to block Samsung sales in Australia:
Innovation Patents
2008100283: List scrolling and document translation, scaling, and rotation on a touch-screen display
2008100372: Electronic device for photo management
2009100820: Unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image
2008100419: Unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image
2008101171: Portable electronic device for imaged-based browsing of contacts
Standard Patents
2008201540: List scrolling and document translation, scaling, and rotation on a touch-screen display
2005246219: Multipoint touchscreen
2007283771: Portable electronic device for photo management
2009200366: List scrolling and document translation, scaling, and rotation on a touch-screen display
2007286532: Touch screen device, method and graphical user interface for determining commands by applying heuristics
(from here [theconversation.edu.au])
Bullshit Description (Score:2)
Re:Bullshit Description (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure:
In the latest edition of the Apple vs. Samsung patent fight, the ABC is reporting that Samsung has filed in Australian and Japanese courts seeking an injunction to halt sales of the iPhone 4S for alleged 3G patent violations. It remains to be seen whether Samsung has any better luck with the retaliatory strike in Australian and Japanese courts than it did with courts in the Netherlands. I expect that Samsung will fail partly because of overseas precedent, but mostly because their patents are technical and narrow in scope.
Happier now?
For the record I do not own any Apple product, any Android based device (Samsung or other), or a mobile phone. I hold shares in neither company. Ultimately, I couldn't care less about these particular two devices, but I do care about the collateral damage to innovation caused by the patents-as-weapons mentality regardless of who is wielding it.
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Name those "designs" that "courts actually agreeing on Apple's side" please.
So far we only have:
1) Duesseldorf judge agreeing that rectangular shape with round corners can be patented (unlike her Dutsch colleagues)
2) Dutch court disagreeing with most but one of Apple's claim ("obvious" / "prior art"), with a single exception in gallery view app, which is covered by updating to newer Android anyway
What are "all those courts" pretty please?
Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:5, Interesting)
As previously stated [slashdot.org], it's not a patent on round-rects:
Re:Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:4, Informative)
It's not just that. It's also shit like this [samsung.com].
That came from this/ screen cap. [flickr.com]
It's absurd.
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Just a stupid mockup picture. I mean it is Google Maps and that is an obvious way to do it. As for actual look and feel, the Google Maps app on the samsung does actually look a lot different than the one on the iPhone. And it's not even made by samsung so I don't see why it would apply here anyway.
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They couldn't even get screen caps from their own product!
It's on samsung's site! What the hell?
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Re:Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, we already know that it's not just "round rectangles." Even Gumph.
What he said was "[...] the patent-a-rectangle nature [...]," emphasis mine.
Even taken all together, Apple's design patent could be used to take practically all smartphones off the market, and certain aspects have been common in computers and phones for over a decade. The "patent-a-rectangle" part is just highlighting one obviously silly piece of a silly patent.
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They're claiming that stuff as trademarks? Wow, that's even worse than rounded rectangles.
The purpose of a trademark is designation of origin. It isn't supposed to be a user interface patent, or a method to lock in users by preventing competitors from creating a product that customers familiar with the trademark holder's product will have an easier time learning to use.
Re:Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:4, Insightful)
Regardless of if Samsung did "copy" Apple, the idea that Apple should own a shape should be fought. Especially when that shape is the only practical one for tablets (and always has been).
Re:Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:4, Insightful)
Trouble is, even looking at that list, when you see;
https://plus.google.com/u/0/100241261662852079434/posts/En6cqNeQqDJ [google.com]
on shows aired in 2003, that were rectangular glass fronted, rounded edges portable machines, it all appears obvious that Apple haven't really invented much, just taken what's out there and put polish on it. The move to better screens, everyone was leaving resistive behind.
Why do people link to just some of Samsung's designs with dates and skips things like;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JooJoo [wikipedia.org]
that was released March 2010 and shown before the iPad was even publically admitted to exist.
You can look at Apple's kit and say 'yeah, they look great, but truly innovative? or just another design style that the industry was moving to anyway, for some things, Apple got there first, for some things, they got there late, but still claimed they invented it.
I think that's what winds most people up about this, we've got devices on our desks that are claimed to be infringing that are obviously not, or other devices that came out before the ipad/phone but did all the same stuff.
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It is clear that Apple created something. After all, other companies had tried to create tablet computers, but none had achieved much mass market penetration. The technology was there for any company to create an iPad like device, but none did. Indeed, the conventional wisdom was that tablet computers would not sell, and that consumers preferred cheap netbooks. Other companies were making smartphones, including touch capabilities, before the iPhone, but none achieved the iPhone's success.
So clearly Apple cr
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I came across this yesterday and found it interesting (comparisons of what Samsung's tablets looked like before and after the iPad came out)
The problem is that these troll pages pretend that there was only ever Apple and Samsung designing phones and tablets. That wasn't the case.
If I wanted to play the same game, I'd say that the iPad is itself designed from the rounded-rectangle tablet PCs that came before it, like this [wikipedia.org] and the iPhone from the PDAs that came before it, like this [typepad.com].
Re:Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:5, Informative)
Someone already did make an antitroll image [googleusercontent.com]
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Someone already did make an antitroll image [googleusercontent.com]
Interesting that they chose to omit the Galaxy Tab 10 from the "after iPad - reality" images. Of course, if they did it might spoil the message by reinforcing how many post-iPad tablet makers have come up with designs that don't shamelessly ape the iPad.
Note, I agree that the only beneficiaries of this silly patent war will be the lawyers - but trying to deny that the iPhone and iPad have hugely influenced the design of phones and tablets - and that the Samsung Galaxy products haven't been influenced more
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Yeah, but those tablets aren't selling. Those tablets aren't in the, "Let's chase after the iPad" tablet market segment.
I love Apple's products, and I despise Apple's lawsuits based on look and feel(Apple's a big boy company with lots of lawyers to argue this in court; they don't need me)...
But the thing that sticks in my craw about the whole mess is how the consumer electronics industry turned on a dime to mimic the iPad. It's disgusting to think that companies like Palm, HP, Lenovo, et al, could build i
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...and the iPhone from the PDAs that came before it, like this [typepad.com].
Or maybe, this [oldcomputers.net]. Oh, wait, that was made by Apple, so I guess they're allowed to copy it.
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No, it's a trademark on round rectangles. Oh sorry, black round rectangles. Still ridiculos claim. Good, LEGO only lost their rectangle trademark a few years ago it's time for someone to take it again.
Re:Not (primarily) about round-rects (Score:4, Interesting)
As far as interface icons are concerned, I'm not sure what the law says, but from a practical point of view I think it's best to encourage companies to imitate each others' interfaces whenever possible: it makes it easier for consumers to switch from using one to another.
Well yes and no. Yes it makes it easier for customers to switch between devices, but it also limits their choice because maybe the customer doesn't _want_ the interface to look like that.
As an example, several years ago I was looking around for a new phone. I was considering an HTC Dream (which I did buy in the end), but the salesman at the Carphone Warehouse was doing his level best to tell me that I didn't want an HTC Dream because it wasn't very iphone-like (it had a hard keyboard rather than an on-screen keyboard) and kept directing me to various other phones because they were "more iphone-like". He didn't seem to be able to grasp the concept that I didn't *want* an iPhone clone, I was specifically looking for a phone with a hard keypad and if I wanted something like the iPhone I'd probably have just damned well bought an iPhone!
Whilst I will accept that having the same interface everywhere is good in environments where you are constantly switching between several devices that do essentially the same job, in an environment where you own and use a single device for this job (which is usually the case with phones) then it would seem more sensible to give the user a UI that they find pleasant and efficient to work with rather than forcing everyone to use the same interface that may well not work for them. This applies equally to other devices, such as desktop PCs - as another example, I find having my PC set to do sloppy-focus so that I can rapidly switch between and work on half-hidden windows. It is a minor inconvenience when I have to use someone else's PC that isn't set up like this, but it would seriously harm my working efficiency if I was unable to set my own workstation how I wanted. Since 99% of my time is spent working on my own workstation, it makes the most sense to have it configured in the best way for *me* (and then having to deal with some inconvenience on the 1% of the time I use a different machine) than it would be to have a lowest-common-denominator setup where everything is identical(ly crap).
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Interesting comparisons. Just from the first link (hardware design [peanutbuttereggdirt.com]), it looks like there's a better case that Samsung is copying Apple on phones than it is on tablets. (Incidentally, the iPad trademark matches the earlier Samsung picture frame [blogcdn.com] on every single point,
Ohh? Let's check every single point (and not just the front) mkay? [appleinsider.com]
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As previously stated [slashdot.org], it's not a patent on round-rects:
From the link you provided, the only relevant difference between the Samsung Q1 UMPC (released 3 years before the iPad) and the Galaxy Tab (released 7 months later) is the rounding of the corners.
You should immediately seek a doctor to check your eyesight.
So I guess we've picked a side then (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm so glad to see Slashdot his picked a side in this patent battle. I guess we'll just safely assume that Samsung only tried to submarine the entire 3G standard in retaliation of Apple's legal moves and would have never pulled that shit with less than noble intentions. I guess whenever Apple gets mad because one of their biggest business partners is aping their design cues and ripping off their trade dress, that they are trying to patent rectangles and smother innovation.
Got it.
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Exactly. It's clear that this summary was written either by a Samsung shill, or someone so incredibly biased it's not even funny.
Never mind that Samsung tried to Rambus the 3G F/RAND technology pool - that's perfectly OK because they're sticking it to Apple!
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I've owned an iPhone 4 and now own a Samsung Galaxy S2 - and so I can testify first-hand that look is not anywhere near as similar as Apple fanbois claim it to be, and in terms of functions it's light years ahead of iPhone - so much so that any claims that "Apple innovates and Samsung copies" are pure BS.
Then again, the claims that everyone out there is copying from Apple have been floating around since forever, even though the supposed perpetrators always differed. As we all well know, everything worth not
Illiterate troll? (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe if you actually read the patent and had some imagination you'd realize that there are different ways of doing things.
Apple's design process: let's do lots of research as to what works and doesn't, both in software and hardware.
Samsung's design process: let's copy Apple's.
Can Samsung's UX team point out exactly how they designed all of Samsung's hardware and software? Why do their icons look that way? Why have the sheen/gloss instead of a flat look? Why not make the icons circular vignettes instead of rounded squares? Why taper the back of your device just so?
They can't, because their work is basically Apple's work.
Samsung's UX and R&D team are sitting in Cupertino inside 1 Infinite Loop. Their secondary teams are in a Samsung facility sitting around and changing some little things here and there.
Have you ever seen any interviews with their design and UX teams? No. That's because they don't exist.
Have you ever heard the name of their head UI person? You'd think that, given the success of the Samsung tablet, that the person would be giving interviews left and right. Anyone? Anyone?
Here's an analogy that even a closed-minded geek can understand. You have a Wii, XBox 360, and a PS3. Which one of them looks like the other? They all have an optical drive and a bunch of A/V output ports. Could you, at a glance, mistake one for another?
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Where are mod points when you need them??
The console analogy nailed it right on the head.
The 2G phone models is another similar case. We have so many different models of 2G phones, all are basically rectangularish with a button pad and a display, with earpiece and mic at both ends. Yet when you take a phone each from two manufacturers, you can distinguish the two most of the time, as all of them are trying to make phones that are distinct from other manufacturers.
Another example would be cars (automobiles f
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The console analogy nailed it right on the head.
Makes me wonder what history would look like if the "look and feel" of nails, bricks, rope, tiles, etc, were patented.
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First of all, there is a huge amount of variety when it comes to bricks, rope and tiles. Nails aren't entirely homogenous either.
Second, patents last a maximum of 20 years. A patent granted on a brick in the First World War would have expired before the Second World War. History wouldn't really look all that different.
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You design a tablet that is easily hand held with a flat screen, at a widely readable size, that is a compact as possible, and see how many designs you come up with that aren't similar. the iPad itself is very similar to several devices from years before the iPad.
Re:Illiterate troll? (Score:5, Insightful)
>Another example would be cars (automobiles for your Americans). All are basically a rectangular block on top of 4 wheels, with 2 or 4 doors. Yet you would have no problem identifying one zooming past you in a second or two.
Actually - that's pretty much not true anymore. My previous car was a Ford Fiesta, on many an occasion I would think "oh another ford Fiesta" while driving and realize as I got close enough to see the logo that it was in fact an Opel Corsa (I believe in the USA they are sold as Chevrolet) or a KIA picanto or any other 4-door compact.
Their shape is all but entirely identical.
I now drive an Audi A3 and when I'm not close enough to see the logos I cannot distinguish it from any other 2-Dear semi-luxury car, Japanese, Korean, American or German.
In fact - your argument proves the opposite. Cars shapes are determined - above all - by the laws of aerodynamics. Those laws remain the same regardless of who designs which is why in any given generation most cars converge on the same rough shape - the shape that is - with current engineering skill - the most aerodynamic we can do.
For any given class of car - that's the same shape. There is only one most aerodynamic shape for a sedan possible, only one for an SUV, only one for a 4x4 and only one for a compact.
You can easily tell the class - but the maker - from shape and design ? No way - because form has to follow function and the function is constrained by the laws of physics that puts a natural limit on creativity.
As technology improves the shapes change - but within a year or two everybody else has changed in the exact same way.
The same thing applies here - there are notable constraints on the design placed by what it has to do. It must be portable, maximize screen space, comfortable to work with, easy to rest on any surface etc.
In fact the design follows inevitably from the purpose of the device - and all devices converge on it. Star Trek on a purely hypothetical level converged on the exact same design 30 years before the ipad came out.
As for your silly statements about popularity... did it every occur to you that perhaps Korean's don't have the celebrity obsession of Americans ? Samsung certainly doesn't have the kind of fanboism apple has - and thus there is no celebrity. We don't see interviews with their design head because Samsung's users are not "fans" - just people who chose a product that met their needs, they don't idolize the guy who drew the pictures it was made from. Apple has the same celebrity appeal as Angelina Jolie and the same slavish uncritical love from it's fans.
Community theater actors may have no less talent, but they don't get followed around by the paparazzi.
Now whether geek-celebrity as espoused by apple is something we should encourage or not is beside the point -but it is the reason why we never really hear from the designers in other companies. A little bit in Microsoft - but who is the chief UI designer for Oracle ? Who is the chief UI designer at google (whose interfaces I really like for the slick simplicity). Who is the brilliant designer that designed that slick and elegant interface for my Audi's radio system ? It's familiar to anybody whose used a car radio - yet massively advanced over the cheapo that came in my ford. Audi is a company noted for brilliant designs and ergonomics, but nowhere in the press do I read interviews with their designers either.
Celebrity is an American phenomenon, geek-Celebrity is mostly an Apple pheonomenon, that doesn't mean nobody else HAS people who do these jobs, just that those who do them at other companies don't get interviewed by rolling stone magazine.
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Could you, at a glance, mistake one for another?
What would be the net result even if you could? At a glance you could quite easily mistake the AppleTV for a Western Digital Elements, doesn't really have any impact though. I bought a macbook air because of what it functionally is (running OSX), if samsung came out with an notebook that looked the same that wouldn't have changed my mind. Same with the ipad, i bought it because that's what i wanted - i don't particularly like the iphone but i wanted iOS apps - and a galaxy tablet would not have worked.
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Now I'm going hungry...
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Lots of people cannot tell one car from another. Does that mean one infringes on the design of another? Certainly not now. Maybe at one point in time a company designed the current pedal system (clutch, break, accelerator), and the standard PRNDL indicator for an automatic transmission. Should that have been protected? I dunno.
Personally I love my Galaxy S. But I don't care that it looks vaguely similar to an iphone (very few people think it's an iphone when I pull it out... the iPhone is very blocky
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Top Gear did a program on this. The earliest car they could find with what is now the standard layout of controls was (IIRC) a Cadillac.
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Re:Illiterate troll? (Score:5, Insightful)
Can Samsung's UX team point out exactly how they designed all of Samsung's hardware and software? Why do their icons look that way? Why have the sheen/gloss instead of a flat look?
I don't know about the icons, but most laptops these days are glossy because that's what people tend to buy. This isn't something that started with tablets.
Why not make the icons circular vignettes instead of rounded squares?
Because a square shape is much more practical. It gives you more space to work with to come up with a descriptive picture. It's kind of like these things called "icons" some of us have had for decades on our computers. I've seen plenty of rounded icons on non-Apple devices long before the iPad.
Why taper the back of your device just so?
Ok, may have been copied. But it's a stupid thing to block a product over.
Have you ever heard the name of their head UI person? You'd think that, given the success of the Samsung tablet, that the person would be giving interviews left and right. Anyone? Anyone?
I can't name the head UI person of really any company ever. Most companies don't have celebrity designers.
Here's an analogy that even a closed-minded geek can understand. You have a Wii, XBox 360, and a PS3. Which one of them looks like the other? They all have an optical drive and a bunch of A/V output ports. Could you, at a glance, mistake one for another?
Those devices aren't trying to pack relatively standardized parts into the lightest and smallest packages they can. They don't have to support a flat display on the front or fit nicely in your hands. I have some ear buds that look a lot like some old ear buds I had from a previous brand. Should those companies sue each other because there's a limited number of practical ways to make a device fit in the ear?
I don't know why I'm even responding to an obvious Apple fanboy but that post being modded insightful is absurd.
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You have a Wii, XBox 360, and a PS3...Could you, at a glance, mistake one for another?
Of course the answer to this question is no, but unfortunately that's the wrong question, because the range of designs that can effectively serve as an appliance that sits near the tv and plays video games is much broader than the range of designs that fits in your hand and plays games or surfs the web.
Now the real question: You have an XBox 360 controller [newegg.com], a PS3 controller [google.com] and a Logitech F310 controller [newegg.com]. Could you, at a glance, mistake one for another?
The human hand, unlike a common tv stand, can accommod
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Maybe if you actually read the patent and had some imagination
Maybe if you'd read the 'patent' you'd know, it, ummmm, isn't a patent.
It's a registered design that's being disputed, ie. the shape.
Here it is: http://www.scribd.com/doc/61944044/Community-Design-000181607-0001 [scribd.com]
If you're going to argue that that particular shape is radically different from dozens of others which came before it or that it's somehow not obvious or simply the next step from designs like the one below then you're an idiot.
eg. Take away this device's keyboard (which is needed because it's Window
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Take a step back and just listen to what you're saying:
Apple is the only company in the world allowed to make icons with a sheen/glossy look?
Apple is the only company in the world allowed to make icons with rounded squares?
Re:Illiterate troll? (Score:4, Interesting)
Um, no...because a console's case has no 'function' other than to look exciting and stop people touching the innards.
A 'pad' computer has to have a touchscreen covering the top side of it. There's no choice about what the principal surface looks like - It's a screen. Period.
It has to be slim so the side walls are pretty much done. Maybe you can use a different color plastic, I dunno.
The back has to be flat and smooth so you can lay it down on things.
That's all sides covered methinks. The only real design choices are whether the corners are rounded and where the connectors go. I don't think Samsung copied Apple's connectors. Arguing about exactly how round the corners are isn't making anybody look intelligent.
Yay for conflation? (Score:4, Insightful)
Trademarks are not patents. Patents are not trademarks. You'll have a hard time getting a patent on a rectangle, but getting a trademark on an iconic design that just happens to be rectangular? Sure. Trademarks are there to protect the look and feel of products from copies, knock-offs, and imitations, and to ensure that consumers don't confuse products they see with one another. People, including the summary, keep referring to this as strictly a patent battle, but trademarks are playing a large role as well, and the "rectangle" complaint the submitter made is referencing trademarks, not patents.
Speaking personally, I'm a dyed-in-wool Apple fanboy, but even I didn't think too highly of Apple's recent complaints and lawsuits. That is, I didn't until I went into a Best Buy a few months back, walked up to what I thought was an iPad display next to the Apple section of the store, activated the device, and discovered it was a Galaxy Tab. If I got them confused both at a distance and up close, what hope does a typical consumer have? Trademarks are designed to prevent that sort of confusion, and I honestly think it's justified here.
Re:Yay for conflation? (Score:5, Insightful)
Isn't that, in large part, because Apple's design avoids having anything that particularly distinguishes it as Apple? IE there is no Apple logo on the front. It seems to me that Apple is trying to claim what is essentially a lack of trade dress as trade dress, thereby gaining protection over something essentially generic rather than something specific.
I think it is a worrying technique because the trademark stops being a useful tool for the customer (ie letting them know a certain company stands behind a particular product) and starts being a weapon against other companies implementing fairly basic designs.
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It will be much harder to set standards, much less get companies to follow them. Products will be less compatible, leadin
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Missed the shining silver "SAMSUNG" on it, did you?
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You mistakenly assume that Apple is only talking about trademarks and design patents here. This is plainly not the case - it started that way in Germany, but by now they're bringing out such innovative patents [theconversation.edu.au] as "Unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image" or "Portable electronic device for photo management" to block sales of Samsung products in Netherlands and Australia.
Tit or tat didn't happen (Score:2)
Sorry, just had to be said. My brain is tired.
I predict Samsung will lose... (Score:2)
simply because the iPhone is such a loved device the court wont want to halt its sale for fear of angry mobs.
Blah blah blah (Score:2)
This had better not delay my retina iPad with LTE.
poor analysis (Score:2)
Unfortunately, I expect that Samsung will fail partly because of overseas precedent, but mostly because their patents are sane, technical and narrow in scope (unlike the patent-a-rectangle nature of the opposition).
I know it's bad form to make fun of the Slashdot editors, but is this the best analysis they could find? Samsung will lose because their patents are sane, but Apple's are insane? The lack of legal understanding in that post is disheartening........Really, good patents are better, although underestanding what a 'good' patent is might take a little bit of research....
Chances of success (Score:2)
It remains to be seen whether Samsung has any better luck with the retaliatory strike in Australian [snip] courts than it did with courts in the Netherlands.
I don't know, will adversarial courts get it wrong like inquistorial courts did? :P
Re:A clean uncluttered rectangle wasn't that obvio (Score:4, Insightful)
> Except nobody bar a few design students with incredible vision (but without the support of large companies) knew it at all. If it was obvious then early 1990s tablet PCs would have soon had the same design.
Oh you mean like the PADDs in STNG or the ones in all sorts of other SciFi since the 80s. They are the ones with the vision, the SciFi writers, producers and set designers. Apple just managed implementation.
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The PADDs had larger bezels and buttons on the front. The iPad trademark (and the infringing Samsung products) do not.
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Just like paper maps ;-)
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Yeah, just like the brilliant design students who decided to make computers smaller than a battleship, right? I mean, it seems obvious now that desktop computers should be smaller, thinner, and lighter, but we never would have guessed if it weren't for the first people who happened to do it after it was technically feasible. Pardon me while I roll my eyes.
Re:A clean uncluttered rectangle wasn't that obvio (Score:4, Insightful)
If it wasn't for Apple's iPad and iPhone, Samsung's tablets and phones would look like this [askdavetaylor.com] and this [mobilegazette.com].
Either that or... form follows function. Capacitive screens and more robust OSs have killed the need for buttons. This limits the design space available. A modern tablet (with or without Apple) would eventually have turned into a nothing but a face and a screen. All of those buttons on your cherry-picked photos are completely superfluous thanks to better technology (which Apple didn't invent). The only choice is the size of the screen, the color of the flat space around it, and whether to round your corners or not. Black is a normal color for these things, as well. Go to your local electronics store and see what the popular color for all gadgets currently is... You'll be shocked to learn that its black. Further... icons in a grid... really? I've have icons in a grid long before anyone even thought of smart phones. I've have hand-held devices (back when they were called PDAs) with icons in a grid. Actually a grid is the most sensible way of arranging small squares... Go figure.
I don't have a horse in this race. Both Apple and Samsung are behaving badly. But at least Samsung actually is using patents that DO something, which isn't nearly as dangerous as the shit Apple is pulling.
This is true, since there existed flat objects with rounded corners, and a centered touch sensitive screen before the iPad, or iPhone.
Unless the argument is that Samsung should have been forced to stick superfluous buttons on their modern devices, since obviously Apple is special.
Further, icons in a grid
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The best part is: The iPad does still have one button on it but it's not shown in the registered design...
http://www.scribd.com/doc/61944044/Community-Design-000181607-0001 [scribd.com]
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Archos 9 [slashgear.com], the year before the first iPad.
If you want I can remake that web page you linked and put it where the iPad is and put the iPad at the bottom. Or are you finished trolling?
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I like that trick of having all the "pre" iPad stuff oriented one way, then having the iPad and everything following oriented another, in the hope that people don't notice that most tablets don't use the iPad aspect ratio. Any time people resort to trickery, it means they know their main point is questionable.
Also, tying into a comment I made above: what if you had all vehicles "pre" Model T and "post" Model T? How do you think that would look? Why do you think that is?
I didn't used to disdain Apple pro
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And what you don't get is that "form follows function". All tablet designers were headed in that direction:
eg.
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2006/03/samsungpictureframe.jpg [blogcdn.com]
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/File:Tablet.jpg [wikimedia.org]
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You do realize that the iPad's shape is hardly unique, I mean for god's sake there's one in 2001 a movie that predate's the iPad by literally decades.
Re:Not-quite-objective summary (Score:4, Informative)
You mean the one with an asymmetric bezel, 10 buttons, and a completely different profile [thefoxisblack.com]?
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Go to Hulu, look up John Doe, episode The Rising, 20 seconds in. Play it for 20 seconds and note all those iPads.
In 2003.
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Yes, exactly, we all know it's ok for Apple because they had 9 less buttons on the bottom whereas Samsung does not so, by the law of button count infringement, that means Apple doesn't infringe on the 2001 device but Samsung infringes on Apple's device.
The many buttons (or lack thereof) are an immediately-evident detail that shows we're not looking at a genuine iPad in 2001. When I searched on Google (for "2001 ipad" I think) to eventually find that page, I noticed small dots at the bottom of the 2001 tablet. That difference was evident in a thumbnail of a scene shot from a perspective of being 3 meters high overhead. That's a very obvious detail, and it contributes greatly to having an overall different appearance.
Apple has a symmetric bezel as opposed to an asymmetric bezel and because of the well-known bezel symmetry vs beveled edge inequality
The bezel is the frame around the screen
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It says "Samsung" on the front of it. Your turn.
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That's a big post full of ad hominem, so I'll respond to the meaningful parts:
i actually thought ... that was a real ipad in that movie and they just took decades to release it.
The point of a trademark or design patent is to establish a distinctive appearance, so that it is clear at a quick glance what product you're seeing. It could be the logo, or the shape of a bottle [wikipedia.org], or something more general, like a color [pressrelated.com] or a particular plaid [reuters.com]. In essence, a trademark protects a distinctive aspect of a product, and a design patent protects a distinctive product in particular.
The entire point of this thread is to po