Apple Can't Block US Sales of Samsung Devices 213
An anonymous reader snips this good news (for Samsung fans) from Edible Apple "In April of 2011, Apple kicked off what would soon become a global and complex series of litigation disputes when it sued Samsung in the U.S. claiming that its line of Galaxy smartphones and tablets infringed upon Apple's intellectual property and were nothing more than 'slavish' copies. As part of its suit, Apple requested a preliminary injunction that would bar Samsung from selling said products in the U.S. This past Friday, Judge Lucy Koh denied Apple's motion for a preliminary injunction."
Good to see. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Good to see. (Score:5, Informative)
Apple's contention within the case is that Samsung is misappropriating Apple's intellectual property, namely patents related to the design of the iPhone devices, user interface designs, icons, images, and methods of operation.
Samsung's contention is that "there are only so many ways to build a smartphone", and that the elements that Apple is complaining about are either "too broad" or are obvious, and thereby not enforceable.
The judge in this particular case has decided that Apple had not presented sufficient evidence in pre-trial proceedings that would show that Apple would be irreparably damaged through Samsung continuing to sell the products in question within the United States.
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patents related to the design of the iPhone devices, user interface designs, icons, images, and methods of operation.
Patents are supposed to be for inventions.
The terrorists have won.
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Except for the bouncing animation patent (which seems dubious to me, since bouncing when reaching a limit has been a staple of cartoon animation for decades, and of rubber balls for centuries), the patents in question are design patents [wikipedia.org]. That's the main reason the judge denied the injunction. A design patent (in the U.S.) has to be purely ornamental - e.g. the distinctive shape of a Coca-Cola bottle is purely artistic and serves no function purpose.
To paraphr
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Interestingly, the judge who originally granted an injunction is white.
(above is just to point out how irrelevant OP's comment is)
Re:Good to see. (Score:5, Funny)
Does he now or has he ever worn a turtleneck?
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Hell yes! It is about time too...
Re:Good to see. (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe you didn't read all of the article either. The judge felt that Apple's patent was invalid. Meaning, the judge didn't "agree with Apple on almost all points, except the one . . . "
Nice spin though.
Re:Good to see. (Score:5, Interesting)
The judge felt that the D'087 patent was likely invalid (too similar to previous designs), but not the D'677 patent. The D'677 patent covers the black transparent glass-like front surface. I think the judge was wrong in not dismissing that based on it being a functional component, but that's still to be litigated.
Re:Good to see. (Score:5, Informative)
The judge actually agree with Apple on almost all points, except the one that they would suffer irreparable harm.
Not really true.
To quote TFA;
"Nevertheless, Samsung raised questions of validity regarding Apple’s D’899 patent and Apple did not establish that it would likely to succeed at trial."
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In a world of craptastic approve anything US patents. Where the idea is to gain more revenue for the patents office and for US lawyers. I'd bet that lobbyists for US lawyers are sneaking around between those politicians who have connections to the patents office to ensure influence on the more craptastic the patent is, the more it should be approved. Craptastic patents guarantee civil court actions. so Apple's Craptastic patent, fixed it for you.
Seems fair... (Score:4, Informative)
This is similar to the recent reversal of the Apple-Samsung injunction in Australia - there, the court said that an injunction was unwarranted, but that Samsung would have to keep detailed records of every penny earned on the products, because they could be on the hook for all of them. Same thing here - if the patents are found valid and Samsung is found to have infringed, they'll owe damages to Apple... but there's no reason to preemptively make those damages $0 by stopping the sale of the product.
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G'day, dingo! I herd yer like reversing, so I put a reversal on your reversal so yer can reverse while yer bloomin' well reversing.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-02/apple-wins-extension-on-samsung-tablet-ban.html [bloomberg.com]
Agree with the rest 100%, certainly it's how it should be. But sometimes it seems the law and common sense nod when they pass each other on opposite s
Apple hates competition (Score:5, Insightful)
Plain and simple.
"Oh my god, their tablet is like ours! Ban it!"
No kidding (Score:4, Interesting)
Particularly since the "design patent" they are whining about it violating is stupidly broad. More or less it is "A black rectangle with rounded corners." Oh wow. What an amazing design. I haven't seen that anywhere before except TVs, computer monitors, computer cases, picture frames, speakers, furniture, and so on.
I think Apple is really scared right now because Android is a major threat. It has been making big inroads on their iToy market and that is where all their money has come from. I mean they have a computer market, don't get me wrong, but their were a smaller company when that was what they did. Consumer electronics are where they've risen to massive profitability. Android is threatening that and I don't think they have a "what's next" a different market to move in to that they can try and dominate.
So instead they try and shut down competition.
Re:Apple hates competition (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple steals liberally from competitors (iOS5 status bar and wireless updates and sync, anyone?), and then sues them when the opposite happens. How do you arrive at your conclusion?
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also, copy and paste.
Relevant: Apple gives Samsung advice on non-patent (Score:5, Funny)
Phone Arena:
Apple gives Samsung advice on non-patent infringing designs
In order to disprove Samsung’s claim, Apple needed to provide alternate design options to prove that Samsung did, in fact, blatantly copy Apple’s design. Some samples from these suggestions include:
Smartphones:
* Front surface that isn't black.
* Overall shape that isn't rectangular, or doesn't have rounded corners.
* Display screens that aren't centered on the front face and have substantial lateral borders.
* Non-horizontal speaker slots.
* Front surfaces with substantial adornment.
* No front bezel at all.
Tablets:
* Overall shape that isn't rectangular, or doesn't have rounded corners.
* Thick frames rather than a thin rim around the front surface.
* Front surface that isn't entirely flat.
* Profiles that aren't thin.
* Cluttered appearance.
They also have a great depiction of what such a tablet may look like [phonearena.com]
Re:Relevant: Apple gives Samsung advice on non-pat (Score:5, Interesting)
When you're pimping a Chrysler, people know it's a Chrysler. Despite the similarities, there's no way in hell anybody with half a brain would confuse a Chrysler with a Bentley. And Bentley, being classy, is aware of that and that suing Chrysler would be a very tacky and un-classy move.
Apple could learn a few things from that little case study, but they want to be tacky and don't have enough faith in consumers to be able to distinguish the two.
Oh, I just clicked preview and saw that you're now at +5 funny and I've been trolled. I may be too dumb to get sarcasm, but I'm still not dumb enough to confuse a Galaxy with an iPad.
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Maybe it's just me, but those two vehicles don't look similar.
Really? Not similiar? Hell, they're almost IDENTICAL! Both have windshields of clear glass trimmed with chrome.
Both have round steering wheels. Both have the driver's seat facing forward. They even both have four round wheels in diametrically opposite corners. I could go on and on...
Re:Relevant: Apple gives Samsung advice on non-pat (Score:5, Interesting)
- The headlights are recessed from the Grille. Think of the center grille section as kind of a "nose" between the "eyes."
- The fender areas are tightly "wrapped" around the wheel wells and there is a small distance between the top of the wheel and the hood. Also note that both vehicles have big, spoked rims and small street-tires, all contributing to both models' "low-slung" appearance.
- On both vehicles, the angle of the front windshield is larger than the angle of the back windshield, and the roof itself is sloping downward toward the rear.
- Both vehicles are black with silver trim, and are generally intended to evoke a luxury appearance. Chrysler is obviously paying homage to Bentley.
- An obvious difference between the two pics I provided is that the Chrysler's grille extends to the bottom, and there are fog lights on its bumper. However, using this [automotivescycle.com] bentley pic as a reference, once again there is more similarity.
- While we're talking about the fronts, take into consideration the logos of the Bentley [gotbroken.com] and the Chrysler [gotbroken.com] here. Both logos are encapsulated in an oval, adorned with wings, and located on the top center of the grille.
I was saying earlier that Apple should appreciate that others are paying homage to them instead of trying to stop their shipments. It is apparent to anybody with half a brain which is which, especially when the GUIs are visible.
If Apple still wanted to stop Samsung, they could have at least compared the radius of the corners rather than just saying, "rounded corners," for example.
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These were actually some of the design options Apple said Samsung had to make their products more differentiated, and not infringe on their design products. While some of them are just crazy, others aren't too bad. Here's the original article: http://www.theverge.com/2011/12/2/2596527/apple-samsung-design-patent-iphone-ipad-work-around [theverge.com]
Re:Dumb (Score:5, Interesting)
Looks like you've got Samsung's lawyers beat, then: Even Samsungâ(TM)s Lawyers Can't Tell the Difference Between Its Tablet and an iPad [gizmodo.com]
You act like that's Samsung's problem.
I wonder if they (or Apple's lawyers) could tell this [androidauthority.com] apart from the front of the Galaxy Tab... because if not, Apple has a serious problem, because that's a Samsung Digital Photo Frame from 2006, predating the iPad by 4 years.
Now, the back looks nothing like a Galaxy Tab, but that's not likely to be the part the court was showing when asking the question.
Here's a tip: If you rip off someone's design, don't sue the person you ripped off for ripping off said design in a different product.
Re:Relevant: Apple gives Samsung advice on non-pat (Score:5, Insightful)
Pity really, I like Apple products (other then iOS which is too restrictive for me) but they seem to have some crazy people working there these days.
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The people at Apple aren't the crazy ones. No, the crazy people are a) the legistlators who made the laws that Samsung is (supposedly) infringing on, and b) the judges who allow the laws to stand. In the US, at least, judges can invalidate laws if they find them bad enough (not sure how bad they have to be) and I imagine they can in other countries was well.
Apple is just using the system to get an advantage. Unfair, of course, but they don't care.
tie up Apple in court (Score:5, Insightful)
The law doesn't and can't define where the line is between patentable and unpatentable designs; that is for the courts to sort out, and they are trying to sort it out.
The reasons this is coming up now and is such a problem are twofold. First, product cycles and market opportunities are very short lived. Samsung had a few months to turn a profit on the 10.1 and Apple killed that. Now, the Transformer Prime is coming out and the lawsuit doesn't matter anymore. Second, most companies focus on making good products and don't, as a habit, go around suing each other over trivialities--it wastes everybody's time.
The last point may also be the solution to this problem: Samsung and everybody else being sued by Apple should tie up Apple's designers and executives in court, for years. Given how marginal Apple's claims are, the court should grant wide latitude to the defense to depose and question these people. When Apple's employees spend more time in court than doing work, maybe they'll figure out that these kinds of lawsuits are not productive for anybody.
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Uh what tablets and phones looked and behaved like an iPhone/iPad before the two devices came out?
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Shape that isn't rectangular and cluttered appearance :-D Brillant!!!!
Stupid you. Google for "sony tablet" or for "toshiba tablet" and you will find two nice tablet designs that are rectangular and look nothing like an iPad. If Sony and Toshiba can do it, then surely Samsung can do it.
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Shape that isn't rectangular and cluttered appearance :-D Brillant!!!!
Stupid you. Google for "sony tablet" or for "toshiba tablet" and you will find two nice tablet designs that are rectangular and look nothing like an iPad. If Sony and Toshiba can do it, then surely Samsung can do it.
Actually, the iPad also doesn't look all that much like whatApple filed in its design patent paperwork either.
But, anyway, many of the Toshiba tablets look similar to the iPad (because they iPad has a very generic design)
http://www.reviewphones.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/toshiba-thrive-tablet-vs-ipad-21.jpg
And here is one from Sony:
http://www.gayakuman.com/uploads/2010/02/sony-tablet.jpg
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I'll give you the SONY Tablet S - that's definitely quite different. At least, from the side. From the front it's just like most other tablets.
Which brings me to the "Toshiba Tablet". You're saying it looks "nothing like an iPad".
http://cdn.cbsi.com.au/story_media/339308309/toshiba-tablet-10- [cbsi.com.au]
Re:Relevant: Apple gives Samsung advice on non-pat (Score:4, Insightful)
Stupid you. Google for "sony tablet" or for "toshiba tablet" and you will find two nice tablet designs that are rectangular and look nothing like an iPad. If Sony and Toshiba can do it, then surely Samsung can do it.
Then why did Apple feel like they should copy the design of tablets/phones that existed before iPhone/iPad?
They could have invented some new design too.
this is good for national security (Score:4, Funny)
I don't want some muslims ripping off American technology and implementing a Muslim Caliphate. Did you know that in the Muslim World, women are raped if they drive a car? That young girls cannot go to school or their heads are cut off and fed to dogs?
This is what is at stake, when terrorist groups like Samsung attack our American values. We have to defend America first, and to hell with everyone else.
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This is what's called "mods with no sense of humor at all. Nope."
--
BMO
thanks bmo (Score:2)
im glad it half-way entertained one person
although it was over the top and completely irresponsible
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I took it as probably the way you meant it...
Making fun of the people who would agree with it.
--
BMO
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Don't worry - I suspect most people are smart enough to get the joke, and merely chuckled without feeling a compulsive need to reply. :)
appeasement! (Score:5, Funny)
this is how Hitler was allowed to invade the Sudetenland, annex Austria, and crash those planes into the Trade Towers.
Re:this is good for national security (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh wait...
They've created an Us and Them situation... (Score:5, Insightful)
The worst part of these preliminary injunctions is they kill the biggest sales time - pre-Christmas.
While there may be merit on both sides, aborting the product in it's first large sales growth period is a sure-fire way of killing off a competitor.
What Apple has done, is polarise a significant portion of people against them. It's almost as if they modelled themselves on Microsoft...
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What Apple has done, is polarise a significant portion of people against them. It's almost as if they modelled themselves on Microsoft...
With regards to this Christmas season, I doubt a significant portion of people even know Samsung makes a tablet, or that the Streisand Effect will kick in. Apple is still a media icon, and people don't even bother to check out what the competition has to offer.
Even today, just about every advertisement on the radio reminds you that they have an app "for your iPod or iPad". Hearing someone mention Android (at least) is a rare occasion. I assume non-tech magazines are in that same boat.
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With regards to this Christmas season, I doubt a significant portion of people even know Samsung makes a tablet
To provide you with some insight to how things worked in Australia. The Samsung Galaxy Tab was about the only tablet other than an iPad you could find at most Carrier stores. It was one of the few tablets you could actually buy on a plan like the iPad. The majority of the tablets sold here are sold at consumer electronic stores, many of which don't / can't actually carry Apple devices. On top of that actual Apple stores here are few and far between.
The place where they managed to initially get the Galaxy Ta
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To a non tech user, iPad is interchangeable for "Tablet". They'll buy Samsung or Apple or HTC or whatever as long as it has Youtube and Angrybirds.
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While there may be merit on both sides...
like what?? i fail to see this as anything but an underhanded act of a company that does not want to compete.
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Not all those that read /. live in their mum's basement.
My wife doesn't read /., but she's an S2 owner and routinely evangelises her Samsung compared to her 3GS. When it came time to upgrade, she didn't want to go for a 4 (4S wasn't out) and even before asking me about it (didn't want to risk a nerd rant - gee thanks!) she had spoken to quite a lot of people and played with their phones - and made her decision before talking to a slashdotter.
Re:They've created an Us and Them situation... (Score:4, Insightful)
Microsoft has revolutionised computing in general bringing standard UIs to an industry with so many disparate hardware and software vendors, APIs, and technologies. You may dislike the interface, but it is a common standard through sheer numbers.
Apple does it with a handful of hand-picked "partners"
Microsoft has revolutionised collaboration internally with things such as OLE, DDE and Office, and externally with Exchange & Sharepoint.
Both companies have bought, lied, sued, or outright lifted others ideas to get ahead, and I despise what both have become, so I'd disagree with called ignorant.
(BTW I have admin certs with Microsoft, Apple, Red Hat, and Cisco - nevertheless I'll put the boot into any of those companies should they require it.)
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I think Apple products are very nice, attractive and pretty well-made (with some notable exceptions). That being said, I have an important question to ask here:
Does loving Apple products too much make you stupid? Because I'm starting to get a little bit concerned. It seems to sort of go like this: First they get a MacBook, and they really like it. And then they get an iPhone and
Re:They've created an Us and Them situation... (Score:4, Funny)
Does loving Apple products too much make you stupid?
no; but it does give a head start.
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Loving anything too much makes you stupid.
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Except your mother.
Wait, not your mother specifically, but one's mother.
(You have to be specific these days.)
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LOL, I haven't smeared myself with feces yet but I do like my Apple stuff. Then again, I think Apple is behaving like a little kid with their lawsuits against Samsung.
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Apple still has the only OS on smartphones that can be touted as 100% secure, with absolutely zero instances of malware in the wild going on.
Perhaps they should patent this and sue any other phone makers that are malware free.
Apple knows Samsung is better... (Score:5, Insightful)
Apple is scared to death, because they know Samsung is making a better product.
Apple can control its sheeple users, but they have no right to control other companies or the right to block buyers from the competition.
When will Apple be called out for doing all the horrible shit people think Microsoft does?
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I'm afraid you're right. I am very curious to how Apple will be doing in 5 years from now. That is what makes tech interesting: the stuff itself is fun but the policies and doings of the companies that make it are even more fun to watch.
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NeXT didn't do well with him either.
And I'm not quite sure how losing PC market to IBM qualifies, a success?
Re:Apple knows Samsung is better... (Score:4, Insightful)
When will Apple be called out for doing all the horrible shit people think Microsoft does?
I call them out all the time. But the problem is that ever since Apple adopted a Unix-y OS for its OS X, a large number of geeks have become fans and thereafter switched their brains entirely off. It's sad.
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Every time an autistic freetard calls millions of users "sheeple" I want to pull their tongue out of their body and strangle them to death with it.
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Read your reaction again, please. Does it remind you of something? It does for me.
That reaction sounds very much like the type of reaction you'll encounter when 'offending' some religion. And isn't that more or less what those 'autistic freetards' you talk about claim about the'sheeple'?
I'd say your reaction is proof that the 'autistic freetard' is at least partl
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The sheeple never realize they're the sheep.
Re:Apple knows Samsung is better... (Score:4, Informative)
"Firewire" (an IEE standard, like many common interfaces), "Airport" (Apple's name for it's totally standard implementation of 802.11a/b/g/n), and "no USB" (err, on what? All of Apple's devices support USB....) as "weird Apple standards"....
I'm not really sure what you're driving at here, but the only way you could be more wrong is if you said Hydrogen was the least common element in the universe.
Anyway, ignoring all your totally ignorant "truthiness" about that, there's plenty of customisation and choice. I take it you've never actually *used* an Apple product before, to actually test this out for yourself? You're just repeating the talking points and wishing really hard that it's true.
If we're throwing around generalisations... have you ever met a Linux user who doesn't live in their mom's basement? I mean, all they do is troll Apple stories and crow about how everyone else are just "sheeple" because they don;t compile their own OS from scratch every weekend.
Re:Apple knows Samsung is better... (Score:5, Funny)
Stop typing on an iPad touch screen and use something with a keyboard!
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Only so many ways (Score:3, Insightful)
When I was in university, I had a CS assignment in an assembly language course. The prof. accused about 15 people in the class of plagiarism. I got 100% on the assignment, but wasn't one of the ones accused. The assignment was quite specific about expectations, and the code size was small (about 15 lines of code). The prof. openly accused one guy, and the guy asked: is there another way of writing this code and getting a correct result? The prof. stopped and thought for a minute, then said 'no', at which point he stopped. There are lots of ways of making a cell phone. Round corners isn't proprietary. Colorful icons aren't proprietary. Clicking once or twice isn't proprietary. Apple is hoping for a judicial monopoly, but developing a market doesn't mean you get an instant monopoly on that market.
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Ah yes, the "it's obvious!" argument. Where were these obvious implementations before the iPad and iPhone? Why didn't anyone try something remotely similar? Why did Android convert from a Blackberry ripoff to an iOS clone 9 months after the iPhone's release?
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Because fashion changes. That's how things go. Apple is a fashion leader, but having a monopoly on any "style" of design is just... stupid. Or should Ferrari be the only car company that can design supercars, because they were the first?
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Because fashion changes. That's how things go. Apple is a fashion leader, but having a monopoly on any "style" of design is just... stupid. Or should Ferrari be the only car company that can design supercars, because they were the first?
Design patents are like trademarks. They are designed to prevent companies from making clone products that confuse consumers, even if they don't have the exact trademark of the company. A design patent (even were it granted) on rectangular black phones would be un-enforcable by itself. That said, Samsung's conduct goes well beyond that. They cloned the basic look of the iPhone, the layout of the GUI buttons, the color, gradient, and icons on some of the buttons (trademarked icons by the way), the packaging
"new style of rocker switch apple invented" (Score:3)
also they invented the mouse, the GUI, the same-look-across-product-line, the idea that computers should be white, the educational computer, the floppy disk, bresenham's algorithm, microkernels, ..
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They were not the first. Bugatti was there much much earlier (1909 vs 1929).
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Ah yes, the "it's obvious!" argument. Where were these obvious implementations before the iPad and iPhone? Why didn't anyone try something remotely similar? Why did Android convert from a Blackberry ripoff to an iOS clone 9 months after the iPhone's release?
The obvious implementations before iPad/iPhone have been mentioned so many times (on Slashdot and every other tech site), that I find it amusing you would even say something like this.
Hell, even on this page you will find at least 1 reference to something that predates iPhone/iPad.
I was an Amiga fan (zealot), and I though that was the worst kind imaginable, but Apple fans are way worse.
I'm a "non-Apple fan" (Score:3)
It really pisses me off that Apple is trying to monopolize the market for thin, rectangular tablets and phones. They didn't invent that form factor, they weren't the first to produce devices in it, and they should not have a design patent on it.
So, I'm supporting anybody who fights Apple, including Samsung and HTC.
Re:What's a Samsung fan? (Score:4, Informative)
Ok, I'll bite on the bait.
A Samsung fan is just a regular person who doesn't have a deeply compelling brand loyalty. Or at least in the usage in this article summary on Slashdot that is the meaning.
It means, anybody who isn't a Steve-fan.
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A Samsung fan is just a regular person who doesn't have a deeply compelling brand loyalty.
Same as a Steelers fan is just a regular person who doesn't have a deeply compelling sport loyalty.
Or a Saturn fan is just a regular person who doesn't have a deeply compelling car loyalty.
You know that "fan" comes from "fanatic", yes?
Re:What's a Samsung fan? (Score:4, Informative)
You know that "fan" comes from "fanatic", yes?
Actually according to Wikipedia it could come from the word fancy: "Paul Dickson, in his Dickson Baseball Dictionary, cites William Henry Nugent's work that claims it comes from fancy, a 19th century term from England that referred mainly to followers of boxing." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_(person) [wikipedia.org]
I'm a steelers fan, but I certainly wouldn't get into any arguments or flamewars about them. Does that mean I'm also a Steelers fanatic?
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You know that "fan" comes from "fanatic", yes?
Actually according to Wikipedia it could come from the word fancy: "Paul Dickson, in his Dickson Baseball Dictionary, cites William Henry Nugent's work that claims it comes from fancy, a 19th century term from England that referred mainly to followers of boxing." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fan_(person) [wikipedia.org]
"According to that unsupported explanation", yes. But most dictionaries only mention "fanatic" and very few would link it to "fancy" or "fantasy". But I agree with you that fans are more restrained than fanatics. It's just that the irony of hiding fanatism behind that snide remark cracked me up.
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Ok, I'll bite on the bait.
A Samsung fan is a device consisting of several oscillating blades to direct air flow made by Samsung.
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I read it as a dig at Samsung, implying that they're not a brand, or at least not in the same league as Apple.
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Re:What's a Samsung fan? (Score:5, Interesting)
Hmm. I looked at a whole bunch of flat screen monitors and generally preferred the picture from the Samsungs, so I bought one. I looked at a whole bunch of Android phones August of last year, and wound up buying a Galaxy S because I liked the AMOLED screen and disliked Motorola's policy on requiring signed kernels on their droids. I since haven't been too thrilled with how long it's taken to get Android updates, but now that the warranty is expired, I'll probably switch to Cyanogen soon when it supports Android 4 for the Galaxy.
So technology wise, they seem to be above average, although their update support leaves something to be desired. When I next have to buy home electronics, I'll probably take a close look at anything Samsung has to offer, keeping in mind their supposed limitations. You could call me a Samsung fan because I have bought two of their products and would consider buying more, or you could call me a careful shopper. I'm willing to give the other guy the benefit of the doubt that he just appreciates the good qualities of their products.
Re:What's a Samsung fan? (Score:4, Insightful)
I've got two of their LED TV's (47 and 55 inch), four PC monitors, two Blu-ray players, an Epic (Galaxy S) phone, and a home theater. They all go great together, and updates seem reasonable to me. The home theater could be a little easier to use, and using the phone as a remote for the TV could use a little work, but overall it's good stuff and has been quite reliable. Way better than that Sony nonsense - the stuff just plugs together. Recommended them to Mom, and when she got it she was like "Oh. Wow."
About half of the HDTVs you can buy now actually have Samsung displays, as well as all the iPhones and iPads. It's getting hard to get away from their products because more and more if you don't buy the gear from them, the people who made it buy their parts from Samsung.
Asus is totally kicking their ass on the Android tablet front with the Transformer, and now the Transformer Prime, but everything else looks like good gear so far.
We'll see if the lifecycle holds up. I expect a TV or monitor to last ten years or more. That's why I bought LED rather than plasma or LCD. It will take a while before I know if it was a good bet. For now I'm happy, so I guess I'm a Samsung fan too.
Quite as an aside, the prevalence of inexpensive LED displays in 1080p resolution has degraded the availability of higher-resolution displays that used to be common. It's nice that movies look nice, but sometimes we want to do wide spreadsheets or other stuff that calls for more pixels and setting up 4 monitors in a grid is really a pain.
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I found their BluRay player to border on false advertising.
Crappiest DLNA support I've ever seen, tech support that doesn't care, and yes it will support your MPEG4 encoded file from a USB port (not DLNA), but only if it has an MP4 extension, not if it has the more common M4V extension. I bought it because it said DLNA on the box. The thing was slow to respond to every button push on the remote and I even had it lock up a few times. I gave it away, bought an LG and I've been happy with it every since.
Sam
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but only if it has an MP4 extension, not if it has the more common M4V extension.
You're joking, aren't you? M4V would only be common among those who have been using Apple's software and devices. All AVC+AAC videos I got from the internet are either in MP4 or MKV containers.
Re:What's a Samsung fan? (Score:5, Funny)
>do they make ceiling fans or something?
They do make fans. And per ROK specifications, they come with timers.
Because, you know, fan death is a leading killer of Koreans.
--
BMO
Re: (Score:2)
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Even if an injunction were granted it wouldn't matter much. The ASUS Transformer Prime is dropping in a few weeks and it's superior in every
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If you've read through the details of the ruling, the judge essentially says that it's likely that Samsung infringes on Apple's patents, but that it's unlikely that allowing Samsung to continue to sell their products will cause any significant damage to Apple, hence that there's no need for an injunction.
Even better then that: In sum, the Court found that Samsung was successful in raising substantial questions as to the validity of Apple’s D’087 patent and that Apple was unable to persuade the Court that it would likely succeed at trial in its efforts to uphold the validity of said patent.
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And how exactly would she recuse herself? On the basis of being too prejudiced? Due to "racial discrimination"? Her career would be forever shot.
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Those are words with strong implications.
You are essentially saying that the judge may have been under personal pressure to bias her findings. Which, if true, would imply that she should have recused herself from her duty in this case based on the determination that she could not act impartially.
I would think it's wise that Apple's legal team did not make any such remarks.
Re:Judge in an untenable position (Score:5, Informative)
Her husband was born in Mexico and lives in the US since childhood, and she was raised in Mississippi and Oklahoma. And her mother is from North Korea, only the father is from South.
Boy was I wrong :( (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, one of the great things about the Internet (and the slashdot posting system) is the relative anonymity it provides.
I'm glad because it has limited my embarrassment for making such an ill-considered statement without doing the most cursory investigation. (If you Google "Lucy Koh", the very first listing is the Wikipedia entry with her bio.). At least I don't have to face up to my mistakes in my "real" public life.
However, the other nice thing about the anonymity the Internet provides is that it helps keep one's ego from getting in the way of an admission of being wrong.
So, boy I was wrong to imagine that Ms. Koh might have been unduly influenced; with her upbringing, education and qualifications, it is very unlikely that this would've happened. My apologies to all the other posters who wasted their time on this thread.
Re: (Score:2)
Why are you so stupid? Does it hurt when you think?
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Spelling seems to hurt him. And his spelling hurts me, too!
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no they should not be forced to sell os to clones. apple it just one of many company's abusing ip patents.
I'm sorry, but this abuse of your copyright by only including your comments from this post in this post is intolerable. You should be forced to write half your words on a topic in one comment on Slashdot and half on comment in a French language "My Little Pony" fan site.
Re:Obvious to whom? (Score:4, Informative)
Next, the Court considers whether Samsung’s products, in the eyes of an ordinary observer, would likely be deemed substantially the same as Apple’s iPhone. To this end, the Court finds that an ordinary observer would, in fact, find the Samsung Galaxy S 4G to be substantially the same as the iPhone.
But I thought the criterion was obviousness to one skilled in the art?
You're confusing the obviousness clause for granting utility patents with the consumer discernment criteria for design patents. To be granted a utility patent it cannot be obvious to a normal person skilled in the relevant art. To be granted a design patent you have to have a combination of appearance features distinct to your product which, if copied significantly, could confuse a normal consumer about which product was which.