Feds Ask Supreme Court To Void Apple's $400 Million Award From Samsung (siliconbeat.com) 63
An anonymous reader quotes the San Jose Mercury News technology blog: "The $400 million awarded to Apple in a patent-infringement case against Samsung is a moving target... On Friday, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a "friend of the court" brief to the Supreme Court, asking justices to void the $400 million award and send the case back to a lower court to determine if a new trial is needed... Samsung has argued that it should be liable only for profits attributable to a specific design that violated a patent, not an entire phone, and that the law should be interpreted to impose liability related to "components of the phones, rather than the phones themselves, according to the brief. The department came down on Samsung's side on the component argument, and blasted a federal circuit court ruling that had upheld the jury award.
Ironically, earlier this week Steve Wozniak was praising Samsung for its innovation, both in virtual reality headsets and with a Samsung camera that takes a picture whenever you say "smile".
Ironically, earlier this week Steve Wozniak was praising Samsung for its innovation, both in virtual reality headsets and with a Samsung camera that takes a picture whenever you say "smile".
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I guess the golden Apple age is really over.
Woz keeps praising lots of stuff. Including Apple gear. Apple must be doomed.
Re:Let's not forget (Score:4, Interesting)
Which had the look and feel of an LG Prada, or a Mio A701, or a dozen other candy bar phones. But I digress...
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Yet was unique enough that Samsung was caught red handed trying to copy it down to the icons. FYI, it did not have the look and feel of the LG Prada, and the Prada was revealed just a couple of months before the iPhone. The Mio A701 used a stylus and looked more like a Palm Treo than an iPhone. I have no idea where people like yourself come up with this nonsense. But I digress...
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FYI, it did not have the look and feel of the LG Prada, and the Prada was revealed just a couple of months before the iPhone.
Actually, the official reveal was a few days after the iPhone - but who's counting. http://www.phonearena.com/news/LG-Prada-phone-officially-announced_id1739 [phonearena.com]
Re:Let's not forget (Score:4, Interesting)
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I agree, however it's one patent scam out of a multitude. Why would they decide to step in for Samsung? They didn't help Blackberry out or any of the other companies that got hijacked by patent scams. What's special about Samsung? Who did they pay off? Or perhaps the President of South Korea had a talk with high level US officials and arranged a favor? You can bet there's a reason besides "it's a patent scam."
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No, if Boeing had put an inflight screen in, and that screen had "one click buy duty free" button on it, is it then OK for Amazon to demand ALL the sales from every Boeing 747 since they were made? Simply because one component of one component violated Bezos one click patent?
It's a patent scam
So your point that Samsung only had sales worth $400 million?
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I keep seeing posts like this. If they aren't song lyrics, they should be.
Slashdot is slow, for analysis (Score:2)
The other day Slashdot posted a story about a court filing that happened in early 2015 - over a year ago. This particular story is about as fast as Slashdot gets - the news sites covered it Friday, two days ago. I'm sure Slashdot will have a story about the shooting in the next few days, probably after more is known so there can be better discussion.
Or Slashdot isn't "Headline News Now" (Score:2)
> they are either incompetent or uncaring, possibly both.
"They" is mainly a computer algorithm, users vote on stories in the Firehose to determine what appears on the front page. So yes, the algoritm is uncaring.
Beyond that, this isn't "Headline News Now, Up to the Minute Reporting of What's Going on Today". There are sites that do that. Slashdot isn't one of those. Try CNN or Fox.
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Someone got shot? Imagine that. People get shot every day.
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This will be a thing of the past once Emperor Palpatine Clinton takes control of the country. Gun control and using the Presidency for personal gain is the legacy of that clan.
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I can see where they might want to reign in all the restrictions of the US Constitution. With things like the 2nd and 4th amendments holding them back from keeping us safe from terrorists. If it weren't for that pesky old document just think how safe we'd be! There's a reason why our forefathers screamed "Give me liberty or give me death!" Living under tyranny makes dying preferable.
Visited Taipei Display Geek (retired) last month (Score:5, Informative)
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I don't understand the utility of asking juries to award $400M patent awards based on "telephones" with "rounded corners".
Even if it's a bit chancy, it's a great way to launder and write off 400 mil... The "lawsuit" is just another way of transferring funds
Payback (Score:3)
This is the Obama administration giving their friends at Apple the UFIA.
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It's a price worth paying. Apple don't need the $400M if it comes with "iOS backdoor" strings attached.
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Damn! I was wondering why the Feds were being Samsung's bitch. Now I see the light. I'm getting slow in my old age, I should have seen that right off the bat.
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Because—as old crusty coot knows to the very marrow of his fragile bones—the most cynical available view is never wrong. My diagnosis is that old age is still penetrating your hard tissues. But take heart. The process is automatic. You won't even have to work for it.
Hitchen's Author of America contains a super depressing page on Thomas
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I'm getting old and slow. You've gone for senility. From the Feds fucking Apple over after the refusal to crack the iPhone to whites fleeing vengeful ex-slaves. Quite a trip. Now that I think on it I believe it might be drug or alcohol instead of senility.
Not possible (Score:3)
Anyone who has any experience dealing with the federal government can tell that there's just no way they could make a conspiracy work, even if all the involved parties agreed (which is also impossible).
the shifting definition of "innovation" (Score:3, Funny)
Steve Wozniak was praising Samsung for its innovation ... with a Samsung camera that takes a picture whenever you say "smile".
20th century innovation: The solid state transistor. The integrated circuit. Laser. Space travel. The internet.
21st century innovation: A "camera that takes a picture whenever you say smile". Selfies. Facebook. The "selfie-stick".
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I guess it's a matter of degree.
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And my Lg G4 will take a photo if you say Cheese, Whisky, Smile, Kimchi or LG.....
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Steve Wozniak was praising Samsung for its innovation ... with a Samsung camera that takes a picture whenever you say "smile".
20th century innovation: The solid state transistor. The integrated circuit. Laser. Space travel. The internet.
21st century innovation: A "camera that takes a picture whenever you say smile". Selfies. Facebook. The "selfie-stick".
Good thing we have 4-score+ years left in this century...
I'm glad the Feds feel that way (Score:2)
The next person that loses against the MPAA/RIAA should then bring this document out. Since only profits should be repaid then the person should owe them nothing as it is commonly known that due to creative accounting techniques music and movies don't make money.
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I've thought the same thing. Although one is copyright and the other is patent law...
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Apples and Oranges, my friend. MPAA/RIAA is copyright (and some trademark). This Fed thing is Patent, and the purpose for the award is, based on the jury's decision on the evidence, to get justice for Samsung making (huge) profits off stolen idea(s). Apple being a big company, the issue may get a little fuzzy. So, imagine if Apple were a tiny company of a few guys in a garage, making a few phones with their parents' money, and a year later Samsung is making billions of them that look and act just like t
Ironically... (Score:2, Insightful)
This has NOTHING to do with Apple denying the Obama Administration's demand to add backdoors to their operating system.
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No, it's their desire to kill American companies in favor of foreign ones.
DOJ supported Apple (Score:2)
They did support apple. What happened?
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I've got to admit I liked the look of the S2. I've always bought Samsung until they did away with the removable battery and SD card. Now they're exactly like Apple. Had to go to LG for my Wife's new phone.
Payback time! (Score:2)
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It may actually be a correction of banana republic behavior. They should have been putting the brakes on this well before now. I would be heartened by this except I don't believe any actual correction has taken place in government, it's just that Apple is no longer on the special friends list.
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irrelevant, not irony (Score:2)
That might be ironic if Woz was a part of the lawsuit and claimed that Samsung never made innovative products. But that's not the case.
Congress should fix it (Score:3)
Both the Patent law and Copyright law are in desperate need of fixing, and letting courts bumble their way around is not the way to go.
Current Patent law is drafted with the idea that you patent whole devices, at which point if you build something covered by patent without getting a license you should be liable for your "total profits". But today patents cover small bits in the device, and each device embodies thousands of patents. Courts (especially the Supreme Court) can say "Congress didn't think about that when it drafted the law, so we'll 'interpret' the language Congress actually wrote [total profits] to mean something that makes sense [the part of the profits which is attributable just to the infringed patent]. But this is a bad solution -- much better would be for Congress to change the law. At that time other urgent fixes (like the term of patents, the windfall rules for making out-of-patent and out-of-production rare drugs etc) can also be made.
Copyright law is similar: rather than hope courts will restrain themselves (lowering absurd damage verdicts like the Jammie Thomas case) or restrain Congress (how did Eldred v Aschroft do?) we need to get Congress to fix the copyright term at something reasonable (say 20 years, renewable with registration once).
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WTF (Score:2)