Samsung is getting nailed... live update as it happens on the Verge

Forums › Android › Samsung is getting nailed... live update as it happens on the Verge

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | ... | 21

4629 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#676975 25-Aug-2012 23:10

Wade: This outcome surely puts some spotlight on the possible benefits to manufacturers if they ran pure AOSP on their devices? Apple vs Google would surely make for a far more interesting courtcase?As a side issue the Manufacturer/Carrier AOS updating issue would disappear overnight

Nexus also on that list. I am not too sure if running aosp would have avoided this 'patent' issue.

matisyahu

1623 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#676988 26-Aug-2012 01:05

nakedmolerat:
Wade: This outcome surely puts some spotlight on the possible benefits to manufacturers if they ran pure AOSP on their devices? Apple vs Google would surely make for a far more interesting courtcase?As a side issue the Manufacturer/Carrier AOS updating issue would disappear overnight

Nexus also on that list. I am not too sure if running aosp would have avoided this 'patent' issue.

But a way in which vanilla android builds can run on phones will result in one good thing - a castrated shipped version to the consumer that is 'lawyer approved' then with a knowledgeable friend who is 'good with computers' they can upgrade their castrated version to the vanilla feature complete version with the binaries hosted in a country that doesn't have the horrid patent legal land mine field that is the US. End of the day what has always put me off Android is the fact that all the drivers are closed source thus it is a mine field trying to get Android to build with all the required functionality for ones phone where as in a perfect world all the drivers would be open source and all you'd need is a functioning compiler tool chain to compile the latest stable branch to load onto ones phone. Oh well, one can always dream.

"When the people are being beaten with a stick, they are not much happier if it is called 'the People's Stick'"

oxnsox

1923 posts

Uber Geek

#677016 26-Aug-2012 09:02

Last century companies were happy to make'things' and compete on the basis of their own innovations..... A certain, mines better than yours because, approach.

Now we're entering an era where we're competing based on 'ideas', it matters less whether its our implementation or someone-eleses. People would rather put their time, and effort, money and resources, into defending an idea; rather than making a better mousetrap. Shame really, its the law letting money chase money rather than using the law to enable.

old3eyes

9119 posts

Uber Geek

Subscriber

#677017 26-Aug-2012 09:05

tdgeek:
old3eyes:
kiwitrc: I dont think there was ever any doubt that a US jury would not rule in favour of a US company versus a Korean company.

+1. This is the final nail in the coffin as far as I'm concerned about and will never buy an Apple product.. Looking round for an iTunes replacement.. Who's next , HTC, Motorola??

And if Samsung had won?

Samsung didn't bring the law suit Apple did..

Regards,

Old3eyes

tdgeek

29746 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#677033 26-Aug-2012 09:49

old3eyes:
tdgeek:
old3eyes:
kiwitrc: I dont think there was ever any doubt that a US jury would not rule in favour of a US company versus a Korean company.

+1. This is the final nail in the coffin as far as I'm concerned about and will never buy an Apple product.. Looking round for an iTunes replacement.. Who's next , HTC, Motorola??

And if Samsung had won?

Samsung didn't bring the law suit Apple did..

So? Ok, So those who bring a lawsuit are bad. The defending party who allegedly is at fault, is the victim.

blair003

557 posts

Ultimate Geek

#677065 26-Aug-2012 11:51

tdgeek:
old3eyes:
tdgeek:
old3eyes:
kiwitrc: I dont think there was ever any doubt that a US jury would not rule in favour of a US company versus a Korean company.

+1. This is the final nail in the coffin as far as I'm concerned about and will never buy an Apple product.. Looking round for an iTunes replacement.. Who's next , HTC, Motorola??

And if Samsung had won?

Samsung didn't bring the law suit Apple did..

So? Ok, So those who bring a lawsuit are bad. The defending party who allegedly is at fault, is the victim.

If you bring lawsuits based on patents that people think are stupid (obvious, shouldn't be patentable), then the party you bring the lawsuits against is seen as the victim.

At least that's how it is for me. If I thought the patents that the lawsuits related to had merit, it would be a different story. But I am yet to hear about an apple patent that wasn't stupid (in my view).

rhysb

435 posts

Ultimate Geek

Trusted

#677103 26-Aug-2012 13:25

Excellent writeup on Groklaw. I don't think we've heard the last of this yet.

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2012082510525390

Equinox IT

Cloud spending continues to surge globally, but most organisations haven’t made the changes necessary to maximise the value and cost-efficiency benefits of their cloud investments. Download the whitepaper From Overspend to Advantage now.

sidefx

3711 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#677114 26-Aug-2012 14:05

rhysb: Excellent writeup on Groklaw. I don't think we've heard the last of this yet.

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2012082510525390

Very good writeup, just as I would expect from pj... Good God, just looking at some of the quotes from the jury....

(Oh ffs and that memo from Tim Cook... *sigh*)

"I was born not knowing and have had only a little time to change that here and there." | Octopus Energy | Sharesies
- Richard Feynman

tdgeek

29746 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#677124 26-Aug-2012 14:44

blair003:
tdgeek:
old3eyes:
tdgeek:
old3eyes:
kiwitrc: I dont think there was ever any doubt that a US jury would not rule in favour of a US company versus a Korean company.

+1. This is the final nail in the coffin as far as I'm concerned about and will never buy an Apple product.. Looking round for an iTunes replacement.. Who's next , HTC, Motorola??

And if Samsung had won?

Samsung didn't bring the law suit Apple did..

So? Ok, So those who bring a lawsuit are bad. The defending party who allegedly is at fault, is the victim.

If you bring lawsuits based on patents that people think are stupid (obvious, shouldn't be patentable), then the party you bring the lawsuits against is seen as the victim.

At least that's how it is for me. If I thought the patents that the lawsuits related to had merit, it would be a different story. But I am yet to hear about an apple patent that wasn't stupid (in my view).

Depends how you define a patent as stupid. Pinch to Zoom is I believe, one of the ones in question. Is that stupid? I dont think so as it is a great idea, and standard issue these days. Is is wrong that whoever came up with that does not desreve protection from copying, and that for a period, they get patent fees so others can also use that?

If you feel that all of Apple's patents are stupid, I'd assume that all of Samsung's are not stupid. Just strikes me as more anti Apple as anti the case outcome TBH. Its a tall poppy thing

Wade

2225 posts

Uber Geek

#677125 26-Aug-2012 14:47

nakedmolerat:
Wade: This outcome surely puts some spotlight on the possible benefits to manufacturers if they ran pure AOSP on their devices? Apple vs Google would surely make for a far more interesting courtcase?As a side issue the Manufacturer/Carrier AOS updating issue would disappear overnight

Nexus also on that list. I am not too sure if running aosp would have avoided this 'patent' issue.

Which creates another question, how do some of these software patent issues become Samsung's issue when they made the hardware to run a third party software? By being the manufacturer of the hardware do they assume responsibility for the software as well?

GBristow

178 posts

Master Geek

#677147 26-Aug-2012 15:47

The patent system is broken. I mean, one of Apple's patents was the grid pattern for home screen icons. Nokia did that five years earlier. Clearly the patents currently in possession are far too general in nature. This prevents other companies from creating competing products. Patent USD593,087 covers the "minimalistic" design of the iPhone. How many variations on a rectangular touch screen can there really be?

This is a blow to innovation, and will only scare companies into using less intuitive interface features in future.

blair003

557 posts

Ultimate Geek

#677155 26-Aug-2012 16:17

tdgeek:
Depends how you define a patent as stupid. Pinch to Zoom is I believe, one of the ones in question. Is that stupid? I dont think so as it is a great idea, and standard issue these days. Is is wrong that whoever came up with that does not desreve protection from copying, and that for a period, they get patent fees so others can also use that?

If you feel that all of Apple's patents are stupid, I'd assume that all of Samsung's are not stupid. Just strikes me as more anti Apple as anti the case outcome TBH. Its a tall poppy thing

Just because something seems to be a good idea doesn't mean it is or should be patentable. This is part of the problem -- it seems _any idea_ is patentable these days regardless of how obvious the idea is to someone skilled in the art and regardless of what prior art exists for the idea.

AFAIK apple didn't invent gestures, multi touch gestures or pinch gestures. They didn't invent capacative touch screens or multi touch screens. They were merely the first to apply these existing ideas to a phone user interface and the first to register a patent on the idea in respect of phone user interfaces.

And let's not kid ourselves - apple are not suing to get fees, they are doing it to try and block their competitors products from the market and reduce competition for their products.

I am sure Samsung has lots of patents I would consider stupid, but because Samsung are not going around suing everyone based on their stupid patents, I don't know about them. I will admit have become fairly anti apple now as a result of their actions in recent years. Previously I was not -- I purchased a 3gs back when it was the best phone on the market. However, even if apple did come out with the best phone right now I would probably not buy it because I disagree with how they operate.

networkn

Networkn
32351 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#677157 26-Aug-2012 16:22

I am sure Samsung has lots of patents I would consider stupid, but because Samsung are not going around suing everyone based on their stupid patents, I don't know about them. I will admit have become fairly anti apple now as a result of their actions in recent years. Previously I was not -- I purchased a 3gs back when it was the best phone on the market. However, even if apple did come out with the best phone right now I would probably not buy it because I disagree with how they operate.

Yup I agree with this. Other than the fact I dislike Apple for many other reasons, like you say, if they had the best phones in the world right now, I wouldn't touch them with a 50 foot pole. It's my cross to bear I need to support them daily :)

Apple could have won a lot of people over in the way it should have handled the 4S holding your phone wrong debacle. If they have come out and said.. "Hey, we screwed up, we are sorry, we will fix this no matter the cost", they would have won a lot of loyalty. They would have won over a lot of people who previously were not fans, or were on the fence, and moved the haters slightly closer to the fence. The cost of that would have easily be recouped in sales. Their stupid alternative was to blame the end user.

spacedog

482 posts

Ultimate Geek

#677174 26-Aug-2012 16:50

I don't think the jury was as stilted for being in San Jose and close to Apple HQ as many in this thread have suggested.

I'm not sure how many of you closely followed this case and the unfolding of events during the trial, but it was obvious the jury was going to find in favour of Apple because there was some epically bad lawyering by Samsung during the trial. One of the most damning documents for Samsung was not going to be admitted until Samsung's own lawyer screwed up cross-examination of their own Samsung witness which opened the door to allowing Apple to submit those documents (Samsung lawyers were actively fighting to prevent those documents from being filed and the Judge had agreed, but warned Samsung's lawyers to tread cautiously in their questioning or she would allow them).

The judge had also reprimanded Samsung lawyer for, well, basically not shutting up at one point.

Then there was the reprimand of Samsung for risking jury tainting by taking evidence out to the media after it had been warned.

The final nails in the coffin were the various emails, interviews, and documents that clearly illustrated 'wilfull intent' by Samsung to use Apple design as a basis for improving their own design.

I think you'd have be incredibly biased towards Samsung (or against Apple) to ignore that there was 'willful intent' to copy/duplicate design features. That was obvious.

The more important question was not 'Did Samsung try to copy?', but 'Should Apple have protection rights to something like 'pinch-to-zoom' or 'rectangular device with rounded corners?'

Personally, I think that if Samsung hadn't done such a terrible job of lawyering they might have had more success with the judge and the jury and we would have seen a different verdict or some sort of split-decision.

richms

28174 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#677176 26-Aug-2012 17:02

Copying happens all the time with cars. To think that you shouldnt take inspiration from competing products is to just go totally against the design process.

Richard rich.ms

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | ... | 21