Apple, Samsung Declare Peace
bloomberg.com
bloomberg.com
IBM is considered an IP failure for allowing the PC-clone market to come into being...even though it is highly unlikely computing would have taken off the way it did otherwise.
The arguments for and against this notion are perpetual.
For example, the "Dummie's Guide" trade dress cases about yellow or the one-click patent lived at the edges of those spheres, and thus helped define what the edge was. Was this a case that largely only impacts these two companies, or does the matter at hand fall into well-established realms and this was just a matter of legal details?
These are questions most journalism does a terrible job of covering, and hunting down legal blogs that also have enough technical knowledge AND aren't biased because patent attorneys tend to fall into the "everything must be protected no matter what" camp is quite an exercise.
It just seems like patents were invented for an entirely different type of innovation than occurs now in software.
You may be surprised to learn that these companies do not at all care what benefits the world.
Let me amend: I _should_ not be surprised at corporate indifference, but I'll admit I'm nonetheless surprised more often than I should be.
Nothing is perfect, but that doesn't' mean things can't be improved. If this case had near-zero benefit to the world outside of these two companies, and had it never happened not much outside of these two companies would be impacted, then it's a piece of evidence (one piece, not independently conclusive) that the IP issues involved are too heavy, no longer useful as a matter of public policy.
If, on the other hand, this impacts many companies in a good way, or settles certain legal issues that enables real innovation (as opposed to just locking down licensing requirements that don't spur innovation), then it's a piece of evidence (not independently conclusive) that the IP issues involved have actual merit and the protected and expensive fight is regrettable for the cost but not the existence.
And of course, on the gripping hand, any number of nuanced levels in the middle, including related issues like "took too long". "issue was important, but settlement leaves outside companies just as confused", etc.
Being far too ignorant to have an opinion (as I mentioned in my OP) I was hoping to get some enlightenment, some details, some sources, not hoping for a strawman shutdown. If we did so to every question on the internet, what kind of world do you think we'd end up with?
I had hoped that Samsung would fight Apple's absurd design claims to the end so as not to set any dangerous legal precedence, but it looks like Apple's hometown advantage (ie, judge, jury, POTUS) was a bit too much for Samsung to handle.
All in all, it's a huge loss for the tech industry with no benefit. Apple is not immune from potential design litigation, either.
If I would put three pieces of black masking tape on the iPhone 3G and Galaxy SII covering the locations of the brands and the home button you would have a really hard time telling them apart.
The OS is different but at first glance they don't look very different at all. Packaging had been cloned. The shape of the charger and connector had been cloned.
Design patents are for very specific design elements, not the overall impression. Apple did assert trade dress claims (overall impression) against Samsung tablets (and IIRC smartphones), but the appeals court rejected it -- you can't assert trade dress claims on non-ornamental (or functional, obvious) features.
This is not remotely similar to the way the iPhone was marketed. At the time it looked utterly distinctive to all its competitors so Apple used that as the key differentiating feature in its marketing.
Samsung released a product that was so aesthetically close it wouldn't pass the masking tape test, certainly not with the iPhone's target audience. It's important to remember that nearly everyone being marketed at had never bought any modern smartphone before, ever, from any brand.
[1] This is why Samsung aren't making sets that mimic LG's OLED industrial design—they're making old-school backlit LCDs with the marketing label "QLED".
http://www.knowyourmobile.com/products/2404/lg-ke850-prada-t...
Unsurprisingly a touchphone developed prior to the iphone also is a slab of black with a touchscreen covering most of the screen and fairly minimal buttons on the edges. It was only distinctive when compared to non-touchphones.
It is as absurd as hearing a non-programmer assert that Rust and R are basically the same.
http://www.patentadesign.com/gallery/coca-cola-bottle-design...
The infamous Coca cola bottle (16oz) is far from generic. Their bottle design is not driven by function (ie, maximum capacity, minimal materials required to make one, anti-slippery, etc). We can tell it apart from other soda bottle designs precisely because the bottle's curvy contour is purely "ornamental" and unique. The Coke's bottle therefore can be protected by "trade mark" -- although the EU has however has stricter standards and has refused to grant it.
Their 8oz soda can design however is utterly generic and they differ very little from generation to another. It's difficult to tell it apart from other soda cans -- not without the white logo and red background which is also trade marked -- because it's functionally necessary to come to that design to achieve maximum volume capacity and minimum materials used. This shape/design of the cans therefore can not be trade marked.
Your earlier comparison is absurdly flawed because once you mask prominent non-functional (or ornamental) features (with 3 tapes), what you end up with is a generic rectangular shape which can be attributed to any mobile device, which has been around much longer than Apple's birth and certainly not created by Apple.
I have an HTC HD2 and another Nokia smartphone from the same era that really didn't need to look that much like an iPhone to offer comparable services. Put three pieces of tape on that Nokia, three pieces of tape on the HTC and three pieces of tape on the Samsung Galaxy S and ask anyone which one of those two is an iPhone 3G by looking at the front, without turning them on.
Everyone picks the Galaxy S instead of saying "well I guess none of those?".
Not only are you unfamiliar with the patent laws involved in these lawsuits, but you are also now purposely conflating two different types of patent/copyrights issues -- that of design/trade dress issues and utility patent (touch). There were predecessors like the LG Prada (2007), Pidion (2006), and other phones that had the combined or separate features, indicating the mobile device designs were already converging on to what the first iPhone later revealed. The fact that the iPhone's predecessors were poorly implemented are besides the point, especially in design/trade dress where only the look and overall impression matters.
As I noted here in my earlier comment about "Apple's lawyering," the problem wasn't that there weren't prior arts to destroy Apple's claim to the original designs/trade dress; it was that Apple's lawyers tried very hard to prevent prior arts to stand in the case. Apple's homeown judge Koh eagerly obliged and allowed almost all Apple's evidence to stand while disallowing disproportionate number of Samsung's evidence and experts. In once instance, Magistrate Judge Grewal allowed Apple's motion for evidence spoliation against Samsung when it was revealed that Samsung failed to retain all dated documents required, but when Samsung asked the same to Apple just two days later, as it turned Apple also failed to retain their documents too, Grewal refused reasoning that Samsung's motion was one day after the tentative deadline. This was reversed only after a brief public uproar, but there were other examples of such odd procedural rulings that crippled Samsung's defense. Samsung likewise had counter-evidence to Apple's 130+ page doc Samsung allegedly used to copy Apple design, but wasn't allowed.
Let's not even go to the Obama administration's reversal of Samsung's win at ITC in 2013 which would have banned all iPhone importation (or forced Apple to settle the case amicably back then).
I have no idea about packaging, chargers and connectors though. Those may be copied, I don't know. The device itself is distinctively samsungy though. I really don't think that "if you covered rounded edges, you would have hard time telling Openmoko Neo1973 (its design actually came earlier) and Apple iPhone apart" is a sound argument.
Or was this a legal dispute of the sort that companies have been engaging in since the invention of companies, and individuals have been engaging in since the invention of the court?
Thankfully that world is far away.
The CIA even launched another operation to find the Soviet influence in Guatemala to justify the coup. The operation was a failure.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Outcomes
They were quite effective, too.
On one hand Qualcomm CEO have said it is all about the cost of patents, and they will very likely settle out of court. Downplaying whatever damage there is, on the other hand they don't seem like they will settle.
Another interesting battle looming.
Apple was forced to settle with pretty much every wireless patent holders and all in patent holders' favors (eg, Nokia, Ericsson to name a few) in the past -- I'm not sure if that's going to change this time.
The last thing an associate wants to have happen at the partnership vote is for 2/3 of the senior partners to say "who?" when their name comes up. The last thing a partner wants to have happen is to get a reputation of "nobody ever makes partner working for him/her".
So...is that what was accomplished here?
1) you can't mess around with a politically well connected American company. Of course, I'm talking about the Obama administration's reversal of Samsung's ITC win that would have settled this lawsuit back in 2012.
2) thx to Apple, now we are very likely to see more absurd design patent lawsuits in coming months.
The entire idea of patents is sound, but the rules we play by need to be revised... hopefully our nations lawmakers will one day see how destructive the current rules are.
Copyrights should not apply to any functional work. Trademarks should not be used to stifle discussion, review and criticism. Patents should require expert testimony on originality and also a working example.
It does seem that the rules governing them need to be revised. Many patented ideas are utterly trivial, or have no practical implementation, or are just unused. The terms are clearly too long as well. But the underlying idea doesn't seem terrible.
Apple clearly had no desire to settle, but Samsung clearly saw that there was no way that they could get a fair trial like they did in non-US courts around the globe. Samsung probably ended up paying slightly less the amount the last jury awarded, plus some humiliating terms and conditions.