Jury Reaches Verdict in Apple vs. Samsung Trial - To Be Updated
macrumors.com
macrumors.com
All this story is telling me is just how much the system needs to be reformed.
Set aside the details of which particular patent has been claimed -- is this not a just decision? Is it not completely clear that Samsung copied Apple's designs to an extent bordering on fraud?
If Samsung were making knockoff purses as similar to Louis Vuitton purses as many of its phones and tablets (and stores) were to Apple's, its products would be seized and destroyed. But Samsung isn't a hole-in-the-wall designer fashion accessory vendor but a multibillion dollar operation.
Louis Vuitton knockoffs are routinely destroyed for infringing exactly the kinds of design IP Samsung has just been nailed for.
I wonder why TV manufacturers don't sue each others... they all look the same!
B. Samsung devices were rounded-rectangle designs WELL before the iPod existed, and the concept of rounded-rectangle iPad-like devices that played video existed back in Stanley Kubrick's 2001. Ei ther should invalidate a "design patent" on such a look -- "black rounded rectangle" is absolutely insane to claim Apple owns!
B. If it were simply about "rounded rectangles" you'd be right. But it isn't and you're wrong.
The letters L and V are not protected, but overlay them and print them on a handbag and you are in deep shit. (And yes, trademarks and design patents are different things but work in much the same way and have been used against each other in lawsuits.)
OK, pinch to zoom was invented even before Microsoft used it. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_PixelSense and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-touch
A big part was the rounded rectangles. Apple claimed it and the jury supported that claim. That's reprehensible garbage, and no legal system should support it.
You're revealing yourself as an Apple fanboy; claiming that a rounded rectangle with black borders (that looks identical to previous years-old Samsung products!) is now OWNED by Apple is not sane and rational.
The LV logo is distinctive. The shape of the iPad is at least as similar to products before it as the Samsung products that came later. You can't (or SHOULDN'T be able to) take ownership of a public domain design just because you've created a popular product that uses it!
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4429940
Direct link to the live blogging is
http://www.siliconvalley.com/ci_21356424/live-blog-verdict-a...
"Jury finds on bounce back patent that Samsung infringed Apple on all the devices in play, smartphones and tabs"
"On the "pinch and zoom" patent, jury also finds Samsung infringed Apple patents on the menu of smartphones and tablets..with just a few exceptions."
"On tap and zoom, jury finds infringement for tap and zoom feature on most of the smartphones and tablets, although no on a few, such as Nexus S 4G...split this one up by various devices, but largely in favor of Apple"
"Jury also finds for Apple on charge Samsung "knew or should have known" it was inducing its telecommunications and electronics divisions to infringe"
"Apple blitzing Samsung so far, jury now finds infringed design of iPhone contours, etc."
"Some products of Samsung being spared the gallows, but not many so far"
"Jury finds Samsung infringed Apple graphical interface on iPhone....so much for those differences Samsung argued for"
http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?p=15520468#post15...
And that is what Apple wanted. Not money.
I can't see this being good for anyone except Apple shareholders, and in the long run I'm not sure it will even be good for them.
Whether that stifles competition is a separate issue.
I don't think any one seriously expects Samsung to not be able to sell phones because of this so there won't be a bump due to analysts expect apple to steal Samsung customers.
And AAPL US Equity has about 1 Billion shares outstanding so the reward, if it gets paid and it probably won't, will come out to a one time boost of $1 per share.
So if a $1 rise int he stock price is considered a nice boost then I guess AAPL's stock should have a nice boost on Monday.
RIM had to pay $650,000,000 to a patent troll with no products, for violating a patent that no one had seen before. By comparison, considering the massive size of the companies involved and the brazen copying and infringement, the Samsung verdict would seem light.
Of course it won't matter. Samsung will keep this going for a while on appeal until they win and then Apple will appeal. I don't see a clear victory for either company for a long, long, time.
And even the lawyers will not win as much as they think, because they will have set back technological progress decades behind.
This one is going to go well into extra innings. The question is whether there will be a timely injunction of Apple's likely attempt to cut off Samsing's sales of infringing products in the US.