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Comment by jhuckestein | Hacker News Reader

They got a design patent for the iPad's design. Not for a rounded rectangle. Comp the first comment on arstechnica that jccc posted here.

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I still don't understand what's special about that design. Again, as the link says, the only unbroken line is that the front face is made like a rounded rectangle.

>>I still don't understand what's special about that design.

Jonathan Ive said it best: great design looks obvious in hindsight.

edit: Gotta love the downvotes. Must have hit a soft spot. :)

So just confirming, you really, REALLY think rounded rectangle was a great design innovation by Apple God, which now looks obvious in hindsight right?

I love how people think they get downvotes only because they hit some hypothetical soft spot. :)

The rounded rectangle was NOT the design innovation. That's a strawman thrown around by people who don't understand what a design patent is.

It really seems you understand design patents more than many out here. Care to explain, what does it cover more than the rounded rectangle? (I hope you read the patent before commenting).

Sure, I can do that. Design patents are not the same thing as regular ("utility") patents. They are solely to get exclusive right to the form of a functional object so that a 3rd party cannot make a different device with an identical appearance.

What's important is that design patents are really really narrow in scope. A would-be imitator would have to do their best to copy them exactly (like Samsung did with their iPhone copycats) in order to infringe. So no, it would not be enough for a company to have a rounded rectangle device to get in trouble.

I expected it. These are the rhetoric sentences everyone who claims to know 'more' about them seems to be copying on HN, possibly without understanding the fact that NO ONE is talking about utility patents here. That's why I wrote that I hope you read the patent before commenting. Contrary to what iPhone fans would like to believe, most of us DO know the difference. But what you should know is, (i)They DO sue over design patents. (ii). This particular patent specifically says unbroken (dashed) lines are not included in the patent. So the only thing that is the basis of this patent is the rounded rectangular front shape (which is represented by the unbroken lines, in fact, that's the whole point of the article, which fanboys don't seem to understand). It'd have made at least some sense if all the lines were unbroken. Then THAT would be a design they'd have to exactly copy in order to infringe. But not with this patent.

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