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It's interesting how Apple is moving away from being the first phone with a feature (face id, Samsung did that before, or oled displays that are edge to edge).

It's interesting how Apple is moving away from being the first phone with a feature (face id, Samsung did that before, or oled displays that are edge to edge). I think the shift from that innovation is a maturing step, but also a sign that the company is aging poorly. They can no longer claim to be leading with creation, just with quality. More and more the focus in smartphone development, not just Apple, is on being the best of what currently exists instead of actually bringing groundbreaking technology to the table.

acchow 9y ago
Samsung does every feature first, and terribly. They hit check boxes. Apple executes. You could unlock Samsung phones with photographs [1] [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-galaxy-note-8-facial-recognition-tricked-with-a-photo-2017-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-galaxy-note-8-facial-...
- FireBeyond 9y ago
  And you could/can unlock TouchID with playdoh casts, even high res fingerprints printed on paper... so?
  - theshrike79 9y ago
    Printing someone's photo off Facebook is trivial. Lifting a working fingerprint and transferring it to a play-doh mold or a hi-res printer is a whole another beast.
    - vilmosi 9y ago
      I thought it needed to be a high resolution photo?
      - theshrike79 9y ago
        For Samsung, nope. You can just open someone's profile picture on Facebook on your phone and show it to their phone and It'll unlock (or not, just like with their actual face).
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
- bhnmmhmd 9y ago
  I agree partially, but Apple is also expected to introduce some new features, right? Or else, what's left of Steve's legacy?
- sorenjan 9y ago
  Samsung didn't do face unlock first either, it was part of Android 4.0. Of course, using a single camera without movement you'll only get 2d data, so it shouldn't stand a chance against Apple's 3d sensor.
dopamean 9y ago
Hasn't this been true for a while?
- jgh 9y ago
  It's almost always been true. Think back to the early iPhone days when they didn't even have cut & paste! Apple has always done a good job of really refining features, but I'm not certain I can think of one that they were first on.
  - oneeyedpigeon 9y ago
    First keyboard-less tablet?
    - redial 9y ago
      There were many before. There was even a mac keyboard-less tablet years before the iPhone, just not made by Apple.
  - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
    First use of capacitive touch on a smart phone (or anything consumer for that matter), the original iPhone really was a big deal with lots of firsts.
    - redial 9y ago
      First to integrate them on a product category maybe, but multitouch was not invented by them.
      - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
        Ok, what consumer device had capacitive touch before the iPhone. You just gotta name one! I'm pretty tired of these smug ignorant attitudes, this isn't reddit. Also, I stated capacitive, not multitouch, if that is meant a strawman.
mtgx 9y ago
Samsung's face recognition software was hacked from day one. Not only did, it was hacked with a 2D picture, something that was also shown possible since 2011, when Google first introduced face recognition. It's like Samsung didn't even bother to improve it at all. Being first with a crappy solution is not exactly ideal, either. We'll see if Apple's solution is that much better - I don't really trust any face recognition tech, but the 1:1,000,000 FAR ratio vs 1:50,000 for fingerprint looks promising at least.
- WithHighProb 9y ago
  u sure you catch up with latest deep learning stuff? It wasn't so surprising
S_A_P 9y ago
I actually thought they were always of the opinion that they will only lead when they feel like they can make it a good experience or that the tech is finished or mature enough.
moogleii 9y ago
I think it was reported here that Samsung just stored a jpeg of your face on the local file system and did a simple compare. But sure, they get to claim being first. I suspect Apple is okay with that.
mikestew 9y ago
face id, Samsung did that before No, they didn't. What Samsung did was release software that mimicked facial recognition. In fact, it mimicked it so well, people were convinced that Samsung did it first. What Samsung actually did was implement software that would sometimes coincidentally "recognize" a face, and more often would "recognize" a photo of the target user. What Samsung didn't do was implement facial recognition that was reliable and secure, which I think is what most people think of when they think "facial recognition".
- josteink 9y ago
  > What Samsung actually did was implement software that would sometimes coincidentally "recognize" a face, and more often would "recognize" a photo of the target user No way unique to Samsung. Every implementation I've seen fails at this, even the latest one in Windows 10. If you care about security, don't use it. That's my advice.
- problems 9y ago
  This raises a major question though - what's the use case and threat model for facial recognition? If you're remotely concerned about security, clearly you're not going to use it. If you only care about preventing the casual attacker, either option seems good enough. I just don't see a security model in which Apple has substantially improved it. The security of it is terrible in either case - all Apple did was make it more expensive.
redial 9y ago
Apple has never been first with any feature, don't know what gave you that impression. Not even copy and paste.
- oneeyedpigeon 9y ago
  They're rarely the first to market with a feature, but they often are the first to really succeed at one, including cut/copy/paste.
  - redial 9y ago
    Which is just what I said.
  - vilmosi 9y ago
    What was so special about their copy/paste?
    - oneeyedpigeon 9y ago
      > Apple Computer widely popularized the computer-based cut/copy-and-paste paradigm through the Lisa (1983) and Macintosh (1984) operating systems and applications. (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut%2C_copy%2C_and_paste https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut%2C_copy%2C_and_paste)
    - theshrike79 9y ago
      On phones, their FIRST copy/paste version worked between apps, worked with pictures as well as text, etc.
jccalhoun 9y ago
As others have said, the Samsung face unlock was not secure. Windows Hello has been around a while though and I think it works similarly to how the iphone one works.
daveorzach 9y ago
How many iPhone X will sell this month and how many Samsung phones sold the 1st month they released edge to edge displays? I think part of Apple's problem is success, they have to launch with a profitable phone the 1st month; no delays & no defects. Samsung can have a higher internal scrap rate for the 1st few months because they sell less and it impacts the bottom line less.
- robotresearcher 9y ago
  > they have to launch with a profitable phone the 1st month; no delays & no defects. They've survived both in the past.
eco 9y ago
Google had face unlock back in 2011 when the Galaxy Nexus came out but I'm not going to pretend it was anything like this. It worked alright but had plenty of warnings saying it wasn't perfect and that someone that looked like you could unlock your phone. I always found it quite cumbersome to use because it turns out my natural way of holding my phone doesn't point the front camera directly at my face. I hope for the sake of iPhone X users that that isn't true for FaceID and that the sensors are wide angle enough that it isn't as annoying to use as Face Unlock is.
jfoutz 9y ago
It's almost obligatory. "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame." [1] [1] https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/apple-releases-ipod https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/apple-releases-i...
nnd 9y ago
To be fair Apple always was further behind the adoption curve for bleeding edge technologies perfectly timing for them to become mature enough first.

acchow 9y ago

Samsung does every feature first, and terribly. They hit check boxes. Apple executes. You could unlock Samsung phones with photographs [1] [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-galaxy-note-8-facial-recognition-tricked-with-a-photo-2017-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-galaxy-note-8-facial-...

FireBeyond 9y ago
And you could/can unlock TouchID with playdoh casts, even high res fingerprints printed on paper... so?
- theshrike79 9y ago
  Printing someone's photo off Facebook is trivial. Lifting a working fingerprint and transferring it to a play-doh mold or a hi-res printer is a whole another beast.
  - vilmosi 9y ago
    I thought it needed to be a high resolution photo?
    - theshrike79 9y ago
      For Samsung, nope. You can just open someone's profile picture on Facebook on your phone and show it to their phone and It'll unlock (or not, just like with their actual face).
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
bhnmmhmd 9y ago
I agree partially, but Apple is also expected to introduce some new features, right? Or else, what's left of Steve's legacy?
sorenjan 9y ago
Samsung didn't do face unlock first either, it was part of Android 4.0. Of course, using a single camera without movement you'll only get 2d data, so it shouldn't stand a chance against Apple's 3d sensor.

dopamean 9y ago

Hasn't this been true for a while?

jgh 9y ago
It's almost always been true. Think back to the early iPhone days when they didn't even have cut & paste! Apple has always done a good job of really refining features, but I'm not certain I can think of one that they were first on.
- oneeyedpigeon 9y ago
  First keyboard-less tablet?
  - redial 9y ago
    There were many before. There was even a mac keyboard-less tablet years before the iPhone, just not made by Apple.
- seanmcdirmid 9y ago
  First use of capacitive touch on a smart phone (or anything consumer for that matter), the original iPhone really was a big deal with lots of firsts.
  - redial 9y ago
    First to integrate them on a product category maybe, but multitouch was not invented by them.
    - seanmcdirmid 9y ago
      Ok, what consumer device had capacitive touch before the iPhone. You just gotta name one! I'm pretty tired of these smug ignorant attitudes, this isn't reddit. Also, I stated capacitive, not multitouch, if that is meant a strawman.

mtgx 9y ago

Samsung's face recognition software was hacked from day one. Not only did, it was hacked with a 2D picture, something that was also shown possible since 2011, when Google first introduced face recognition. It's like Samsung didn't even bother to improve it at all. Being first with a crappy solution is not exactly ideal, either. We'll see if Apple's solution is that much better - I don't really trust any face recognition tech, but the 1:1,000,000 FAR ratio vs 1:50,000 for fingerprint looks promising at least.

WithHighProb 9y ago
u sure you catch up with latest deep learning stuff? It wasn't so surprising

S_A_P 9y ago

I actually thought they were always of the opinion that they will only lead when they feel like they can make it a good experience or that the tech is finished or mature enough.

moogleii 9y ago

I think it was reported here that Samsung just stored a jpeg of your face on the local file system and did a simple compare. But sure, they get to claim being first. I suspect Apple is okay with that.

mikestew 9y ago

face id, Samsung did that before No, they didn't. What Samsung did was release software that mimicked facial recognition. In fact, it mimicked it so well, people were convinced that Samsung did it first. What Samsung actually did was implement software that would sometimes coincidentally "recognize" a face, and more often would "recognize" a photo of the target user. What Samsung didn't do was implement facial recognition that was reliable and secure, which I think is what most people think of when they think "facial recognition".

josteink 9y ago
> What Samsung actually did was implement software that would sometimes coincidentally "recognize" a face, and more often would "recognize" a photo of the target user No way unique to Samsung. Every implementation I've seen fails at this, even the latest one in Windows 10. If you care about security, don't use it. That's my advice.
problems 9y ago
This raises a major question though - what's the use case and threat model for facial recognition? If you're remotely concerned about security, clearly you're not going to use it. If you only care about preventing the casual attacker, either option seems good enough. I just don't see a security model in which Apple has substantially improved it. The security of it is terrible in either case - all Apple did was make it more expensive.

redial 9y ago

Apple has never been first with any feature, don't know what gave you that impression. Not even copy and paste.

oneeyedpigeon 9y ago
They're rarely the first to market with a feature, but they often are the first to really succeed at one, including cut/copy/paste.
- redial 9y ago
  Which is just what I said.
- vilmosi 9y ago
  What was so special about their copy/paste?
  - oneeyedpigeon 9y ago
    > Apple Computer widely popularized the computer-based cut/copy-and-paste paradigm through the Lisa (1983) and Macintosh (1984) operating systems and applications. (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut%2C_copy%2C_and_paste https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cut%2C_copy%2C_and_paste)
  - theshrike79 9y ago
    On phones, their FIRST copy/paste version worked between apps, worked with pictures as well as text, etc.

jccalhoun 9y ago

As others have said, the Samsung face unlock was not secure. Windows Hello has been around a while though and I think it works similarly to how the iphone one works.

daveorzach 9y ago

How many iPhone X will sell this month and how many Samsung phones sold the 1st month they released edge to edge displays? I think part of Apple's problem is success, they have to launch with a profitable phone the 1st month; no delays & no defects. Samsung can have a higher internal scrap rate for the 1st few months because they sell less and it impacts the bottom line less.

robotresearcher 9y ago
> they have to launch with a profitable phone the 1st month; no delays & no defects. They've survived both in the past.

eco 9y ago

Google had face unlock back in 2011 when the Galaxy Nexus came out but I'm not going to pretend it was anything like this. It worked alright but had plenty of warnings saying it wasn't perfect and that someone that looked like you could unlock your phone. I always found it quite cumbersome to use because it turns out my natural way of holding my phone doesn't point the front camera directly at my face. I hope for the sake of iPhone X users that that isn't true for FaceID and that the sensors are wide angle enough that it isn't as annoying to use as Face Unlock is.

jfoutz 9y ago

It's almost obligatory. "No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame." [1] [1] https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/apple-releases-ipod https://slashdot.org/story/01/10/23/1816257/apple-releases-i...

nnd 9y ago

To be fair Apple always was further behind the adoption curve for bleeding edge technologies perfectly timing for them to become mature enough first.