4 ms·

Apple are also well in the business for stupid patents, so they know better than to question it.

dplgk 8y ago
Not sure why's you're getting down voted. I guess because your comment is considered whataboutism and the patent is not defending Apple. But yes, for example, Apple's slide to unlock phone patent is equally as dumb.
- jayess 8y ago
  Or the pull-down screen "rubbery stretch" effect is also a stupid patent.
- close04 8y ago
  Apple's problem isn't that the patents are stupid, it's that the inventions or ideas never belonged to them in the first place. In the vast majority of cases the idea or implementation already existed. Like the slide to unlock which was used at least since 2005 in a commercial device. [0][1] They also tried patenting a method to reduce power consumption of a chip by reducing voltage. Something that isn't just a law of nature (thus unpatentable) but was also used decades before ever since ICs were developed (thus "prior art"). One of the most controversial patents is the "rectangle with rounded corners". This was a design patent and these in general are usually not just very hard to enforce but also stupid in most cases. [0] https://www.gsmarena.com/neonode_n1m-1137.php https://www.gsmarena.com/neonode_n1m-1137.php [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj-KS2kfIr0&t=240s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj-KS2kfIr0&t=240s
  - alain94040 8y ago
    Close, but not quite. The video you show is missing a key element of what Apple patented: the animation that tells you what to do to unlock. Apple didn't patent a swipe to unlock, it patented the version where a visual guide is provided to swipe to unlock: 1. A method of unlocking a hand-held electronic device, the device including a touch-sensitive display, the method comprising: detecting a contact with the touch-sensitive display at a first predefined location corresponding to an unlock image; continuously moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display in accordance with movement of the contact while continuous contact with the touch screen is maintained, wherein the unlock image is a graphical, interactive user-interface object with which a user interacts in order to unlock the device; and unlocking the hand-held electronic device if the moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display results in movement of the unlock image from the first predefined location to a predefined unlock region on the touch-sensitive display. As you can see if you watch the video carefully, that older device had no feedback regarding how to unlock, and whether the unlock even worked. It makes it a more confusing, hard to use device. Hence a new patent that fixes those limitations makes sense.
    - close04 8y ago
      > continuously moving the unlock image Good find. Wouldn't anyone be able to bypass by simply not having a "continuously moving image", just the suggestion to slide and a button that disappears while sliding?
- MBCook 8y ago
  They come up with good ideas and want to protect them. As long as the patent office is willing to grant them why SHOULDN’T they apply? “Oh competitors who copy everything we do, even sometimes in cargo cult fashion... we didn’t patent this. Please don’t copy it.”
  - Semaphor 8y ago
    It's a question of ethics/morality. Same for tax loopholes. The point from OP btw is that they DIDN'T come up with any idea, yet still patented it or at least tried to. Which is the opposite of what the patent system seeks to achieve.
    - MBCook 8y ago
      Is it? If they don’t not only will they get ripped off (losing the benefit of their good/unique design) the competitor may patent the feature and then Apple would have to spend millions of dollars and years to overturn the patent and hopefully get attorneys fees. It sucks, but it’s a perfectly sane business decision. They open themselves to liability if they don’t.

Not sure why's you're getting down voted. I guess because your comment is considered whataboutism and the patent is not defending Apple. But yes, for example, Apple's slide to unlock phone patent is equally as dumb.

jayess 8y ago
Or the pull-down screen "rubbery stretch" effect is also a stupid patent.
close04 8y ago
Apple's problem isn't that the patents are stupid, it's that the inventions or ideas never belonged to them in the first place. In the vast majority of cases the idea or implementation already existed. Like the slide to unlock which was used at least since 2005 in a commercial device. [0][1] They also tried patenting a method to reduce power consumption of a chip by reducing voltage. Something that isn't just a law of nature (thus unpatentable) but was also used decades before ever since ICs were developed (thus "prior art"). One of the most controversial patents is the "rectangle with rounded corners". This was a design patent and these in general are usually not just very hard to enforce but also stupid in most cases. [0] https://www.gsmarena.com/neonode_n1m-1137.php https://www.gsmarena.com/neonode_n1m-1137.php [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj-KS2kfIr0&t=240s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tj-KS2kfIr0&t=240s
- alain94040 8y ago
  Close, but not quite. The video you show is missing a key element of what Apple patented: the animation that tells you what to do to unlock. Apple didn't patent a swipe to unlock, it patented the version where a visual guide is provided to swipe to unlock: 1. A method of unlocking a hand-held electronic device, the device including a touch-sensitive display, the method comprising: detecting a contact with the touch-sensitive display at a first predefined location corresponding to an unlock image; continuously moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display in accordance with movement of the contact while continuous contact with the touch screen is maintained, wherein the unlock image is a graphical, interactive user-interface object with which a user interacts in order to unlock the device; and unlocking the hand-held electronic device if the moving the unlock image on the touch-sensitive display results in movement of the unlock image from the first predefined location to a predefined unlock region on the touch-sensitive display. As you can see if you watch the video carefully, that older device had no feedback regarding how to unlock, and whether the unlock even worked. It makes it a more confusing, hard to use device. Hence a new patent that fixes those limitations makes sense.
  - close04 8y ago
    > continuously moving the unlock image Good find. Wouldn't anyone be able to bypass by simply not having a "continuously moving image", just the suggestion to slide and a button that disappears while sliding?
MBCook 8y ago
They come up with good ideas and want to protect them. As long as the patent office is willing to grant them why SHOULDN’T they apply? “Oh competitors who copy everything we do, even sometimes in cargo cult fashion... we didn’t patent this. Please don’t copy it.”
- Semaphor 8y ago
  It's a question of ethics/morality. Same for tax loopholes. The point from OP btw is that they DIDN'T come up with any idea, yet still patented it or at least tried to. Which is the opposite of what the patent system seeks to achieve.
  - MBCook 8y ago
    Is it? If they don’t not only will they get ripped off (losing the benefit of their good/unique design) the competitor may patent the feature and then Apple would have to spend millions of dollars and years to overturn the patent and hopefully get attorneys fees. It sucks, but it’s a perfectly sane business decision. They open themselves to liability if they don’t.