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Apple Files Patent Suit Against Samsung Over Galaxy Line of Phones and Tablets

56 points by pathik 15y ago

Kylekramer 15y ago
Any clue why Apple is beating around the bush and not going after the main source (especially since this is just finishing off the trifecta of suing the main Android OEMs). While Samsung has been pretty blatant in their ripoffs of the iPhone design, I'd have to imagine they are better suited to fend off Apple than Google in this field and the suit is somewhat biting the hand that feeds Apple supplies. Are they just trying to make it known that "You go Android and we sue"?
- pathik 15y ago
  I guess Google needs those Nortel patents more than ever now, if only to fight off such patent lawsuits against its partners.
- roc 15y ago
  The article specifies three design patents. So it doesn't appear to be about Android, but rather just physically-similar devices.
  - Kylekramer 15y ago
    That is what the article focuses on, but the actual suit includes the Android operating system itself. Passing reference in the article to Android as "core technology". Edit: Case in point, the Nexus S is named in the suit despite being pure Android and having a fairly unique design.
- tomkarlo 15y ago
  "In particular, Apple cites patents issued in 2009 and 2010 that cover the physical design of the iPhone along with various trademarks for its app icons." If the main thrust of the suit is around the physical design, they probably have to go after the OEMs, not Google. Seems like Google could probably duck that.
- mikeryan 15y ago
  From the article "In particular, Apple cites patents issued in 2009 and 2010 that cover the physical design of the iPhone along with various trademarks for its app icons." It looks like this is more around form factor which is on Samsung, and only slightly related to screen UI.
- HelloBeautiful 15y ago
  Maybe because of Google Maps on iDevices. Very hard to replace, as there are only 3 companies, including Google, who own somewhat global routing maps.
  - alanh 15y ago
    Keep in mind that the map software itself was created by Apple. Also keep in mind that there is almost certainly some sort of SLA/contract ensuring continued access to Google Maps data for some time period, and that it would not be particularly impossible to switch to, say, Bing-powered map graphics.
    - patrickaljord 15y ago
      > Keep in mind that the map software itself was created by Apple. Sure but it's just using google maps API with a fancy UI. > Also keep in mind that there is almost certainly some sort of SLA/contract ensuring continued access to Google Maps data for some time period And I'm pretty sure there's a clause that would void that contract should apple sue google over patents. > say, Bing-powered map graphics Bing map is way inferior to google maps, otherwise apple would have switched a long time ago.
      - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
        Bing map is way inferior to google maps, otherwise apple would have switched a long time ago. The major companies making maps are TeleAtlas, Navteq, and Google. TeleAtlas is owned by TomTom, Navteq is owned by Nokia. Navteq is used by Google, Microsoft and Mapquest. If Apple ever wanted to switch to another map provider, it wouldn't need a middleman like Microsoft. Sure but it's just using google maps API with a fancy UI. If so, then I reckon that's temporary, given that Apple bought companies like Placebase, Poly9, and Siri. http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/07/14/apple_acquires_online_mapping_company_poly9_report.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/07/14/apple_acquires... http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/10/01/apple_purchased_google_maps_competitor_placebase_report.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/10/01/apple_purchase... http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/04/28/apple_acquires_siri_developer_of_personal_assistant_app_for_iphone.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/04/28/apple_acquires...
- Samuel_Michon 15y ago
  "Any clue why Apple is beating around the bush and not going after the main source" It might be because Google is too powerful. It might be because Google isn't the one putting the OS on phones and selling them, companies like HTC and Samsung are -- maybe that makes it difficult to successfully sue Google directly. In any case, it's clear that Apple and Microsoft are willing to do anything to keep Android from becoming a dominant mobile OS. As John Gruber wrote [1]: "The patent suit against HTC [...] is all about Google - about creating a situation where Android is no longer a free operating system for handset makers in the U.S., because the cost of using it is an expensive legal defense against Apple." Perhaps also of interest: a John Gruber piece [2] arguing against software patents, using quotes from Paul Graham, Tim Bray, and Will Shipley. [1] http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/napalm_in_the_morning http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/napalm_in_the_morning [2] http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/this_apple_htc_patent_thing http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/this_apple_htc_patent_thin...
- nickconfer 15y ago
  Much more effective to go after individual phone makers. If you go after Google you go after a company that obviously has a big stake in mobile share and will want to fight for it. If you go after individual phone makers, they have to decide if it is worth continuing going down this path. Even more likely, a new phone maker might get scared off at producing a clone that doesn't have the financial resources to fight Apple.
- azakai 15y ago
  > Any clue why Apple is beating around the bush and not going after the main source Because Google is not actually doing anything infringing. Google is writing code, but software patents in the US do not apply to abstract code. They apply to specific devices. So if a patent is being infringed, it is done by the phone manufacturers and shippers, and not Google. If that sounds odd, then it is, but that is how the patent system currently works.
  - warfangle 15y ago
    Also, the button layout that they complain about isn't necessarily stock android. It's a UI modification Samsung put on top of things. This is stick android 2.3, for example: http://www.itsagadget.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Android-2.3-Home-Screen.jpg http://www.itsagadget.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/...
arron61 15y ago
Apple is lame. They claim Nokia is suing them with dumb patents and then proceed to sue others with their dumb patents...
- Tycho 15y ago
  Did you see the pics at the bottom? I thought I was looking at an iPhone photo until I looked a bit closer.
  - sukuriant 15y ago
    Indeed. With the exception of the notification bar's organization, it was quite difficult to distinguish the two. I'm against overuse of patents and trademarks, but even to me these are very clearly too similar.
    - dstein 15y ago
      But is putting finger-sized icons on a mobile device something that Apple "invented"? It's not exactly a new technology or concept, it's simply obvious. I recall owning an iPaq that did the same thing years before the iPhone was released. And for that matter every old fashioned telephone ever produced had finger sized icons.
      - sukuriant 15y ago
        It's not the finger-sized icons that are the issue. What makes it very similar to the iPhone are: * the general smooth, rectangular shape of the phone, including a large, center button below the screen * a color-coded section of four buttons at the bottom of the screen that take up the whole space and include "phone", icon on the left-most side. * a speaker in a thin-rectangular shape above the screen. There are a great number of small differences between them, but they are very, very similar. Compare the new Samsung phone with a regular Android UI (e.g. http://www.techwhizz.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Android-2.3-Gingerbread-Using-CyanogenMod-6.1.png http://www.techwhizz.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Android-... (from http://www.techwhizz.com/feel-android-2-3-gingerbread-cyanogenmod-6-1-tweak/ http://www.techwhizz.com/feel-android-2-3-gingerbread-cyanog... ) and notice that, while the two user interfaces accomplish similar things and both use large buttons, the Samsung UI is incredibly and inappropriately close to the iPhone's, especially if Apple has made a point of claiming that precise format as their own.
erikstarck 15y ago
Wow. That's almost as if someone would take the original Xerox Parc computer designs and, you know, build a copied computer of and sell in their own name.
- Anechoic 15y ago
  IIRC, Apple licensed GUI elements from PARC.
  - cooldeal 15y ago
    Not really. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xerox-sues-apple-computer-over-macintosh-copyright.html?scp=3&sq=apple+xerox&st=nyt http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xero...
    - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
      From the 1989 article that you linked to: "A visit by Steven P. Jobs, Apple's co-founder, to Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center in November 1979, is widely recounted in Silicon Valley chronicles as the inspiration for the Lisa and the Macintosh. It was then that he was shown Smalltalk, the first computer language using a mouse, the hand-held device used to instruct the computer. Several former Xerox employees worked on the Lisa and the Macintosh. [...] Ronald S. Laurie, a copyright lawyer with Irell & Minella in Menlo Park, Calif., said Xerox's claim could be weakened because of the long delay in filing suit, some five years after the introduction of the Macintosh. 'There's a legal doctrine that you can't just sit around while someone's infringing your rights and not complain,' he said. In addition, he said, Xerox is 'going to have to show that when Star interface was published in 1981 there was a copyright notice published with it,' 'I don't know if it was published without notice,' he said, 'but I'll bet it was; in those days nobody put c's in a circle on computer screens.'" Then there's PBS' 1996 "Triumph of the Nerds", in which the execs of the 80s are interviewed about the situation back then [1]: "Larry Tesler: 'Everybody wanted to make a real difference, we really thought that we were changing the world and that at the end of this project or this set of projects personal computing would burst on the scene exactly the way we had envisioned it and take everybody by total surprise.' But the brilliant researchers at PARC could never persuade the Xerox management that their vision was accurate. Head Office in New York ignored the revolutionary technologies they owned three thousand miles away. They just didn't get it. John Warnock: 'None of the main body of the company was prepared to accept the answers. So there was a tremendous mismatch between the management and what the researchers were doing and these guys had never fantasized about what the future of the office was going to be and when it was presented to them they had no mechanisms for turning those ideas into real live products and that was really the frustrating part of it was you were talking to people who didn't understand the vision and yet the vision was getting created everyday within the Palo Alto Research Centre and there was no one to receive that vision.' [...] Steve Jobs had co-founded Apple Computer in 1976. The first popular personal computer, the Apple 2, was a hit - and made Steve Jobs one of the biggest names of a brand-new industry. At the height of Apple's early success in December 1979, Jobs, then all of 24, had a privileged invitation to visit Xerox Parc. Steve Jobs: 'And they showed me really three things. But I was so blinded by the first one I didn't even really see the other two. [...] I was so blinded by the first thing they showed me which was the graphical user interface. I thought it was the best thing I'd ever seen in my life. Now remember it was very flawed, what we saw was incomplete, they'd done a bunch of things wrong. But we didn't know that at the time but still though they had the germ of the idea was there and they'd done it very well and within you know ten minutes it was obvious to me that all computers would work like this some day.' Adele Goldberg: 'He came back and I almost said asked, but the truth is, demanded that his entire programming team get a demo of the Smalltalk System and the then head of the science centre asked me to give the demo because Steve specifically asked for me to give the demo and I said no way. I had a big argument with these Xerox executives telling them that they were about to give away the kitchen sink and I said that I would only do it if I were ordered to do it cause then of course it would be their responsibility, and that's what they did.' Larry Tesler: 'After an hour looking at demos they [Apple] understood our technology, and what it meant more than any Xerox executive understood after years of showing it to them.'" And then there's an 1996 essay [2] by Bruce Horn, who worked at both Xerox PARC and Apple: "For more than a decade now, I've listened to the debate about where the Macintosh user interface came from. Most people assume it came directly from Xerox, after Steve Jobs went to visit Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). This "fact" is reported over and over, by people who don't know better (and also by people who should!). Unfortunately, it just isn't true - there are some similarities between the Apple interface and the various interfaces on Xerox systems, but the differences are substantial." Lastly, a 2000 Motley Fool article [3] states: "Xerox could have owned the PC revolution, but instead it sat on the technology for years. Then, in exchange for the opportunity to invest in a hot new pre-IPO start-up called "Apple," the Xerox PARC commandos were forced -- under protest -- to give Apple's engineers a tour and a demonstration of their work. The result was the Apple Macintosh, which Microsoft later copied to create Windows." [1] http://www.pbs.org/nerds/part3.html http://www.pbs.org/nerds/part3.html [2] http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=On_Xerox,_Apple_and_Progress.txt http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=On_Xerox,_Apple_a... [3] http://www.fool.com/news/foth/2000/foth000918.htm http://www.fool.com/news/foth/2000/foth000918.htm
YooLi 15y ago
Would all the knee-jerk comment posters actually click through and see that it's not an 'Android' lawsuit.
- shagrath 15y ago
  except the Samsung Wave, running on Bada and similary looking to the iPhone is not cited in the lawsuit...
  - cube13 15y ago
    http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/Samsung-Wave/ http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/Samsung-Wave/ That doesn't look all that much like the iPhone, to be honest.
  - r00fus 15y ago
    The Wave2 looks very unlike an iPhone. I would never mistake the two. However, the Samsung i9000S (Galaxy S) looks very much like the iPhone (3GS) and on casual observation may be mistaken for one another. It takes a lot to get trade-dress lawsuits won, so I expect this will only put pressure on Samsung to do what Apple wants, and is not intended to actually win. (which, btw, shows how broken the legal system is, since cases are more used to bully smaller players than to win on merits)
Hov 15y ago
Suddenly, Microsofts decision to come up with a unique UX/UI doesn't seem so dumb.
Groxx 15y ago
>http://mobilized.allthingsd.com/files/2011/04/apple-v.-samsung-2.png http://mobilized.allthingsd.com/files/2011/04/apple-v.-samsu... I think they have an actual case here. That's about as blatantly-copying as you can get without making a complete knock-off that's designed to fool people.
- abstractbill 15y ago
  There's only so much variation you can have once you've decided that most of the surface area of a phone is going to be taken up by a touch-sensitive screen.
  - Groxx 15y ago
    I'm sure people claimed that prior to iOS's success as well.
  - Bud 15y ago
    Yeah, exactly: Samsung was FORCED into using the exact same number of icons, arranged in the same 5 rows of 4 icons, in the exact same shape. Also forced into a 4-icon shaded bar at the bottom with the 4 key icons in said bar, and forced into using a near-identical "phone" icon in the exact same place, because after all, a light-green phone icon with a diagonally-slanted depiction of a phone handset was the only possible way to go. Samsung was also clearly forced into using the exact same means of depicting multiple screens of icons. Come on. Samsung clearly didn't even TRY to distinguish their product, here. This is about as obvious as it gets.
    - uvdiv 15y ago
      The 5x4 layout seems pretty unremarkable -- should each phone manufacturer have to trademark their own layout (n,m), for nonzero integers n,m? Will small players be forced to adopt button grids like 21x1 if they can't license actually-usable arrangements? I don't think it's reasonable that a simple silhouette of a phone, used as an icon to represent a phone, is trademarkable. The color is more interesting, until you look at wikipedia and see that mobile phones were using almost the exact same iconography -- phone silhouette over light green background -- at least as far back as 1989: Nokia Mobira Cityman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia#First_mobile_phones http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia#First_mobile_phones http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nokia_150_and_nokia_1100.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nokia_150_and_nokia_1100.j... The only difference is that the icon has been rotated and now has a shorter aspect ratio. Also the silhouette is now white instead of black.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
drivebyacct2 15y ago
Apple invented the phone, the idea of representing applications as icons in a grid, and the idea of having quick access to specific applications. Those features have existed in countless other operating systems, and DEs? Blasphemy.
ephcon 15y ago
Trade dress concerns trademarks, not patents.
noonespecial 15y ago
This is actually a pretty good example of patenting "product" and not "process". No comment on if this is good or bad, but we should probably decide explicitly if we're going to grant monopolies on entire kinds of products. It seems more like a trademark issue than a patent issue.
- cube13 15y ago
  >No comment on if this is good or bad, but we should probably decide explicitly if we're going to grant monopolies on entire kinds of products. That's exactly what the patent system was intended for, though. If you invented a new product, you were granted an effective monopoly on that specific invention for a certain amount of time(now 25 years in the US).
  - noonespecial 15y ago
    I was under the impression that it was something more like "method and process for making a better mouse trap" and not "any old thing that catches mice". We're to the point now that mouse trap makers are suing the breeders of cats.
EGreg 15y ago
"“Samsung’s Galaxy Tab computer tablet also slavishly copies a combination of several elements of the Apple Product Configuration Trade Dress,” Apple says in its suit, noting that Samsung’s tablet, like Apple’s, uses a similar rectangular design with rounded corners, similar black border and array of icons." Ah yes, rectangles with rounded corners, the presence of black borders, and the ability to have icons. But joking aside, the samsung one sold in Korea does look very similar.
ChuckMcM 15y ago
Patent-a-geddon continues. I wonder if this is an artifact of the great expiring due to start in 2015 of various silly patents.
- alanh 15y ago
  Source? Considering software patents are continuously filed and granted, I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
  - ChuckMcM 15y ago
    The great surge of technology patents started around 1990 and had really picked up steam by 1995 [1]. Patents, unlike Copyrights, are not 'renewable' in the sense that once their 20 year term expires they revert to the public domain by law. Further, now that folks have successfully litigated bogus Patent Marking [2] you can't use an old Patent number on your design to intimidate folks into not copying it. So while filing rates continue to be high (although as you see from the linked graph issue rates have been falling) the patent office has become better educated about what should be and what shouldn't be patentable (not perfect yet but its getting noticeably better, if only because patent examiners are entering the market who grew up in a digital age). So a side effect is that when the patent claims for issued patents expire, that's it, no more revenue. You can perfectly legally implement the RSA key exchange algorithm now (as an example) without infringing on any patents. This was speculated to be the primary reason that RSA Data Security Inc was trying to get people signed up to use their Copyrighted implementation of same, since if you licensed the copyrighted code, and then decided to stop paying them license fees and implement it yourself they couldn't sue you for patent infringement but they would want to go through your code to see that you hadn't used large parts of their software in your new design. That approach was unavailable if you hadn't been given access to their source code. So starting in 2010, and accelerating until 2020 all of those patents that were issued between 1990 and 2000 will revert to being public domain. It is one of the reasons I predict a tech boom in 2015 - 2025 :-). I did not anticipate however that prior to their death that these companies would go all out in try to extract some, possibly any, value from them by suing the pants off everyone. I don't know, but I suspect that this is at least partly responsible for the current fracas. [1] http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=patents+us http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=patents+us [2] http://blogs.forbes.com/docket/2010/09/02/patent-marking-lawsuit-trollers-get-a-boost-with-brooks-brothers-opinion/ http://blogs.forbes.com/docket/2010/09/02/patent-marking-law...
kenjackson 15y ago
Here's some pictures from the Palm OS a few years before iOS: http://www.palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=6542 http://www.palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=6542 I guess if the issue is that the grid has to be 4x4 w/ a black background. But otherwise, this looks like the standard paradigm for app launching on mobile phones.
- Samuel_Michon 15y ago
  And here's a screenshot of Apple's Newton OS, which came out three years before Palm released its Pilot in 1996. http://pdadb.net/img/os/newton/newton_os_2.0_all_icons.png http://pdadb.net/img/os/newton/newton_os_2.0_all_icons.png The lawsuit isn't just about Samsung using a desktop metaphor. They copied all sorts of hardware and software characteristics from the iPhone.
  - kenjackson 15y ago
    Are they suing using the Newton UI patent? I don't think so. Shipping and patenting 10 years later doesn't help. In fact this Apple could be prior art against itself. This just weakens Apple's position.
    - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
      My point is that Apple isn't suing just because Samsung chose to use a home screen filled with icons. From the article: "It’s no coincidence that Samsung’s latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging." an Apple representative told Mobilized. And from the WSJ article about the same topic: Alan Fisch, an attorney with Kaye Scholer LLP in Washington D.C., said, "By sheer volume alone, this is a substantial assertion of intellectual property rights."
      - kenjackson 15y ago
        Except it also looks a lot like the HP iPaq 100 series that predates the iPhone. A full screen touch device with no keyboard and rounded corners. The 200 series came in black. Apple's alleged "trade dress" is the evolution of the touch device w/ no keyboard.
r00fus 15y ago
Anyone here notice that this suit basically comes right around the time that a credible iPod Touch competitor arrives? Maybe there's another "line in the sand" that Apple had set for the Google/Android that just got stepped over?
- Samuel_Michon 15y ago
  As far as I know, the Galaxy Player isn't even on the market yet [1]. However, it does very much look like an older generation iPod touch. It even has the same color scheme and metal rim. iPod touch: http://media.obsessable.com/media/2008/09/12/575/apple-ipod-touch.jpg http://media.obsessable.com/media/2008/09/12/575/apple-ipod-... Galaxy Player: http://www.samsunghub.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/galaxy-player.jpg http://www.samsunghub.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/galaxy-... But no, I don't think the release of the Galaxy Player has much to with it. I'm willing to bet Apple would've sued Samsung anyway, as Apple has been hunting Android handset makers since early last year. [1] http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/16/samsung-galaxy-player-4-and-5-hit-the-us-this-spring/ http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/16/samsung-galaxy-player-4-a...
smogzer 15y ago
Singularity should not ben pattentable. Like 15 years ago i described how myspace future phone would be like: no physical buttons taking space, a gps, runs linux, and a thinnier form than my current ipaq. So, after a decade after the first ipaqs the samsung galaxy from where i am typing finally arrives.

56 points by pathik 15y ago

Any clue why Apple is beating around the bush and not going after the main source (especially since this is just finishing off the trifecta of suing the main Android OEMs). While Samsung has been pretty blatant in their ripoffs of the iPhone design, I'd have to imagine they are better suited to fend off Apple than Google in this field and the suit is somewhat biting the hand that feeds Apple supplies. Are they just trying to make it known that "You go Android and we sue"?

pathik 15y ago
I guess Google needs those Nortel patents more than ever now, if only to fight off such patent lawsuits against its partners.
roc 15y ago
The article specifies three design patents. So it doesn't appear to be about Android, but rather just physically-similar devices.
- Kylekramer 15y ago
  That is what the article focuses on, but the actual suit includes the Android operating system itself. Passing reference in the article to Android as "core technology". Edit: Case in point, the Nexus S is named in the suit despite being pure Android and having a fairly unique design.
tomkarlo 15y ago
"In particular, Apple cites patents issued in 2009 and 2010 that cover the physical design of the iPhone along with various trademarks for its app icons." If the main thrust of the suit is around the physical design, they probably have to go after the OEMs, not Google. Seems like Google could probably duck that.
mikeryan 15y ago
From the article "In particular, Apple cites patents issued in 2009 and 2010 that cover the physical design of the iPhone along with various trademarks for its app icons." It looks like this is more around form factor which is on Samsung, and only slightly related to screen UI.
HelloBeautiful 15y ago
Maybe because of Google Maps on iDevices. Very hard to replace, as there are only 3 companies, including Google, who own somewhat global routing maps.
- alanh 15y ago
  Keep in mind that the map software itself was created by Apple. Also keep in mind that there is almost certainly some sort of SLA/contract ensuring continued access to Google Maps data for some time period, and that it would not be particularly impossible to switch to, say, Bing-powered map graphics.
  - patrickaljord 15y ago
    > Keep in mind that the map software itself was created by Apple. Sure but it's just using google maps API with a fancy UI. > Also keep in mind that there is almost certainly some sort of SLA/contract ensuring continued access to Google Maps data for some time period And I'm pretty sure there's a clause that would void that contract should apple sue google over patents. > say, Bing-powered map graphics Bing map is way inferior to google maps, otherwise apple would have switched a long time ago.
    - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
      Bing map is way inferior to google maps, otherwise apple would have switched a long time ago. The major companies making maps are TeleAtlas, Navteq, and Google. TeleAtlas is owned by TomTom, Navteq is owned by Nokia. Navteq is used by Google, Microsoft and Mapquest. If Apple ever wanted to switch to another map provider, it wouldn't need a middleman like Microsoft. Sure but it's just using google maps API with a fancy UI. If so, then I reckon that's temporary, given that Apple bought companies like Placebase, Poly9, and Siri. http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/07/14/apple_acquires_online_mapping_company_poly9_report.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/07/14/apple_acquires... http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/10/01/apple_purchased_google_maps_competitor_placebase_report.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/09/10/01/apple_purchase... http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/04/28/apple_acquires_siri_developer_of_personal_assistant_app_for_iphone.html http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/10/04/28/apple_acquires...
Samuel_Michon 15y ago
"Any clue why Apple is beating around the bush and not going after the main source" It might be because Google is too powerful. It might be because Google isn't the one putting the OS on phones and selling them, companies like HTC and Samsung are -- maybe that makes it difficult to successfully sue Google directly. In any case, it's clear that Apple and Microsoft are willing to do anything to keep Android from becoming a dominant mobile OS. As John Gruber wrote [1]: "The patent suit against HTC [...] is all about Google - about creating a situation where Android is no longer a free operating system for handset makers in the U.S., because the cost of using it is an expensive legal defense against Apple." Perhaps also of interest: a John Gruber piece [2] arguing against software patents, using quotes from Paul Graham, Tim Bray, and Will Shipley. [1] http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/napalm_in_the_morning http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/napalm_in_the_morning [2] http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/this_apple_htc_patent_thing http://daringfireball.net/2010/03/this_apple_htc_patent_thin...
nickconfer 15y ago
Much more effective to go after individual phone makers. If you go after Google you go after a company that obviously has a big stake in mobile share and will want to fight for it. If you go after individual phone makers, they have to decide if it is worth continuing going down this path. Even more likely, a new phone maker might get scared off at producing a clone that doesn't have the financial resources to fight Apple.
azakai 15y ago
> Any clue why Apple is beating around the bush and not going after the main source Because Google is not actually doing anything infringing. Google is writing code, but software patents in the US do not apply to abstract code. They apply to specific devices. So if a patent is being infringed, it is done by the phone manufacturers and shippers, and not Google. If that sounds odd, then it is, but that is how the patent system currently works.
- warfangle 15y ago
  Also, the button layout that they complain about isn't necessarily stock android. It's a UI modification Samsung put on top of things. This is stick android 2.3, for example: http://www.itsagadget.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Android-2.3-Home-Screen.jpg http://www.itsagadget.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2010/...

arron61 15y ago

Apple is lame. They claim Nokia is suing them with dumb patents and then proceed to sue others with their dumb patents...

Tycho 15y ago
Did you see the pics at the bottom? I thought I was looking at an iPhone photo until I looked a bit closer.
- sukuriant 15y ago
  Indeed. With the exception of the notification bar's organization, it was quite difficult to distinguish the two. I'm against overuse of patents and trademarks, but even to me these are very clearly too similar.
  - dstein 15y ago
    But is putting finger-sized icons on a mobile device something that Apple "invented"? It's not exactly a new technology or concept, it's simply obvious. I recall owning an iPaq that did the same thing years before the iPhone was released. And for that matter every old fashioned telephone ever produced had finger sized icons.
    - sukuriant 15y ago
      It's not the finger-sized icons that are the issue. What makes it very similar to the iPhone are: * the general smooth, rectangular shape of the phone, including a large, center button below the screen * a color-coded section of four buttons at the bottom of the screen that take up the whole space and include "phone", icon on the left-most side. * a speaker in a thin-rectangular shape above the screen. There are a great number of small differences between them, but they are very, very similar. Compare the new Samsung phone with a regular Android UI (e.g. http://www.techwhizz.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Android-2.3-Gingerbread-Using-CyanogenMod-6.1.png http://www.techwhizz.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/Android-... (from http://www.techwhizz.com/feel-android-2-3-gingerbread-cyanogenmod-6-1-tweak/ http://www.techwhizz.com/feel-android-2-3-gingerbread-cyanog... ) and notice that, while the two user interfaces accomplish similar things and both use large buttons, the Samsung UI is incredibly and inappropriately close to the iPhone's, especially if Apple has made a point of claiming that precise format as their own.

erikstarck 15y ago

Wow. That's almost as if someone would take the original Xerox Parc computer designs and, you know, build a copied computer of and sell in their own name.

Anechoic 15y ago
IIRC, Apple licensed GUI elements from PARC.
- cooldeal 15y ago
  Not really. http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xerox-sues-apple-computer-over-macintosh-copyright.html?scp=3&sq=apple+xerox&st=nyt http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xero...
  - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
    From the 1989 article that you linked to: "A visit by Steven P. Jobs, Apple's co-founder, to Xerox's Palo Alto Research Center in November 1979, is widely recounted in Silicon Valley chronicles as the inspiration for the Lisa and the Macintosh. It was then that he was shown Smalltalk, the first computer language using a mouse, the hand-held device used to instruct the computer. Several former Xerox employees worked on the Lisa and the Macintosh. [...] Ronald S. Laurie, a copyright lawyer with Irell & Minella in Menlo Park, Calif., said Xerox's claim could be weakened because of the long delay in filing suit, some five years after the introduction of the Macintosh. 'There's a legal doctrine that you can't just sit around while someone's infringing your rights and not complain,' he said. In addition, he said, Xerox is 'going to have to show that when Star interface was published in 1981 there was a copyright notice published with it,' 'I don't know if it was published without notice,' he said, 'but I'll bet it was; in those days nobody put c's in a circle on computer screens.'" Then there's PBS' 1996 "Triumph of the Nerds", in which the execs of the 80s are interviewed about the situation back then [1]: "Larry Tesler: 'Everybody wanted to make a real difference, we really thought that we were changing the world and that at the end of this project or this set of projects personal computing would burst on the scene exactly the way we had envisioned it and take everybody by total surprise.' But the brilliant researchers at PARC could never persuade the Xerox management that their vision was accurate. Head Office in New York ignored the revolutionary technologies they owned three thousand miles away. They just didn't get it. John Warnock: 'None of the main body of the company was prepared to accept the answers. So there was a tremendous mismatch between the management and what the researchers were doing and these guys had never fantasized about what the future of the office was going to be and when it was presented to them they had no mechanisms for turning those ideas into real live products and that was really the frustrating part of it was you were talking to people who didn't understand the vision and yet the vision was getting created everyday within the Palo Alto Research Centre and there was no one to receive that vision.' [...] Steve Jobs had co-founded Apple Computer in 1976. The first popular personal computer, the Apple 2, was a hit - and made Steve Jobs one of the biggest names of a brand-new industry. At the height of Apple's early success in December 1979, Jobs, then all of 24, had a privileged invitation to visit Xerox Parc. Steve Jobs: 'And they showed me really three things. But I was so blinded by the first one I didn't even really see the other two. [...] I was so blinded by the first thing they showed me which was the graphical user interface. I thought it was the best thing I'd ever seen in my life. Now remember it was very flawed, what we saw was incomplete, they'd done a bunch of things wrong. But we didn't know that at the time but still though they had the germ of the idea was there and they'd done it very well and within you know ten minutes it was obvious to me that all computers would work like this some day.' Adele Goldberg: 'He came back and I almost said asked, but the truth is, demanded that his entire programming team get a demo of the Smalltalk System and the then head of the science centre asked me to give the demo because Steve specifically asked for me to give the demo and I said no way. I had a big argument with these Xerox executives telling them that they were about to give away the kitchen sink and I said that I would only do it if I were ordered to do it cause then of course it would be their responsibility, and that's what they did.' Larry Tesler: 'After an hour looking at demos they [Apple] understood our technology, and what it meant more than any Xerox executive understood after years of showing it to them.'" And then there's an 1996 essay [2] by Bruce Horn, who worked at both Xerox PARC and Apple: "For more than a decade now, I've listened to the debate about where the Macintosh user interface came from. Most people assume it came directly from Xerox, after Steve Jobs went to visit Xerox PARC (Palo Alto Research Center). This "fact" is reported over and over, by people who don't know better (and also by people who should!). Unfortunately, it just isn't true - there are some similarities between the Apple interface and the various interfaces on Xerox systems, but the differences are substantial." Lastly, a 2000 Motley Fool article [3] states: "Xerox could have owned the PC revolution, but instead it sat on the technology for years. Then, in exchange for the opportunity to invest in a hot new pre-IPO start-up called "Apple," the Xerox PARC commandos were forced -- under protest -- to give Apple's engineers a tour and a demonstration of their work. The result was the Apple Macintosh, which Microsoft later copied to create Windows." [1] http://www.pbs.org/nerds/part3.html http://www.pbs.org/nerds/part3.html [2] http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=On_Xerox,_Apple_and_Progress.txt http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=On_Xerox,_Apple_a... [3] http://www.fool.com/news/foth/2000/foth000918.htm http://www.fool.com/news/foth/2000/foth000918.htm

YooLi 15y ago

Would all the knee-jerk comment posters actually click through and see that it's not an 'Android' lawsuit.

shagrath 15y ago
except the Samsung Wave, running on Bada and similary looking to the iPhone is not cited in the lawsuit...
- cube13 15y ago
  http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/Samsung-Wave/ http://www.linuxfordevices.com/c/a/News/Samsung-Wave/ That doesn't look all that much like the iPhone, to be honest.
- r00fus 15y ago
  The Wave2 looks very unlike an iPhone. I would never mistake the two. However, the Samsung i9000S (Galaxy S) looks very much like the iPhone (3GS) and on casual observation may be mistaken for one another. It takes a lot to get trade-dress lawsuits won, so I expect this will only put pressure on Samsung to do what Apple wants, and is not intended to actually win. (which, btw, shows how broken the legal system is, since cases are more used to bully smaller players than to win on merits)

Hov 15y ago

Suddenly, Microsofts decision to come up with a unique UX/UI doesn't seem so dumb.

Groxx 15y ago

>http://mobilized.allthingsd.com/files/2011/04/apple-v.-samsung-2.png http://mobilized.allthingsd.com/files/2011/04/apple-v.-samsu... I think they have an actual case here. That's about as blatantly-copying as you can get without making a complete knock-off that's designed to fool people.

abstractbill 15y ago
There's only so much variation you can have once you've decided that most of the surface area of a phone is going to be taken up by a touch-sensitive screen.
- Groxx 15y ago
  I'm sure people claimed that prior to iOS's success as well.
- Bud 15y ago
  Yeah, exactly: Samsung was FORCED into using the exact same number of icons, arranged in the same 5 rows of 4 icons, in the exact same shape. Also forced into a 4-icon shaded bar at the bottom with the 4 key icons in said bar, and forced into using a near-identical "phone" icon in the exact same place, because after all, a light-green phone icon with a diagonally-slanted depiction of a phone handset was the only possible way to go. Samsung was also clearly forced into using the exact same means of depicting multiple screens of icons. Come on. Samsung clearly didn't even TRY to distinguish their product, here. This is about as obvious as it gets.
  - uvdiv 15y ago
    The 5x4 layout seems pretty unremarkable -- should each phone manufacturer have to trademark their own layout (n,m), for nonzero integers n,m? Will small players be forced to adopt button grids like 21x1 if they can't license actually-usable arrangements? I don't think it's reasonable that a simple silhouette of a phone, used as an icon to represent a phone, is trademarkable. The color is more interesting, until you look at wikipedia and see that mobile phones were using almost the exact same iconography -- phone silhouette over light green background -- at least as far back as 1989: Nokia Mobira Cityman http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia#First_mobile_phones http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia#First_mobile_phones http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nokia_150_and_nokia_1100.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Nokia_150_and_nokia_1100.j... The only difference is that the icon has been rotated and now has a shorter aspect ratio. Also the silhouette is now white instead of black.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

drivebyacct2 15y ago

Apple invented the phone, the idea of representing applications as icons in a grid, and the idea of having quick access to specific applications. Those features have existed in countless other operating systems, and DEs? Blasphemy.

ephcon 15y ago

Trade dress concerns trademarks, not patents.

noonespecial 15y ago

This is actually a pretty good example of patenting "product" and not "process". No comment on if this is good or bad, but we should probably decide explicitly if we're going to grant monopolies on entire kinds of products. It seems more like a trademark issue than a patent issue.

cube13 15y ago
>No comment on if this is good or bad, but we should probably decide explicitly if we're going to grant monopolies on entire kinds of products. That's exactly what the patent system was intended for, though. If you invented a new product, you were granted an effective monopoly on that specific invention for a certain amount of time(now 25 years in the US).
- noonespecial 15y ago
  I was under the impression that it was something more like "method and process for making a better mouse trap" and not "any old thing that catches mice". We're to the point now that mouse trap makers are suing the breeders of cats.

EGreg 15y ago

"“Samsung’s Galaxy Tab computer tablet also slavishly copies a combination of several elements of the Apple Product Configuration Trade Dress,” Apple says in its suit, noting that Samsung’s tablet, like Apple’s, uses a similar rectangular design with rounded corners, similar black border and array of icons." Ah yes, rectangles with rounded corners, the presence of black borders, and the ability to have icons. But joking aside, the samsung one sold in Korea does look very similar.

ChuckMcM 15y ago

Patent-a-geddon continues. I wonder if this is an artifact of the great expiring due to start in 2015 of various silly patents.

alanh 15y ago
Source? Considering software patents are continuously filed and granted, I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
- ChuckMcM 15y ago
  The great surge of technology patents started around 1990 and had really picked up steam by 1995 [1]. Patents, unlike Copyrights, are not 'renewable' in the sense that once their 20 year term expires they revert to the public domain by law. Further, now that folks have successfully litigated bogus Patent Marking [2] you can't use an old Patent number on your design to intimidate folks into not copying it. So while filing rates continue to be high (although as you see from the linked graph issue rates have been falling) the patent office has become better educated about what should be and what shouldn't be patentable (not perfect yet but its getting noticeably better, if only because patent examiners are entering the market who grew up in a digital age). So a side effect is that when the patent claims for issued patents expire, that's it, no more revenue. You can perfectly legally implement the RSA key exchange algorithm now (as an example) without infringing on any patents. This was speculated to be the primary reason that RSA Data Security Inc was trying to get people signed up to use their Copyrighted implementation of same, since if you licensed the copyrighted code, and then decided to stop paying them license fees and implement it yourself they couldn't sue you for patent infringement but they would want to go through your code to see that you hadn't used large parts of their software in your new design. That approach was unavailable if you hadn't been given access to their source code. So starting in 2010, and accelerating until 2020 all of those patents that were issued between 1990 and 2000 will revert to being public domain. It is one of the reasons I predict a tech boom in 2015 - 2025 :-). I did not anticipate however that prior to their death that these companies would go all out in try to extract some, possibly any, value from them by suing the pants off everyone. I don't know, but I suspect that this is at least partly responsible for the current fracas. [1] http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=patents+us http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=patents+us [2] http://blogs.forbes.com/docket/2010/09/02/patent-marking-lawsuit-trollers-get-a-boost-with-brooks-brothers-opinion/ http://blogs.forbes.com/docket/2010/09/02/patent-marking-law...

kenjackson 15y ago

Here's some pictures from the Palm OS a few years before iOS: http://www.palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=6542 http://www.palminfocenter.com/view_story.asp?ID=6542 I guess if the issue is that the grid has to be 4x4 w/ a black background. But otherwise, this looks like the standard paradigm for app launching on mobile phones.

Samuel_Michon 15y ago
And here's a screenshot of Apple's Newton OS, which came out three years before Palm released its Pilot in 1996. http://pdadb.net/img/os/newton/newton_os_2.0_all_icons.png http://pdadb.net/img/os/newton/newton_os_2.0_all_icons.png The lawsuit isn't just about Samsung using a desktop metaphor. They copied all sorts of hardware and software characteristics from the iPhone.
- kenjackson 15y ago
  Are they suing using the Newton UI patent? I don't think so. Shipping and patenting 10 years later doesn't help. In fact this Apple could be prior art against itself. This just weakens Apple's position.
  - Samuel_Michon 15y ago
    My point is that Apple isn't suing just because Samsung chose to use a home screen filled with icons. From the article: "It’s no coincidence that Samsung’s latest products look a lot like the iPhone and iPad, from the shape of the hardware to the user interface and even the packaging." an Apple representative told Mobilized. And from the WSJ article about the same topic: Alan Fisch, an attorney with Kaye Scholer LLP in Washington D.C., said, "By sheer volume alone, this is a substantial assertion of intellectual property rights."
    - kenjackson 15y ago
      Except it also looks a lot like the HP iPaq 100 series that predates the iPhone. A full screen touch device with no keyboard and rounded corners. The 200 series came in black. Apple's alleged "trade dress" is the evolution of the touch device w/ no keyboard.

r00fus 15y ago

Anyone here notice that this suit basically comes right around the time that a credible iPod Touch competitor arrives? Maybe there's another "line in the sand" that Apple had set for the Google/Android that just got stepped over?

Samuel_Michon 15y ago
As far as I know, the Galaxy Player isn't even on the market yet [1]. However, it does very much look like an older generation iPod touch. It even has the same color scheme and metal rim. iPod touch: http://media.obsessable.com/media/2008/09/12/575/apple-ipod-touch.jpg http://media.obsessable.com/media/2008/09/12/575/apple-ipod-... Galaxy Player: http://www.samsunghub.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/galaxy-player.jpg http://www.samsunghub.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/galaxy-... But no, I don't think the release of the Galaxy Player has much to with it. I'm willing to bet Apple would've sued Samsung anyway, as Apple has been hunting Android handset makers since early last year. [1] http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/16/samsung-galaxy-player-4-and-5-hit-the-us-this-spring/ http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/16/samsung-galaxy-player-4-a...

smogzer 15y ago

Singularity should not ben pattentable. Like 15 years ago i described how myspace future phone would be like: no physical buttons taking space, a gps, runs linux, and a thinnier form than my current ipaq. So, after a decade after the first ipaqs the samsung galaxy from where i am typing finally arrives.