6 ms·

>> if companies are continuously innovative Those companies that are continuously innovative have nothing to fear from copycats... because they are always one

by theoj 14y ago

>> if companies are continuously innovative Those companies that are continuously innovative have nothing to fear from copycats... because they are always one step ahead of the copycats. Companies which want to prevent everyone from "copying" (going as far as saying that you cannot apply to computers the minimalist style that they didn't even invent[1]) do so because they don't want to innovate -- they want to live large off their past achievements. >> Not some cheap ripoff. A cheap ripoff is not even close competition to a well executed product. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimalism http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimalism

enraged_camel 14y ago
I cannot find any word other than "bullocks" to describe your argument. If you spent billions of dollars in R&D to come up with an innovative and revolutionary product and sold millions of it, and six months later someone produced imitations of it and sold millions as well, you would be pissed regardless of how many steps ahead you were. Reason is simple: they would be free-riding on your hard work.
- neya 14y ago
  >innovative and revolutionary product Are you a salesman for Apple? Cut out the junk words, seriously. There's nothing wrong in defending a product/company you like, but just don't push it too far.
  - sbuk 14y ago
    It's a troll piece from the EFF and has been responded to on both sides in a similar fashion. Leave this nonsense for the Reddit boards. It's about time we all stopped being so damned idealogical about computing and computers, phones and tablets and actually spend the wasted cycles arguing about it to produce great things. All of it is just pissing in the wind. And I don't care who started it.
  - enraged_camel 14y ago
    The iPhone completely changed - revolutionized - the cellphone industry, and the iPad single-handedly revived an industry long thought dead. Do you deny it? Please give a serious answer.
    - enraged_camel 14y ago
      Why the downvote with no explanation? I thought HN would be better than this.
      - neya 14y ago
        I didn't downvote you, but I suspect its because of too much bias from you in favor of Apple. Patent wars aren't good for anyone regardless of who started it and like sbuk says this has to stop.
        nirvana 14y ago
        Your comment is hilarious, so please don't take this personally. It is hilarious that you would say his comment has "too much bias in favor of Apple" and then follow it with a claim of an ideological position as fact. Your actual statement -- that you "suspect it is because of.." is probably completely correct. The very idea that you should downvote someone because of "bias" is such a Generation-Y concept. Obviously everyone's biased. I've yet to see an anti-Apple post from anyone (including this EFF post, or any comments anywhere on HN) that wasn't full of bias. In fact the bias is so blatent it is to the point of simply lying to try and rationalized it-- for example, claiming that Apple did nothing new, or innovative in the iPhone is absurd, since no phone worked like the iPhone at the time it was announced and the iPhone clearly had a massive impact because it was so innovative. Or another example- claiming that the Mac was a ripoff of Xerox. So, when someone says "you're biased" it simply means "you don't agree with me, and I can't argue against your points, so I'll engage in ad hominem and call you a name".... But the profoundly sad thing about it is that I really think they think that they are being "objective" when they believe this anti-Apple ideology. I haven't seen any evidence of actual damage from the "patent wars", and if Apple is triumphant here, it will be good for the industry and good for consumers. Innovation is Good. The idea that it "has to stop" or that it is "bad" has only come up at the same time that android has come into existence, and so the motivation for claiming that patents are somehow problematic seems... excuse the use of the word-- biased!
  - bkorte 14y ago
    Go look at devices before & after the iPhone was announced. If you still think it wasn't revolutionary, you're a moron.
    - neya 14y ago
      >Go look at devices before & after the iPhone was announced. Check out 'LG Prada' my friend, it was iPhone minus the heavy marketing, which your friends at Apple had 'inspired' from. I still think it wasn't revolutionary. But I doubt if I suddenly become a moron, because some random uncivilized guy calls me so, just because I don't agree with him.
      - nirvana 14y ago
        The LG Prada was nothing like the iPhone, and using it, simply because it had a form of "touch" interface, to try and defend your point is simply false. None of the key iPhone technologies were present on the LG Prada. It was single touch, it did not resolve touches into single pixels like the iPhone does, it thus had very large buttons. It had no stack oriented UI, no tab or navigation based UI, no scrolling lists. No two fingers, and really to call what it had a "UI" is not quite correct at all. It wasn't even a smart phone, it was a feature phone with a gimmick. There were no apps, except for the built in features that make up all feature phones. In short, none of the innovations of the iPhone were even in it, and it didn't ship until After the iPhone. It was announced before the iPhone shipped in part to try and steal some of Apple's thunder but it doesn't even compete in the same category as the iPhone. So, bringing it up is, quite simply, dishonest. It really is quite astounding the level of self deception and rationalization that Apple haters have to employ to pretend like Android and all these multi-touch smart phones that came after the iPhone, are not copying the iPhone simply because someone had a device with a screen you could touch prior to 2007. But when you state such things in public, you step beyond self deception and into the arena of simple deception. Further, the fact that the LG Prada example has been brought up ad infinitum for the past 5 years from people such as yourself, and that you still bring it up now, shows that the actual facts of reality are not relevant to you. Your only point is to defend your ideology. And to do that, you are, quite simply, lying. Touch is not what Apple invented. There were touch screens going back in the past. Jeff Han made one using Cameras. That's not prior art for the iPhone. Neither is the movie 2001: A space odessy, or any of the other long refuted nonsensical claims one finds android fanatics making. Consequently, I am forced to reach the conclusion that you recognize that Android is a blatent ripoff of the iPhone, and you simply don't care. You either hate Apple or Love google, or you've attached to some anti-IP ideology, and that is more compelling to you than logic and reason, and the simple facts of history. I know that this site is full of people who share your ideology and you will shout down and vote down anyone who disagrees, while calling them "uncivilized" and other names. But that does not change the facts, and you cannot refute the facts. You can only evade them. Or you can lie, and choose to live in your own made up reality.
- zmmmmm 14y ago
  A few corrections ... > an innovative and revolutionary product an innovative step based on an existing long line of 20 years of mobile devices from many various different companies > six months later 3 years & $100b in the bank later > someone produced imitations someone produced high quality competing products with innovations of their own that outclass your own in many respects > you would be pissed you would launch thermonuclear war based on abuse of patent system to attempt to destroy all competition in the market place > Reason is simple: they would be free-riding on your hard work Reason is simple: you refuse to compete on price, features, form factor or all kinds of other things consumers care about and are seeing dramatic gains in market share from your competitors who do offer these things
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- jaekwon 14y ago
  If apple had spent 60 billions of dollars in R&D to come up with the exact same iPhone, and everything else were the same, do they still deserve a monopoly on iPhone-like devices to recoup their losses? How about 2 trillion? You can always try to spend more money to get a product created sooner, marketed better... but that doesn't imply that the innovator deserves a sanctioned monopoly, even if temporary. Ladies and gentlemen, what we have here, is the need for a better framework for determining who deserves what. If such a framework is not found, our next best alternative is a non-framework (e.g. no patent system), because history shows us that the abuse of legislated restrictions on innovations lead to great stagnation of innovation, and abuse is rampant.
  - nirvana 14y ago
    You're presuming your conclusion and you've provided no evidence of it. The calls for patent "reform" came at the same time google decided they wanted to get away with violating apple's patents (and now google has sued Apple to try and do so). Near as I can tell, and from what I've seen in history, patents have worked out pretty well. They protect the small guy more than they do the big guy, for instance, though this is often ignored or the opposite is claimed. Why do you want to throw out a system that protects small innovators in favor of allowing a major company-- google-- to get away with stealing innovations? Apple was ripped off when they invented the GUI, so they knew they would need to protect themselves and they patented their inventions in the iPhone. This is exactly what the patent system was designed for. If Samsung wins, then we need reforms to strengthen the system. But if Samsung loses then justice will have prevailed.
    - jaekwon 14y ago
      >> They protect the small guy more than they do the big guy, for instance, though this is often ignored or the opposite is claimed What small guy benefited from the patent system in developing and marketing their invention?
arihant 14y ago
The innovator is also losing money here. What happens when innovator dies because of loses and we only have copycat left? You have people using Windows XP till 2012 (and that is despite innovator coming back to industry).

by theoj 14y ago

enraged_camel 14y ago

I cannot find any word other than "bullocks" to describe your argument. If you spent billions of dollars in R&D to come up with an innovative and revolutionary product and sold millions of it, and six months later someone produced imitations of it and sold millions as well, you would be pissed regardless of how many steps ahead you were. Reason is simple: they would be free-riding on your hard work.

neya 14y ago
>innovative and revolutionary product Are you a salesman for Apple? Cut out the junk words, seriously. There's nothing wrong in defending a product/company you like, but just don't push it too far.
- sbuk 14y ago
  It's a troll piece from the EFF and has been responded to on both sides in a similar fashion. Leave this nonsense for the Reddit boards. It's about time we all stopped being so damned idealogical about computing and computers, phones and tablets and actually spend the wasted cycles arguing about it to produce great things. All of it is just pissing in the wind. And I don't care who started it.
- enraged_camel 14y ago
  The iPhone completely changed - revolutionized - the cellphone industry, and the iPad single-handedly revived an industry long thought dead. Do you deny it? Please give a serious answer.
  - enraged_camel 14y ago
    Why the downvote with no explanation? I thought HN would be better than this.
    - neya 14y ago
      I didn't downvote you, but I suspect its because of too much bias from you in favor of Apple. Patent wars aren't good for anyone regardless of who started it and like sbuk says this has to stop.
      - nirvana 14y ago
        Your comment is hilarious, so please don't take this personally. It is hilarious that you would say his comment has "too much bias in favor of Apple" and then follow it with a claim of an ideological position as fact. Your actual statement -- that you "suspect it is because of.." is probably completely correct. The very idea that you should downvote someone because of "bias" is such a Generation-Y concept. Obviously everyone's biased. I've yet to see an anti-Apple post from anyone (including this EFF post, or any comments anywhere on HN) that wasn't full of bias. In fact the bias is so blatent it is to the point of simply lying to try and rationalized it-- for example, claiming that Apple did nothing new, or innovative in the iPhone is absurd, since no phone worked like the iPhone at the time it was announced and the iPhone clearly had a massive impact because it was so innovative. Or another example- claiming that the Mac was a ripoff of Xerox. So, when someone says "you're biased" it simply means "you don't agree with me, and I can't argue against your points, so I'll engage in ad hominem and call you a name".... But the profoundly sad thing about it is that I really think they think that they are being "objective" when they believe this anti-Apple ideology. I haven't seen any evidence of actual damage from the "patent wars", and if Apple is triumphant here, it will be good for the industry and good for consumers. Innovation is Good. The idea that it "has to stop" or that it is "bad" has only come up at the same time that android has come into existence, and so the motivation for claiming that patents are somehow problematic seems... excuse the use of the word-- biased!
- bkorte 14y ago
  Go look at devices before & after the iPhone was announced. If you still think it wasn't revolutionary, you're a moron.
  - neya 14y ago
    >Go look at devices before & after the iPhone was announced. Check out 'LG Prada' my friend, it was iPhone minus the heavy marketing, which your friends at Apple had 'inspired' from. I still think it wasn't revolutionary. But I doubt if I suddenly become a moron, because some random uncivilized guy calls me so, just because I don't agree with him.
    - nirvana 14y ago
      The LG Prada was nothing like the iPhone, and using it, simply because it had a form of "touch" interface, to try and defend your point is simply false. None of the key iPhone technologies were present on the LG Prada. It was single touch, it did not resolve touches into single pixels like the iPhone does, it thus had very large buttons. It had no stack oriented UI, no tab or navigation based UI, no scrolling lists. No two fingers, and really to call what it had a "UI" is not quite correct at all. It wasn't even a smart phone, it was a feature phone with a gimmick. There were no apps, except for the built in features that make up all feature phones. In short, none of the innovations of the iPhone were even in it, and it didn't ship until After the iPhone. It was announced before the iPhone shipped in part to try and steal some of Apple's thunder but it doesn't even compete in the same category as the iPhone. So, bringing it up is, quite simply, dishonest. It really is quite astounding the level of self deception and rationalization that Apple haters have to employ to pretend like Android and all these multi-touch smart phones that came after the iPhone, are not copying the iPhone simply because someone had a device with a screen you could touch prior to 2007. But when you state such things in public, you step beyond self deception and into the arena of simple deception. Further, the fact that the LG Prada example has been brought up ad infinitum for the past 5 years from people such as yourself, and that you still bring it up now, shows that the actual facts of reality are not relevant to you. Your only point is to defend your ideology. And to do that, you are, quite simply, lying. Touch is not what Apple invented. There were touch screens going back in the past. Jeff Han made one using Cameras. That's not prior art for the iPhone. Neither is the movie 2001: A space odessy, or any of the other long refuted nonsensical claims one finds android fanatics making. Consequently, I am forced to reach the conclusion that you recognize that Android is a blatent ripoff of the iPhone, and you simply don't care. You either hate Apple or Love google, or you've attached to some anti-IP ideology, and that is more compelling to you than logic and reason, and the simple facts of history. I know that this site is full of people who share your ideology and you will shout down and vote down anyone who disagrees, while calling them "uncivilized" and other names. But that does not change the facts, and you cannot refute the facts. You can only evade them. Or you can lie, and choose to live in your own made up reality.
zmmmmm 14y ago
A few corrections ... > an innovative and revolutionary product an innovative step based on an existing long line of 20 years of mobile devices from many various different companies > six months later 3 years & $100b in the bank later > someone produced imitations someone produced high quality competing products with innovations of their own that outclass your own in many respects > you would be pissed you would launch thermonuclear war based on abuse of patent system to attempt to destroy all competition in the market place > Reason is simple: they would be free-riding on your hard work Reason is simple: you refuse to compete on price, features, form factor or all kinds of other things consumers care about and are seeing dramatic gains in market share from your competitors who do offer these things
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
jaekwon 14y ago
If apple had spent 60 billions of dollars in R&D to come up with the exact same iPhone, and everything else were the same, do they still deserve a monopoly on iPhone-like devices to recoup their losses? How about 2 trillion? You can always try to spend more money to get a product created sooner, marketed better... but that doesn't imply that the innovator deserves a sanctioned monopoly, even if temporary. Ladies and gentlemen, what we have here, is the need for a better framework for determining who deserves what. If such a framework is not found, our next best alternative is a non-framework (e.g. no patent system), because history shows us that the abuse of legislated restrictions on innovations lead to great stagnation of innovation, and abuse is rampant.
- nirvana 14y ago
  You're presuming your conclusion and you've provided no evidence of it. The calls for patent "reform" came at the same time google decided they wanted to get away with violating apple's patents (and now google has sued Apple to try and do so). Near as I can tell, and from what I've seen in history, patents have worked out pretty well. They protect the small guy more than they do the big guy, for instance, though this is often ignored or the opposite is claimed. Why do you want to throw out a system that protects small innovators in favor of allowing a major company-- google-- to get away with stealing innovations? Apple was ripped off when they invented the GUI, so they knew they would need to protect themselves and they patented their inventions in the iPhone. This is exactly what the patent system was designed for. If Samsung wins, then we need reforms to strengthen the system. But if Samsung loses then justice will have prevailed.
  - jaekwon 14y ago
    >> They protect the small guy more than they do the big guy, for instance, though this is often ignored or the opposite is claimed What small guy benefited from the patent system in developing and marketing their invention?

arihant 14y ago

The innovator is also losing money here. What happens when innovator dies because of loses and we only have copycat left? You have people using Windows XP till 2012 (and that is despite innovator coming back to industry).