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Apple Never Invented Anything

245 points by chmars 14y ago

jawr 14y ago
Slightly off topic, but I was under the impression that Ford didn't invent the automobile, Benz did.
wallflower 14y ago
A better article on the Counternotions site, "Why Apple doesn’t do 'Concept Products'" "Concept products are like essays, musings in 3D. They are incomplete promises. Shipping products, by contrast, are brutally honest deliveries. You get what’s delivered. They live and die by their own design constraints. To the extent they are successful, they do advance the art and science of design and manufacturing by exposing the balance between fantasy and capability." http://counternotions.com/2008/08/12/concept-products/ http://counternotions.com/2008/08/12/concept-products/
VengefulCynic 14y ago
Whenever I'm using "enterprise" software or some equally-awful tool that's sold using a feature checklist, I can't help but think about Steve Jobs's line about how innovation is saying no to 1000 things. edit: Well, a feature checklist and $50,000 worth of sales dinners, games of golf and "gifts that do not violate the professional ethics rules of the company buying said tool."
- 5teev 14y ago
  I suspect the worst software is the kind where the person buying it is not the person using it. This might also explain Apple's recent successes.
  - mdonahoe 14y ago
    Can you clarify the point you are making? Are you saying that Apple is succeeding because their customers are their users? Or are you claiming Apple software sucks, and every ipad sold was a gift?
    - 5teev 14y ago
      > Are you saying that Apple is succeeding because their customers are their users? Yes, and they have different priorities than the CTO or IT manager, who may select enterprise software by feature checklist (or other priorities) rather than end-user experience.
- anextio 14y ago
  To quote Zed Shaw on how enterprise software gets sold: "steak and strippers".
- eckyptang 14y ago
  "Enterprise software" is about selling a $10,000,000 piece of software to one entity which requires specific features (and usually complex logic). Apple's mantra is selling a $1 piece of software to 10,000,000 people who require a simple piece of software. The two are perfectly valid. In fact the latter would not exist if it wasn't for enterprise software (such as CAD systems, inventory, supply chain management etc).
  - greedo 14y ago
    Have you purchased any "enterprise" software lately? The idea that it's customized, bespoke software addressing specific requirements of the customer couldn't be farther from the truth. Here's how it works at my company. Some "architect" decides we need to have an Identity Management System and consults his latest Gartner report. He looks for the packages in the Magic Quadrant, and contacts the vendors. Then we buy what's the safest, least threatening application we can, for an exorbitant price. Hire consultants to help deploy it, discovering that it's a pile of dung that doesn't do what it advertises, much less what we actually need to do. This happens all the time in the "enterprise" world. Whether it's sold by IBM, BMC, etc etc. Don't conflate "enterprise" software with anything complex or intelligent. It's typically some of the worst software you can find.
    - eckyptang 14y ago
      Actually I build enterprise software and am a enterprise architect at a large company :) Please don't tar us all with the same brush. It's not all like that. You've been stung by a shitty purchasing and architecture team, probably put together from people who've ascended the ranks to the point they no longer understand the technology and want to suck up to management and wheel around the country in a company rollerskate with a ThinkPad and a caffiene problem. These are called ivory tower architects or as we call them: asshat-itects. Enterprise should mean certain guarantees about scalability and reliability and ability to adapt to the organisation. If it doesn't, you've bought a lemon, not a piece of enterprise software. Note: there are more lemons than not so you have to be careful.
zerostar07 14y ago
Do we to start another debate with an inflaming article?
- thejayoj 14y ago
  Where's the inflaming part?
  - greedo 14y ago
    He probably didn't read the article and missed the irony of the title.
    - zerostar07 14y ago
      I did read the article. I 'm just tired of going through fanbois vs the world flamewar once again
- marcusf 14y ago
  It doesn't feel very inflammatory, just re-iterating a point that to some seems very contentious, that the composition of separate parts Apple does is innovation. Anyway, I very much like JLG and I liked and agree with the articles push.
endlessvoid94 14y ago
A breath of fresh air.
drats 14y ago
I made this case last week. "Apple products are like a good classy restaurant or hotel chain. They take ingredients everyone has and put a lot of work into fit and finish, they make the customer feel special for a slightly higher price."[1] And I stand by it. I'll go even further actually, I think Apple is one of the least innovative big companies. Look at all the big research labs at Microsoft, Yahoo, IBM or Google. Anyone who seriously follows this stuff knows a) Apple doesn't have a profile in the academic world and b) knows enough computer history to know Apple is claiming things invented decades ago. [1]http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4435504 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4435504
- stephencanon 14y ago
  It's clear that you didn't actually read the linked article, since it argues precisely the opposite.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- klawed 14y ago
  in·no·va·tive/ˈinəˌvātiv/ Adjective: (of a product, idea, etc.) Featuring new methods; advanced and original. (of a person) Introducing new ideas; original and creative in thinking: "an innovative thinker". This definition does not tie innovation to invention. I think it would be hard to argue that Apple's work is not original relative to their competitors. Apple out-innovates their competitors in marketing, in supply chain management, in product lifecycle management and in design. It's impossible to invent every (or even most) components of a general purpose computer. But to select the right pieces, assemble them in a way that maximizes user experience and market them in a way that makes them stand apart from competitors' products made with almost the same components - that's innovation, just the same way that Netflix' model for mailing DVDs (they didn't invent the mailbox, the postal service or the DVD) was extremely innovative.
  - 001sky 14y ago
    Perhaps another example of original innovation: the swiss army knife. Look at a victorinox. Look at a knife, a corscrew, a scissor, a toothpick, and a tweezer sitting on the desk. Sometimes an act of integration is enough to be transformative. iOS is a great example of radical originality, even if not a breakthrough technically. The Concept of the ap - a litewight, bandwidth efficient, modular, reconfigurable element integrated into the OS - was certainly original. It was also thus, highly innovative. It was reductive smaller, lighter, less complex. Edit: clarity
Tichy 14y ago
Patents apply to the recipe, though, not the actual mixture.
- ceejayoz 14y ago
  There are multiple types of patent. One of them is a design patent.
belorn 14y ago
Its an old idea to remove everything until just the essence is left. Apple succeed in identifying markets that was making over complex products. The silly part is that complexity goes in cycles. New products need to differential themselves with old ones, so they add new features. After a while, you end up with a car stereo with 20 buttons, and suddenly a "new" competitor comes out with a clean design with just 3 buttons and the 20 button design looks ill-designed in comparison. Stereos is one of the earlier examples, but you can see the same phenomena in web-design with today’s White and clean design vs the old dark and complex design.
- gnaffle 14y ago
  I think simplicity isn't the only story, it's usable simplicity. If simple was the only game in town, Apple would only need the iPod shuffle and something like John's Phone (http://johnsphones.org/ http://johnsphones.org/) to rule the world. The iPod and iPhone has added lots and lots of functionality over the years, yet the interface has stayed simple. It's possible to add lots of new features in ways that doesn't make the interface more complex, however it's a big challenge.
  - belorn 14y ago
    You can add new features without adding interface complexity, but its harder to differential products if the user do not have any visible difference between ones old product now going for 15$, the competitors new 30-99$ products, and ones own new product going for 100$. Abstract arguments like "its faster!, more feature than before!" is much harder sell when the two devices look and feel the same. One way is to sue all competitors and have the only store available presenting exclusive the new product, but that only goes so far. As for the johnsphones, it has buttons. As interface goes, it still look complex compared to a smartphone. The most simplistic phone design is one with only one or zero buttons, like the Third generation iPod Shuffle if it had been a phone.
pippy 14y ago
>Software is all zeroes and ones, after all. The quantity and order may vary, but that’s about it. Hardware is just protons, neutrons, electrons and photons buzzing around, nothing original. Apple didn’t “invent” anything, the iPad is simply their variation, their interpretation of the well-known tablet recipe. You can make cookies and cakes from the same raw ingredients, doesn't mean that the person who invented cookies also invented cake. Also the 'Software is all zeroes and ones' argument irks me. It's the bridge between an expensive paperweight and a practical device.
- stephencanon 14y ago
  I don't suppose you made it to the next paragraph where the author says: > "By this myopic logic, Einstein didn’t invent the theory of relativity..." i.e. he agrees with you.
AnthonyMouse 14y ago
I think the article is right in what it says but is wrong because of what it doesn't say. Apple succeeded where others had failed, and that is certainly commendable, but now we have a problem: Apple doesn't have a patent on "an iPad" meaning a device with all the individual characteristics that make an iPad an iPad and make it successful, instead they have individual patents on all the individual features. But the individual features are the things that Apple didn't do. Yet that's what they sue over because that's how patent law is set up. So now we see Samsung lose big in court and popular reaction is split, and here's why: People looking at the actual facts of the case are outraged that Apple could win that way because the actual grounds of the win had nothing to do with copying or Samsung's actions and everything to do with the fact that anyone with a million over-broad patents on obvious "inventions" and laws of nature and mathematics can win in court against anyone who produces a computing device, arguing that any actual copying on the part of Samsung is irrelevant. On the other hand, we have the people who look at the result and the fact that Samsung's devices do actually look entirely too much like Apple's and think Samsung got what was coming to them, ignoring that in order to do it Apple had to adopt a long list of bully tactics that they've now demonstrated that they or anyone else with a sufficient patent arsenal can successfully use against their competitors (including those whose devices aren't intentionally copied, because there are too many patents to possibly even attempt to avoid them all). Nobody seems willing to say that Apple should potentially have some remedy against Samsung for actual copying but that what they got is the wrong remedy in the wrong way, not least which because the same tactics can be used against anyone whether they've done anything wrong or not.
- robertskmiles 14y ago
  Agreed entirely. To make the metaphor accurate, the chef would then have to sue someone else who was making mayonnaise by a similar recipe.
  - swombat 14y ago
    If no one else could make mayonnaise successfully and a chef came up with the process for making it, that chef should damn well get some kind of protection from the IP system for his innovation, invention, or whatever the hell you wanna call it. That is, after all, what will make him want to share his methods instead of keeping them a secret. That's the fundamental principle of the patent system: you share, and we give you a temporary monopoly defended by law. This patent system is obviously broken, but in the mayonnaise case it wouldn't be.
pge 14y ago
I think this article makes some good points but overlooks the crucial question - what inventions are patentable? Like a great chef that combines known ingredients, apple has made excellent products, but apple has not produced new innovation that is worthy of patent protection. Apple's path to success should be winning customers, just like the chefs he describes, not through patent litigation. The examples given by the OP actually support this point. It's true that Einstein didnt discover relativity first - both lorentz and poincare had worked out the mathematics, but Einstein articulated the concepts best. I often use this case study as an example of how innovations often arise independently from different inventors simultaneously because the conditions are right. The other famous and illustrative example is newton and leibniz inventing calculus independently. As a VC, I see this all the time - the market conditions are right for a new idea, and suddenly 4 or 5 companies appear doing variations on the same thing, none aware of the others. Let good execution and the market decide which one is best, not the date on a patent filing for something each came up with on their own.
- babesh 14y ago
  Einstein understood the meaning. Poincare and Lorentz just understood the machinery. That is a fundamental difference that let Einstein go beyond special relativity to general relativity. Big, big difference. The difference between friendster and facebook.
ThomPete 14y ago
Apple invented the ability to take geeky stuff and turn it into cool stuff for normal people. That's a pretty big feat in itself.
- cheald 14y ago
  That's called "marketing". It's not really new.
  - mdonahoe 14y ago
    You are right, but Apple's definition of marketing doesnt end with the billboards or the tv commercials. Every time you see someone wearing those white earbuds, that's marketing. When your mom is always on her ipad, despite 20 years of lessons from you on how to use a computer, that's marketing. When you are sitting in an airport and you notice the glow of the Apple logo on the back of someone's Macbook Air, that's marketing. When the same dude is still using his macbook, 6 hours into a flight without a powercord, that's marketing. When you walk into an Apple store, and you feel the aluminum unibody... when you unwrap the sturdy yet smooth packaging and the bottom slides out to reveal the device... when computer boots directly to a gray apple logo on a white screen, instead of a DOS prompt for a few seconds, that's marketing. It takes a lot of work to do Apple style marketing.
    - cheald 14y ago
      I completely agree. Apple's marketing is genius. But, the comment I was replying to seems to think that Apple invented effective marketing, and that's just not true. They do it really, really well, but you gotta be chugging the kool-aid to think that they invented the concept of using their products to advertise their brand.
  - upinsmoke 14y ago
    Other companies don't do marketing then?
    - surrealize 14y ago
al_biglan 14y ago
This is the same argument aimed at Microsoft in the 90's. next big tech company will get the same thing in 20 years. Meh.
noirman 14y ago
Of course Apple did not invent anything. Steve Jobs did.
cromwellian 14y ago
One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. Notice that in the scientific community, humanity has been building upon previous work for centuries with no copyright or patent protection, and nothing more than honor, citation, and shame against plagiarists. The fundamental defense made by many is that without patent protection for software, people would not put much effort into innovating. 1) If you look at science, open source, fashion, food, and other areas where humans continually build on culture, you see plenty of continued innovation without insane legal protection. 2) The amount of effort pales in comparison to the monopoly granted. You could make the argument for say, pharmaceuticals, that if it takes 10 years from lab through human trials and hundreds of millions of dollars, that a 2-decade long protection period might be needed. But there is no FDA for software, and Apple actually spends far less on R&D than other companies, and with $100 billion in the bank, you can't claim that haven't gotten an incredibly good return in their investment. Therefore, it is insane to grant 20 year protection to Apple for stuff like pinch gestures. 2 years maybe. But 20? It's absurd.
- fffggg 14y ago
  Regarding the expense of clinical trials, it's important to note that the scientific results of a clinical trial are not protected by either patent or copyright. Pure research data cannot be restricted under any form of IP. Factual data without a creative element is explicitly exempted from both the patent and copyright system. A published paper on the results of a trial may fall under copyright, but the factual observations and conclusions cannot be. The "clinical trials are expensive" argument is incredibly disingenuous.
- mbell 14y ago
  > One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. He didn't invent, he discovered. I'm not just being pedantic, I think the approaches signified by these two words goes to the root of the differences your describing.
  - Peaker 14y ago
    I believe patents apply to discoveries in the same way as inventions.
TylerBrock 14y ago
This is absurd. I wish I could vote the article out of existence.
hastur 14y ago
yaaaaawn so what's new they did other stuff: made things better, connected in new ways, etc. i still don't like their stuff - for aesthetical reasons so what get a life
jpincheira 14y ago
Come on. Shut up. I use Windows on a Dell laptop and I can tell you that's not true. (Pun intented)
smartkids 14y ago
The iPaq was/is a fantastic device. You could attach peripherals. Try doing that with an iPad. I could put an entire OS on a CF Card and assuming I could boot from the card, the expanded functionality is limited only by the hardware specs. They are durable. I've seen consumer electronics businesses still using them to track inventory. I wish HP would revive the iPaq. My only imagined use for an iPad is as a portable display. I want the Retina quality, but I have a more powerful hardware to attach and I need a real keyboard. There's nothing the iPad can do that my open, unlocked hardware cannot do. I believe it was even possible to attach a real keyboard to an iPaq. That's the kind of flexibility I want. I can get data into and out of the device in any number of ways, without hassle.
- mdonahoe 14y ago
  People like you are not a large market, unfortunately. > There's nothing the iPad can do that my open, unlocked hardware cannot do. Your open, unlocked hardware, cannot survive two days with my mother.
  - smartkids 14y ago
    I understand the comment. Of course the thought has crossed my mind. But I'm not so sure there's any evidence to support it. I actually test some of my ideas with people like your mother, and surprisingly (why should I be surprised?) they have little trouble catching on. What's really amusing is that these things that I have them doing are things that many nerds cannot themsleves do. I've got them using systems and techniques that many nerds won't touch because they think it's too "hard core". It's hilarious. There are lots and lots of unfounded assumptions about what users can and cannot do. There are facts, supported by evidence. And then there are assumptions. One requires a bit of work. The other is effortless: you just hit "Submit".
    - deleted 14y ago
      [deleted]
    - arn 14y ago
      I understand the comment. Of course the thought has crossed my mind. But I'm not so sure there's any evidence to support it. Your post is vague enough that I have a hard time parsing it. No evidence for what? That there is such a thing as a "non techy" user? The evidence is overwhelming, including anecdotal evidence from practically every "techy" person here who have ever had to help their family/friends with a computer issue. And it's not a question of ability, it's a question of ability + caring enough. The non-tech people might not care to boot an OS from a CF Card -- certainly not enough to seek out how to learn it. To mom-type: Here's an iPad, you can use it to easily email your friends, check facebook, and check the web. or... Here's an iPaq 2012, you can do all the above, but it's a little harder to use, HOWEVER you can boot any linux distribution you want, add a USB device, attach ANY keyboard -- like one with mechanical switches! I personally prefer the Cherry Blues, but you might want to try the Topre ones. People who use those never go back. They cost a bit more ($~250), and you have to get it imported from Asia or find a U.S. distributor... but it's worth it.
drblast 14y ago
This article is unintentionally an excellent argument against patent protection for Apple's products. If Apple is a company that uniquely has the talent and taste of a good chef, the patent protection is unnecessary. They will be able to continually outdo other companies that don't have the same talent. Arguing that a company has so much talent and is so successful that it needs legal protection seems absurd to me.
- csmeder 14y ago
  I think the point he was making was: once you see a master chef make mayonnaise you realize the reason you failed. You tried too hard. And now you can make mayonnaise. Tablet makers (iPaq, MS, etc) tried too hard. Apple showed them don't try too hard. And now they can make tablets too. So yes, the excellent chef can be the first to make mayonnaise, however, with out patents on mayonnaise so can everyone else now. The idea of a patent is that the master chef spent years learning to not mix the ingredients too hard, now that he has showed the world the way to make mayonnaise, the only thing stopping the world from stealing the fruits of his work are patents. The point being if Apple never created the iPhone and iPad we would still have phones like the iPaq and the clunky MS tablets in the year 2012. I whole heartily agree with this. If it wasn't for Apple, every other phone and tablet company today would not be making anything of the flavor of the iPhone or iPad. Android and Win Mobile Phone are of the flavor of Apple. So why is it right for them to taste like "L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon" (Apple) in the year 2012 if they would still taste like "Taco Bell" (MS, iPaq, etc) in the year 2012 if it wasn't for Jobs' iphone and ipad. Obviously with out a parallel universe for us to visit together I can't prove this to you. However, I do feel the overwhelming facts of 20 years of failure by iPaq, MS, etc show the trajectory they were heading for and we can guess where they would be in the year 2012: - Stylus pen, or clunky touch screen that you have to press very hard. - Lots of ram, lots of CPU power. - Very heavy - Very large and thick - Poor quality materials - Mediocre software that does not come any where close to the current android software. - Buggy software - no App store, lots of viruses and other security issues. - Expensive and running full Windows 8, no RT version. So if the products Samsung and MS were selling today fit the above recipe, I agree Apple shouldn't be suing them. But this isn't what is happening. Apple is being robbed blind. Every technique and recipe Apple created is being meticulously stolen and engineered into Android and windows phones. These are recipes that Jobs, Ive and the whole Apple company put years of effort into, they poured their heart and soul into these recipes. The reason so much of the tech media don't see it this way is they have no taste buds. Most people have terrible taste buds. Well, they have great unconscious taste buds but their conscious taste buds are almost worth less. So they see things like the iPaq and those old MS Tablets and think "Well Gee golly, that food sure was tasty, sure android is tastier but not much tastier, apple doesn't really deserve much credit for androids improved taste." As some one with excellent taste buds (I am a UX/Product designer, I have predicted the success and failure of almost all major tech product that have come out in the past 10 years, you can read the comments in my HN history as I defended the iPad to almost 99% of HN thinking it was stupid when it came out, I predicted the failure of the Zune, I predicted the success of Apple as whole back in 2004, and predicted MS' current decline) I can tell you with a fair amount of certainty how different iPaq and android taste. What android and Win Phone are doing is sneaky. It is so sneaky you don't realize how many subtle but important details they have stolen. They can do this because you don't have the conscious taste buds necessary to notice it. These details may be subtle but they are far from small. If you ever watch a grand master play chess. Every time he makes a great move you think to yourself "Gee golly that was an obvious move". No. No, it was not. Once you see a chess move you can no longer look at it objectively. The way to objectively judge a chess move is to try to figure it out on your own before some one shows it to you. After spending hours and hours and more hours looking for this move before finding it, you then fully appreciate the move. The tech media is watching a chess game from the sidelines Apple is the grandmaster, Android and windows phone are the people building a database of the grandmaster's moves to beat people at chess. Most people won't be able to comprehend or believe the next sentence: A non Expert Chef or food critic (Expert Product Designer) will never be able to appreciate the Gigantic chasm between the taste of Apples products and any of their competitors, however, on an unconscious level everyone will be drawn to Apples taste so strongly that if the competitors don't copy it, soon Apple will have no competitors still in business. This is the natural Monopoly the iPod almost had for a few years. In 2010 "The latest research by NPD Group claims that iPod had a 76 percent share of the MP3 player market in US in May this year."[0] This monopoly would have been true if Samsung, Google and Microsoft were not spending the past 5 years perfecting their ability to hire Expert Product designers to steal Apple's recipes. From 2001, when the first iPod came out, until about 2010 MS, Google and Samsung went through a phase of denial, trial (trying to steal ideas) and then finally some succes (actually stealing ideas). It took them about a decade just to get good at stealing ideas from Apple. The Zune was an example of how hard it is to steal ideas from apple. A non Expert Product Designer would think the Zune was good thievery, however, it was a sloppy job, it wasn't until windows phone and android, that these companies started to be good at stealing ideas. [0] http://www.ithinkdiff.com/the-ipod-has-76-percent-of-mp3-player-market-in-us_7654/ http://www.ithinkdiff.com/the-ipod-has-76-percent-of-mp3-pla... You are going to hate me for saying this, and you won't agree with me but the truth is that: you don't on a conscious level know what is going on. You are Unconsciously Incompetent. And Android and Win Phone are using this to their advantage. Its the same way Europeans stole land from Native americans. The native americans were Unconsciously Incompetent when it came to the idea of "Owning Land". They saw the land as owning them. Thus they signed documents that seemed to have little importance. This is what Android and Win Phone are doing. They are using you to steal from Apple. That said Jiro [1] doesn't patent his Sushi, he simpley makes the best sushi. And he does quite well for him. If I was Apple I would spend a lot more of my time in the kitchen making the best Sushi in the world and a lot less time in the courtroom. [1] http://www.magpictures.com/jirodreamsofsushi/ http://www.magpictures.com/jirodreamsofsushi/ Note: I am sorry if I come off as arrogant by calling myself an "Expert Product Designer" and claim most people won't understand what I understand, but I don't say this out of arrogance, rather out of fact. I have spent more than a decade to be as competent as I am in Product Design. This is not small feat. In college I was a talented student when it came to Physics, in particular my introduction to Quantum Physics and special relativity class. If I had chosen to pursue the path of Quantum Physis I am quite confident I would be an Expert Quantum Physis today. And if this was so, it would not be arrogant for me to say such things as: "light is both a particle and wave, most people will never appreciate how amazing this is, only expert Quantum Physis', such as my self, will come close to appreciating this statements full glory." This would not be arrogant, rather it would be a fact. The sad fact is that "Product/UX Design" doesn't get the same respect as the hard sciences. From my point of view it should. I use just as much if not more of my brain power to wrap my head around design solutions when I am designing a product as I did when I studied the particle and wave form duality of light and the intricate details of space and time learned through special relativity.
cageface 14y ago
Right, because once that chef figured out just the right twist on those common ingredients no other chefs in the world were allowed to make mayonnaise any more and we would have no fine cuisine without extensive IP protection enforced by law. Oh, wait...
- pooriaazimi 14y ago
  It's a metaphor. You don't take them seriously. They're just there to tell a cute little story and you move on to the real thing. Certainly iPad involved a little more than a twist.
justinicenhour 14y ago
But bmw never sued brand x for the patten on useing steal or plastic in there cars. Nor has einsteins estate ever sued the government for teachers in our schools using his therories.
ekianjo 14y ago
Most people here seem to argue whether or not Apple have the rights to hold patents on what they did (and whether that should grand them protection). But where this argument is flawed, is that protection from being copied is not only centered around the patent system. There are multiple ways you can protect your inventions, through trade secrets, supply chain efficiency that nobody else can reproduce, through a software environment which is worth more in its whole than the sum of its parts. We know Apple is already using all the above techniques to protect their business. They have an excellent supply chain, they obviously have preferential trade partners which enable them access the new technologies first before anyone else, and they have a iOS system which is well rounded for its purpose. Net, they really do not need to leverage their patents protection. That could be an indication that they do not think they are going to be very innovative down the road, and therefore they just want to keep competitors as far as possible until they pull their act together again... or that they have too many lawyers with too much time on their hands to investigate how much harm they could do with claims based on air and smoke. When a company resorts to such practices, it is usually not a good sign.
yogrish 14y ago
I was under the same opinion as the author. While the Apple Vs Sammy was going many ppl said every feature iphone existed before. But, iphone has the right mix of them in right proportions and that has made it Tick. W.r.t Patenting rects with round corners etc, I too disagree with Apple. Violating Trade dress by Sammy is not acceptable either.
aresant 14y ago
There was a clear before and after when they launched the iPhone By NAILING it apple managed to popularize existing tech like the modern touch-screen interface, the app develeper economy & handheld computing. So enough with this apple hasnt done anything bs, the reason they print money is they keep making future tech accessible, I hope the iPhone 5 (6?) lives up to their record.
kbronson 14y ago
This is not fair. Certainly didn't invented anything, but they improved patent trolling as to make it a way of life. Who needs to invent, when you can patent, sue and win? Let's others do the work.
MaysonL 14y ago
Note this: Apple spends substantially less (as a fraction of revenue) on R&D, and gets substantially more, in terms of outstanding products, compared to every other tech company. What is it that they're doing so well?
- hazov 14y ago
  Nothing besides of polished systems and good hardware. But I do not like the type of signal this can show to the tech companies around the world: that their patents of new tech that are life changing for everyone are worth less than a pinch zoom on a touch screen, now I don't think it was a obvious gesture but I do not think it should be covered by a patent. There should be a better way to protect new UI elements.
- greedo 14y ago
  Do you have some links referring to this? Specifically the R&D expenditures for Apple's direct competitors? Say, Asus, Acer, Lenovo, Samsung's smartphone division? You can't lump all of "tech" into one basked and compare it to Apple. You have to keep it aligned with companies that are in the same industry, and then exclude the extraneous R&D like Samsung's washing machine or refrigerator business.
Uchikoma 14y ago
Got to love HN, if someone copies a startup pixel by pixel and business modell, hulla, the lynch mob readies it's pitchforks. If someone copies a freelancers design, website or logo, woha, people run amok. If someone copies Apples UI, hardware, apps and app market it's "Apple Never Invented Anything."
- pooriaazimi 14y ago
  Did you even read the article?!
  - Uchikoma 14y ago
    My comment was about the HN comments not the article. Did you even read my comment?!
epo 14y ago
God, this is depressing, lots of whiny fandroids who can't even f---ing read. These morons have taken the article title as a literal synposis, it is being ironic (and yes, we know that Americans famously don't get irony). The authors (one of whom is a former Apple exec) are arguing that what Apple did was invention and does indeed deserve protection from the legion of lazy wannabes who would just otherwise simply copy from the smartest kid in class.

245 points by chmars 14y ago

jawr 14y ago

Slightly off topic, but I was under the impression that Ford didn't invent the automobile, Benz did.

A better article on the Counternotions site, "Why Apple doesn’t do 'Concept Products'" "Concept products are like essays, musings in 3D. They are incomplete promises. Shipping products, by contrast, are brutally honest deliveries. You get what’s delivered. They live and die by their own design constraints. To the extent they are successful, they do advance the art and science of design and manufacturing by exposing the balance between fantasy and capability." http://counternotions.com/2008/08/12/concept-products/ http://counternotions.com/2008/08/12/concept-products/

VengefulCynic 14y ago

Whenever I'm using "enterprise" software or some equally-awful tool that's sold using a feature checklist, I can't help but think about Steve Jobs's line about how innovation is saying no to 1000 things. edit: Well, a feature checklist and $50,000 worth of sales dinners, games of golf and "gifts that do not violate the professional ethics rules of the company buying said tool."

5teev 14y ago
I suspect the worst software is the kind where the person buying it is not the person using it. This might also explain Apple's recent successes.
- mdonahoe 14y ago
  Can you clarify the point you are making? Are you saying that Apple is succeeding because their customers are their users? Or are you claiming Apple software sucks, and every ipad sold was a gift?
  - 5teev 14y ago
    > Are you saying that Apple is succeeding because their customers are their users? Yes, and they have different priorities than the CTO or IT manager, who may select enterprise software by feature checklist (or other priorities) rather than end-user experience.
anextio 14y ago
To quote Zed Shaw on how enterprise software gets sold: "steak and strippers".
eckyptang 14y ago
"Enterprise software" is about selling a $10,000,000 piece of software to one entity which requires specific features (and usually complex logic). Apple's mantra is selling a $1 piece of software to 10,000,000 people who require a simple piece of software. The two are perfectly valid. In fact the latter would not exist if it wasn't for enterprise software (such as CAD systems, inventory, supply chain management etc).
- greedo 14y ago
  Have you purchased any "enterprise" software lately? The idea that it's customized, bespoke software addressing specific requirements of the customer couldn't be farther from the truth. Here's how it works at my company. Some "architect" decides we need to have an Identity Management System and consults his latest Gartner report. He looks for the packages in the Magic Quadrant, and contacts the vendors. Then we buy what's the safest, least threatening application we can, for an exorbitant price. Hire consultants to help deploy it, discovering that it's a pile of dung that doesn't do what it advertises, much less what we actually need to do. This happens all the time in the "enterprise" world. Whether it's sold by IBM, BMC, etc etc. Don't conflate "enterprise" software with anything complex or intelligent. It's typically some of the worst software you can find.
  - eckyptang 14y ago
    Actually I build enterprise software and am a enterprise architect at a large company :) Please don't tar us all with the same brush. It's not all like that. You've been stung by a shitty purchasing and architecture team, probably put together from people who've ascended the ranks to the point they no longer understand the technology and want to suck up to management and wheel around the country in a company rollerskate with a ThinkPad and a caffiene problem. These are called ivory tower architects or as we call them: asshat-itects. Enterprise should mean certain guarantees about scalability and reliability and ability to adapt to the organisation. If it doesn't, you've bought a lemon, not a piece of enterprise software. Note: there are more lemons than not so you have to be careful.

zerostar07 14y ago

Do we to start another debate with an inflaming article?

thejayoj 14y ago
Where's the inflaming part?
- greedo 14y ago
  He probably didn't read the article and missed the irony of the title.
  - zerostar07 14y ago
    I did read the article. I 'm just tired of going through fanbois vs the world flamewar once again
marcusf 14y ago
It doesn't feel very inflammatory, just re-iterating a point that to some seems very contentious, that the composition of separate parts Apple does is innovation. Anyway, I very much like JLG and I liked and agree with the articles push.

endlessvoid94 14y ago

A breath of fresh air.

drats 14y ago

I made this case last week. "Apple products are like a good classy restaurant or hotel chain. They take ingredients everyone has and put a lot of work into fit and finish, they make the customer feel special for a slightly higher price."[1] And I stand by it. I'll go even further actually, I think Apple is one of the least innovative big companies. Look at all the big research labs at Microsoft, Yahoo, IBM or Google. Anyone who seriously follows this stuff knows a) Apple doesn't have a profile in the academic world and b) knows enough computer history to know Apple is claiming things invented decades ago. [1]http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4435504 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4435504

stephencanon 14y ago
It's clear that you didn't actually read the linked article, since it argues precisely the opposite.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
klawed 14y ago
in·no·va·tive/ˈinəˌvātiv/ Adjective: (of a product, idea, etc.) Featuring new methods; advanced and original. (of a person) Introducing new ideas; original and creative in thinking: "an innovative thinker". This definition does not tie innovation to invention. I think it would be hard to argue that Apple's work is not original relative to their competitors. Apple out-innovates their competitors in marketing, in supply chain management, in product lifecycle management and in design. It's impossible to invent every (or even most) components of a general purpose computer. But to select the right pieces, assemble them in a way that maximizes user experience and market them in a way that makes them stand apart from competitors' products made with almost the same components - that's innovation, just the same way that Netflix' model for mailing DVDs (they didn't invent the mailbox, the postal service or the DVD) was extremely innovative.
- 001sky 14y ago
  Perhaps another example of original innovation: the swiss army knife. Look at a victorinox. Look at a knife, a corscrew, a scissor, a toothpick, and a tweezer sitting on the desk. Sometimes an act of integration is enough to be transformative. iOS is a great example of radical originality, even if not a breakthrough technically. The Concept of the ap - a litewight, bandwidth efficient, modular, reconfigurable element integrated into the OS - was certainly original. It was also thus, highly innovative. It was reductive smaller, lighter, less complex. Edit: clarity

Tichy 14y ago

Patents apply to the recipe, though, not the actual mixture.

ceejayoz 14y ago
There are multiple types of patent. One of them is a design patent.

belorn 14y ago

Its an old idea to remove everything until just the essence is left. Apple succeed in identifying markets that was making over complex products. The silly part is that complexity goes in cycles. New products need to differential themselves with old ones, so they add new features. After a while, you end up with a car stereo with 20 buttons, and suddenly a "new" competitor comes out with a clean design with just 3 buttons and the 20 button design looks ill-designed in comparison. Stereos is one of the earlier examples, but you can see the same phenomena in web-design with today’s White and clean design vs the old dark and complex design.

gnaffle 14y ago
I think simplicity isn't the only story, it's usable simplicity. If simple was the only game in town, Apple would only need the iPod shuffle and something like John's Phone (http://johnsphones.org/ http://johnsphones.org/) to rule the world. The iPod and iPhone has added lots and lots of functionality over the years, yet the interface has stayed simple. It's possible to add lots of new features in ways that doesn't make the interface more complex, however it's a big challenge.
- belorn 14y ago
  You can add new features without adding interface complexity, but its harder to differential products if the user do not have any visible difference between ones old product now going for 15$, the competitors new 30-99$ products, and ones own new product going for 100$. Abstract arguments like "its faster!, more feature than before!" is much harder sell when the two devices look and feel the same. One way is to sue all competitors and have the only store available presenting exclusive the new product, but that only goes so far. As for the johnsphones, it has buttons. As interface goes, it still look complex compared to a smartphone. The most simplistic phone design is one with only one or zero buttons, like the Third generation iPod Shuffle if it had been a phone.

pippy 14y ago

>Software is all zeroes and ones, after all. The quantity and order may vary, but that’s about it. Hardware is just protons, neutrons, electrons and photons buzzing around, nothing original. Apple didn’t “invent” anything, the iPad is simply their variation, their interpretation of the well-known tablet recipe. You can make cookies and cakes from the same raw ingredients, doesn't mean that the person who invented cookies also invented cake. Also the 'Software is all zeroes and ones' argument irks me. It's the bridge between an expensive paperweight and a practical device.

stephencanon 14y ago
I don't suppose you made it to the next paragraph where the author says: > "By this myopic logic, Einstein didn’t invent the theory of relativity..." i.e. he agrees with you.

AnthonyMouse 14y ago

I think the article is right in what it says but is wrong because of what it doesn't say. Apple succeeded where others had failed, and that is certainly commendable, but now we have a problem: Apple doesn't have a patent on "an iPad" meaning a device with all the individual characteristics that make an iPad an iPad and make it successful, instead they have individual patents on all the individual features. But the individual features are the things that Apple didn't do. Yet that's what they sue over because that's how patent law is set up. So now we see Samsung lose big in court and popular reaction is split, and here's why: People looking at the actual facts of the case are outraged that Apple could win that way because the actual grounds of the win had nothing to do with copying or Samsung's actions and everything to do with the fact that anyone with a million over-broad patents on obvious "inventions" and laws of nature and mathematics can win in court against anyone who produces a computing device, arguing that any actual copying on the part of Samsung is irrelevant. On the other hand, we have the people who look at the result and the fact that Samsung's devices do actually look entirely too much like Apple's and think Samsung got what was coming to them, ignoring that in order to do it Apple had to adopt a long list of bully tactics that they've now demonstrated that they or anyone else with a sufficient patent arsenal can successfully use against their competitors (including those whose devices aren't intentionally copied, because there are too many patents to possibly even attempt to avoid them all). Nobody seems willing to say that Apple should potentially have some remedy against Samsung for actual copying but that what they got is the wrong remedy in the wrong way, not least which because the same tactics can be used against anyone whether they've done anything wrong or not.

robertskmiles 14y ago
Agreed entirely. To make the metaphor accurate, the chef would then have to sue someone else who was making mayonnaise by a similar recipe.
- swombat 14y ago
  If no one else could make mayonnaise successfully and a chef came up with the process for making it, that chef should damn well get some kind of protection from the IP system for his innovation, invention, or whatever the hell you wanna call it. That is, after all, what will make him want to share his methods instead of keeping them a secret. That's the fundamental principle of the patent system: you share, and we give you a temporary monopoly defended by law. This patent system is obviously broken, but in the mayonnaise case it wouldn't be.

pge 14y ago

I think this article makes some good points but overlooks the crucial question - what inventions are patentable? Like a great chef that combines known ingredients, apple has made excellent products, but apple has not produced new innovation that is worthy of patent protection. Apple's path to success should be winning customers, just like the chefs he describes, not through patent litigation. The examples given by the OP actually support this point. It's true that Einstein didnt discover relativity first - both lorentz and poincare had worked out the mathematics, but Einstein articulated the concepts best. I often use this case study as an example of how innovations often arise independently from different inventors simultaneously because the conditions are right. The other famous and illustrative example is newton and leibniz inventing calculus independently. As a VC, I see this all the time - the market conditions are right for a new idea, and suddenly 4 or 5 companies appear doing variations on the same thing, none aware of the others. Let good execution and the market decide which one is best, not the date on a patent filing for something each came up with on their own.

babesh 14y ago
Einstein understood the meaning. Poincare and Lorentz just understood the machinery. That is a fundamental difference that let Einstein go beyond special relativity to general relativity. Big, big difference. The difference between friendster and facebook.

ThomPete 14y ago

Apple invented the ability to take geeky stuff and turn it into cool stuff for normal people. That's a pretty big feat in itself.

cheald 14y ago
That's called "marketing". It's not really new.
- mdonahoe 14y ago
  You are right, but Apple's definition of marketing doesnt end with the billboards or the tv commercials. Every time you see someone wearing those white earbuds, that's marketing. When your mom is always on her ipad, despite 20 years of lessons from you on how to use a computer, that's marketing. When you are sitting in an airport and you notice the glow of the Apple logo on the back of someone's Macbook Air, that's marketing. When the same dude is still using his macbook, 6 hours into a flight without a powercord, that's marketing. When you walk into an Apple store, and you feel the aluminum unibody... when you unwrap the sturdy yet smooth packaging and the bottom slides out to reveal the device... when computer boots directly to a gray apple logo on a white screen, instead of a DOS prompt for a few seconds, that's marketing. It takes a lot of work to do Apple style marketing.
  - cheald 14y ago
    I completely agree. Apple's marketing is genius. But, the comment I was replying to seems to think that Apple invented effective marketing, and that's just not true. They do it really, really well, but you gotta be chugging the kool-aid to think that they invented the concept of using their products to advertise their brand.
- upinsmoke 14y ago
  Other companies don't do marketing then?
  - surrealize 14y ago

al_biglan 14y ago

This is the same argument aimed at Microsoft in the 90's. next big tech company will get the same thing in 20 years. Meh.

noirman 14y ago

Of course Apple did not invent anything. Steve Jobs did.

cromwellian 14y ago

One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. Notice that in the scientific community, humanity has been building upon previous work for centuries with no copyright or patent protection, and nothing more than honor, citation, and shame against plagiarists. The fundamental defense made by many is that without patent protection for software, people would not put much effort into innovating. 1) If you look at science, open source, fashion, food, and other areas where humans continually build on culture, you see plenty of continued innovation without insane legal protection. 2) The amount of effort pales in comparison to the monopoly granted. You could make the argument for say, pharmaceuticals, that if it takes 10 years from lab through human trials and hundreds of millions of dollars, that a 2-decade long protection period might be needed. But there is no FDA for software, and Apple actually spends far less on R&D than other companies, and with $100 billion in the bank, you can't claim that haven't gotten an incredibly good return in their investment. Therefore, it is insane to grant 20 year protection to Apple for stuff like pinch gestures. 2 years maybe. But 20? It's absurd.

fffggg 14y ago
Regarding the expense of clinical trials, it's important to note that the scientific results of a clinical trial are not protected by either patent or copyright. Pure research data cannot be restricted under any form of IP. Factual data without a creative element is explicitly exempted from both the patent and copyright system. A published paper on the results of a trial may fall under copyright, but the factual observations and conclusions cannot be. The "clinical trials are expensive" argument is incredibly disingenuous.
mbell 14y ago
> One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. He didn't invent, he discovered. I'm not just being pedantic, I think the approaches signified by these two words goes to the root of the differences your describing.
- Peaker 14y ago
  I believe patents apply to discoveries in the same way as inventions.

TylerBrock 14y ago

This is absurd. I wish I could vote the article out of existence.

hastur 14y ago

yaaaaawn so what's new they did other stuff: made things better, connected in new ways, etc. i still don't like their stuff - for aesthetical reasons so what get a life

jpincheira 14y ago

Come on. Shut up. I use Windows on a Dell laptop and I can tell you that's not true. (Pun intented)

smartkids 14y ago

The iPaq was/is a fantastic device. You could attach peripherals. Try doing that with an iPad. I could put an entire OS on a CF Card and assuming I could boot from the card, the expanded functionality is limited only by the hardware specs. They are durable. I've seen consumer electronics businesses still using them to track inventory. I wish HP would revive the iPaq. My only imagined use for an iPad is as a portable display. I want the Retina quality, but I have a more powerful hardware to attach and I need a real keyboard. There's nothing the iPad can do that my open, unlocked hardware cannot do. I believe it was even possible to attach a real keyboard to an iPaq. That's the kind of flexibility I want. I can get data into and out of the device in any number of ways, without hassle.

mdonahoe 14y ago
People like you are not a large market, unfortunately. > There's nothing the iPad can do that my open, unlocked hardware cannot do. Your open, unlocked hardware, cannot survive two days with my mother.
- smartkids 14y ago
  I understand the comment. Of course the thought has crossed my mind. But I'm not so sure there's any evidence to support it. I actually test some of my ideas with people like your mother, and surprisingly (why should I be surprised?) they have little trouble catching on. What's really amusing is that these things that I have them doing are things that many nerds cannot themsleves do. I've got them using systems and techniques that many nerds won't touch because they think it's too "hard core". It's hilarious. There are lots and lots of unfounded assumptions about what users can and cannot do. There are facts, supported by evidence. And then there are assumptions. One requires a bit of work. The other is effortless: you just hit "Submit".
  - deleted 14y ago
    [deleted]
  - arn 14y ago
    I understand the comment. Of course the thought has crossed my mind. But I'm not so sure there's any evidence to support it. Your post is vague enough that I have a hard time parsing it. No evidence for what? That there is such a thing as a "non techy" user? The evidence is overwhelming, including anecdotal evidence from practically every "techy" person here who have ever had to help their family/friends with a computer issue. And it's not a question of ability, it's a question of ability + caring enough. The non-tech people might not care to boot an OS from a CF Card -- certainly not enough to seek out how to learn it. To mom-type: Here's an iPad, you can use it to easily email your friends, check facebook, and check the web. or... Here's an iPaq 2012, you can do all the above, but it's a little harder to use, HOWEVER you can boot any linux distribution you want, add a USB device, attach ANY keyboard -- like one with mechanical switches! I personally prefer the Cherry Blues, but you might want to try the Topre ones. People who use those never go back. They cost a bit more ($~250), and you have to get it imported from Asia or find a U.S. distributor... but it's worth it.

drblast 14y ago

This article is unintentionally an excellent argument against patent protection for Apple's products. If Apple is a company that uniquely has the talent and taste of a good chef, the patent protection is unnecessary. They will be able to continually outdo other companies that don't have the same talent. Arguing that a company has so much talent and is so successful that it needs legal protection seems absurd to me.

csmeder 14y ago
I think the point he was making was: once you see a master chef make mayonnaise you realize the reason you failed. You tried too hard. And now you can make mayonnaise. Tablet makers (iPaq, MS, etc) tried too hard. Apple showed them don't try too hard. And now they can make tablets too. So yes, the excellent chef can be the first to make mayonnaise, however, with out patents on mayonnaise so can everyone else now. The idea of a patent is that the master chef spent years learning to not mix the ingredients too hard, now that he has showed the world the way to make mayonnaise, the only thing stopping the world from stealing the fruits of his work are patents. The point being if Apple never created the iPhone and iPad we would still have phones like the iPaq and the clunky MS tablets in the year 2012. I whole heartily agree with this. If it wasn't for Apple, every other phone and tablet company today would not be making anything of the flavor of the iPhone or iPad. Android and Win Mobile Phone are of the flavor of Apple. So why is it right for them to taste like "L'Atelier de Joel Robuchon" (Apple) in the year 2012 if they would still taste like "Taco Bell" (MS, iPaq, etc) in the year 2012 if it wasn't for Jobs' iphone and ipad. Obviously with out a parallel universe for us to visit together I can't prove this to you. However, I do feel the overwhelming facts of 20 years of failure by iPaq, MS, etc show the trajectory they were heading for and we can guess where they would be in the year 2012: - Stylus pen, or clunky touch screen that you have to press very hard. - Lots of ram, lots of CPU power. - Very heavy - Very large and thick - Poor quality materials - Mediocre software that does not come any where close to the current android software. - Buggy software - no App store, lots of viruses and other security issues. - Expensive and running full Windows 8, no RT version. So if the products Samsung and MS were selling today fit the above recipe, I agree Apple shouldn't be suing them. But this isn't what is happening. Apple is being robbed blind. Every technique and recipe Apple created is being meticulously stolen and engineered into Android and windows phones. These are recipes that Jobs, Ive and the whole Apple company put years of effort into, they poured their heart and soul into these recipes. The reason so much of the tech media don't see it this way is they have no taste buds. Most people have terrible taste buds. Well, they have great unconscious taste buds but their conscious taste buds are almost worth less. So they see things like the iPaq and those old MS Tablets and think "Well Gee golly, that food sure was tasty, sure android is tastier but not much tastier, apple doesn't really deserve much credit for androids improved taste." As some one with excellent taste buds (I am a UX/Product designer, I have predicted the success and failure of almost all major tech product that have come out in the past 10 years, you can read the comments in my HN history as I defended the iPad to almost 99% of HN thinking it was stupid when it came out, I predicted the failure of the Zune, I predicted the success of Apple as whole back in 2004, and predicted MS' current decline) I can tell you with a fair amount of certainty how different iPaq and android taste. What android and Win Phone are doing is sneaky. It is so sneaky you don't realize how many subtle but important details they have stolen. They can do this because you don't have the conscious taste buds necessary to notice it. These details may be subtle but they are far from small. If you ever watch a grand master play chess. Every time he makes a great move you think to yourself "Gee golly that was an obvious move". No. No, it was not. Once you see a chess move you can no longer look at it objectively. The way to objectively judge a chess move is to try to figure it out on your own before some one shows it to you. After spending hours and hours and more hours looking for this move before finding it, you then fully appreciate the move. The tech media is watching a chess game from the sidelines Apple is the grandmaster, Android and windows phone are the people building a database of the grandmaster's moves to beat people at chess. Most people won't be able to comprehend or believe the next sentence: A non Expert Chef or food critic (Expert Product Designer) will never be able to appreciate the Gigantic chasm between the taste of Apples products and any of their competitors, however, on an unconscious level everyone will be drawn to Apples taste so strongly that if the competitors don't copy it, soon Apple will have no competitors still in business. This is the natural Monopoly the iPod almost had for a few years. In 2010 "The latest research by NPD Group claims that iPod had a 76 percent share of the MP3 player market in US in May this year."[0] This monopoly would have been true if Samsung, Google and Microsoft were not spending the past 5 years perfecting their ability to hire Expert Product designers to steal Apple's recipes. From 2001, when the first iPod came out, until about 2010 MS, Google and Samsung went through a phase of denial, trial (trying to steal ideas) and then finally some succes (actually stealing ideas). It took them about a decade just to get good at stealing ideas from Apple. The Zune was an example of how hard it is to steal ideas from apple. A non Expert Product Designer would think the Zune was good thievery, however, it was a sloppy job, it wasn't until windows phone and android, that these companies started to be good at stealing ideas. [0] http://www.ithinkdiff.com/the-ipod-has-76-percent-of-mp3-player-market-in-us_7654/ http://www.ithinkdiff.com/the-ipod-has-76-percent-of-mp3-pla... You are going to hate me for saying this, and you won't agree with me but the truth is that: you don't on a conscious level know what is going on. You are Unconsciously Incompetent. And Android and Win Phone are using this to their advantage. Its the same way Europeans stole land from Native americans. The native americans were Unconsciously Incompetent when it came to the idea of "Owning Land". They saw the land as owning them. Thus they signed documents that seemed to have little importance. This is what Android and Win Phone are doing. They are using you to steal from Apple. That said Jiro [1] doesn't patent his Sushi, he simpley makes the best sushi. And he does quite well for him. If I was Apple I would spend a lot more of my time in the kitchen making the best Sushi in the world and a lot less time in the courtroom. [1] http://www.magpictures.com/jirodreamsofsushi/ http://www.magpictures.com/jirodreamsofsushi/ Note: I am sorry if I come off as arrogant by calling myself an "Expert Product Designer" and claim most people won't understand what I understand, but I don't say this out of arrogance, rather out of fact. I have spent more than a decade to be as competent as I am in Product Design. This is not small feat. In college I was a talented student when it came to Physics, in particular my introduction to Quantum Physics and special relativity class. If I had chosen to pursue the path of Quantum Physis I am quite confident I would be an Expert Quantum Physis today. And if this was so, it would not be arrogant for me to say such things as: "light is both a particle and wave, most people will never appreciate how amazing this is, only expert Quantum Physis', such as my self, will come close to appreciating this statements full glory." This would not be arrogant, rather it would be a fact. The sad fact is that "Product/UX Design" doesn't get the same respect as the hard sciences. From my point of view it should. I use just as much if not more of my brain power to wrap my head around design solutions when I am designing a product as I did when I studied the particle and wave form duality of light and the intricate details of space and time learned through special relativity.

cageface 14y ago

Right, because once that chef figured out just the right twist on those common ingredients no other chefs in the world were allowed to make mayonnaise any more and we would have no fine cuisine without extensive IP protection enforced by law. Oh, wait...

pooriaazimi 14y ago
It's a metaphor. You don't take them seriously. They're just there to tell a cute little story and you move on to the real thing. Certainly iPad involved a little more than a twist.

justinicenhour 14y ago

But bmw never sued brand x for the patten on useing steal or plastic in there cars. Nor has einsteins estate ever sued the government for teachers in our schools using his therories.

ekianjo 14y ago

Most people here seem to argue whether or not Apple have the rights to hold patents on what they did (and whether that should grand them protection). But where this argument is flawed, is that protection from being copied is not only centered around the patent system. There are multiple ways you can protect your inventions, through trade secrets, supply chain efficiency that nobody else can reproduce, through a software environment which is worth more in its whole than the sum of its parts. We know Apple is already using all the above techniques to protect their business. They have an excellent supply chain, they obviously have preferential trade partners which enable them access the new technologies first before anyone else, and they have a iOS system which is well rounded for its purpose. Net, they really do not need to leverage their patents protection. That could be an indication that they do not think they are going to be very innovative down the road, and therefore they just want to keep competitors as far as possible until they pull their act together again... or that they have too many lawyers with too much time on their hands to investigate how much harm they could do with claims based on air and smoke. When a company resorts to such practices, it is usually not a good sign.

yogrish 14y ago

I was under the same opinion as the author. While the Apple Vs Sammy was going many ppl said every feature iphone existed before. But, iphone has the right mix of them in right proportions and that has made it Tick. W.r.t Patenting rects with round corners etc, I too disagree with Apple. Violating Trade dress by Sammy is not acceptable either.

aresant 14y ago

There was a clear before and after when they launched the iPhone By NAILING it apple managed to popularize existing tech like the modern touch-screen interface, the app develeper economy & handheld computing. So enough with this apple hasnt done anything bs, the reason they print money is they keep making future tech accessible, I hope the iPhone 5 (6?) lives up to their record.

kbronson 14y ago

This is not fair. Certainly didn't invented anything, but they improved patent trolling as to make it a way of life. Who needs to invent, when you can patent, sue and win? Let's others do the work.

MaysonL 14y ago

Note this: Apple spends substantially less (as a fraction of revenue) on R&D, and gets substantially more, in terms of outstanding products, compared to every other tech company. What is it that they're doing so well?

hazov 14y ago
Nothing besides of polished systems and good hardware. But I do not like the type of signal this can show to the tech companies around the world: that their patents of new tech that are life changing for everyone are worth less than a pinch zoom on a touch screen, now I don't think it was a obvious gesture but I do not think it should be covered by a patent. There should be a better way to protect new UI elements.
greedo 14y ago
Do you have some links referring to this? Specifically the R&D expenditures for Apple's direct competitors? Say, Asus, Acer, Lenovo, Samsung's smartphone division? You can't lump all of "tech" into one basked and compare it to Apple. You have to keep it aligned with companies that are in the same industry, and then exclude the extraneous R&D like Samsung's washing machine or refrigerator business.

Uchikoma 14y ago

Got to love HN, if someone copies a startup pixel by pixel and business modell, hulla, the lynch mob readies it's pitchforks. If someone copies a freelancers design, website or logo, woha, people run amok. If someone copies Apples UI, hardware, apps and app market it's "Apple Never Invented Anything."

pooriaazimi 14y ago
Did you even read the article?!
- Uchikoma 14y ago
  My comment was about the HN comments not the article. Did you even read my comment?!

epo 14y ago

God, this is depressing, lots of whiny fandroids who can't even f---ing read. These morons have taken the article title as a literal synposis, it is being ironic (and yes, we know that Americans famously don't get irony). The authors (one of whom is a former Apple exec) are arguing that what Apple did was invention and does indeed deserve protection from the legion of lazy wannabes who would just otherwise simply copy from the smartest kid in class.