4 ms·
What a mess this is on both sides. Apple has reacted poorly, but if I were British I would be a bit upset that my judges were wasting time on punishments like
by jarcoal 14y ago
What a mess this is on both sides.
Apple has reacted poorly, but if I were British I would be a bit upset that my judges were wasting time on punishments like this. The point is to punish Apple, so just fine them and be over with it. The end result is the same, just without all this drama in the middle.
EDIT: I'm going to retract my opinion here because a few good points have been made and I shouldn't have spoken when I was not 100% informed on the matter. Sorry!
- CervezaPorFavor 14y agoI believe it has been said many times that the main objective is to undo some of the harm that Apple has caused to Samsung. Hence, the public announcements.
- jarcoal 14y ago"harm" for a company is another way of saying money lost, so why not just fine Apple a ton of money and give it to Samsung?
- chc 14y agoBecause that still allows Apple to profit from what the court views as severe misbehavior?
- aes256 14y agoBecause there is no way of calculating the potential cost of the damage to Samsung's reputation. Plus, it makes far more sense to tackle the root of the problem — the harm caused to Samsung's reputation — by ordering Apple to make public announcements that its allegations against them were false.
- jbri 14y agoSo it should be fine to break the law and commit any sort of crime against a company, and the only penalty should be giving them make-up money after the fact?
- jarcoal 14y agoThe lifeblood of a company is money, so yes. Phrasing it as "make-up money" implies it always has to be a slap on the wrist. It doesn't. It can be a devastating amount.
- jbri 14y agoIs this intended to be punitive (as suggested by your "devastating amount" phrase), or is it indented to make-whole the injured party? If industrial espionage sets back a company's R&D by a decade, you can't fix that with money. Throwing money at the problem won't magically get your research back. It won't magically get your market-leading position back after your competitors take advantage of your setback. And we're not even starting on what happens if the party doing the injuring goes bankrupt before paying all that is owed. The idea that money is a magic panacea that fixes everything is completely wrong.
- jarcoal 14y ago@jbri What would you offer as punishment in the example you just stated?
- jbri 14y agoIt is an example to show that a monetary payment is not always sufficient to repair any harm caused. For another example, you could consider the case where a company has lost a dominant market position due to libel and slander from a competitor. Being given money wouldn't magically repair that company's market position.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- dbuxton 14y agoIt seems likely that any fine that the court could impose would pale into insignificance in comparison to what Samsung's lawyers have rung up, so this is pretty effective.
- citricsquid 14y agoWe have a big issue with companies giving Britain the middle finger with tax avoidance at the moment so the government in any form standing up to a big company is pretty much the #1 thing that British citizens will love right now (if they pay attention to the news). Although it is ultimately quite petty, Apple are refusing to comply with court mandated actions and the court standing up to them is definitely something people want to see -- from my circle of British people anyway.
- jarcoal 14y agoOk, well I'm in the states, so I'm in no position to assume what the UK public wants, but it seems little strange to prioritize payback over progress, which is my interpretation of what is happening here.
- barking 14y agoWhat's progressive about Apple acting in a manner that would embarrass a patent troll?
- Lewisham 14y agoDefine "progress". I don't understand what you think will happen. The courts have more time to look at other people not following the law? So the one yet are currently dealing with that isn't following the law can skip away?
- jarcoal 14y agoSorry that wasn't very well worded. All I'm saying is that the apology is an inefficient punishment. It's meant to sting Apple which eventually means they lose money. All I'm saying is skip the drama and just take the money. The best argument I've heard against this is that it would be difficult to determine the dollar value equivalent of the apology, which is certainly true.
- Nursie 14y agoHow very American - reducing everything to a monetary value!
- DanBC 14y agoDamages are usually not punitive. Thus, Apple would only have to pay a tiny amount (in relation to the huge pots of money they have). That would mean that the fine would be no deterrent, and further fines could merely be the cost of doing business. I'm not upset at the judge. I am upset at companies taking this stuff through court, and other companies not just putting a simple apology up.
- jarcoal 14y agoWell obviously the amount needs to be higher. Clearly the apology is not as simple as it might appear, hence this whole debacle. Apple is definitely the one making it more difficult, but I can't imagine other companies wouldn't do the same, and the courts should be expecting that.
- lutze 14y agoI'm British, and I actually feel quite the opposite. Apple sought to use UK courts to their own ends, and then threw a bitch fit when the ruling didn't go their way. The judge is absolutely right to slap them down. You shouldn't get to pick and choose which court orders to respect, even if you're the richest company in the world. That's hardly the basis for a sound legal system is it? Frankly, whoever authorised this reaction in the first place is a disrespectful idiot. They treated the UK like a fucking banana republic, and got reamed accordingly.
- jarcoal 14y agoNot disagreeing that the judge should punish them for non-compliance, just arguing the initial punishment was inefficient (despite that fact that it might be satisfying).
- flatline3 14y agoThe judicial system shouldn't be able to force you to say anything you don't believe in, to your own customers, with no means of telling your side of the story. Self determination is a sacrosanct right, and this punishment crosses the line.
- codeulike 14y agoThey werent forced to 'say' anything, it was more the equivalent of a dodgy restaurant being made to put up a poster or a leaflet in a shop window informing customers that they only got a C on their hygiene inspection
- keithpeter 14y agoUK resident: no, there is no 'sacrosanct right' here at all. If a company chooses to take legal action in the UK, then they have to comply with what the court decides. If they don't, there will be consequences.
- pfortuny 14y agoA company does not self-determine itself.
- ZoFreX 14y agoI'm not upset at all. Fines seem to have very little effect on companies, especially as in the UK they are frequently embarrassingly small. One thing I really like about the USA is that when they fine a company, they don't mess around. But one thing I like about the UK is that we don't tolerate B.S. - quite a few American companies have come over here and been tripped up by one of the many areas we're a little stricter in.
- adaml_623 14y agoAS a UK resident I'm upset that Apple has wasted the court's time with this. The article states that a million people read the first notice. Presumably a large number of people were following links from articles, on websites like this one, pointing out how the notice barely conformed to the courts ruling. Maybe if no one had noticed and Samsung hadn't complained (I don't know if they did) then nothing would have happened. But you can't show contempt for a court ruling in a massively public way and expect no consequences. Justice has to be seen to be done. And Apple caused this to drag on further than it should have.