Jury Foreman in Apple vs. Samsung Case Speaks to Rationale for Verdict

avonord · Aug 28, 2012

This is like two neighbourhood restaurants. One spent days and night coming up with tasty and new dishes, and tries to cash in on the new ideas. The other restaurant keeps imitating the dish and sells them at a lower price. The residents are happy because they get a similar dish for a lower price. When the 1st chef starts complaining, the neighbours all go to the 2nd chef's defence. The ingredients have always been around, they say, so it's not a copying.

But they don't realize that after a while, the smart chef will be discouraged from creating any more new dishes because it's simply not worth the effort. And they don't realize, sometimes, it is not the one or two ingredients that make the dish tasty. It's the combination on the whole dish.

jhende7 · Aug 28, 2012

rendevouspoo said:
That's like LG suing Panasonic for putting an 'input' button on their television remote.

No, that's like LG coming up with a new and innovative method to change inputs without the need to ever touch a "button", then Samsung deciding that there just going to copy it because it's "obvious". That was their whole defense. "We copied it because it's obvious" However no one can seem to explain why they didn't do it before Apple.

samcraig · Aug 28, 2012

For me there are two issues involving the court case - but these are just my issues and obviously I'm not the judge or jury.

1) Willful copying
2) Patent validity.

I can concede that Samsung did #1 although I also think in some regards it wasn't copying but building/jumping off of Apple's (and others) designs.

But patent validity is the important one to me long term. As of now, the judge and jury decided Apple's patents are valid. If this holds true through appeals - then #1 is no contest. But if they are invalidated - then #1 loses steam as far as punishable.

I didn't watch the video (I'm at work) - but did the jury take into any consideration that some of the models aren't even on ATT and at the time - a lot of Apple's iPhones were ATT exclusive (in the USA). Or did they just assume that people WOULD have bought an iPhone had they not been "confused" by a phone on a different carrier that doesn't even carry Apple's iPhone?

Blorzoga · Aug 28, 2012

rendevouspoo said:
Good. They need to win the appeal. Consumers do too. The litigation thugs of Apple need to stop suing over petty stuff like 'pinch-to-zoom.' That's like LG suing Panasonic for putting an 'input' button on their television remote.

You mean petty stuff like pinch-to-zoom that Apple patented and is therefore entitled to license? Are you serious?

mbh · Aug 28, 2012

Steviejobz said:
Apple found 12 uninformed people to determine whether or not we get competition in the mobile device market.

Brilliant.

This jury only had 9 members. Source

KPOM · Aug 28, 2012

pandamonia said:
So one man led a 12 man jury to agree with him because he thought he was right!

Samsung should be able to appeal this pretty easy because the more i read the more i think this whole trial was a joke.

If you read carefully, there were two jurors who did most of the discussion (one on each side). That is actually fairly common. Also, the jury had 9 members, not 12. Nothing the two jurors have said undermines their deliberations. There is no evidence of tampering or bias. In fact, the jurors have indicated that there was no "hometown bias" at work, a lot of them, including the foreman, don't own Apple products, and that there was a lot of discussion on the merits of each side's case.

samcraig · Aug 28, 2012

avonord said:
This is like two neighbourhood restaurants. One spent days and night coming up with tasty and new dishes, and tries to cash in on the new ideas. The other restaurant keeps imitating the dish and sells them at a lower price. The residents are happy because they get a similar dish for a lower price. When the 1st chef starts complaining, the neighbours all go to the 2nd chef's defence. The ingredients have always been around, they say, so it's not a copying.

But they don't realize that after a while, the smart chef will be discouraged from creating any more new dishes because it's simply not worth the effort. And they don't realize, sometimes, it is not the one or two ingredients that make the dish tasty. It's the combination on the whole dish.

Happens often. And the incentive for the 1st chef is to create something continuously so the menu doesn't get stale and to continue to lure people to his or her restaurant instead.

KPOM · Aug 28, 2012

samcraig said:
I didn't watch the video (I'm at work) - but did the jury take into any consideration that some of the models aren't even on ATT and at the time - a lot of Apple's iPhones were ATT exclusive (in the USA). Or did they just assume that people WOULD have bought an iPhone had they not been "confused" by a phone on a different carrier that doesn't even carry Apple's iPhone?

They awarded 1/3 of what Apple wanted. Plus, AT&T did gain a lot of subscribers during its exclusivity period.

albertc · Aug 28, 2012

samcraig said:
I didn't watch the video (I'm at work) - but did the jury take into any consideration that some of the models aren't even on ATT and at the time - a lot of Apple's iPhones were ATT exclusive (in the USA). Or did they just assume that people WOULD have bought an iPhone had they not been "confused" by a phone on a different carrier that doesn't even carry Apple's iPhone?

I think this is a great point

nutmac · Aug 28, 2012

rendevouspoo said:
Good. They need to win the appeal. Consumers do too. The litigation thugs of Apple need to stop suing over petty stuff like 'pinch-to-zoom.' That's like LG suing Panasonic for putting an 'input' button on their television remote.

Pinch-to-zoom was not part of the patents that Samsung was found to be in violation.

JayLenochiniMac · Aug 28, 2012

rjohnstone said:
He needs to stop talking.
Every time he opens his mouth, he is helping Samsung's case for appeal.
It's bad enough the jury flat out ignored the judges orders on damages, he's now admitting to doing all but taking the role of Apple's counsel in the jury room.

Steviejobz said:
Apple found 12 uninformed people to determine whether or not we get competition in the mobile device market.

Brilliant.

We could say the same about some of the 12 loud-mouthed jurors who acquitted OJ Simpson

Was the verdict overturned as a result? No.

samcraig · Aug 28, 2012

KPOM said:
They awarded 1/3 of what Apple wanted. Plus, AT&T did gain a lot of subscribers during its exclusivity period.

That doesn't answer my question. But thanks. I was already aware of what is already "known"

TMay · Aug 28, 2012

Oh, and BTW, Moto agreed to FRAND licensing by Apple to be determined by German Courts for cellular SEP.

Bodes ill for all the rest of Moto's and Samsung SEP patents that they are battling Apple and MS with.

Could be that not much value will be obtained by Google $12B purchase of Motorola other than licensing fees, and those fees will almost certainly to be eclipsed by licensing fees that the OEM's have and wll have to pay on Android OS use. The end result is that Android isn't free as far as the OEM"s are concerned, and has the result of making production and sales of smartphones less viable.

Peace · Aug 28, 2012

jontech said:
TOO.... MUCH..... LOGIC....

Ahh my Android head!

Nope.

rjohnstone · Aug 28, 2012

Blorzoga said:
It's called being the foreman, genius.

No **** sherlock.
But it's not the foreman's duty to decide for the rest of the jury or to even convince the rest that his way is right.

One of the foreman's primary responsibilities:
"He or she decides how the evidence is reviewed and assures that all evidence and arguments made during the trial are considered."

With 700 questions being decided in 2 1/2 days, that means they averaged less than 2 minutes per question.
That's barely enough time for a thorough first pass let alone the final verdict.

Mgb74 · Aug 28, 2012

I wonder if the same result would have occurred if the trial was in S. Korea. Or if on neutral territory. There is a graphic going around that shows that before iPhone, Samsung smart phones were eerily similar to Blackberry's. After iPhone launched, the design switched. Coincidence?

Anyone recall the BASF commercials from the 80's & 90's? Their tag line was "we don't make your VHS tapes, we make them better.". That could be Samsung's too: "We didn't spend money or have the creative intellect to invent the iPhone, but we took a rectangle with rounded corners and made 4 home buttons instead of one. That made ours better. We gave you, the consumer, more button choices. We also didn't come up with our own operating system, we were smarter, we let someone else do that too. One model? We have 8. They all do almost the same thing, but it's more choice for you, the goat, uh er consumer. Confused? So are we. But we're better, we think."

jhende7 · Aug 28, 2012

samcraig said:
Happens often. And the incentive for the 1st chef is to create something continuously so the menu doesn't get stale and to continue to lure people to his or her restaurant instead.

B.S The 2nd chef would never be able make the exact dish because its a lot harder to reverse engineer food then it is a visual implementation of an operating system.

Aside from that I find it hilarious that you think Apple should just let everybody copy the s*** out of their work in order to satisfy some pie in the sky holier than though idea that their moral and core value should be to continuously improve and innovate to bring the industry forward into the new age.

samcraig · Aug 28, 2012

Mgb74 said:
I wonder if the same result would have occurred if the trial was in S. Korea. Or if on neutral territory. There is a graphic going around that shows that before iPhone, Samsung smart phones were eerily similar to Blackberry's. After iPhone launched, the design switched. Coincidence?

Anyone recall the BASF commercials from the 80's & 90's? Their tag line was "we don't make your VHS tapes, we make them better.". That could be Samsung's too: "We didn't spend money or have the creative intellect to invent the iPhone, but we took a rectangle with rounded corners and made 4 home buttons instead of one. That made ours better. We gave you, the consumer, more button choices. We also didn't come up with our own operating system, we were smarter, we let someone else do that too. One model? We have 8. They all do almost the same thing, but it's more choice for you, the goat, uh er consumer. Confused? So are we. But we're better, we think."

meh - too wordy to be considered clever

----------

jhende7 said:
B.S The 2nd chef would never be able make the exact dish because it a lot easier to reverse engineer food then it is a visual implementation of an operating system.

Aside from that I find it hilarious that you think Apple should just let everybody copy the s*** out of their work in order to satisfy some pie in the sky holier than though idea that their moral and core value should be to continuously improve and innovate to bring the industry forward into the new age.

I never said anything you just accused me of. Take a deep breath.

BC2009 · Aug 28, 2012

Steviejobz said:
Apple found 12 uninformed people to determine whether or not we get competition in the mobile device market.

Brilliant.

Man -- I sure wish Samsung had a say in jury selection. Its too bad the plaintiff gets to hand pick the jury.

/s

I'm just glad they did not select the jury from commenters on tech forums. Then we really would have had a skewed view of the evidence.

rjohnstone · Aug 28, 2012

JayLenochiniMac said:
We could say the same about some of the 12 loud-mouthed jurors who acquitted OJ Simpson Was the verdict overturned as a result? No.

There were only 9 in this case. Civil cases have slightly different rules than criminal cases.

The prosecution in the OJ case is barred from trying him again. This pesky thing called double jeopardy that prevents DA's from filing the same charge over and over again until they get the verdict they want.

pacalis · Aug 28, 2012

sha4000 said:
Said all the right things when being questioned I would think.

I think so to. Without being there I thought this decision tilted too far in Apple
s favor and I also thought that the statements the foreman made were ill advised.

However, he does seem to be a highly considered guy, and defended the worst of his prior quoted comments very clearly and very fairly. I think damages will be reduce, but overall infringement claims are going to stick.

All that as one thing, he ends with "I'm a windows guy." Lol. Yup, MS is coming up right in the middle of this.

minderbinder106 · Aug 28, 2012

avonord said:
This is like two neighbourhood restaurants. One spent days and night coming up with tasty and new dishes, and tries to cash in on the new ideas. The other restaurant keeps imitating the dish and sells them at a lower price. The residents are happy because they get a similar dish for a lower price. When the 1st chef starts complaining, the neighbours all go to the 2nd chef's defence. The ingredients have always been around, they say, so it's not a copying.

But they don't realize that after a while, the smart chef will be discouraged from creating any more new dishes because it's simply not worth the effort. And they don't realize, sometimes, it is not the one or two ingredients that make the dish tasty. It's the combination on the whole dish.

Chefs do this and yet somehow restaurants still exist.

Overg · Aug 28, 2012

While I agree with the trail results, I have to admit that the jury system in USA is ridiculous!
How can 12 uniformed people, who have no idea what so ever in technology, can decide in such trail. All they want is to go home and get over with.
Seeing this movie prove my point.
Sad justice system, really sad.

Ca$hflow · Aug 28, 2012

No Juror had a iPhone or samsung smartphone

I think this is really interesting. It seems to me that this created a very fair jury. Also you do realize that Apple and Samsung choose jurors. I don't understand why people think that Apple stacked the jury. In the jury selection process BOTH parties intensely question each jury member. Then Samsung and Apple must both decide unanimously yes or no to each jury member before being accepted as a juror. I'm sure Samsung lawyers knew what they were doing.

pandamonia · Aug 28, 2012

KPOM said:
If you read carefully, there were two jurors who did most of the discussion (one on each side). That is actually fairly common. Also, the jury had 9 members, not 12. Nothing the two jurors have said undermines their deliberations. There is no evidence of tampering or bias. In fact, the jurors have indicated that there was no "hometown bias" at work, a lot of them, including the foreman, don't own Apple products, and that there was a lot of discussion on the merits of each side's case.

There are a number of manufacturers near where i live and trust me there is home town bias in every industry.

Jury Foreman in Apple vs. Samsung Case Speaks to Rationale for Verdict

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