Apple Files Lawsuit Against HTC Over Alleged iPhone Patent Infringement

[NebulaClash]

I take it we can expect a countersue from HTC?

HTC have been in the smartphone business a *tad* longer than Apple also, is there any chance Microsoft and Google could be bought into the fray?

Of course HTC will counter-sue. That's how this game works. And Apple knows it. So the fact that Apple initiated this move tells me they know they hold the winning hand no matter what HTC can do.

 

[rwilliams]

What makes you think there won't be a choice? The market will always have plenty of phones to choose from. Apple isn't complaining about all of HTC's phones, merely the few that violate Apple's patents related to the iPhone.

Competitors can make any phone they want, but if they primarily copy the iPhone you get your horrible market where everything looks alike. Instead HTC should innovate their way to new kinds of phones and let the market decide. Apple makes the iPhone. Other companies should make their own kinds of phones and not just copy Apple.

I agree. People can say what they want about Windows Mobile 7, but Microsoft appears to be one of the few that are trying to move far away from the iPhone clone look. I don't think it'll do so great, but still, it would have been easy to fall into the same trap that everyone has since the debut of the iPhone.

 

[kevgav]

Are all you people forgetting the Apple Newton Message Pad? It was launched in 1993. Palm ripped off a great deal of the Newton when it launched in 1996 but Steve Jobs killed Newton when he returned to controlling Apple. Apple doesn't have to worry about a lot of Palm's patents because of prior art.

Also Apple acquired FingerWorks a pioneer in multitouch in order to have legitimate rights to a lot of multitouch gesture patents.

 

[DanielSw]

This is NOT good. A market in which the iPhone is the only option is a horrible market indeed.

Having a choice is a good thing. If Apple manages to destroy HTC, Android, Palm, etc... we'll no longer have a choice. And that's a horrible situation.

We all love Apple for different reasons. I love the Mac. You love the iPhone. I can understand it, but at the same time, I'd rather there continue to be competition, because it keeps companies on their toes providing amazing stuff for us to play with at prices most of us can afford.

-Z

What a stupid statement! As if it's up to Apple to ALLOW competition by NOT suing over patent infringements!? Ridiculous.

It's like Steve Jobs said as quoted in the article:

"We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We've decided to do something about it," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours."

Apple isn't discouraging competition. They're merely setting the bar pretty high with their own accomplishments. Does an Olympic athlete complain about the bar being high by the previous record setter? If he does, he doesn't belong in the Olympics.

 

[iphone4verizon]

Apple-Save yourself time & Money

When the iphone comes to Verizon, HTC will be dead......So HURRY UP and take care of business apple, WE ARE WAITING!!!!!!

 

[ddubbo]

You can implement Apple's patents - and if you're not Apple, there's a good chance you'll mess it up.

You'll end up with a bad iPhone copy. Which is what the Nexus One is.

I own one. It's better then any iphone from any point of view. It's more robust, cheaper, faster. I don't even talk about childish iphone design.

 

[SteveSparks]

Apple released the iPhone - really unlike anything else out there - and then suddenly we saw iPhone-like smartphones everywhere, many that were eerily similar, if not by all appearances visible copies.

I really think this is the core of the issue, Its that they look like the iphone. They all look like the iphone. Now the iPhone is pretty basic in terms of shape etc, but these guys were obviously trying to copy the iPhone.

Some of the pictures I have seen, show early phones had the same basic layout of items in the menu system. At least the Windows UI, supports a differing menu structure.

 

[kas23]

No double standard at all. Apple innovates all the time. Now they are also litigating. The world is not black and white.

Apple has not innovated anything since the original iPhone. All subsequent models have only added features that should have been on the original (and have been found on other phones for years) or have come from 3rd party developers via the App Store. The iPad is hardly innovative. It's just a large iPod Touch.

 

[DougB541]

Are all you people forgetting the Apple Newton Message Pad? It was launched in 1993. Palm ripped off a great deal of the Newton when it launched in 1996 but Steve Jobs killed Newton when he returned to controlling Apple. Apple doesn't have to worry about a lot of Palm's patents because of prior art.

Also Apple acquired FingerWorks a pioneer in multitouch in order to have legitimate rights to a lot of multitouch gesture patents.

You obviously have never use a Newton or a Palm Pilot if you think they were similar.


But seriously, Palm holds onto a lot of PDA/Phone patents (airplane mode anyone?)

I'm interested to see which patents they are filing a lawsuit against and if other companies would fall under that.

 

[jaw04005]

"Apple said that the lawsuit was filed concurrently with the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) and in U.S. District Court in Delaware."

At least it wasn't the eastern district of Texas.

 

[kevgav]

so what's your opinion about Nokia's case against apple?

if apple were to come up with a multitasking or notification system like palm pre, do you want palm to sue apple?

Palm's WebOS is not a true multitasking OS it's a browser and each app is simply a new tab/window. App developer's don't have access to OS level APIs they are doing what Apple originally wanted Developers to do on iPhone and use Web 2.0 to make Apps.

 

[cumanzor]

No double standard at all. Apple innovates all the time. Now they are also litigating. The world is not black and white.

Uhhu... except that if you imply that Nokia was wrong and Apple is right by default, you are making it "black and white".

They all look like the iphone. Now the iPhone is pretty basic in terms of shape etc, but these guys were obviously trying to copy the iPhone.

Yeah, many of them tried, and it kinda sucks. But then again, a bunch of other devices are nothing like the iphone. Winmo is different, even Android is different, Sense UI is miles away from anything else we have right now. And well, even the Windows Phone 7 UI is completely different.

Any word on which patents are at play here?

 

[cmaier]

lol, fun fact? you can sit here and say "this is small part", that is "major part", lol, who do you think you are? judge?

is GSM technology a major part in iPhone?
is grid like launcher UI system a major part in iPhone?

Can you read? I stated the rules of the game, and explained how, given a set of facts, things turn out. I didn't make any judgment about what feature are major or minor.

I also don't believe Palm holds any GSM patents, nor does Palm have a grid launcher patent (and if it did, since the workaround is trivial, damages would also likely be capped at the cost of the workaround).

 

[SteveSparks]

I own one. It's better then any iphone from any point of view. It's more robust, cheaper, faster. I don't even talk about childish iphone design.

No matter how good, or better we think one phone might be over the other, you have to consider that the basic look needs to be more different from the iphone.

 

[kas23]

Apple isn't discouraging competition. They're merely setting the bar pretty high with their own accomplishments. Does an Olympic athlete complain about the bar being high by the previous record setter? If he does, he doesn't belong in the Olympics.

Actually, by this logic, Apple should get out of the courtroom and just "set the bar higher" by making a better product.

 

[DougB541]

I really think this is the core of the issue, Its that they look like the iphone. They all look like the iphone. Now the iPhone is pretty basic in terms of shape etc, but these guys were obviously trying to copy the iPhone.

Some of the pictures I have seen, show early phones had the same basic layout of items in the menu system. At least the Windows UI, supports a differing menu structure.

Its the way tech works. Everyone was copying a flip style phone after the Star-tac got big.

Hell, one could argue Apple saw the Palm Pilot/Treo app launcher as a smart and UI friendly launcher (it makes the most sense for ease of use) so they used that for their phone.

Whats funny however is HTC def. was working on a full touchscreen device aronud the same time the iphone was being worked on:

The HTC Touch came out June 5th 2007...ain't no way they saw the iPhone and scrambled to copy it for June. (not saying i liked the phone cause Win Mo 6 was terrible...but this is what started their touchflo/sense UI)

 

[doctoree]

Problem is, when Apple patents every stupid **** they come up with and never actually use in a shipping product what's left for the competition? Nothing!

 

[BaldiMac]

They didn't do so well against Creative.

Seems like it worked out a lot better for Apple than Creative.

 

[DougB541]

Palm's WebOS is not a true multitasking OS it's a browser and each app is simply a new tab/window. App developer's don't have access to OS level APIs they are doing what Apple originally wanted Developers to do on iPhone and use Web 2.0 to make Apps.

Ugh...please at least know what you are talking about.

The original iPhone apps were straight up web apps....WebOS apps have a lot of grips into the hardware.

Further more there are currently 3D games on the Palm Pre that also multi-task along with the rest of the phone. Palm came out with a PDK that does native apps (and actually makes it simple for coders to port iPhone games over to WebOS).

 

[DougB541]

Here is a list of some of the patents:

The ‘331 Patent, entitled "Time-Based, Non-Constant Translation Of User Interface Objects Between States," was duly and legally issued on April 22, 2008 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

The ‘949 Patent, entitled "Touch Screen Device, Method, And Graphical User Interface For Determining Commands By Applying Heuristics," was duly and legally issued on January 20, 2009 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘949 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit B.

The ‘849 Patent, entitled "Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image," was duly and legally issued on February 2, 2010 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘849 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit C.

The ‘381 Patent, entitled "List Scrolling And Document Translation, Scaling, And Rotation On A Touch-Screen Display," was duly and legally issued on December 23, 2008 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘381 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit D.

The ‘726 Patent, entitled "System And Method For Managing Power Conditions Within A Digital Camera Device," was duly and legally issued on July 6, 1999 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘726 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit E.

The ‘076 Patent, entitled "Automated Response To And Sensing Of User Activity In Portable Devices," was duly and legally issued on December 15, 2009 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘076 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit F.

The ‘105 Patent, entitled "GMSK Signal Processors For Improved Communications Capacity And Quality," was duly and legally issued on December 8, 1998 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘105 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit G.

The ‘453 Patent, entitled "Conserving Power By Reducing Voltage Supplied To An Instruction-Processing Portion Of A Processor," was duly and legally issued on June 3, 2008 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘453 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit H.

The ‘599 Patent, entitled "Object-Oriented Graphic System," was duly and legally issued on October 3, 1995 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘599 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit I.

The ‘354 Patent, entitled "Object-Oriented Event Notification System With Listener Registration Of Both Interests And Methods," was duly and legally issued on July 23, 2002 by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. A copy of the ‘354 Patent is attached hereto as Exhibit J.

 

[mikes70mustang]

The iPhone is losing appeal and they dont want to lose customers. Jobs will be suing every touch screen phone. They might as well recognize that other companies are starting to make better phones than them. Im still waiting for apple to steal the surepress technology in the storm2 to make the macbook lines trackpad more useful.

 

[R3tard]

Wouldn't Get To Train

What a stupid statement! As if it's up to Apple to ALLOW competition by NOT suing over patent infringements!? Ridiculous.

It's like Steve Jobs said as quoted in the article:

"We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it. We've decided to do something about it," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "We think competition is healthy, but competitors should create their own original technology, not steal ours."

Apple isn't discouraging competition. They're merely setting the bar pretty high with their own accomplishments. Does an Olympic athlete complain about the bar being high by the previous record setter? If he does, he doesn't belong in the Olympics.

I'm not sure this analogy works all the way. If we apply it to the situation, Apple would sue me for training for the Olympic event the same way they do. Since Apple already trained a certain way and it helped them 'set the bar' higher, each athlete would need to invent a completely new way of training for the event. We would quickly run out of ways to train...

 

[NAG]

This must mean that the Nexus 1 is pretty good.

Apple wouldn't bothers suing over a crappy product.

Because filing a lawsuit is as easy as going to a McDonalds. I wouldn't be surprised if the Nexus One is mentioned but this probably started quite some time ago. You have to sue over crappy products if they infringe because then when a half decent one comes along and you'll look like an idiot for not protecting your patents for so long.

 

[mikes70mustang]

Here is a list of some of the patents:

Those are pretty ambiguous patents, a company like HTC will probably find a way around such things.

 

[srauber]

What is very funny to see here, is that if any company files a case against apple a lot of people getting angry ( I know this is a Apple forum but not one for the blind or mad )
If Apple is filing a case against other companies it is OK, whatever the reason is.
I think every company has the same rights ......!!!!!