Ban on Sale of Samsung Galaxy Smartphones in EU Set for October 13th

[divinox]

You are right, but the fact of the matter is that the patent system is being abused. And without any intervening action from a regulatory body, any company "too decent" to play the game will lose. So again. In this climate there is no other way than to patent and to litigate. Whether the companies and we as consumers like it or not.

Theres a big difference between being "too decent" and being "as bad as one possibly can". Your argument is basically the old "if i dont sell drugs, someone else will". Anyway, since the politicians dont stop the nonsense it is up to us consumers. Stop endorcing crap practices and they might stop. If youre not part of the solution, youre part of the problem.

p.s. i'd say the climate has changed quite drastically in the last couple of years.

 

[rjohnstone]

That's not the point. They have to release the kernel source because the kernel is GPL. It's not their choice, they'd be in violation of the license if they withheld the kernel source.

Secondly, what I meant was they're not marketed as open source. The droid commercials don't say "introducing the new open sourced Bionic/Thunderbolt/Charge"..."open source" and "openness" (or whatever Google wants to define them to be) or not the selling points that are presented when these phones are marketed.

However, android forumgoers use that as the number one reason why android is better then ios. Usually, its just them not knowing what they're talking about.

No, they do not have to release any proprietary code used in the kernel.
A lot of the kernel mods for the Atrix are coming from nVidia's source code for the Tegra II since Motorola has not released any source code for their proprietary kernel components.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

I got a question. Why is only the Samsung Galaxy phones banned, when basically every android phone from 1.6 uses the exact same swipe behavior in the Photo gallery?

Is Apple scared of Google?

The consequences can be big if Google ban Apple from all their services as a retaliation just to annoy Apple

chances are Google would be face with a list of Anti trust lawsuits left and right.

 

[ChazUK]

does it "un-swipe" if you release it without going more than halfway to the next pic? for some reason the tab-version is perfectly fine as far as the patent goes, so it has to be something highly specific.

Both you and rjohnstone are in fact correct. My Nexus simply moves onto the next pic if I do a partial swipe, just like my Xoom. Interestingly, if I do a partial swipe on my Omnia 7, it sometimes bounces back.

Microsoft should be on the lookout for trouble.....

 

[MacinDoc]

I really don't see how Fingerworks supports your argument here. Apple bought Fingerworks' patents, (for some $14 million) and hired some of the company founders, back in 2005. Westerman continues to be named in numerous Apple patent applications.

You may certainly argue that the original idea wasn't developed in-house at Apple. But by buying the IP, surely Apple is rewarding the hard work and innovation of the people who created it? And surely you can't be suggesting that, having invested millions of dollars in an as-then commercially unproven technology, Apple should simply give away the rights to all and sundry?

As far as Jeff Han and Perceptive Pixel, I'm not aware that there are any on-going disputes between Perceptive Pixel and Apple.

Personally I see Apple's actions in all this as being for the good of innovations (and innovators.) It can cost tens of millions of dollars to bring new technologies to market. Far better than innovators such as the guys at Fingerworks sell their IP to a firm like Apple - than to quietly go bankrupt and have their patents bought up by a Patent Troll that has no plan on ever bringing the technology to market.

Its worth noting that Apple didn't make the so-called '949 Patent (which covers very basic touchscreen zooming and scrolling behavior) part of its case in the US (or I believe germany or Holland.) Why they omitted this is open to speculation.

The '949 Patent is probably the broadest (and potentially most valuable) of those Apple acquired from Fingerworks. It certainly could face some potential challenges on various grounds, although it has survived at least one challenge when the PTO refused to grant re-examination back in July of 2010.

It may very well turn out that many, if not all, of Apple's Patents on touchscreen and other technologies are ultimately overturned or denied. That is up to the lawyers and the courts to decide.

But I think the important question people need to ask themselves is this: Is the "bad guy" here Apple, which paid the inventors of that technology millions of dollars. Or Samsung - which paid them nothing, and just took the work other people had done for nothing?

What company is going to inspire and motivate the next scientist or engineer work on tomorrows breakthroughs? Apple - which comes calling with its checkbook open. Or Samsung, which plasters the Internet with pictures from Sci-Fi movies.

Exactly! Did Samsung buy Fingerworks? Did it give Fingerworks anything for its multitouch IP? No, that's right, it was Apple that ponied up for the technology, but Samsung is using it without any acknowledgement of its inventors, because Samsung believes it can, and it may be right. But which company's approach is more admirable is more likely to promote further innovation, the company that buys and implements promising but underutilized technology, or the company that sees what another company is succeeding at and simply tries to make something that looks and works the same, disregarding any issues of IP ownership? Evil Apple, rewarding inventors for their hard work, and trying to protect its value!

 

[KnightWRX]

The GS2 will sell 5 million in a year..

Hum...

http://www.tgdaily.com/hardware-brief/57522-samsung-has-sold-5-million-galaxy-s-ii-phones

The 5 million in sales mark was achieved in only 85 days.

and they aren’t even for sale in the U.S. yet.

What was I saying about egg on your face ? At least research stuff before you make bold claims against Apple's competition. Validate that your unfounded opinion at least has a basis in reality.

 

[divinox]

We're not talking about some little start-ups here, we're talking about Apple, Samsung and HTC, some of the world's largest electronics manufacturers. The latter two of which base their success on copying other companies' successful inventions (not just in computers and handheld devices, in the case of Samsung). This is not to say that they do not make good products, merely that their focus is not on spending money to develop revolutionary products, and as a result, neither company ever has.

Does it matter? Its the same system, and none of us should support it. Regarding Samsung theyre doing well in both display and flash technology. Id even go as far as to say that they can be considered to be world leading.

I'm not saying that the patent system doesn't have its problems; witness the patent granted for embedding a button in an application, which Apple has licensed but supposedly is not allowed to include in its developers' toolkit in spite of having licensed it (and what could be more obvious than a link initiated by activating a button?). I am quite frankly tired of all of the legal manipulations in the tech industry right now.

So be part of the change. Start by not giving these companies your money.

At the same time, you have to look at it from a business standpoint. If Apple has invested money in researching and developing a technology, if it has been granted a patent for such technology, or if it has developed a product which is widely recognized due to its iconic appearance that everyone else suddenly starts to copy due to its success, the company is EXPECTED to protect such intellectual property and trade dress to the best of its ability. Whether such patents should or should not have been granted, and whether they are strong or weak, any failure to defend them results in such intellectual property being lost as an asset. I fail to understand how Apple living up to its fiduciary responsibility to its shareholders is considered by some on these forums to be "evil". From the standpoint of shareholders, to fail to do so would be evil and irresponsible, because it reduces the value of the company by failing to meet the company's obligations to protect its property.

i have no objection when it comes to real innovation. however, most of the battles nowaday seem to be about crappy, overly broad, claims to things that were already existing in one form or the other.

----------

Both you and rjohnstone are in fact correct. My Nexus simply moves onto the next pic if I do a partial swipe, just like my Xoom. Interestingly, if I do a partial swipe on my Omnia 7, it sometimes bounces back.

Microsoft should be on the lookout for trouble.....

MSFT need not worry. Apple is not going that route, especially* not considering how they just "refined" some WP7 stuff in iOS5.

* like this would matter if MSFT were to launch a full out patent war vs Apple.

btw: any news on UK touchpads?

 

[peterdevries]

Theres a big difference between being "too decent" and being "as bad as one possibly can". Your argument is basically the old "if i dont sell drugs, someone else will". Anyway, since the politicians dont stop the nonsense it is up to us consumers. Stop endorcing crap practices and they might stop. If youre not part of the solution, youre part of the problem.

p.s. i'd say the climate has changed quite drastically in the last couple of years.

Your drug analogy doesn't really fly because these patent disputes are all within the law and set rules by the EPO and USPTO. But I see what you mean and agree with you, but we shouldn't expect any of these companies to start a "decent patent"- revolution to change the dynamic. That's what we have regulatory bodies for, to keep the companies in check, because these companies are being run by shareholder marionettes who think of their own wallet first.

So IMO the change should come from the regulatory bodies (meaning: stop granting patents for ridiculously generic software behaviour). The companies will not change by themselves. And if there is one that will, than it will be punished for it's good behavior by the rest.

 

[Winni]

The real news here is that the judge found ALL other patent claims from Apple to be invalid and this was the only one that he gave them. So this injunction basically is a big loss for Apple. The swiping feature can be replaced in no time while Apple has run out of ammunition.

Typing this on my SGS2, by the way. You can keep all the typos that you find.

 

[voonyx]

No, they do not have to release any proprietary code used in the kernel.
A lot of the kernel mods for the Atrix are coming from nVidia's source code for the Tegra II since Motorola has not released any source code for their proprietary kernel components.

yes, i know they don't have to release proprietary code. i dont even know why we're arguing about this haha. it has nothing to do with my original statement that these phones are NOT being marketed as open source...and they're not.

The whole "openness" crap is something that android forumgoers preach, not anything that any carrier or any OEM states when selling their phones.

 

[peterdevries]

So be part of the change. Start by not giving these companies your money.

Sorry divinox but isn't this a bit naive? There is not a piece of electronics in any of all of our houses that doesn't have a patent on it that's just as ridiculous as the one we are talking about. Is your house empty of electronics? I guess not judging by the fact that you are posting here.

And in addition we are just talking about gadgets. What "real evil" is being done here? How significant is it that one phone can't swipe and the other can't do something else?

 

[swagi]

This is still very early news but it seems that this is a win situation for Samsung. The judge rejected all claims from Apple except a patent violation that can be fixed with a quick update. Also lets not forget that the specific patent has been invalidated in most european countries. There are only four countries on the list in which it still applies. The biggest drawback for Apple if it continues this litigation will be the loss of mindset share. US maybe a different market but us Europeans think very differently and do not have the blind loyalty towards brands nor are we sympathetic towards large corporations especially when they try to deprive us of options.

THIS!

Combined that the ban is effective coming October 13. Reread it - October 13.

So basically Samsung has more than a month in time to develop an update correcting that flaw in the Gallery app. So actually this decision means (to any rational thinking person)...

...there is no ban.

And Apple severely damaged its image. Anecdotally I know several people, that won't buy an Apple product again.

(Now goes online and tries to get an update for his Galaxy phone - maybe that nasty GPS behaviour is corrected with the update )

 

[MRU]

lol @ Apple.

Samsung has almost surpassed Apple in the smartphone market so they feel the heat.

Fact is, the Samsung Galaxy S 2 is a superior product in every way.

It's lighter, thinner, faster, better screen, better camera and so on than an overpriced iPhone 4.

Apple knew Samsung would be the new leaders in the smartphone markets if they didn't stop Samsung.

Anyway, Samsung has already changed the swipe behavior so the Samsung Galaxy 2 is already legal to be sold again

i agree the samsung s2 will be the iPhone killer

I have a Galaxy S 2 since European launch. It's a good phone indeed but certainly not better than the iPhone in a large number of ways.

Battery life is very hit and miss, check out xda forums for proof. Whilst some may scrape a day, a lot of us get 10 hours tops. It has a terrible Android OS bug.

The rollout of software update is painful, resulting in most users forcing updates from other territories in order to get 2.3.4 or decent wifi signal. With Apple when there's a software update, it's available globally on iTunes for all. With Samsung Galaxy S2 it's a total joke with no universal rollout and you feel at the mercy of Samsung & carriers. I mean where the hell is my 2.3.4

Software update delivery on the Mac via Kies is also a unmitigated disaster. Worst piece of software on a Mac in a long long time.

The camera may be 8 mega pixel but it ds not do as good a job of capturing photos as the iPhone 4's with HDR. 1080p footage struggles with an aggressive autofocus and lack of detail. So much so that the iPhoe 4's 720p is better than 1080p results. Samsung's software for editing video is a joke compared to iMovie.

The keyboard and predictive text | auto correction is vastly inferior to Apples implementation. I had to download swiftey X for a better keyboard, but even then the auto correction on the iPhone remains superior.

The music application is no way near as good as standard iPod | Music application on the iPad. Though thankfully you can install double twist or ubermusic to improve this. With the iPhone you don't need to install another music player to get a quality experience - because it's already there.

Samsung's Bluetooth voice command system if infuriating in it's implementation requiring a double press to activate and then it takes a long while before accepting voice command, and when it does it fails most of the time to comprehend anything. It is useless in the car because of this.

Samsung Apps are pretty much useless (games hub / social hub etc..)

Android marketplace is definitely not as good as the iTunes app store. Whilst there may be plenty of personalization apps. Productivity, entertainment, lifestyle and games on the iTunes App Store totally eclipse the Android Marketlace. Many games and live wallpapers are not working on th galaxy S2 even though you get the message telling you they are compatible with your device leading to frustration on the store.

Whilst it's beautifully thin - the choice of plastic an the cheap plastic snap on back cover, the phone means it doesn't feel as good in the hand as the iPhone.

The screen is beautiful, but the light sensor is poor - often taking too long to adjust to the light conditions the user it utilizing the phone in.

Remote control headphone support on the S2 has less functionality (3 tap for backward and double tap forwards for track movement doesn't work at all. In fact double tapping starts the annoying Samsung voice command I have already posted about).

Speed wise in day to day usage feels no different to the iPhone 4. There is nothing that makes you feel you are using a more powerful device over the iPhone 4 despite the CPU bump and dual core.

The device can get very warm when running a game, very noticeably so. The plastic casing is not as good at dispersing the heat as the glass on the iPhone 4.

------


So yes it's a lovely phone, but iPhone 4 killer?........ Not from my ownership, if anything it has made me more eager for an iPhone 5.

 

[voonyx]

Hum...

http://www.tgdaily.com/hardware-brief/57522-samsung-has-sold-5-million-galaxy-s-ii-phones







What was I saying about egg on your face ? At least research stuff before you make bold claims against Apple's competition. Validate that your unfounded opinion at least has a basis in reality.

yeah i saw that after i made my "bold" claim haha...now let's examine the iphone side of it:

http://www.shinyshiny.tv/2011/07/iphone-the-biggest-selling-phone-in-the-world-wow.html

That's 20M in one quarter...let's make it nice and clean and say a quarter is exactly 90 days...that's about 19 million in 85 days...about 4 times what the GS2 sold in that same time-frame.

Yes, the egg is on my face for this ridiculously bold unfounded claim that the GS2 is not going to put any kind of dent in the iPhone's bottom line...

You really should do stand up because I believe I called you comical before as well. You're suggesting that releasing the GS2 in the US will suddenly make this phone sell 4 times more units in a quarter thus killing the iPhone? Or were you just pointing out my "bold" claim?

Silliness has no bounds on macrumors...

 

[MacinDoc]

I agree, I hope Apple stops copying too and then claiming they invented it.

Apple buys or licenses technology and IP (XEROX PARC and Fingerworks/multitouch, for example), then uses it in ways that had not been previously considered. Does Samsung?

 

[Therbo]

I guess Samsung arn't really worried about loss of sales, I bet they probably only sold a dozen.

They arn't popular in the UK, at all,

My mums contact was up for renewal, and the carrier was willing to give her a Samsung Galaxy for free because they literally wanted to get rid of all the stock they had, but she opted to pay an extra £100 and get an iPhone 4

 

[KnightWRX]

Yes, the egg is on my face for this ridiculously bold unfounded claim that the GS2 is not going to put any kind of dent in the iPhone's bottom line...

Nope, the egg on your face is for making a claim like "5 million in a year" and repeating that "couple of million and then disappear" stuff for over 1 page. Now should we search for all the posts where you said "Samsung is blatanly copying Apple" ?

Next time, fact check.

BTW, your 20 million figure includes the iPhone 3GS, not just the iPhone 4. And since an earlier Macrumors article pointed out the 3GS was the 2nd most sold handset model, they must have sold more than 5 million of them in a quarter, meaning your 20 million iPhone 4s per quarter is also wrong.

Just stop bashing Apple's competition. Be happy with Apple's success instead. Drop the negative attitude, if the Galaxy S2 is successful, what does it change for the iPhone's success ?

 

[PlipPlop]

Its going to be awesome when Motorolla get iphones banned from Europe for stealing the face detection during a call patent.

 

[MacinDoc]

Your drug analogy doesn't really fly because these patent disputes are all within the law and set rules by the EPO and USPTO. But I see what you mean and agree with you, but we shouldn't expect any of these companies to start a "decent patent"- revolution to change the dynamic. That's what we have regulatory bodies for, to keep the companies in check, because these companies are being run by shareholder marionettes who think of their own wallet first.

So IMO the change should come from the regulatory bodies (meaning: stop granting patents for ridiculously generic software behaviour). The companies will not change by themselves. And if there is one that will, than it will be punished for it's good behavior by the rest.

Quoted for truth.

 

[swagi]

And on the funny side:

Just look, how AI manipulates the Mac Crowd

Yes - they actually dig up that whole design stuff again, that was INVALIDATED today. But that caters to the Macheads and gives dozens of clicks.

Oh...the Flock...I'm getting RDFFS (read Reality Distortion Field Fatigue Syndrome)

 

[voonyx]

Nope, the egg on your face is for making a claim like "5 million in a year" and repeating that "couple of million and then disappear" stuff for over 1 page. Now should we search for all the posts where you said "Samsung is blatanly copying Apple" ?

Next time, fact check.

BTW, your 20 million figure includes the iPhone 3GS, not just the iPhone 4. And since an earlier Macrumors article pointed out the 3GS was the 2nd most sold handset model, they must have sold more than 5 million of them in a quarter, meaning your 20 million iPhone 4s per quarter is also wrong.

Just stop bashing Apple's competition. Be happy with Apple's success instead. Drop the negative attitude, if the Galaxy S2 is successful, what does it change for the iPhone's success ?

Did I say iPhone4 or did I say iPhone? Since you're an avid fact checker you might want to check that fact. When you do, you'll see that I said iPhone. I didn't say 20M iPhone4s sold in the quarter. Perhaps you'd like to correct my grammar too? Just make sure you don't spell it "grammer" as you do so...because it'll make you look silly like you do now after your little "fact check" diatribe.

Secondly, I don't care about either's success. I just find it funny that people out there really think that the GS2 is going to suddenly dethrone the iPhone as the best selling smartphone ever. It's pure foolishness in every sense of the word to even suggest that...

Oh and yes please do find where I said Samsung is "blatantly copying apple"...for a fact checker you sure don't present a lot of facts....

 

[weespeed]

Samsung made it easy to follow what happened in the dutch case. Straight from their website:

 

[Mattie Num Nums]

Samsung made it easy to follow what happened in the dutch case. Straight from their website:

Image

Not to mention the article mentions that Apple may have let this patent lapse in many countries.

 

[Renzatic]

I love the little pictures they use to describe the use of the patent.

"Here's a guy. Here's a guy getting railroaded by our ass backwards software patent system (holy crap, bob. I can't believe we're getting away with this). Any questions"?

I mean, yeah. That's dumb. The idea is basically an extension of using the scrollwheel on my mouse to flip through my pictures in Irfanview. Only you obviously don't have access to a scrollwheel on a touch based interface, so you, you know, use your finger.

I mean I guess Android phones could have you swipe up and down to scroll through your pics. That's an idea. But not left or right. Oh no. Much like Amazon's totally revolutionary One-Click buying technology, swiping left and right is a totally unique implementation of an abstract idea that no one can even attempt to copy for 17+ years.

And I really can't blame Apple for this. Well, I can't blame them more than any other company, anyway. They're all playing the same stupid damn game. They all have to play it. Because if they don't, they lose. And lose big.

Just ask John Mayonnaise about what happens when you don't protect your patents and trademarks.

The software patent system needs a complete rewrite.

 

[KnightWRX]

Did I say iPhone4 or did I say iPhone? Since you're an avid fact checker you might want to check that fact.

You didn't say iPhones.

I'll concede that point to you since I'm not scared to admit when I'm wrong.