Dieter Rams and Over 100 Top Designers Support Apple in Longstanding Samsung Lawsuit

[newyorkone]

Samsung is no better than the Chinese knockoff companies like Xiaomi, etc., and it is precisely because of the copying and infringing on Apple's design that has given them an unfair advantage to catch up. Anyone saying that Apple is now copying Samsung or any of these other companies is completely ignoring that basic fact. Get a clue...

 

[mi7chy]

I'm actually waiting for Apple to fully copy the Galaxy Note. iPhone 6S Plus and iOS 10 are closer but it needs pen.

 

[I7guy]

I'm actually waiting for Apple to fully copy the Galaxy Note. iPhone 6S Plus and iOS 10 are closer but it needs pen.

Keep waiting. Although considering how much the galaxy has copied from the iPhone I'm sure some cross-pollination is inevitable.

 

[apolloa]

Not really surprising designers siding with Apple here. Shame they are clueless considering the main patent Apple won their case with is the one being made void, as Apple should never have been awarded it.

Just another day in the stupid American open to abbuse patent system.

 

[Johnny907]

And all the little Who's stood outside the courthouse, side by side in solidarity, holding hands whilst singing "Fahoo Fores Dahoo Dores, Welcome Settlement Come This Way."

 

[Solomani]

Samsung are historically a company that steal design, functionality, features, make bagloads of profit, and then glue the lawsuits in redtape for years -- until it's not a financial hit for them to pay the fine, as they've made all the money already.

Yup. Samsung's history of habitual copying started way before Apple. Just ask all those Japanese electronics companies that pioneered (innovated) all the electronics products in the 70s and 80s, they know all about Samsung.

 

[69Mustang]

Not really surprising designers siding with Apple here. Shame they are clueless considering the main patent Apple won their case with is the one being made void, as Apple should never have been awarded it.

Just another day in the stupid American open to abbuse patent system.

This. Funnily enough, the Apple Jingoist in this thread fail to understand what the amicus brief is actually supporting. The designers aren't supporting Apple per se. They are supporting Apple's position on 289. That's what they care about. If the tables were turned and Samsung was arguing for 289 to be applicable, guess who this group would be supporting? Samsung. Heck, I'm pretty sure Apple really doesn't even support their own position in this case. No one in the tech industry does. 289 is a pain in the ass to the tech industry (including Apple). It's what helps patent trolls to stay motivated, hoping for an outsized judgment. This is what the designers are supporting because they don't want design patents to lose their power. For those who don't know what 289 says:
35 U.S.C. 289 Additional remedy for infringement of design patent.
Whoever during the term of a patent for a design, without license of the owner, (1) applies the patented design, or any colorable imitation thereof, to any article of manufacture for the purpose of sale, or (2) sells or exposes for sale any article of manufacture to which such design or colorable imitation has been applied shall be liable to the owner to the extent of his total profit, but not less than $250, recoverable in any United States district court having jurisdiction of the parties. Nothing in this section shall prevent, lessen, or impeach any other remedy which an owner of an infringed patent has under the provisions of this title, but he shall not twice recover the profit made from the infringement.

 

[Zedcars]

Hmm.. Support from Google, that's odd

And Xerox too!!

You might want to re-read the article.

"The design professionals, which have collectively provided services to..."

 

[tennisproha]

Shape is important. I can tell if a woman is attractive to me just by looking at her shape.

But seriously Samsung should get sued the **** out of business.

Hmm.. Support from Google, that's odd

You read that wrong. It's a list of companies that have used the design services of the designers included in the amicus brief. Google used the design services of one of the designers. Google is not a part of the amicus brief.

 

[TechGeek76]

even Samsung itself, among others, believe that Apple is entitled to all profits that Samsung has earned from copying patented designs.

Um right, Samsung believes Apple owes them all profits? Ok.... LOL
[doublepost=1470340007][/doublepost]

Samsung copying Apple is obvious to anyone with eyes

Anyone with eyes can see the differences, including you know, the BIG HUGE Samsung planted on the front of devices? If you can't tell the difference, you need glasses. Plain and simple.

 

[Sandybox]

Well, the lawsuit is not about simple drawings, but basically manufacturing a real phone lookalike and selling it for profit.

I think most peoples have a hard time realizing how hard Industrial Design really is and how good Apple is at it.

One of the quality researched by someone like Jonathan Ive is the design feeling "natural and unavoidable". Making it like it's just obvious that a phone should look that way. And really Apple accomplish that with their design (mostly), their product like it's almost too simple, it define how you think a phone or a tablet or a computer should look like. However, that's only after the fact, because in reality, before it all, when you start from a blank sheet it is anything but obvious, it's actually really really hard to get to such a natural and simple design that work so well.

IDEO were probably leading the way in end-user-centric design focussing on real world use cases when Ive was still at school. The greatest challenge in ID is probably balancing an objects desirability with the ability to production engineer it to have the right price point and profit margin. Ive might draw simple lines but I bet it's the wider team that turn the concept into reality and $$$

 

[Black107]

I've typically only gotten glances or quick "here take a photo" experiences with the Galaxy line, but having recently received a GS7 for testing at work, I can honestly say the plagiarism in Samsung's industrial design is nothing short of shameful. If you hold this thing up next to a 6s/6s+ the likeness is unmistakeable. If this were an American company doing this they'd be dead already.

 

[TechGeek76]

Well, the lawsuit is not about simple drawings, but basically manufacturing a real phone lookalike and selling it for profit.

I think most peoples have a hard time realizing how hard Industrial Design really is and how good Apple is at it.

One of the quality researched by someone like Jonathan Ive is the design feeling "natural and unavoidable". Making it like it's just obvious that a phone should look that way. And really Apple accomplish that with their design (mostly), their product like it's almost too simple, it define how you think a phone or a tablet or a computer should look like. However, that's only after the fact, because in reality, before it all, when you start from a blank sheet it is anything but obvious, it's actually really really hard to get to such a natural and simple design that work so well.[/QUOTE]Good thing none of the phones were "real" copies then eh?

[doublepost=1470341262][/doublepost]

I've typically only gotten glances or quick "here take a photo" experiences with the Galaxy line, but having recently received a GS7 for testing at work, I can honestly say the plagiarism in Samsung's industrial design is nothing short of shameful. If you hold this thing up next to a 6s/6s+ the likeness is unmistakeable. If this were an American company doing this they'd be dead already.

If the likeness is unmistakable, you sir need glasses.

 

[developer13245]

As someone who has applied for trademarks and patents, I can say that the system is F'd up. Basically if you have money up front, you can protect your IP... Small enterprise always gets run over by bigger concerns with more $$$.

 

[Iconoclysm]

You (and others) keep misunderstanding that document. But I'm not going to stop you. Just going to grab some popcorn.

Not going to stop them...because you can't. It's plain as day, quite easy to understand. This is what complete denial looks like.
[doublepost=1470342919][/doublepost]

Or a headphone socket (oh, yeah, they solved that one maybe). A pen (oh, they have already stolen that idea for the iPad). Dustbin design for the Mac Pro (anyone remember the Cray 1?). Ultra slim laptop (early carbon shell Sony Vaio)..................

Funny, the Apple Newton had a stylus. The Cray 1 was about as similar to a Mac Pro as a Hoover is to a Dyson. Making the argument for smaller or bigger is just ridiculous. Sony wasn't the first to make a slim executive laptop, and it didn't take a genius to figure out that 5 lbs brick in your bag is a lot less convenient than a lighter one. Sure, the subnotebook category already existed...but it was Apple's entry that led the rest of the industry away from cheap plastic and off the shelf parts.
[doublepost=1470343281][/doublepost]

Copying things like color or app icon picture or being touch screen isn't illegal. It is only illegal when you copy protected stuff like patents, copyright stuff and trademarks.

Notice the lawsuit was for copying things like rounded corners and rubber bounce scroll feature. Yeah it looks like these were copied but should they be stuff that is patentable?

It is called trade dress, and it is absolutely something that can be illegal. The only thing Samsung left out of their copying of the iPhone's trade dress was putting a fruit on the back, and ruining the design with text on the front.

 

[Tom-Helge]

Samsung copying Apple is obvious to anyone with eyes

No, everyone copies everyone like everyone have done for many decades already is obvious to anyone with a brain. DEAL WITH IT.

 

[ani4ani]

That business tactics rather sounds like Apple than anybody else in the industry. Apple only claims to be the mother of all invention, but they usually just rip off smaller companies that do not have the money to defend themselves. "Being sherlocked" is the expression for that in the Apple ecosystem. Read up on it.

"At Apple, we've always been shameless about stealing." -- Steve Jobs

Apple copy as much as the next company; heck, they even copy from themselves - take a look at the iphone 7; it looks like they copied the iphone 6 /s

 

[samcraig]

Not going to stop them...because you can't. It's plain as day, quite easy to understand. This is what complete denial looks like.
[doublepost=1470342919][/doublepost]

Funny, the Apple Newton had a stylus. The Cray 1 was about as similar to a Mac Pro as a Hoover is to a Dyson. Making the argument for smaller or bigger is just ridiculous. Sony wasn't the first to make a slim executive laptop, and it didn't take a genius to figure out that 5 lbs brick in your bag is a lot less convenient than a lighter one. Sure, the subnotebook category already existed...but it was Apple's entry that led the rest of the industry away from cheap plastic and off the shelf parts.
[doublepost=1470343281][/doublepost]

It is called trade dress, and it is absolutely something that can be illegal. The only thing Samsung left out of their copying of the iPhone's trade dress was putting a fruit on the back, and ruining the design with text on the front.

I'm just going to throw this out - that the technology landscape changes - and smart companies adapt/adopt. Meaning, people on here (not you) balked about the clunky tablets in the 90s vs the iPad. However - back in the 90s - the tablets that existed were "best in breed" for what technology allowed. It's an unfair comparison. Touchscreen phones were in the pipeline of many OEMs before and during the time of the iPhone. The iPhone helped as a case-study/proof point that the public was ready - but you can't simply ignore the efforts other OEMS had made and were making in the space and write it off as copying the iPhone.

 

[Iconoclysm]

I'm just going to throw this out - that the technology landscape changes - and smart companies adapt/adopt. Meaning, people on here (not you) balked about the clunky tablets in the 90s vs the iPad. However - back in the 90s - the tablets that existed were "best in breed" for what technology allowed. It's an unfair comparison. Touchscreen phones were in the pipeline of many OEMs before and during the time of the iPhone. The iPhone helped as a case-study/proof point that the public was ready - but you can't simply ignore the efforts other OEMS had made and were making in the space and write it off as copying the iPhone.

It's interesting that you say this in a vacuum, ignoring Samsung's changing their boxes, their power adapters, their USB cables, and even putting the phone with the app drawer exposed on the front of the box so it looks even closer to the iPhone's boxes.

I'm absolutely not ignoring efforts but there is very little evidence that any of them were even trying to move in this direction outright - let alone with capacitive touch, glass over plastic, no keyboard, etc. Samsung's first attempts at this were actually Windows Mobile phones that launched after the iPhone 3G came along, and they were an absolute joke...they didn't function well at all, obviously they needed a lot more time and someone else to make the software. And that's exactly what led to their next iterations of copying the iPhone.

As for tablets in the 90's, my recollection is that they came along around 2003-2004...at least in any form that was meant to be used like a PC

 

[samcraig]

It's interesting that you say this in a vacuum, ignoring Samsung's changing their boxes, their power adapters, their USB cables, and even putting the phone with the app drawer exposed so it looks even closer to the iPhone on the boxes.

I'm absolutely not ignoring efforts but there is very little evidence that any of them were even trying to move in this direction outright - let alone with capacitive touch, glass over plastic, no keyboard, etc. Samsung's first attempts at this were actually Windows Mobile phones that launched after the iPhone 3G came along, and they were an absolute joke...they didn't function well at all, obviously they needed a lot more time and someone else to make the software. And that's exactly what led to their next iterations of copying the iPhone.

As for tablets in the 90's, my recollection is that they came along around 2003-2004.

Sorry you lost me at little evidence. Having worked for one of the major OEMs in the early 2000s I can assure you you're wrong.

 

[Iconoclysm]

Sorry you lost me at little evidence. Having worked for one of the major OEMs in the early 2000s I can assure you you're wrong.

Sorry, you're still not providing any evidence...and ignoring the part about glass over plastic, capacitive touch, etc.

Also ignoring the part before where you were lost...about Samsung copying the trade dress.

 

[Rogifan]

Ha, Samsung actually used drawings from an Watch patent filing in one of their wearables patent filings. No where in their patent do they reference Apple or Watch.

http://www.patentlyapple.com/patent...design-figures-in-a-recent-patent-filing.html

 

[samcraig]

Sorry, you're still not providing any evidence...and ignoring the part about glass over plastic, capacitive touch, etc.

Also ignoring the part before where you were lost...about Samsung copying the trade dress.

I and others have posted about this topic dozens of times. Zzzzz. Sorry, I just don't feel like rehashing everything yet again.

 

[Iconoclysm]

I and others have posted about this topic dozens of times. Zzzzz. Sorry, I just don't feel like rehashing everything yet again.

Well, I'm sorry, but I've seen the stuff you posted before - none of which can prove this was the direction Samsung was going. Especially when it still took almost 3 years for them to adopt the glass, capacitive touch, and more AFTER the first iPhone launched. If they were on that path, they'd have definitely responded more quickly than the Omnia II.

Also, http://www.patentlyapple.com/patent...design-figures-in-a-recent-patent-filing.html

This company copies, it's their MO.

 

[rjohnstone]

Well, I'm sorry, but I've seen the stuff you posted before - none of which can prove this was the direction Samsung was going. Especially when it still took almost 3 years for them to adopt the glass, capacitive touch, and more AFTER the first iPhone launched. If they were on that path, they'd have definitely responded more quickly than the Omnia II.

Also, http://www.patentlyapple.com/patent...design-figures-in-a-recent-patent-filing.html

This company copies, it's their MO.

Now go read the patent and see it in context.
http://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PG01&p=1&u=/netahtml/PTO/srchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1="20160223992".PGNR.&OS=DN/20160223992&RS=DN/20160223992

The images are used to describe prior art and list some of the many different scenarios and design needs for attaching a wearable device. (perfectly legal)
This is done all the time. It's used to give the examiner some frame of reference.

They are not listed in the claims, therefore they are not making any claim to the design.

Digging deeper into the claims, it looks like they're describing a "smart" strap or strap with some built in functionality.