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Florida Man Sues Apple for $10+ Billion, Says iOS Devices Copy His 1992 Drawings
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Seriously, this guy sucks at being a patent troll. Hope he hasn't quit his day job.
This guys should have his home taken for wasting the courts time.
Quality, looks like he didn't even have a ruler when he drew that. Diskette drive PMSL.
Think he saw a pic of the newton before its release then drew this?
Think he saw a pic of the newton before its release then drew this?
Cool. I'm going to go sue people over similar drawings I made in middle school, and then I'm going to draw a bunch more stuff I imagine we can make 20 years down the road.
What a ****ing clown.
Anyway, the Newton was well under development at that time, which reflected technology that was actually achievable in the 20th century.
What a ****ing clown.
Anyway, the Newton was well under development at that time, which reflected technology that was actually achievable in the 20th century.
Not even a patent troll in this case, just a troll in general.
For a second I thought I was reading an article at the onion.
The only important part of the whole story... "but the application was declared abandoned in April 1995 by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office after he failed to pay the required application fees". Case shouldn't even be heard and his lawyers should receive a warning about wasting everyone's time.
I'm no lawyer, but it seems to me he has no standing for a suit. Even if he did, why did he wait almost 10 years after the iPhone was launched to file a lawsuit?
In order news, Google is being sued by Herbie the self-driving car.
Sounds legit. I scribbled something with crayon when I was a toddler that looks like an iPad, maybe I was drawing rectangles at the time. I plan to sue.
Florida resident Thomas S. Ross has filed a lawsuit against Apple this week, claiming that the iPhone, iPad, and iPod infringe upon his 1992 invention of a hand-drawn "Electronic Reading Device" (ERD). The court filing claims the plaintiff was "first to file a device so designed and aggregated," nearly 15 years before the first iPhone.
Between May 23, 1992 and September 10, 1992, Ross designed three hand-drawn technical drawings of the device, primarily consisting of flat rectangular panels with rounded corners that "embodied a fusion of design and function in a way that never existed prior to 1992."Ross applied for a utility patent to protect his invention in November 1992, but the application was declared abandoned in April 1995 by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office after he failed to pay the required application fees. He also filed to copyright his technical drawings with the U.S. Copyright Office in 2014.
While the plaintiff claims that he continues to experience "great and irreparable injury that cannot fully be compensated or measured in money," he has demanded a jury trial and is seeking restitution no less than $10 billion and a royalty of up to 1.5% on Apple's worldwide sales of infringing devices.
Ross v. Apple, Inc. was filed with the Florida Southern District Court on June 27. The case number is 0:2016cv61471.
Article Link: Florida Man Sues Apple for $10+ Billion, Says iOS Devices Copy His 1992 Drawings
Love that 3 1/2 floppy option.
Not sure why you can draw something, never actually make anything and get a patent on it. They should make you display a working prototype to get a patent on anything physical and they should totally abandon issuing patents on software functionality
I would love use a 3.5'' floppy drive in my iPhone
Nice try, but a 3.5" disk drive that's about 20% of the 7" device height?! Back to school for the lessons in scale.
Until then, I thought he was onto something, using Apple's own "round cornered rectangle" patent against them.
Until then, I thought he was onto something, using Apple's own "round cornered rectangle" patent against them.