Well now we're back into requiring an alternate universe. The iPod and the iPhone are two different devices with different markets and competition. So no - you can't compare.
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Japanese Court Rules Apple Does Not Infringe on Samsung Patents
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Well now we're back into requiring an alternate universe. The iPod and the iPhone are two different devices with different markets and competition. So no - you can't compare.
That's a good indication, I agree. My reply to kdarling was just meant to point out that it's something that may be hard to prove, and is a very weak method to show that these feautures doesn't have value. Let's look at this from a different angle, if the features had no value, why did Samsung feel the need to copy the features to begin with.
It all depends on if they blatantly copied the feature, or if they accidentally infringed. There is a marked difference between the two, and the latter happens far more often than most people around here think.
Those who have followed this may remember the over 100 page comparative design analysis of the Samsung interface and iOS including suggested changes for Samsungs UI to become more iOS like.
You can look at what the competition is doing to improve your own product. There's nothing illegal about that, so long as you're not directly lifting features wholesale without any changes made to the base design.
It's an iterative process. Taking a basic idea from elsewhere, and changing it to either improve upon it, or to fit your own needs. Everyone does it, including Apple. It's how progress is ultimately made.
Case in point, would you want to go back to iOS' old notification system, or do you prefer the spiffied up Android-like setup seen in iOS6 and 7? What about Control Center? Android had something like it for years now. Apple took the same concept and fit it into iOS. It's similar, but not exactly the same. Though it's obvious that they did build upon an idea introduced elsewhere.
Same with iOS 7's new multitasking setup. It's almost directly lifted from WebOS. Is Apple guilty of copying Palm?
No matter which side you cheerlead for, you can always point out something that your side came up with on their own, and something the other side aped from the competition. No one exists in a vacuum, and no one company currently operating can lay claim to inventing an entire OS, it's features and subsystems wholesale.
Wrong person. Wasn't to me
Yep, and that's what patent infringement awards are for. Samsung got hit heavy for those.
My post went off on a tangent about the requirements to get a sales injunction based on lost profits. That's what requires a patented feature to be a sales driver. I.e. you can't have lost profits if the other device would've sold anyway. Sorry I wasn't clear about that.
You implied that it was accidental in the prior post. I reminded you about documents showing that it was anything but accidental, and now you are making a different point.
I addressed you and the subject directly, but I'll go ahead and say it again.
Looking at what the competition is doing isn't definitive proof that you're copying. It's simply "look at what they're doing better than us. How can we improve".
That design document wasn't as much of a smoking gun as you think it was.
Wrong person. Wasn't to me
Yep, and that's what patent infringement awards are for. Samsung got hit heavy for those.
My post went off on a tangent about the requirements to get a sales injunction based on lost profits. That's what requires a patented feature to be a sales driver. I.e. you can't have lost profits if the other device would've sold anyway. Sorry I wasn't clear about that.
Ah, ok I see.
Of course, but it shows that it wasn't accidental, which is what you said first. It showed that they were very much aware. And seeing the actual interfaces you could see the similarities as well.
I actually read the entire document, and most of it was generic UI stuff. Like "We should have fun animations, too".
Moreover, out of the over 100 suggestions in there, only a handful were ever implemented... and those were things like "Make End Call Button bigger" or "Use Microphone image in voice recorder", stuff which is hardly Apple specific.
None of that has any relation to a utility patent fight anyway. Patents can't cover an idea, but only how it's implemented, and THAT is what is almost always accidental. E.g. how global search is done internally.
In any case, Samsung changed to be non-infringing years ago... and sales skyrocketed for them. To me, that's clear proof that the features were not essential sales drivers. (Do you know anyone who didn't buy a Samsung simply because it didn't have the same slide-to-unlock? Or rubberbanding? )
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While I haven't read the entire document, none of what I have seen was that generic. It's specifically comparing different parts of the Galaxy and the iPhone user interfaces and includes suggested changes for Samsung to include the feature mentioned on iOS. The existence of that document shows that the similarities that was seen in the early galaxies was not accidental at all, but for most people that was evident by just looking at the devices however.
Samsung, which wasn't as big on phones prior to the touch smart phones managed to establish itself early on by piggy backing on the iPhone success IMO.
You missed both of their points. The document doesn't prove what you think it proves. It only shows analysis.
Further - Apple managed to establish itself early on as well by piggy backing on the entire cell phone industry's rich history of innovation. As they should have. As any company should.
No. Since they have done the analysis, they are aware, changes that are similar are not accidental.
What Apple did with the iPhone was vastly different from what was available at the time. If you don't see that, then the only reasonable explanation I can come up with is amnesia.
And yet without the innovations of other companies - they would have been nowhere. I'm not the one with amnesia. I just give credit to the millions of patents, R&D, infrastructure, design, creativity, etc that existed before Apple brought out the iPhone. I give credit to Apple for pushing the industry forward as well. But they didn't do that in a bubble.
Apple didn't invent the phone, I never said that they did. It's an absurd thing to say.
You're creating a straw man.
I said "Further - Apple managed to establish itself early on as well by piggy backing on the entire cell phone industry's rich history of innovation. As they should have. As any company should."
Then you said "What Apple did with the iPhone was vastly different from what was available at the time. If you don't see that, then the only reasonable explanation I can come up with is amnesia."
Apple couldn't have done what they did without all that came before them. I never said you said Apple invented the phone.
Hardly absurd. You seem to want to ignore the flow of the thread and isolate your posts. At least that's all I can think of on why you would find my post absurd.
No worries. And no need to continue going back and forth.
Hardly. I'm agreeing with your point. It's a different point than I made, but I agree.