Jury Members Discuss Thought Process Behind Apple vs. Samsung Verdict

[slattery69]

They were completely obvious, which is why every phone before the iPhone had them.

Oh, wait, THEY DIDN'T.

Just like using a click wheel to pick from a scrolling list was an obvious solution to working with a large music library. But nobody did it before Apple.

That's the process Apple goes through, tries a hundred different options, tests them on real people, sees what they do when they fiddle with a device, and eventually comes up with an interface that is "obvious".

didnt synaptics come up with the click wheel? apple just gave them a guide as to what they wanted ?

 

[leongcy]

Honestly I couldn't care less about the "bounce back" feature. I never even noticed it until you mentioned it. I use both phones on a daily basis and I don't see the suggested copying. It's like saying Ford copied GM coz they both have a steering wheel. Yes some things look similar but sometimes there is no other way of doing things. My flat screen TV looks and works pretty much like all the other flat screen TVs out there. So what happens now. Samsung smartphones are banned in the US. Then what? Apple sues the other Android makers so that we end up with no competition. It's just Apple and Microsoft again. I'm sure Apple would love that but I think that would be a disaster for consumers in the US.

Of course you don't care. You didn't patent the bounce back feature. Apple did, Samsung thought it was "smart" to copy it and got sued for it, amongst other things. Your flat screen TV argument is silly. Check the patent office and see if there are general patents for a flat screen TV. I bet you will find none. Therein lies the difference. There might be certain components and tech in the TV that are patented and in order for other companies to use the, they have to pay a fee/royalty to the original patent owner. Otherwise, patent owner is well entitled to sue!

I find the no competition hilarious and downright funny. You are saying that, because Samsung and Android in general are not allowed to copy Apple's patents there is less innovation?these companies can either pay for licensing fees and deal with the lower margins they get, OR come up with their own ideas. Why do they need bounce back if the consumer doesn't really care? Why not think of some other form of illustration or just get rid of it completely? Why not do their own market resrarch and come up with original idead that consuners want in their devices? Not everything that Apple does is perfect, but at least they think about it themselves Competition thrives when there is innovation, not copying.

 

[GadgetDon]

It would be greatly appreciated if you didn't skew reality to your own liking.

Secondly, a grid of icons ALWAYS existed before the iPhone as did many of the other idiotic 'patents'. Rounded corners??? Are you kidding me?

I've said before that I don't think much of the trade dress stuff.

But having done some UI work on a far lesser scale than Apple works at - the goal is to come up with something that seems absolutely obvious, and that doesn't just spring magically from the forehead like the birth of Athena. It's long hard work to get to that "obvious" point.

So you can invest the years and the money to develop it - or you can wait for someone else to do so and steal it. Samsung chose (b).

 

[tdream]

Like the court in Korea who sided with Samsung? Did you wring your hands over that one?

The court in Korea fined both companies for being ridiculous. Did you not get the facts for that one?

And even if they did side with Samsung wholly, you just proven how home 'literally' court advantage changes the decision outright. Which was my entire point to begin with.

You can't say, hey Korea sided with Samsung and then go on to say American courts sided with Apple, therefore it's fair and balanced. That doesn't make any sense.

The people in south Vietnam that we abandoned might disagree.

Yeah pick the outlier and make it the rule. That makes sense... NOT

 

[BvizioN]

Hopefully this outrageous Decision will be over turned in favour of Sammy.

We got a new name for Sammy. Shamy.
Or if you prefer, CopyCat Sammy

 

[MuppetGate]

I'm not blaming the jurors, I'm blaming the system that put them in this position. I don't think the jury system is the right system for highly technical cases like these. They should have some form of national IP court manned by specialist judges who can hear and decide upon these cases.

Jurors in murder cases are not experts in forensic science. Jurors in fraud cases are not accountants.

The lawyers' job is to present the evidence in such a way that a jury can make an informed decision. There's nothing technical about it.

PS I wonder if the decision had gone the other way you would be shouting out what a bunch of idiots the jury was, I rather think so.

And if it had gone Samsung's way then you wouldn't be arguing for a "national IP court managed by specialist judges."
Perhaps you shouldn't make assumptions about what people would and wouldn't do if the outcome had been different.


Folk should remember that the jury's findings had nothing to do with the size and shape of the devices, so they were smart enough in that regard.

 

[BvizioN]

This link explains it all: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2012082510525390

The jury was just lazy.

Yes, it does explain it exactly the way you want to hear/believe it

 

[tech4all]

Typical arrogant American. And you wonder why so many people around the world hate you.

 

[MuppetGate]

Highly doubt the $1.05B will stick.

"We wanted to make sure the message we sent was not just a slap on the wrist," Hogan said. "We wanted to make sure it was sufficiently high to be painful, but not unreasonable."

Per the jury instructions:

The amount of those damages must be adequate to compensate the patent holder for the infringement. A damages award should put the patent holder in approximately the financial position it would have been in had the infringement not occurred, but in no event may the damages award be less than a reasonable royalty. You should keep in mind that the damages you award are meant to compensate the patent holder and not to punish an infringer.

Did Hogan say that in court?

The amount doesn't really matter. I doubt that the jury could actually award an amount high enough to make a difference to either Apple or Samsung.

Apple sought to show companies that when it comes to protecting its IP then it will go to the wire.

I think they've done that.

----------

Microsoft was not a monopoly either until the governments
(Europe first, then the U.S.) deemed them too controlling and powerful (and RICH). Now Apple is going to be viewed in the same light.

Microsoft was not prosecuted for being a monopoly. They were prosecuted for using their monopoly position to keep competitors out of the market.

Apple is not a monopoly and doesn't have the power to bar entry to the market.

 

[tdream]

http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=2012082510525390

"If the jury instructions [PDF] are as long and complex as they were in this case, a quick verdict can indeed mean it shirked its duty. For example, if the jury rushed so much it assigned $2 million dollars to Apple, and then had to subtract it because there was no infringement, it raises a valid question: what was the basis for any of the damages figures the jury came up with? If they had any actual basis, how could they goof like this? Was there a factual basis for any of the damages figures?

Time will tell, but keep in mind that one of the plays you'll see next will likely be a Rule 50(b) motion by Samsung, and that's the one where you ask the judge for various relief on the basis that no reasonable jury could find what it did find on the evidence presented."


"We wanted to make sure the message we sent was not just a slap on the wrist," Hogan said. "We wanted to make sure it was sufficiently high to be painful, but not unreasonable."

"I'm sure Samsung is glad they are talking, though. Had they read the full jury instructions, all 109 pages [as PDF], they would have read that damages are not supposed to punish, merely to compensate for losses. Here's what they would have found in Final Jury Instruction No. 35, in part:

The amount of those damages must be adequate to compensate the patent holder for the infringement. A damages award should put the patent holder in approximately the financial position it would have been in had the infringement not occurred, but in no event may the damages award be less than a reasonable royalty. You should keep in mind that the damages you award are meant to compensate the patent holder and not to punish an infringer.


-----

Should be easy for Samsung to trim down the $1B awarded to Apple.

Good post. I thought the same myself. Immediately after the verdict, only the Judge recognised the mistake. The mistake and the speed of deliberations one can only conclude they had already made up their minds and the only process left to decide was damages. Even in cases where they did not find Samsung liable for infringement.

This Hogan spokesman sound like either a ringer or he did not read and comply with the full jury instructions, which shows incompetence. Apparently he equates compensation and punishment as equals. The phone that has been used in most comparisons is the Galaxy S. Do you really think this phone had much of an impact on iPhone sales. I do not.

If you are interested in good legal coverage, don't waste your time with Groklaw - it's a free software advocacy site (which is fine), but their all of their analysis goes through that filter. Which is why they have been so wrong about this case.

Oh that's nice, smear a site which which would be considered to be the most neutral and balanced because it's a free software advice site. Please apply all filters fairly and consider most of the posts on this site non objective because of the name of this site.

 

[iEvolution]

Jurors in murder cases are not experts in forensic science. Jurors in fraud cases are not accountants.

The lawyers' job is to present the evidence in such a way that a jury can make an informed decision. There's nothing technical about it.



And if it had gone Samsung's way then you wouldn't be arguing for a "national IP court managed by specialist judges."
Perhaps you shouldn't make assumptions about what people would and wouldn't do if the outcome had been different.


Folk should remember that the jury's findings had nothing to do with the size and shape of the devices, so they were smart enough in that regard.

Actually there are two shape based patents that were "violated", the grid layout with "rounded corner" icons and the shape of the front of the iPhone.

This isn't a victory for consumers, it's a victory for Apple. Not one single consumer is going to benefit from this verdict.

The fact companies can be sued for shapes and the most basic navigation concepts of the touch screen just goes to show how ridiculous the patent system is.

Further, this gives the go ahead for Apple to sue several other phone makers for theses silly patent violations. Victory through litigation, class act Apple has become.

 

[r3m1]

Link to article? Hard to comment on out-of-context statements.

That aside, how are jurors picked in the UK?

Both sides get to voir dire prospects from (iirc) 72 in the original pool, down to 9 (plus some alternates). From what I've read, the process here requires less stringent justification than other countries. For instance, either side can have a certain number dismissed for no reason - something not done in the UK. That means that, if anything, a jury here is likely more balanced [between parties].

Here is the source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentis...ng-quest-global-tech-domination?newsfeed=true

It's only fair to note that Apple fans are ecstatic at the prospect. They are eager to live in the embrace of their favorite company, and believe they get a safer and smoother experience by doing so. But those of us who believe we should be able to use what we buy the way we want to use it are less enthralled. We don't want Apple, or any other company, dictating – in fundamental ways – how we compute and communicate. Yet, that is precisely where we may be heading.

And what of the patent process that has given Apple such leverage?

Richard Posner, a well-respected federal judge in another Apple-versus-Android case (this one, which he threw out of court, involved Google's Motorola unit), has famously called said there are "serious problems" with the current patent system, warranting an overhaul. We're stuck with what we have for the moment, however.

And if Apple can abuse that off-the-rails system to thwart innovation and the iterative process that sees all tech companies build on the successes of the past, the most valuable company in the world will have more power than what it has richly earned through smart business practices.

The cases in Seoul, San Jose and around the world are about everyone's future. For people who believe in competition in technology, and freedom in how we use it, Friday's events were bleak, indeed.

I hope that Apple users will look beyond the fanboy-ims and see what the implications are.

 

[Icaras]

This.

Are you still trying to convince this forum and the world that Apple is big brother?

Tro- I mean try harder.

 

[Abazigal]

But I find that description quite modest. I think its total effing horsehockey. They got a patent on something as obvious as 'pinch to zoom' ??? My dad, who is technologically inept and has never used a smartphone ever of any kind saw my HTC Glacier for the first time when I was showing him some pictures on the phone. When he wanted to zoom, on his own he pinched to zoom and I asked 'uh, how did you know to zoom like that?'

His response: Because... it just felt obvious.

And thats where Apple should never have gotten these ridiculous patents. None of them are anything special, all of those patents are obvious features. That bounce effect when scrolling down a page is just like a ball falling down and bouncing back up or a stack of papers falling down and bending as it lands.
[/url]

For something that was bleedingly obviously, the industry at that time certainly seemed nowhere close to implementing such features, from the direction RIM and Nokia were headed. RIM was fixated with their physical keyboards, while Nokia continued to churn out dumbphone after dumbphone. Samsung was just being Samsung and having problems choosing which company to pirate next.

Likewise, if these patents were nowhere special, why did companies like Samsung insist on copying them at all costs, despite knowing fully well the likely repercussions? Is the rubber-banding scrolling feature that important that you die-die got to have it in a phone? Samsung apparently felt it was, innocuous as this feature may seem to you. They could just as easily have left it out of their OS and created one less headache for themselves.

Steve Jobs believed it was a special enough feature that he couldn't stop crowing about it in the iphone keynote, and it seems he may have been right.

So yeah, it may seem obvious, but that doesn't change the fact that it took a then fledgling company $150 million to research and implement, or that other companies at looking at copying it shamelessly. That just doesn't feel right to me.

I believe that as we look back in history, much as some are loathe to, we have to give Apple credit for ushering in certain novel concepts, many we often take for granted.

But why would anyone want to protect and glorify a company that wants to limit competition, choice and innovation (save for its own) and rape the consumer with their artificially inflated prices? All to just show off their deep connection to a logo as if it gives them social status?

I am not defending anyone here. I don't see how Apple's prices can be construed as overpriced anymore when their competitors are having problems coming out with equivalent alternatives and charging comparable prices.

Are you telling me there is only one way to build a phone, one way to scroll in a window and only one way to design the features in an OS? I am sure there are many other ways, just that no one else bothers to research what these are anymore because they can get access to just as great ideas for free - by copying directly from apple.

It is this laziness, and this general reluctance to take risks, that is stifling innovation, not Apple. How it is innovation when you are faced with a future where the only choices of phones are an iphone, or a blatant iphone-knockoff?

I'm absolutely disgusted by what Apple has become... it used to be the superior underdog but now its become everything theyve stood against starting from their ridiculously hypocritical 1984 commercial

The way I see it, Apple has great ideas, and through hard work and a lot of luck, are simply enjoying the fruits of their labour. Nobody is twisting your arm and forcing you to purchase an Apple product (unlike microsoft). Apple is doing it the good old fashioned way - by actually making a product that doesn't suck and which people want. Why would I want a netbook without a keyboard that syncs with a computer running an OS used by less than 10% of the world? Well, apparently, 70% of the consumers do.

 

[mikerr]

Interesting post that the trial result is backfiring on apple:

"People in starbucks think this means Samsungs are the same as Apple, so why buy Apple?":

https://plus.google.com/110619855408549015935/posts/NPTWKSQEHLi

Though I'm not sure people are really that stupid

 

[GadgetDon]

Here is the source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentis...ng-quest-global-tech-domination?newsfeed=true

It's only fair to note that Apple fans are ecstatic at the prospect. They are eager to live in the embrace of their favorite company, and believe they get a safer and smoother experience by doing so. But those of us who believe we should be able to use what we buy the way we want to use it are less enthralled. We don't want Apple, or any other company, dictating – in fundamental ways – how we compute and communicate. Yet, that is precisely where we may be heading.

I hope that Apple users will look beyond the fanboy-ims and see what the implications are.

Here's the main way Apple is "dictating" the way we communicate - by creating breakthrough products that change the way we want to communicate.

There were Smartphones before the iPhone. And any companies that wish to sell those types of Smartphones can do so without a hint of a tut tut from Apple's legal department. Or any company that says, Apple showed there are new ways to look at Smartphones, let's come up with something else.

What the Guardian is protecting is the right to take advantage of the work Apple did to upend what the public thinks a Smartphone should be without doing the work.

 

[theluggage]

Your flat screen TV argument is silly. Check the patent office and see if there are general patents for a flat screen TV.

I saw Philips publicity material talking about flat-screen TVs 'coming real soon now' back in the 70s. Actual working flat-panel TVs have been around for years to anybody with huge wads of cash so it's likely that any design patents are long gone.

...and there are bound to be heaps of patents covering the finer details, but all the major manufacturers will have mutual cross-licensing deals. This is the real flaw with the patent deal, since it makes it very difficult for new players without a thick patent portfolio to join the clique. That's the trend that Apple is bucking.

The court in Korea fined both companies for being ridiculous. Did you not get the facts for that one?

You can't compare international cases in this way. Different countries have different IP laws, companies hold different patents/trademarks/copyrights in different jurisdictions, and lawyers decide what patents to assert, what evidence to present depending on local conditions...

Both court decisions could easily be correct, according to the local rules. Equally, there may be a home turf advantage simply because the local team understands the local rules better - nothing to do with bias.

 

[ade2bee]

Let's thank out lucky stars that not all companies did not take the same attitude as Apple or have the same copyright/patent systems... Can you imagine only one company being able to use the wheel, or the way the foot pedals are in a car, the way you ride your bike.

i hope this come back and bites Apple in the ass... the only people who suffer here are consumers

 

[mastertang]

After Apple has been sued by other companies to get more money for standard essential patents, I have zero issue with them suing another company and winning because that company fine tuned their interface to provide a near-identical user experience (and copied the packaging for that matter).

Reverse engineering is not innovation. Even Windows 8 is more innovative to some degree.

 

[alexN350z]

Without producing a new phone in 2years 3month, they spent all their resource in the court.

 

[Collected]

The problem with the "After the iPhone, phones began to look like this..." argument is before the iPhone were HTC devices that featured a tall glass screen and rectangle design.

 

[tdream]

You can't compare international cases in this way. Different countries have different IP laws, companies hold different patents/trademarks/copyrights in different jurisdictions, and lawyers decide what patents to assert, what evidence to present depending on local conditions...

Both court decisions could easily be correct, according to the local rules. Equally, there may be a home turf advantage simply because the local team understands the local rules better - nothing to do with bias.

Everything to do with bias unfortunately. You need to point and show bias where there is otherwise the general public will think it was an objective conclusion. I don't believe it was.

Take the outspoken juror Velvin Hogan, the guy is a patent holder and he managed to become the jury spokesman. How objective can a patent holder be in a patent infringement case? Non whatsoever in my opinion.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-...ay-have-leaned-on-engineer-patent-holder.html

Manuel Ilagan, said

"It didn't dawn on us [that we agreed that Samsung had infringed] on the first day," Ilagan said. "We were debating heavily, especially about the patents on bounce-back and pinch-to-zoom. Apple said they owned patents, but we were debating about the prior art [about similar technology that Samsung said existed before the iPhone debuted]. [Velvin] Hogan was jury foreman. He had experience. He owned patents himself...so he took us through his experience. After that it was easier. After we debated that first patent -- what was prior art --because we had a hard time believing there was no prior art."
"In fact we skipped that one," Ilagan continued, "so we could go on faster. It was bogging us down."

http://news.cnet.com/8301-13579_3-57500358-37/exclusive-apple-samsung-juror-speaks-out/

So once Hogan got everyone on board, skipping parts he deemed irrelevent ,the rest of the process was simples. Calculate compensatory damages, but Hogan wanted punitive damages. Again showing inability to carry out the jury instructions and wanting a quick deliberation to end the trial from a current patent owner.

Now this is only a tiny miniscule fraction of words coming from the jurors, God knows what they were actually doing and thinking in there. And throw in the mistakes for inducement and incorrectly adding up all the damages. The whole thing reeks of railroading. Seriously, they might as well have held the case in Apple HQ.

As a commentator on another forum said "We'll give em a fair trial, then we'll hang em". That's justice ... US style.

 

[theluggage]

Oh that's nice, smear a site which which would be considered to be the most neutral and balanced because it's a free software advice site. Please apply all filters fairly and consider most of the posts on this site non objective because of the name of this site.

No, it was a fair point. Groklaw is, and always has been, an advocate for the pro-free-software side of the argument. What they did in the case of SCO vs IBM was present the pro-Linux side of the argument in a rational way, backing up their points with evidence and carefully explaining the relevant law - basically what a good advocate should do in an ideal courtroom. For that, they deserve respect - but for pity's sake don't confuse that with being 'neutral and balanced' (and don't confuse 'being biassed' with 'being wrong').

Of course, it helped that - as it turned out - that Linux didn't violate any UNIX IP, even if it had SCO didn't actually own the IP they were suing over, and even if they had owned it they signed away their right to sue when they re-distributed Linux under the GPL... Apple vs. Samsung is a positive moral maze compared to that...

Sadly, once SCO vs IBM started to fizzle out and Groklaw started dealing with cases that actually did have two sides, the quality of articles took a nosedive. In the good old days, they would be posting articles explaining what "trade dress" was, intelligent arguments about why 'pinch-to-zoom' shouldn't be patentable or what the requirements were for valid 'prior art'. Instead, they're posting the same 'ZOMG here's a fuzzy picture of some sort of tablet in a 70s SF film!' drivel you can get from a dozen blogs.

One thing that, in the past, you would never see in Groklaw lead articles, was any idle suggestion that the judge or jury were incompetent or corrupt (reasoned criticism, maybe, discussion of possible grounds for appeal, but no name calling). The last posting on AvS that I saw gleefuly jumped on the 'SCOOP - there was an arithmetical error on the juror form and 2 of the 700 tickboxes contradicted each other so obviously the jury was clueless' band wagon, then pulled a quote from the jury forman out of context so that it sounded as if they'd ignored the Jury instructions in their whole deliberation (it was actually in reference to the 'mistakes', saying they could fix them without new instructions - i.e. 'whups! typo!').

I think maybe the Chap 11 phase of the SCO case has destroyed someone's respect for the legal system...

 

[mastertang]

Let's thank out lucky stars that not all companies did not take the same attitude as Apple or have the same copyright/patent systems... Can you imagine only one company being able to use the wheel, or the way the foot pedals are in a car, the way you ride your bike.

i hope this come back and bites Apple in the ass... the only people who suffer here are consumers

I would consider those standard essential patents, except for the bike example which is not computing in my weak mind.

I would appreciate better examples of how this is harming consumers. Everybody is making expensive phones using similar price models. The only thing I know is many of my Android-using friends have gone through 3-4 phones due to malfunctions while I am on my original phone. And not all were covered under warranty.

They may be bit in the ass when the patent system is (maybe one day ) overhauled to make some of the simple patents like the ones argued fall into SEP territory so that they can't be used unfairly. I don't deny there is some gray in there, but Samsung could not have been more crystal clear in this case about carbon-copying a competitor's product.

 

[GadgetDon]

The problem with the "After the iPhone, phones began to look like this..." argument is before the iPhone were HTC devices that featured a tall glass screen and rectangle design.

And the HTC devices used multitouch with click to zoom, a touch gesture to unlock the phone, etc.?

Before the iPhone, you can point to a few phones and say "hey, that's got one thing similar to the iPhone. After the iPhone, you point to most phones and "hey, that's got one or two things different from the iPhone".