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Samsung's Never-Ending Battle With Apple Over 'Slide to Unlock' May be Headed to Supreme Court
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I'll second your post. Easily twice as often. Scott leaving was the first of Tim's MANY mistakes. Some day way down the road all the "SJ's Temper" crowd will see what an A** the current COO can be. Oops, CEO.
Such a ridiculous thing to be fighting over. It's a touch screen, sliding touches are bound to be part of using it. The patent system needs a serious kick up the rear end.
Face it, there's a reason the iPhone made smartphones mainstream. This was part of the iPhone's unique and amazing UI when it first came out. People are saying features like this are generic now that everyone copied basically their entire design. I'm not sure about individually patenting "slide to unlock," but Google and Samsung deserve a loss for blatantly ripping off iOS's UI design. And it should have happened a long time ago, before they had a chance to grab so much market share/influence with it. The precedent they set encourages people to copy rather than produce originality.
It made me sad when I read the Steve Jobs biography and got to the part where he called up Eric Schmidt to complain about Android and received an "I don't know what you're talking about" reply.
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It made me sad when I read the Steve Jobs biography and got to the part where he called up Eric Schmidt to complain about Android and received an "I don't know what you're talking about" reply.
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It's still just a half-touch if you use Touch ID.
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I don't understand why you are pressing the button after doing TouchID. The phone unlocks as soon as it recognizes your finger print.
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I was annoyed at this too until they added the feature where you raise your phone to see notifications. Now I don't even think about it, I just look at my phone and see them.
You can change that in settings so it behaves like before, as in you don't have to press the button.
Settings-General-Accessibility-HomeButton-Rest finger to open
On the whole slide to unlock as a feature issue, I don't miss it as I find Touch ID to be quick and very convenient. But I don't wear gloves hardly ever.
Uses battery on my 7 Plus. Even the slightest movement makes it turn on. In addition sometimes it just doesnt work
It "just works" for me though. I haven't noticed it randomly turning on though. And whatever battery it does use, it's worth it.
I must admit that I don't know any of the technical details of the Apple mechanism, the Neonode mechanism, nor the lawsuit with Samsung. That being said, your argument has no foundation: an idea cannot be patented; the method used to achieve the idea is what's patentable. If Apple designed a method that was different from Neonode's (which it seems they did as Neonode didn't use a capacitive screen) then that's all that matters. Likewise, if Samsung infringed on Apple's method then they can be held accountable.
Every story like this you go on about the idea, but that means nothing.
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Because Apple not using it now doesn't change history and make it ok for Samsung to use then.
"Your Honour, my client is not guilty of stealing a box of WidgetSupreme. He did do it, but in the two years it took to get his case to trial the company stopped making them, so why is the Crown [State] still fighting him?"
Ever tried with a finger that is slightly damp?
Some of us have sweaty hands that are beyond our control and removing the slide to unlock feature introduces unnecessary frustrations.
Legally speaking, yes you're right, but how many times does Apple have to lose a court battle over a feature it's ultimately abandoned anyway? After a point, the law of diminishing returns shows it's ugly head. I'd thought that point had long since come and gone, but evidently I underestimated Tim Cook's pettiness.
You DO know that Apple holds many patents that are 'ideas' right? Not in physical form but just some drawings and text. It makes a complete mockery of your comment.
As for the legality, I suggest you read up in the German case then as they threw Apples case out twice, basing on prior art including Neonode and other things, so again your making a comment against something that is fact.
The thing is, I would not know beforehand that my registered finger would not work. Sometimes it works while slightly damped. (In other words, an unreliable and inconsistent system)
So, logically, I would try to use the registered fingers first. And if the phone refuses to recognize that finger, I would still need to press the home button more than 2 times to get to the passcode screen.
Here is an example of a situation and the difference between iOS 10 and iOS 9:
Pre-condition: Finger slightly damped.
In iOS 9: Slide to show the passcode screen immediately knowing the finger is slightly damped and may not work with touch ID instead of wasting time gambling to see if it works.
In iOS 10: Press the home button furiously, knowing that it may or may not recognize the fingerprint and pray for the phone show the passcode screen.
That is the issue here. I can't control when does the phone show me the passcode screen so that I can unlock the thing quickly. Sometimes, those 2 seconds wasted are important time that were wasted.
Lastly, as we all know for a fact that the home button (on iPhones with a physical home button) is one of the most vulnerable hardware that is prone to failure. With iOS 10, we need to press that button more than before which could potentially cause it to fail prematurely.
Touch ID is fairly reliable with some limitations. Those limitations don't make it unreliable or inconsistent in the bigger sense. I've been using touchid since the 5s days and I find it overall to be reliable and consistent. Touch id doesn't work with everyones fingerprints, or maybe when dirty or damp, but that does not make it not a worthwhile technology.
I don't have any real issues with touch id so for me it's a time-saver. If you are having issues, turn it off and wait for touchid II in the iphone 8. I may remediate some of the wet/damp/dirty finger issues. There is no magic bullet.
As far as the home button, my analogy is I drive my car hard and don't worry if the engine will prematurely fail. Same with the home button, I use the phone, home button, charge as needed, etc. It's a tool that is easily replaced. (I did replace it with an iphone 7, but my 6s is still active)
There are people who post who have continuing problems with touch id, but from what I've seen around family and friends, it's not a pervasive issue, at least in my circles.
It shows how ridiculous the patent it. I mean considering Apple took Samsung to court across the world with the patent, and courts outside America have thrown it out, it has a lot to do with American cases. As I said hopefully the Supreme Court will invalidate the patent too, it seems to have reversed a few Apple wins against Samsung...
But that doesn't address the issue that in the US, there is a looming issue for Samsung. Samsung loses this and they will have to pay. Of course anything is possible and as the attorneys say: "win some, lose some".
It speaks to the patent's validity. It also points out some of the US court system's foibles.
2013 - The German (and Dutch) cases were decided by judges with technical backgrounds, who looked at the prior art and quickly invalidated the slide-to-unlock patent.
2014 - The US case was originally decided by a lay jury, who... without such technical background, and without seeing the prior art... apparently put a lot of stock in the fact that the patent was granted, not realizing that doesn't necessarily mean it actually should've been.
2016 - Later on, a set of three patent knowledgeable US judges threw out the jury verdict and invalidated the patent.
2016 - Six months later, a different set of judges surprised everyone by (totally out of the blue) deciding that because the three judges above had seen more prior art than the jury had, the jury verdict... which was based on less evidence and knowledge... should be reinstated. They also refused to hear more evidence themselves. In short, they cared less about actual validity, than about legal technicalities.
- The original three judges filed dissenting opinions designed to give Samsung ammunition for a SCOTUS appeal. Moreover, most of the patent legal community... including the nation's top authority on patent law... also is upset with that set of judges weakening the obviousness test for patents, something which goes against a previous SCOTUS ruling. Not to mention refusing to hear more arguments before making such a surprising decision.
It was so controversial an action, even Apple's own counsel seemed surprised.
See: http://www.fosspatents.com/2016/11/federal-circuit-unsurprisingly-upholds.html
Thus we come to today, where everyone is wondering if / how Samsung will file an appeal to the Supreme Court.
It is important to read the original article: http://www.fosspatents.com/2017/02/samsung-is-now-taking-second-apple-v.html
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