Woody wrote: And, by paying in nickles, Samsung has turned this into a massive advertising campaign that people will talk about for a long time.
Woody, I think you may have missed the early part of the thread. This never happened, Samsung hasn't paid anything yet.
Tom_Spangler wrote:Max_Archer wrote: I've been considering a Samsung phone to replace the iPhone I'm currently using, but I'm not sure if I want to encourage a company that only makes its products good by ripping off the R&D that another company has spent thousands of hours and millions of dollars on. It's like patronizing one of those eBay aftermarket parts companies when you know that their products are cheap because they cloned American, European, or Japanese parts.Then I'd suggest getting a Motorola or HTC phone. Because as for me, I certainly don't want to encourage a company that tries (mostly successfully) to patent every damn thing they can and isn't satisfied with their commercial success. They apparently have to remove all their competitors by using the courts, as well. This is all a continuation of Jobs' "thermonuclear war" against Android. The iPhone is a great device, but I like having a choice in the market, too.
I've had a bunch of HTC phones and I'm not willing to go through that again. I have a lot of Android nut friends and none of them have had much luck with Motorolas long-term, either. Samsung seems like the best bet right now, they release infrequently enough that their flagship models stay supported as long as iPhones do, and they definitely have the nicest design and interface. I'm also 99% considering Android only because of the Note formfactor. The big issue I've had with researching Android is that most users seem to think that a year is a long time to keep a phone and that skews all of the reviews. I've had my iPhone 4 since July 2010 and it's only recently started to have any issues, so it's really hard for me to go from something I know will last me two years with no major problems and tons of aftermarket support, to something that I've seen die in six months, and that might not work with any apps released a year from now or whatever.
Max_Archer wrote: ... I'm not sure if I want to encourage a company that only makes its products good by ripping off the R&D that another company has spent thousands of hours and millions of dollars on....
Are you running Windows OS on any machine?
There are no original ideas anymore. Everyone steals, improves, and re-releases and Microsoft is known to be one of the worst offenders. It's one of the reasons we have all the cool stuff we have.
I've seen a fair bit of discussion that some of the patents in question should never have been granted to Apple in the first place. Square device with rounded edges? Yeah, Apple was the first ever to come up with that. Puh-leaze.
Javelin wrote: Funnily enough, Apple lost the same lawsuits in the EU and Korea. The US has been their *only* win so far, and the appeal is looking strong for Samsung with the other verdicts in...
Their wins in other countries aren't relevant. Every nation has their own patent laws and issues their own patents. Samsung could very well be in the right in Korea and some European nations and be boned Inte the US.
Historically, the US has been somewhat unique by recognizing that the person who first comes up with the idea earns the patent. Most countries grant the patent to whomever files first. Additionally, some countries require the filer to produce a working prototype (the US does not).
Unfortunately, the US Patent Office has already decided to revise their process to a first to file, but I don't know if it has yet been implemented, though it certainly wasn't for the patents Aple and Samsung are disputing.
Anyway, it is very likely that Samsung filed first in Korea, or maybe proved that Apple's patent shouldn't have been granted (mabye it isn't novel according to the Korean Patent Office?).
I would expect anyone designing an interface to spend time examining interfaces that work. It's no different than Ford spending time with an M3 to figure out how to make the Boss 302 better. Or taking apart a particularly clever piece of engineering to see how it works and how that could be applied to a different product. It's called benchmarking. It's not the same as copying - although I suspect the line between the two depends in large part on your perspective.
Tom_Spangler wrote:Woody wrote: And, by paying in nickles, Samsung has turned this into a massive advertising campaign that people will talk about for a long time.Woody, I think you may have missed the early part of the thread. This never happened, Samsung hasn't paid anything yet.
Um...I think you're correct. Sorry about that.
You'll need to log in to post.
