Earlier today, Apple issued a press release stating that it has filed suit against cell phone manufacturer HTC for patent infringement. No mention of Android or Google was in the press release. But the actual legal complaints, which we’ve obtained and embedded below, make no bones about it. As expected, this lawsuit is about Android. HTC, of course, is one of the largest manufacturers of Android handsets.
The complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Delaware targets: “certain mobile communication devices including cellular phones and smart phones, including at least phones incorporating the Android Operating System (collectively, “the Accused Products”).” And the complaint filed with the U.S. International Trade Commission specifically calls out the various HTC Android phones (including the Nexus One, Magic/myTouch 3G, Dream/G1, Hero, and Droid Eris) as the main offending products. By going after the biggest Android manufacturer, Apple is putting all Android cell phone makers—and by extension Google— on notice. Is there any doubt now why Google CEO Eric Schmidt had to resign from Apple’s board last year? The battle lines are now drawn.
At least one of the patents (No. 7,479,949) lists Steve Jobs as an inventor, and describes a method to use a touchscreen as a graphical user interface “detecting one or more finger contacts with the touch screen display” (i.e. multi-touch). The complete list of patents the complaint says are being infringed include:
- Patent No. 7,362,331: “Time-Based, Non-Constant Translation Of User Interface Objects Between States”
- Patent No. 7,479,949: “Touch Screen Device, Method, And Graphical User Interface For Determining Commands By Applying Heuristics”
- Patent No. 7,657,849: “Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image”
- Patent No. 7,469,381: “List Scrolling And Document Translation, Scaling, And Rotation On A Touch-Screen Display”
- Patent No. 5,920,726: “System And Method For Managing Power Conditions Within A Digital Camera Device.”
- Patent No. 7,633,076: “Automated Response To And Sensing Of User Activity In Portable Devices”
- Patent No. 5,848,105: “GMSK Signal Processors For Improved Communications Capacity And Quality”
- Patent No. 7,383,453: “Conserving Power By Reducing Voltage Supplied To An Instruction-Processing Portion Of A Processor”
- Patent No. 5,455,599: “Object-Oriented Graphic System”
- Patent No. 6,424,354: “Object-Oriented Event Notification System With Listener Registration Of Both Interests And Methods”
Another complaint was filed with the ITC and may include other patents, since there are only ten here and Apple claims 20 patents are being infringed altogether.
Apple vs HTC
Apple Vs. HTC (ITC complaint)
this does have android written, somewhat, all over the place
those who cannot innovate, sue. Sad, Apple used to innovate.
Are you BLIND?
In case you don’t know, this whole smartphone revolution was started by the iPhone.
Of course the Apple haters wil be hesitant to admit that, saying Palm and BlackBerry made smart phones and touch screen phones… but if you look at this space… it was not until the iPhone came out that smart phones became sexy for the masses.
Who gives a shit who brought it to the masses? Patents should be awarded to the inventor, not the copycat. Smartphones with touchscreen were made AGES before the iPhone hit the stores. There is no invention made by Apple here (or in many thousand other patents that should hever have been granted in the first place because there is no height of innovation)
That is why the entire lawsuit ir hilarious and shameful. Face it, Apple has become the new Microsoft, pulling marketing and legal stunts that once were the sole domain of the Redmond crowd.
Half of those patents aren’t legitimate in the first place. The US patent office needs to stop issuing Apple BS patents for any obscure idea they can come up with that includes a child’s drawing demonstrating the idea.
Now I’m an Apple fan but this is far more symptomatic of Apple’s patent lawyers wanting a new hybrid Porsche than of any legitimate patent infringement claim.
All the details scrutinized: http://bit.ly/apple-htc-lawsuit-examined
Its too bad that 99.999% of Iphone users do not use any SMART phone functions of the Iphone. Having a sexy smartphone that couldnt natively copy / paste for 2 years is not innovation. Ipod that makes phone calls and has 5000 fart applications is nothing special.
Wow, you’re dumber than a pile of bricks. Fanboi much?
ALL of apples mobile technology is copied and based on previous work by others. The Nokia 9000 was release in 1996, ELEVEN YEARS BEFORE THE IPHONE.
Then I guess you are the ‘pile of bricks’!
First they sued Nokia, Then MS, and now HTC.. For sure, Google’s Android will be sued next… I wonder when will Apple call their secret weapon though?
Do not forget SOnyEricsson PDA’s . They have been here since year 2001 and are very much feature packed. Too sad they never came out in US
One word – Palm. Waaaay before iPhone. Nice try though.
Smartphone were a tech geek/business thing until the blackberry pearl came out. But I have to agree that the iphone is what inspired all these new mainstream touchscreen phones.
one word Newton!!
Newton was a bunch of years before palm.
Now go crawl into your mother’s basement. Stupid Google (spyware company) fanboys.
One word (Apple’s) Newton…way before Palm & Nokia
actually the newton was a PDA not a phone. Palm was the first to bring the PDA and Phone together. Although the first to master it was the UIQ interface on the P800. Many of Palms patents are actually being abused by apple. Same with many of the Sony Ericsson patents.. All the vendors should get together and nail apple’s arse to the wall.
@riley
Psion was way before Newton
So you’re saying that it was Apple, not Justin Timberlake that brought sexy back? I smell a counter lawsuit.
Epic…..just pure gold
so your saying that all the phones that HTC put out that had windows mobile on them are not considered smart phones and are hence dumb phones. Clearly your not saying such a thing.
And when in the hell did STEVE JOBS invent multi-touch when clearly it was around from the 80′s.
There is also no way Steve Jobs had anything to do with multi-touch techonology other than having bought out FingerWorks some years ago in order to swallow that technology and prevent anyone else from having it. I’m still bitter and annoyed about that.
Apple used to be such a benign company, and one that i used to support and defend. No more. Apple sucks.
Smartphones were invented WAY before iphone. We don’t need sexy phones.
No. Those who cannot innovate, copy. Apple’s still one of the most innovative companies on the planet. They’re just protecting their turf.
I was hoping for truly innovative Android phones in response to the game-changing iPhone. So far they’re just disappointing iPhone knock offs.
HECK no, none of that is true, android OS is better in EVERY way, way more customization and features than the iphone, the only thing I’m betting you’re going off is apps and android is catching up way quicker than anyone else
And how is the new iPhone game changing at all its almost exactly the same, barely any hardware upgrades that android phones were already getting, nothing else besides that
Can you explain how android is technically better? Just a few points? I didn’t think so.
You dumb Google lovers don’t even know your privacy and data are being harvested by big brother Google.
Android has customization does it. That’s so 1990s and nerdy and not what the masses care about.
Why do you think the iPhone is so popular? Because it’s for normal people!
@Jose: Who cares what “the masses” care about? I care about a phone that works for me.
It really is better, sorry. iPhone is popular because iPods are and because Macs are a status symbol. Not to mention Apple’s learned to sell, finally.
Points, hmm:
I can tether for free. Without jailbreaking.
Native widget support.
Wide array of devices running the OS.
Highest percentage of free apps of any app store.
Free built in turn-by-turn navigation.
Choice of carrier.
Expandable internal storage.
Ability of apps to do damn near anything. Without jailbreaking.
Wins for iPhone:
Tight integration with OS X and iTunes.
Some really nifty apps out of those 150k.
Wide range of accessories.
Mobile Safari.
Predictability…it will always look good, always cost the same, gain a few features anually, and will basically not fail you when you need it.
No iPhone has ever been left out of a firmware upgrade.
They’re both great products but for what I want my phone to do, my Eris is really where it’s at, because I want it to do anything I ever want, if that makes sense. When I was driving down the Interstate and needed to use my computer online for an assignment and decided, with no prior preparation, to see if I could tether my phone to my Mac and had it working -via the Android Market- in under 10 minutes, I was sold for life. my Eris never makes me think “I wish…” and it’s only on Android 1.5 for now, three major releases behind (which sucks, I fully concede). Android is an OS for a machine. iPhone OS is an OS for, well, a machine living under an authoritarian dictator.
As far as Google “stealing my information” or whatever – if that’s really a concern for you, you shouldn’t be online. We all gave up on privacy years ago because the best policy is to assume that it isn’t there, because it isn’t. Google stepped in to make money off of that fact, so what? At least they give me tools in return that seriously improve my life, as does Apple – who make me pay a premium for it.
Protecting their turf? They file a damn lawsuit because some other phone too, makes it possible to unlock your phone by touching the screen. Doesn’t that mean that any phone using any gesture will in fact infringe patents? This is far beyond just “protecting turf.” This is prevention of innovation. How could the android platform ever innovate, if they aren’t even allowed to catch up?
The problem is, Android hasn’t just caught up, they’ve SURPASSED. Which is why Jobs is pissing himself. If you don’t have any idea how Androids became so threatening to Apple, read the numerous iPhone vs Nexus One articles on the web.
Guys, this is the way business workes nowdays. Palm and nokia where indeed the first companies to create a PDA.
Apple made a revolution by bringing the best of all worlds together into the Iphone. Other manufacturers noticed the success and did the same. logical, but Apple has the right to claim it.
Imagine that Apple started a search engine, a bit like Google with almost the same algorithms… Do you think Google won’t make a problem of it?
The real problem is that patent office ever accepted such patent claims. “gesture based unlocking”, “object-oriented GUI” – common Apple, I’d be embarrassed if I ever tried to patent this. Patents should be only granted for real inventions, not for bad-ass companies trying to get the legal ammunition against competition.
PC Tablet computers have been using a touch-interface to log in for about 15 years now. Tablet computers have long been able to perform many of the feats that Steve’s phone has. Steve just “shrunk” it and stuck a phone inside it.
Then once Steve convinced the world that he’d invented all this stuff, he released the iPad, which is 100% a tablet PC running a semi-new OS.
You know: Tablet computers … that thing that Apple just ‘invented’ as the iPad, even though tablet PCs have been around for about 20 years.
Disclaimer: I own an iPhone (3GS 32GB), and I’m compeletely happy with it. It is great, because Apple lags behind in technology by a few years, and steals the best ideas that it sees emerging. Then Apple polishes up the ideas and makes them reliable and pretty.
That’s why I love my iPhone. But it is still theft on the part of Apple. I have no delusions about that.
You are an idiot
at least apple isn’t dumb, the way Yahoo was with PPC/CPC (after they bought Overture, whom had the motherload of PPC/CPC patents), and not do anything for years while Google moved into dominating position and only to settle out of court for peanuts.
I agree that those who can’t innovate will sometimes cry foul and sue. What would Steve Jobs Do? (WWSJD) — he borrows some of his best ideas. Remember Napster? He grabbed it and made it iTunes.
at now will it be to ban the produce
Game has just begun. I wonder what the result of this fight will be.
Game on Guys :)
All this stuff about multi-touch is a side show. The real patent violations HTC/Android/Google need to be worried about date back to NeXT and have nothing to do with the iPhone.
Apple is going to have to go after Palm and Samsung as well. Although I understand that they need to protect their IP, if they win, this means either a dramatic decrease in competing products or competing products are priced higher than Apple, which, by virtue of the fact that there is less choice is BAD for consumers. Not sure how I’m feeling about Apple today.
You know, it is funny. In any of the million times I’ve seen articles about Microsoft threatening to sue Linux distributors for the 200-something patents they feel Linux infringes, I have yet to see a single comment where someone says that Microsoft has no choice but to defend their IP. In fact, the pretty much unanimous consensus always seems to be that Microsoft claiming they have patented basic OS operations is proof that the entire patent system needs to be overhauled.
But hey, Apple trying to sue a mobile version of Linux out of existence over OS-level patents, well that is completely understandable, because a company has to protect their IP, right?
I don’t think Apple is trying to “sue a mobile version of Linux out of existence”; that’s almost *never* what this kind of suit results in. It’s about getting money from people because you beat them to the patent office.
Look, the idea of software patents in general is by and large bullshit. Sure, there are cases that arguably qualify as innovative and inventive, but for every one of those there’s a dozen ones like “blinking a inverted block cursor by XORing the bits of the character it’s on” and “storing the contents of a region of a screen when another region visually appears to be in front of it, and restoring it when the ‘upper’ region moves.” (These are both real patents, and yes, until the first expired you had to license the ability to BLINK YOUR TEXT CURSOR or RISK GETTING SUED. And the second is why some early windowing systems had to redraw windows when windows in front of them moved. Really.)
But having said that, blaming Microsoft or Apple or IBM or Xerox or anyone else for using the patent system to make money is living in fairyland. The patent system is designed to let people make money off their inventions, and a legal invention is what the patent office says it is. Companies that exist only to hold patents and to make all their money suing people for inadvertently tripping over them–yeah, they suck. But filing a patent suit isn’t in and of itself a sign that a company is “no longer capable of innovation,” and anyone who claims it is, well, that may be in and of itself a sign that they’re a blowhard.
Android phones will stay on the market, iPhones will stay on the market, Nokia phones will stay on the market, and eventually everyone will be paying everyone else for mostly stupid crap, no consumers will really notice, and life will go on pretty much as is. And in a way that’s somewhat unfortunate, because the day Apple or HTC or Google or Nokia is actually forced to stop selling products in the US is the day before patent law suddenly gets overhauled in a hurry.
that was very well written, and a very non-biased op on the case at hand. well done sir. I too agree that, however unsavory it may seem, any company would do the same in Apple’s shoes. Can’t play the game? gtfo. it’s business baby
Ok, here are a few problems though as regards the current argument.
1: Apple has thus far refused to license or cross-license any of the patents they claim on the iPhone. That was all Nokia wanted, and Apple is going to court rather than agreeing to cross-license. The same can be said of RIM. The language and behavior of the company, as well as Steve Jobs’ history, strongly suggest that they have no interest in licensing these patents, but rather seek to stifle competition.
2: This “any company would do it” argument is a red herring. Microsoft, RIM, Motorola, Nokia and Palm all have voluminous patent portfolios as regards mobile devices, and they all absolutely have patents on which the iPhone is infringing. They have all chosen to reach cross-licensing deals, and only use their patents defensively in cases such as this (though admittedly this is a recent change of position for RIM). All of these companies answered the iPhone by trying to come up with better products, not by dragging Apple into court (at least at first).
3: You are just proving the point I made with this response. As I said, I find it notable that in the many discussions I have seen about Linux infringing on Microsoft patents, I have yet to see a single “level headed” assessment that of course Microsoft has no choice but to take Linux distributors to court, because they have to defend their IP. 100% of the analysis I have seen of Microsoft trying to do exactly what Apple is doing right now, has been that if they did it, it would be a desperate move by a company who couldn’t compete, and would probably end with most of their patents being invalidated.
I didn’t suggest Apple “had” to do this, any more than Microsoft or anyone else “has” to do this. In theory one can collect a whole bunch of patents and do nothing with them; in practice a lot of companies do that… mostly. But there are very few companies that do that all the time.
As for Nokia vs. Apple: well, yes, we have Nokia’s assertion that they tried to reach licensing deals with Apple before they sued first. We have no reason to doubt them, but it’s worth noting that we have no reason to grant them more or less benefit of the doubt than we do any other company, including Microsoft and Apple.
Ultimately, the point that I think gets lost in virtually any discussion when Apple is involved is simple: Apple is a big company, and behaves like a big company. The biggest mistake that Apple fans make is believing that Apple is unusually good in terms of their business practices. The biggest mistake that Apple detractors make is believing that Apple is unusually bad in terms of their business practices.
On Nokia v. Apple, I think there is ample reason to believe Nokia over Apple for multiple reasons.
1: Nokia has a long track record of cross-licensing deals. Every phone on the market (with the exception of the iPhone) is licensing from either Nokia or Motorola.
2: Apple has no such history. In fact Apple has several instances of refusing to cross-license, until forced to do so in court. Even then, Apple usually prefers to pay a licensing fee, rather than agree to a cross-license.
3: Apple has in no way denied that Nokia tried to cross-license. In fact, Apple confirms that there were negotiations with Nokia, but say that Nokia did not offer them any value worth cross-licensing.
chipotle you are dead wrong. armchair lawyer. “It’s about getting money from people because you beat them to the patent office.”
us patent law revolves around first to invent, not first to register as in other countries
Still doesn’t change the fact that these patents shouldn’t have been allowed in the first place.
Just look at how generic they are! “Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image” that’s not an invention that’s an design choice.
It wouldn’t be so bad if they were just a little bit more open with their platform. As a company Apple are closed and anti-competitive, and by that I mean to a higher degree than (for the sake of the argument) 70% other large companies definitely on par with Microsoft.
Your concern is valid. But, don’t you think it’s Apple’s responsibility to protect their innovations? Also, if this lawsuit succeeds, then yes, there will be a lot less competitors. But, again, is it Apple’s responsibility to make sure that its competitors stay in business? If the competition cannot keep it, it’s not Apple’s fault!
nice to see you can read engadget erick, but can you write your own article?
bunch of inevitable evolution? patent vultures leaving no meat on the bone.
Can you write your own article(s) on TechCrunch ihooih?
i can’t wait until the patent owners for “transmitting voice over a cellular network”, and, “displaying a gui in place of lines of code” come out and smack down apple.
Their smug is nausiating.
@billy Somehow I doubt Apple is going to sue themselves over the invention of the modern GUI. Remember a little product call Macintosh that was introduced 26 years ago? If John Sculley hadn’t foolishly licensed Apple patents to Microsoft, everyone would be using Macs today. And we’d all be better off for it…
Nice try, but in the ’80s software wasn’t patentable in the US. Apple took Microsoft to court over Windows, in a copyright case, not a patent case, and lost. Microsoft licensed their GUI technology from XEROX, just like Apple did.
Try learning some history, before you try to spout it.
I do remember it, it was given to them by Xerox because they saw no commercial use for it. And Xerox had a working Model in 1981. 29 years ago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xerox_Star
Reality:
http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?story=On_Xerox,_Apple_and_Progress.txt
Xerox didn’t give Apple anything…But yet we keep hearing this story from the misinformed & the MS waterboys.
The irony here is that these things could have been patented by someone…
When you can’t buy the latest and greatest HTC, the blame for that should lie firmly at the USPO’s front door for dealing out IPR for things they did not understand, without understanding the implications of their decisions for technological advancement and for not cracking down on time-wasting ‘inventions’ that were nothing more than dubious catch-alls and future gotchas if one of your competitors starts beating you.
If this comes ““transmitting voice over a cellular network”, and, “displaying a gui in place of lines of code” comes every company gets sued not just Apple.
No wonder US is so f***ked up as morons like you still live here.
Ultimately who ever owns patents are the winners whether its Nokia, BlackBerry, Apple or Google
Most software patents are obvious steps when evolving a product, not magic, like side scrolling in games or the “Time-Based, Non-Constant Translation Of User Interface Objects Between States” effects above.
This is pathetic. Apple didn’t care about Android until this year when Android started getting big and taking a decent amount of market share from them. These are things Android has had since the beginning and Apple only cares now. .
umm…no shit?
Android had multitouch since the beginning? Send me the address of the cave you live in. I might send you some Android popsicles ;)
The reply was meant for Celeste. I got lost packing the Android popsicles for him/her! :P
No one said anything about multitouch dude, we’re talking about everything else, didnt you notice one of the patents said miltitasking, iphone never had that and still doesnt but android has since the beginning thats retarded
@Rohit – Looks like Steve Jobs is fucking you up the ass to keep you a loyal fanboy/girl. Keep trying to protect the bully and the bully will eventually turn on you., then you will really be fucked !
Nothing like a insufferable desi iFanboi. I bet he color coordinated his shiny shoes with his iPod and iPhone cover and grins all day thinking how unique and ‘in’ he is with things.
Yes, android has had multitouch since the beginning. They hadn’t had pinch-to-zoom until recently.
“No one said anything about multitouch dude, we’re talking about everything else, didnt you notice one of the patents said miltitasking, iphone never had that and still doesnt but android has since the beginning thats retarded”
The iPhone has had multitasking since the first one hit the streets. How do you think that you can listen to music & surf the web at the same time. It’s just not opened to third parties because as Google is finding out roogue processes can run in the background & lock up the phone in best case scenarios & help malware spread in worse case scenarios. Again another falsehood spread by the Dumd ass tech pundits.
All those gestures were patented by Tom Cruise, haven’t you seen the Minority Report? Seriously though, the technology and ideas from that movie came from a lab in MIT where gesture-based computing was a research subject for many, many years before the iPhone was released.
I hate patent wars.
I love patent wars. And I hope to see some Google blood with this one.
popcorn?
The worlds cell phone makers, alienated and threatened by Apple, adopt Android and countersue the core out of apple.
Hopefully this does nothing more than drive more people to adopt Android.
It won’t, this is just business. Why are people still surprised when companies do this?
Seriously, Apple can go fuck themselves. Every single “patent” is a work of utter obviousness.
“Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image” Wow! Thank god for the patent system, or genius inventors would never have had the motivation to think up something so god damned original!
HTC should buy Jeff Han’s company then sue Apple for stealing another innovation and calling it their own just because they stole it first.
In regards to Apple’s thieving history…
Apple stole its name and logo from the Beatles.
Apple stole the original Mac GUI from Xerox…not to mention the mouse.
Apple stole/borrowed most of the new Mac OS X from the original work on UNIX by AT&T/Bell Labs…not to mention several innovations by others.
In regards to touch screen technology…Apple has to be joking.
From about.com…
Touch Screen By Mary Bellis
A special thanks goes to Jason Ford of Elo TouchSystems, the company whose founder invented touch screen technology, for providing the following historical information.
In 1971, the first “touch sensor” was developed by Doctor Sam Hurst (founder of Elographics) while he was an instructor at the University of Kentucky. This sensor called the “Elograph” was patented by The University of Kentucky Research Foundation. The “Elograph” was not transparent like modern touch screens, however, it was a significant milestone in touch screen technology.
In 1974, the first true touch screen incorporating a transparent surface came on the scene developed by Sam Hurst and Elographics. In 1977, Elographics developed and patented five-wire resistive technology, the most popular touch screen technology in use today. On February 24, 1994, the company officially changed its name from Elographics to Elo TouchSystems.
Patents
US3662105: Electrical Sensor Of Plane Coordinates
Inventor(s)
Hurst; George S. , Lexington, KY
Parks; James E. , Lexington, KY
Issued/Filed Dates:May 9, 1972 / May 21, 1970
US3798370: Electrographic Sensor For Determining Planar Coordinates
Inventor(s)
Hurst; George S. , Oak Ridge, TN
Issued/Filed Dates:March 19, 1974 / April 17, 1972
@edwk RT @jeremychone: Steve Jobs saying “I have been shameless about stealing great ideas”
You must be Mother Theresa then. You have such a flawless character that you can criticize others.
Excuse me, I have multiple patents on character attacks.
You’ll be hearing from my lawyers.
Why are Apple fanboys so whiny ?
Nice rant…Try basing it on fact. Apple didn’t steal it’s GUI from Xerox. BSD is not a GUI concept neither is UNIX. Apple is probably not suing over touch screen technology & other technologies that you mention but they are probably suing over their unique contribution to those technologies. All the Android phones are iPhone knock offs. What exactly has Google or HTC contributed that is actually noteworthy? No other phone worked or looked like the iPhone until Apple put the iPhone on the market. Apple’s newton that predated PALM, MS Anything, Google, HTC, had a stylus based interface. There were other stylus based interfaces at the time. Each probably having their own unique patents & contributions. Apple has been in the hardware/software business for over 30 years. They have a huge patent portfolio. They have worked on plenty of things that never saw the light of day.
http://www.theapplecollection.com/design/macproto/index.html
Time for the angry children to start acting like adults. If HTC is infringing on Apple’s patents then they will lose & deservedly so. Unlike HTC, Dell & every other knock off company in the world Apple designs hardware, chips & components.
Wow, speaking of people who sound like angry children.
These are the facts.
Android phones are NOT iPhone knockoffs. In fact, they are designed to appeal to people who aren’t satisfied with Apple’s solution to the Smartphone experience.
Apple has patents, other companies have patents too. Apple has infringed upon other companies patents, and they have infringed upon Apple’s patents. But here’s how patent wars work; someone infringes upon your patent, you have 2 options: take them to court, or use the opportunity to infringe upon one of their patents.
Notice that Apple sued HTC, not Google. Why? Probably because HTC has infringements upon Apple’s patents, but Apple doesn’t have infringements upon HTC’s patents. Therefore Apple is free to fire away all it wants without being called a hypocrite and counter-sued.
Google and Apple probably won’t sue eachother since they are each infringing upon eachother’s patents. Not a good business move. But Apple is picking a fight it know it can win. This would be akin to someone suing Foxconn or AT&T in order to strike at Apple, without having to risk being counter-sued.
Do you understand now? Apple nor Google nor HTC or any of them out there are playing by the rules. Patent infringements aren’t accidential, they’re carefully calculated moves. There’s so much profit to make, and the risk of losing the patent or having to pay settlement fees are assessed and accounted for. If someone steals your patents, you can steal one of theirs, and you can be pretty sure they won’t sue.
Apple is no more in the right here than the rest, it’s just picking a fight it knows it can win. Apple gets to look like a good guy in the process to the public too, but the facts are it has it’s own dirty little secrets…
Why the hatred?
What hate?
It’s not hate to call out Apple for its blatant hypocrisy.
I think stealing is not correct. Apple has used ideas which already existed, but never stolen them. Xerox’s ideas were licensed…
http://www.folklore.org/StoryView.py?project=Macintosh&story=On_Xerox,_Apple_and_Progress.txt
People get upset because Apple is the first to produce something which becomes wildly successful and which in hindsight seems obvious. But the fact remains, neither Google nor Nokia nor Microsoft nor anyone else came out first with an iPhone. Why is that? Don’t tell me there were iPhone-like phones already out there. Why didn’t they become widely popular like the iPhone? Because Apple has vision, thinks long term and strategically, that’s why.
Now the uninnovative companies, got caught with their pants down, and have to do anything to catch up to the iPhone.
Why does Google, who’s raison-d’etre is search, have to produce a smart phone? Why does Microsoft have to produce hardware? It seems it’s because Apple has hit on a successful model and these companies that are feeling threatened.
Apple is right in defending it’s hard earned success.
Xerox Sues Apple Computer Over Macintosh Copyright
By LAWRENCE M. FISHER, Special to The New York Times
Published: December 15, 1989
http://www.nytimes.com/1989/12/15/business/company-news-xerox-sues-apple-computer-over-macintosh-copyright.html?scp=3&sq=apple+xerox&st=nyt
From The Seattle Times archive…
Wednesday, June 2, 1993 – Page updated at 12:00 AM
Apple-Microsoft Lawsuit Fizzles To A Close — `Nothing Left’ To Fight About
By Paul Andrews
http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19930602&slug=1704430
Apple Corps v Apple Computer
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer
But the fact remains, neither Google nor Nokia nor Microsoft nor anyone else came out first with an iPhone. Why is that? Don’t tell me there were iPhone-like phones already out there. Why didn’t they become widely popular like the iPhone?
you ask why Jose.
Because they had not figured out how to dumb it down for the average person so here comes apple with their Icon top of a ui.
Apple is only doing this due to Nokia suing them over the Iphone for the same bloody thing.
From Ars Technica…
Apple hit with yet another iPhone patent lawsuit
By Justin Berka | Last updated January 24, 2008 12:07 PM
http://arstechnica.com/apple/news/2008/01/apple-hit-with-yet-another-iphone-patent-lawsuit.ars
From BusinessWeek…
Kodak Gets Review in Bid to Block Apple, RIM Imports (Update2)
February 17, 2010, 4:33 PM EST
By William McQuillen
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-02-17/kodak-gets-review-in-bid-to-block-apple-rim-imports-update1-.html
Kind of silly logic there. Why did Apple, a computer manufacturer, decide to make phones?
I will remind you, Microsoft has been making hardware since the 80′s.
You are correct – nobody else came out with an iphone. They came out with something better – something not tied to a closed system.
Ok, a few things.
1: A company called Cisco (maybe you’ve heard of them), dis come out with an iPhone, and even trademarked the name, which Apple willfully ignored, and only came to a settlement on stealing the name AFTER they had released the product, knowing full well they were infringing on Cisco’s trademark.
2: The iPhone has NOT be the runaway breakout success you make it out to be. It is still only selling as many units as Windows Mobile did at its apex, and still isn’t even close to beating RIM or Nokia. Just because you didn’t have a smartphone before Apple told you to get one, doesn’t mean that there weren’t hundreds of millions of them sold before Apple even entered the market. Before the iPhone was the “it” phone, it was the BlackBerry, and before that it was the Treo, and before that is was the Nokia Communicator. Unless you are going to argue that “geeks” are actually the majority, with “normal people” being some small minority of folks who only buy Apple products, then you are just wrong.
3: The iPhone wouldn’t even be possible without all the base-level GSM patents that Apple is currently willfully infringing. Nokia tried for two years to work out a cross-licensing agreement, and Apple responded by saying that Nokia’s patents on base level radio functionality were obvious, and should be struck down.
4: You will notice that Apple is going after HTC, who doesn’t even make the OS, not Microsoft, Palm, RIM, Nokia, Google, or the members of the OHA as a whole. They are doing that, because they have a weak mobile patent portfolio, and they know that any of those other companies would destroy them. HTC, as a hardware manufacturer for licensed OSs, has a very weak portfolio of their own, since they are essentially just a system integrator, and rely on other people’s licensed technology, so Apple thinks they have an easy win here.
But hey, if you want to go on believing that Apple invented the smartphone, then be my guest.
YAWP..You should go help Android in this lawsuit!
@yawp with the links.
Lawsuits don’t conclude stealing.
Not a Apple Fan Boy but definitely, would love to see Android and Google get f***ked all the way.
Really? Have you ever filed patents?
Did anyone ever think of the unlock screen before the iPhone? Calm down, man.
Yes, I have filed and obtained patents.
Have you?
If so, you already know that the patent process, governing IP laws and the USPTO are in serious need of a major revisions just to catch up with the last 30 years. These shortcomings have produced an insanely litigious environment.
The idea of unlocking a device with a software interface has been around for quite some time, including doing so on a touch screen device.
Apple’s choice to do so with a sliding finger gesture may be unique; a more thorough search of applicable patents would be required to establish this assertion as fact. However, even if this fact is true, they are attempting to expand their patent’s application beyond its narrower scope in order to stifle competition and innovation in the marketplace.
BTW, I am calm, dude. How about you?
Have you? “obviousness” is a critical component of the conversation. Not just whether they did it first.
@ matt earle, Maybe you should patent some stuff, but you didn’t.
True genius seems obvious once the inventor tells you how he did it, but you would never have thought of it on your own. That’s exactly why the patent system was created.
Please tell me you thought of using a touchscreen gesture to unlock a phone before Apple showed it to the world. I’d love a good laugh…
I don’t know. Maybe there was prior art, but when the iPhone first came out I thought the swipe to unlock was a pretty nifty trick.
I remember thinking how it was cool ’cause it made it easy to unlock your phone, but was also something you’d be unlikely to do by accident in your pocket. Again, I could be wrong – maybe there was prior art. But it sure seems like pretty darn good example of an inovation that seems obvious today, but was new and different at the time.
Besides, on the face of it, it seems pretty slimey of Google to have a guy on Apples board and then to go off and copy the iPhone.
Amazing what you can patent – “Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image”. This would be an obvious feature of any lockable device with a touch screen.
Maybe I should patent some stuff.
yea un-f-ingbelievable. The patent system is just F*#$ed up
This is ridiculous and apple should be ashamed.
Obviously you’ve never worked hard to create anything worthwhile. You’re also totally ignorant of the patent laws of the United States.
These are all legitimate patents that Apple worked long and hard on and spent millions to develop.
They need to stop HTC, Google, and anyone else who is using their technology.
If you had those patents, you’d be freaking out too.
Obviously you didn’t get he was joking. Get a sense of humor and stop trolling (said the troll).
Actually unlocking a regular door is a gesture as well. You insert the key into the lock and your gesture is a twist.
These patents are stupid. What If IBM patented the typewriter interface? When Apple came out with the Apple // IBM could have sued them out of existance for having a device with 101 keys in a qwerty configuration.
There are over 200 patents pertaining to door locking mechanisms dating back to 1836. What usually happens is that if I want to create a door lock company, I’d either invent a NEW totally different way to secure a door to a frame, which drives innovation, or I’d license an existing method from a current patent holder. It’s the way the world works. Apple doesn’t own a patent simply on the idea of unlocking hardware with a gesture, they own a patent on the technology under the hood that makes that possible. HTC could have licensed it, instead of blatantly ignoring that big ass Keynote slide that said “Patented”. My question here is, why is Apple going after HTC? The Nexus One? Puleeeze… Based on sales, The Droid is a much bigger competitor to the iPhone. Why not go after Motorola? Because Moto holds patents that Apple probably infringes on? Like Palm? And HTC is too young to have jack squat?
Those phones are all on the List. They are made by HTC. I think Google only does the underlying code not the GUI.
http://macdailynews.com/index.php/weblog/comments/24219/
The QWERTY keyboard WAS patented in 1878.
By the time Apple came around, the patents had expired. That’s the key of patents is that it gives the inventor an exclusive right to use their invention for a set number of years – now 17.
Please do some research before spouting your mouth off, boy.
Boy, you are ancient. Most of us weren’t around in the 1870′s.
So buying someone else’s tech is called working long and hard to develop? Please.
Just because something becomes a patent does not mean it cant be contested. If a patent is too generic for instance, it can be contested and removed as a patent. You can make a case that gesturing on a image to unlock something is too generic.
Besides, as I have stated before, Apple did not invent this stuff. They licensed the technology from an independent source, and wrote obnoxious patents around it. They may have improved on some things, but they did not invent it.
And actually, it is as easy as matt states, just as long as you can clearly define your goals, the summary is the easy part, and so is naming. The hard part is reviewing all patents in its genre… but that’s all lawyer stuff you wouldn’t understand.
As a patent holder myself, coming up with the idea is easy. The verification of a viable patent is the hard part.
I see the term “prior art” come up when a company starts flinging around lawsuits over patents, but has it ever actually gotten a patent overturned? I’m having trouble finding one single instance of a tech patent being invalidated because someone produced prior art.
i HOPE you’re trolling, because if you aren’t you need to see a doctor about your MENTAL RETARDATION. You fucking dumb POS how can you possibly think that using “gesture” to unlock a screen could cost millions to devlop? apple only got these patents to be a patent troll.
Wow.
IF it is so simple, why don’t you tell me how it is done?
Yes, it does costs a lot of money, time and hard work to develop the whole stack that makes that simple gesture and other flicks, drags, pinches possible. There’s a reason why no one had done that before. Apple acquired Fingerworks to specifically develop this touch technology into a world class product.
Given a capacitive touchscreen and a multithreading software, once the screen is touched, the OS starts a thread which registers the position of touches every 50th milisecond or so. Once it doesn’t register any touch, it checks the registered points. If the first one falls in the “unlock slider start +20px” area, the end falls in the “unlock slider end +20px” area, and the maximal distance between touches in the drag area is not more than ~10px, the screen unlocks.
Of course, if the slider moves alongside the finger, the software updates the position of the slider to match the closest touch registered to its latest position.
Happy?
A touchscreen relays X / Y coordinates. If contact is made within a strikezone of x1-y1, x10-y10, and the contact area begins moving within certain parameters of the x axis while staying within the boundaries of the y axis, unlock the device.
Not a big deal.
Really, it’s that hard? I did a swipe on a moving graphic element to unlock a screen on a sales kiosk I did back in 1997, and it took me about an hour to code in Director. All you have to do is set a watched target area, and constrain the movement of the sprite to a path, then trigger a behavior when the sprite enters the target area. I must be some kind of fucking genius if it took Apple millions of dollars to replicate that. It never occurred to me to spend $10,000 to patent it, because it seemed pretty obvious. Besides, as an interface designer, if I filed a patent every time I thought I came up with a novel interface element, I would soon be spending more on patent filing fees than I make in a year.
Apple got those patents because they thought they were potentially patentable, not to be a “patent troll.”
The next logical step is for HTC to countersue Apple with a bunch of patents that they have — because they almost certainly do have them, and they will be very similar to Apple’s patents in terms of (theoretical) obviousness. I do trust that everyone here will be just as quick to condemn them if that happens.
Incidentally, the “unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image” patent is not just for having a touch screen, it’s for having the image of a lock on the touch screen which you virtually manipulate like a real lock. Is this innovative enough to be patentable? I don’t know. But I do know that I’ve been working with computers since about the time Apple started as a company (although I wasn’t working with Apples back then!), and I’ve never seen that particular interface gesture on a touch screen before. I’m dubious about whether “interface gesture” should be a patentable concept in the first place — but the mere existence of touch screens for decades before the iPhone is not de facto proof of prior art here.
Not all of these are legitimate patents. These just illustrate how bad the patent system has become, allowing things like “Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image”. The touch screen has been around a lot longer than iphone. This is pathetic. Soon enough they’ll be patenting any gesture you make.
Are you serious, man? Apple has been stealing their way to the top for many years. Maybe you mean that as hard work? Their first big hit on hand held devices, iPod, was a rip off from Creative, who wan the trial and made Apple pay $100 million. Really ridiculous money, considering what it meant for Apple. Sure, Apple is a brilliant company, but this is just making me even more certain of getting an Android, HTC Desire.
To be patentable (in theory, in practice the system is clearly broken) something must be: non-obvious, novel, and useful.
How in the world is using “gesture” to unlock a screen not blinding obvious on a touch device?
To repeat a response that has been posted.
If it was BLINDING-ly obvious, why didn’t Palm or Microsoft implement an unlock feature using a gesture on their smartphones… they’ve been making PDAs and touchscreen phones for years, yet they failed to implement such an “obvious” feature.
Wow. The folks at Palm and Microsoft must be blind monkeys.
Failing requires trying, and trying requires wanting.
As they didn’t want to minimize the number of physical buttons on the devices, they didn’t feel the need of implementing an on-screen unlocker, they could just add a button / switch for that. This is that simple.
There were several PalmOS and Windows Mobile “lock screens” that did exactly this. Just one of them is sited just a couple posts down.
This IS the obvious feature since iPhone. Have you seen that before?
Gridlock by Palm 2003: http://gridlock.en.softonic.com/palm
BAM!
Biggest gripe about the iphone – ifanboys who think they created all this tech
BAM my ass. Gridlock is a series of “blocks” you “tap” to unlock your phone.
I believe Apple’s patent was on the swipe gesture. If that is so obvious please bring up an example of an app using that.
In hindsight.. its obvious as day. But a lot of great inventions are obvious once you actually SEE it implemented.
Yes Apple is very original. *cough* *cough* I mean the first gesture unlock. wow you know I believe I did that on a DS in a video game a few years before the iPhone was out. also if I remember gridlock correctly you could in essence run your finger over the blocks if you made them sequential. Apple is annoying has been for years they are patent trolls. They sign an agreement with Apple Records to not distribute music then create iTunes and since the US government wants to protect them they get away with it. It is a load of crap and this is another lame attempt by Jobs to stifle competition. Those of us who will never by anything with a fruit on it know this. Besides, isn’t the Apple the forbidden fruit that was not supposed to be touched? Coincidence, I think not.
Herein lies the difference between the big boys and the kids who ride the short yellow bus. The now defunct PDA Business (publisher of Gridlock) didn’t spring for the $6-$8000 patent. Had they done that, they could be sitting on a Philippine beach being served fresh mango by topless waitresses, getting fat of licensing money.
Umm No. This is whats is called “Prior Art”
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_art
had they done it they would have also had to have the duckets to defend the patent. this isn’t an arena for the minions to play in.
Don’t be surprised if HTC has an indemnification from Google for Nexus One related issues….
I had my Palm V in 2000 set to lock when I swiped from bottom to top. What’s non-derivative about unlocking with a swipe?
the amount of things that become “obvious” after Apple designs them are plentiful.
That’s what I thought again and again when reading some patents…
Matt Earle..May be you should patent your ability to be ignorant and uninformed! :P
Agreed. Maybe I should put a patent out on covering up the image for 2.2 seconds to unlock the device….or maybe triple tapping the image….or maybe the phone can just detect me staring at it for more than 10 seconds and just unlock.
Someone actually let Apple patent a freaking minimization effect?!?
And what the hell? Apple patented scrolling on a touchscreen? SCROLLING.
This is good. If the complaint was against some HTC hardware solution, HTC would not have had the sort of support it’d get right now. Because this is against Android, all OHA players and the Google Goliath. I expect this to drag as long as it can to scare off OHA players from Android. This is similar to the whole Microsoft and SUN Linux war about 5-6 years ago. We all know how well it went.
I don’t understand, there are some of these things that are unavoidable in creating a device that is intuitive. Can Apple really patent something like Touch Screen Device and List Scrolling? I’m not a lawyer but if feels as though there should be some prevention of making patents on such things.
Non-issue.
HTC will just counter with a few patents of their own that Apple are infringing and they’ll settle out of court with a cross-licensing agreement.
some of these patents are ridiculous:
“Automated Response To And Sensing Of User Activity In Portable Devices” – don’t most portable devices respond automatically to user activity i.e. button pushing?
“Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image” – so when google launched the g1 and showed this cool unlocking technique, apple didn’t think to apply for infringement then?
really Apple?
How does HTC Android phone infringe on your “patents” and not HTC winmo phones?
Fear is in the air….
Interesting, looks like Apple is worrying that the competition could become stronger than they obviousely expected. Kinda sad, but apparently that’s the way business in done today. If you can’t beat them, sue them.
I never thought I’d say this but Go Google! Apple makes great products but some of their patents are ludicrous. I’ll bet one of them is “Using plastic or metal in the backside of the phone casing”. Or maybe I just gave them a new one to file for….oops.
There’s still wood, minerals, bone and textiles… oops.
Steve Jobs and Apple just don’t have the guts to go after Google.
I think they have accepted defeat to Android already – that too in a sour way.
I am actually surprised at some of patents the patent office has given to Apple – LOL
I think it has started again for Autocratic Apple – this time 15 years later…
Two issues surrounding who to sue include product and software features, as well as standard FUD. If HTC implements a feature at the exclusion of another, that is HTC’s choice. It is quite possible to use a physical button to unlock the device.
Secondly, manufacturers are already aware of Windows Phone and future market scenarios. Creating an air of uncertainty around Android helps to promote a fragmented field. Apple doesn’t want or need the entire market.
That’s funny..accepted defeat by the half baked iPhone copy that is Android? Hardly. But it is a pretty blatant yet very poorly executed copy of the iPhone OS. Yes it’;s laggy with a carp UI and cannot run more than a few hundred MB worth of apps at once, which is truly pathetic btw, but is is a really obvious copy. The iPhone 3GS is a year or two ahead of any Android phone and the next model, coming in a few months will be even further ahead. Googles only hope is that the iPhone is not on other vendors, especially Verizon, anytime soon.
Fanboy Alert!
Fanboy Alert!
Fangirl ALERT!
“Yes it’;s laggy with a carp UI and cannot run more than a few hundred MB worth of apps at once, which is truly pathetic btw, but is is a really obvious copy.”
But it can run 2 tiny itty bitty applications at the same time. Like pandora and the browser.
Fan BOY ALERT
Question: were the door frames in your house built a half a foot low, causing you to repeatedly bump your headband when entering and exiting a room? Accepted Defeat? Do you have a Firefox extension installed that blocks market share and sales figures?
re: “Unlocking A Device By Performing Gestures On An Unlock Image”
Is it possible (even with an app) to make an iphone unlock with gestures that are not pressing numerals?
re: “Conserving Power By Reducing Voltage Supplied To An Instruction-Processing Portion Of A Processor”
Maybe Apple could sue laptop vendors for infringing also? Or would the need to sue the OS makers?
“It is possible (even with an app) to make an iPhone unlock with gestures that are not pressing numerals?”
You’re one of those people who thinks that because the iPhone “can’t multitask” that you can’t listen to your music and browse the web at the same time, too, aren’t you? :)
This doesn’t bode well for Apple’s future. Suing competitors over patents is something big companies tend to do when their competitors are outmaneuvering them.
Actually, it’s something fat bald men do from corporations set up in Arizona, every day. Only we call them Patent Trolls. HTC is retarded for building a company and not doing it’s due diligence in researching what they can and can’t do…
Android isn’t the threat. It’s Google’s monopoly on advertising. Have you noticed the blitz of Nexus ads occurring at every site you visit?
Google is the ultimate big brother only they’re more ominous because they’re not blunt about it. They’re cooking you and you don’t even feel the heat going up.
Apple faces to many barriers to compete in the ad space against Google, I doubt that they care about that. What they really fear is growing mobile platforms that compete with their new prize — the iTunes/App store.
It’s hard to run a business, but it is easy to sue.
Three years ago, when Apple announced the iPhone, Jobs said the device was covered by over 200 patents.
I think Apple learned its lesson from its experience with Microsoft. This time they’re not going to let anyone fuck with their hard earned success.
Well done Apple!
I wonder what long term implications such a decision is going to have. Some of the “patent violations” are, in my mind, a stretch. How they were patentable to begin with is something I’d like to know. Maybe the description is just too general, but some seem downright simple.
All I know is that I’m looking forward to filing a patent on flicking people off and retiring on the licensing fees.
I believe there is prior art for that :)
what about the double-flick? That was my idea….. (oops sorry Microsoft, not sure I am allowed to say that)
Read the patents in detail. It isn’t so ‘general’.
I think the patent on “Object-oriented graphic system” is way too general. I certainly believe prior art could be shown fitting the title.
I really want to write a patent in a sufficiently artful fashion that the Patent Office doesn’t notice it’s a patent on the process of getting inappropriate patent filings through the Patent Office, and lets it through.
It’s not “all about Android” as TechCrunch asserts.
If you read the documentation they indicate the following phones: Nexus One, Touch Pro, Touch Diamond, Touch Pro2, Tilt II, Pure, Imagio, Dream / G1, myTouch 3G, Hero, HD2, and Droid Eris.
Yes there are a lot of Android devices in there, but there are also some Windows Mobile ones running TouchFLO.
On the surface this case screams for a thorough inspection and restructuring of the patent applications and the patent office.
On the surface your comment screams for a thorough inspection of your head.
Mine and the heads of a couple thousand other experts in patent law, software development, and tech writers. The system for patenting software is a mess and everyone knows it. The procedures are dated and based on the earliest concept of software, hardly applicable to the modern technology environment. If this eventually becomes a major case or does hinder innovation and development of new products, I think you’ll see a call from bigger names than the comments section of Tech Crunch for a reevaluation of how things are done…assuming your head isn’t still firmly planted in your backside.
Telling point of this story, APPLE WAS GRANTED RIDICULOUS PATENTS.
“Retaining market share by filing numerous pedestrian ideas as patents then suing competitors for infringement”
Just filed it. :)
If you’re hinting that Apple’s patents were “pedestrian”, you’ve basically admitted that Apple’s patents was prior art – hence you’d be rejected for your patent application.
Exactly, prior art hasn’t stopped Apple from getting the pedestrian patents. So their prior methodology shouldn’t limit my ability to patent it.
This is yet another example of why software patents are a huge detriment to technical innovation. Why are such frivolous things patentable? We might as well just patent intelligent thought and put an embargo on all innovation.
Clearly you have never developed anything worthwhile.
I just don’t get these posts by people. I’ve filed patents. I know what it takes to create something that seems ‘obvious’. So obvious that no one has done it before you have.
There’s always noise in the patent world but some patents are real. Sure Apple has been sued by Nokia, this is the game that everyone plays. Only the naive think that infringement is a binary thing.
Thank you Alana, well said.
Sure Alana, patents are really important to protect the innovator – but there is always the problem of trash patents:
http://www.sternhillpartners.com/patentWars.html
Some bad companies actually file patents for something totally normal that everyone uses. And then start sueing everyone. As no one is interested in a million dollar lawsuit they agree on paying some 100 000 for something ridiulous. And thats how these bad companies make money…I don’t like that!
Remember Creative’s patent lawsuit against Apple in 2006 over Zen due to media player interface? And they claimed $100 million from Apple. It’s a trade secret how did they settle but at the end of the day, Creative begun manufacturing ipod accs.
Sounds funny but patents are what they are for.
And apple had the audacity to complain about Nokia’s patent infringement complaints on Apple, only months ago. Hypocrites!