A Cheat Sheet To the Mobile-Patent Mess 42
harrymcc writes "This week's news that Apple is suing Samsung over the similarities of the latter's Galaxy phones and tablets to the iPhone and iPad inspired me to try to document all the court cases involving mobile patents (as well as some related relationships such as licensing agreements) in one infographic. I wonder what sort of technological wonders the companies involved could come up with if they took all the money they're giving to lawyers and spent it on R&D instead?"
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My thought exactly. I didn't even detect a hint of hostility in this article... it had more of a matter-of-fact "isn't this cool" vibe to it.
And it's not entirely accurate... there are so many patents out there that they license all kinds of stuff off each other, but I think they this chart reflects the really noteworthy relationships in an effective manner.
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Slam means "to right a blog post about", right?
Don't make me slam you..
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Be careful. If you make him really angry, he will eviscerate you and salt the earth with your blood!
Or maybe he'll just tweet something and pair a snarky hashtag with it.
Look on the bright side (Score:2)
At least the lawyers are happy about it. This sort of thing drives innovation in the field of lawsuits. Granted the consumer doesn't get to see anything, but you can be sure that behind every lawsuit there are a ton of happy lawyers.
DUPE Data Display (Score:1)
Nice graph, but it contains duplicate data. A right-triangle chart would contain the same information, and be easier to read due to the lack of duplicate data being visualized.
Everything above and including the diagonal is unneeded.
ie:
1 \
2 . \
3 . P \
4 X . S \
. 1 2 3 4
P - Pact
S - Suing
X - Global Thermonuclear Warfare
Re:DUPE Data Display (Score:4, Funny)
A right-triangle chart would contain the same information
Yes, but the problem is that the right-triangle chart is patented.
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Firefox doesn't have "tuple" in the dictionary?.. In the
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Nobody is suing Oracle because Oracle doesn't have any mobile devices. Its just suing Google over Android's use of Java.
Oracle always was horrible in the field of open-source...
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Well Apple is the market leader so they are trying to keep its position from competitors. (they are trying not to do the same mistake they did with the Mac a generation ago)
Google provides the most of software however it is up to the other guys to configure it and make it their own. Thus making them liked by most and avoiding direct attacks.
Microsoft is still a force. The big guys will fight them, the lesser guys will join them.
Not sure why Oracle is in that chart? Just because the Java Issue with android?
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All depends on what you define as "eating their lunch". No one Android phone has come close to matching one iPhone model in sales. And Android is only slightly ahead when looking at the whole world smartphone market. Android is slightly further ahead here in the US, likely due to the AT&T exclusivity that has now ended. Overall phone market, Apple is not in the lead units wise (nor is any smartphone), but profit and revenue wise, Apple is ahead.
This also ignores the software side. It's not Android
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And, you have to consider that "Android" is a platform, not a specific device. Comparing "Android devices" to "iOS devices" is the more accurate measure, and the smartphone sales numbers conveniently leave out the tens of millions of iPads and iPod touches that have been sold to date.
If you want to look at smartphone market share, Apple is the largest single manufacturer of smartphones by volume, by a wide margin, and also the most profitable. "All Android smartphones together (how many dozens of models i
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It's been messy for sure. Nokia has enjoyed suing anyone they can, forcing the newer mobile companies like Apple to countersue. Same for Kodak, and I thought I remembered RIM suing a bunch of others over wireless email.
Then you have Apple going after HTC, Motorola and now Samsung due to Android. Microsoft is being their normal selves, and even Oracle didn't want to be left out. What a mess.
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Apple has no friends because they are (for better or worse) setting the standard in the mobile space. And Android fans, before you dash off a reply filled with breathless indignation, consider that the mobile space is larger than "smartphone share". Apple is the largest single manufacturer of smartphones & tablets, and also the most profitable manufacturer, and still holds the lead when you consider "all iOS devices," rather than just "smartphones." Everybody wants a piece of that pie.
Google has the
Upper triangular (Score:2)
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LIES! The lower-left triangle is necessary. The upper-right triangle is a waste of space.
This is great... (Score:1)
... very surprised anybody beat XKCD to it, though. This is the kind of thing that's right up their alley.
funny (Score:4, Interesting)
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It sort of defeats the purpose of R&D if you're not going to defend that R&D with lawyers.
That's the lawyerish point of view. To normal human beings, that would be: "It sort of defeats the purpose of R&D if you're not going to make products based on that R&D." Who cares about keeping lawyers employed, other than the lawyers themselves?
I wonder... (Score:2)
"I wonder what sort of technological wonders the companies involved could come up with if they took all the money they're giving to lawyers and spent it on R&D instead?"
I wonder what sort of technological wonders the companies involved could come up with if they stopped copying Apple and concentrated on coming up with something original.
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Are you referring to the black rectangular slate with a grid of icons Apple is suing Samsung over? Why is this copying Apple, when black rectangular slates and grids of icons have existed before the iPhone both separately and in tandem? I'm sure many people have seen this image, but it seems to invalidate anything Apple has to say about owning the slate form factor/grid of icons UI.
http://photos.appleinsider.com/Sam.Apple.001.jpg [appleinsider.com]
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The tragedy in how idiotic that image is, even if it is technically correct.
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I think Apple's suit is utterly without merit, but you are trolling or stupid.
From the accompanying article, "the graphic is in error, as Samsung only mentioned plans for the new phone in 2006. It wasn't actually shown until February 2007 at the 3GSM World Congress, held a month after the iPhone's debut. It did not go on sale at that time."
Design patent != Utility patent (Score:3)
Samsung are being sued by Apple over design patents rather than utility patents.Basically the Samsung devices look too much like Apple devices [theregister.co.uk].
Design patents are very narrow scope and deal with just the look of the device as opposed to invention patents and software patents that cover how a device works.
The only company not in court (Score:2)
Either-or (Score:2)
So rather than spend money on lawyers to defend their intellectual property, they'd spend money on R&D to obfuscate their engineered products. In either case, it's not "productive".
Not that expensive (Score:2)
Speculation... (Score:2)
I wonder what sort of technological wonders the companies involved could come up with if they took all the money they're giving to lawyers and spent it on R&D instead?"
And I wonder what sort of technological wonders the companies involved couldn't come up with if they took all the money they've spent on R&D and used it to simply duplicate the work of others instead.
Speculation can go both ways.
Google should create a patent pool for Android (Score:2)
Google should create a defensive patent pool for Android.
Basically the idea is that any company partnering with Google on Android can join the pool.
Joining the pool means that you agree not to sue any member of the pool for patent violations connected to Android products. But in return, you get the right to use patents from any member of the pool as a defensive weapon in the event that a non-pool-member sues you for patent violations connected to Android products.
Collectively, I am sure that the big android