Apple has been beating the legal tar out of Android handset makers. The home button, slide to unlock and a host of other Apple patented design features that once could be found on Android devices are gone, but the battles still aren’t over and, with the issuance of this patent, unlikely to subside any time soon.
The mothership has gotten heat from developers and pundits over its apparent inaction vis-a-vis app piracy, a problem observers say has only gotten worse in recent months. Although criticism of Apple is unlikely to subside, the biggest iOS pirate site has been pushed off shore and the problem has moved to countries ‘that do not have copyright laws.’
Is the US patent system broken? Clearly the answer has to be, “yes.” Although “slide to unlock” is a brilliant concept, should it be patentable? I’m willing to say it should be trademarkable, but this seems like just another egregious “method patent.”
That’s not the exact quote, but it’s unequivocally what Steve Jobs meant. Think you know the Apple CEO? Time to think different. Walter Isaacson’s biography doesn’t officially ship until Monday, October 24, but early copies have leaked and the quotes, the incendiary kind, are already lighting up the web.
Well over a year after they committed the theft and profited from the sale of a pilfered iPhone 4 prototype, the pair have received what can only be described as light punishment. However, with convictions secured, will Apple now turn on Gizmodo publisher Gawker?
When you breathe the strange, rarified air that surrounds all things Apple, it’s hard to know what to believe. Thereupon, if San Francisco’s finest, or at least their spokesman, are believable, then the story of the second lost iPhone prototype has come to a swift and inglorious end, but not before providing a few laughs.
No police report has been filed in this particular incident, but the details are already familiar. An apple employee, hopefully not Gray Powell, left an iPhone 5 prototype in a San Francisco “tequila lounge” whereafter it might have been sold on Craigslist. I’m guessing Gizmodo wasn’t the buyer.
Verizon is generally not so fast and AT&T is renowned for spotty, sometimes unreliable service. Thereupon, rumors that the number three carrier here in the U.S. will be getting the iPhone come Fall have lots of people talking. That is, pretty much everyone except the folks working in Sprint’s retail outlets.
From the miscarriage of justice department comes news that paying for stolen property isn’t a punishable offense. A “journalist” paying a source? Not a punishable offense. However, being a stupid punk is punishable by up to a year in jail and two of those have been charged.
Here’s something you don’t see every day. A diverse array of companies, often bitter competitors, joining forces to bid on that most contentious of all commodities, patents. Apple and Microsoft are part of this coalition of the willing, as are EMC, Sony, Ericsson and RIM.
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