Can you see any similarities between Epic 4g and Apple 4?

[tomy2001]

Right now, Samsung is getting sued by Apple. Apple says that Samsung's products are vere similar to theirs. Samsung Epic 4g is including in the sue. What do you think about this sue?
In my personal opinion, this is a free market. I think there is not any similarities between Epic and Apple 4 or 3g either.

 

[Skunkape60]

Typical apple strategy. Sue their competition instead of making a better product.

Sent from my SPH-D700 using Tapatalk

 

[drekosh]

I don't see a striking similarity between the iphone 4 and the Epic, but I do see a similarity between the iphone and the other galaxy 3 phones.

 

[big_bake]

I think the only thing off the top of my mind and front and rear facing cameras.

Differences:

Form: slider vs slate
OS: android vs iOS
Screen: SAMOLED vs Retina
Apps: Market vs App Store
Connectivity: 4G vs 3G

 

[I Monarch]

TouchWiz replicates the iPhone iOS experience pretty closely. The international i9000 looks to be designed very much like the iPhone. "Free market" doesn't apply when there's design, UI, and UX copyrights involved. If they were readily available, everyday design ideas, Apple wouldn't be able to patent them.

 

[jrz5024]

TouchWiz replicates the iPhone iOS experience pretty closely. The international i9000 looks to be designed very much like the iPhone. "Free market" doesn't apply when there's design, UI, and UX copyrights involved.

^ This. Touchwiz on the Galaxy S is clearly an iOS emulation, from the 4-button soft keys at the bottom to the horizontal app drawer to the hardware key-less face (minus the home key for the i9000). Each one of these individual components might be considered too generic to relate to an iPhone, but when combined it's clear that Apple had some significant influence on the design.

That being said, I have some personal qualms relating to Apple's ability to successfully copyright minimalism. While I can appreciate apple's beautiful hardware aesthetics, iOS is the simplest implementation possible of a touch screen, basically nothing more than a glorified launcher. If you really think about it, iOS doesn't do anything much different than my old palm pilot could do (though it obviously does it much better). Apple's success came not from radical innovation, but from quality execution. The question is, how simple can something get while still being considered unique? If I paint a plain, blue canvas, is it art?

Furthermore, Apple's tendency to wage copyright wars leads to questions like whether one can successfully trademark a term like "App Store," a description so generic that it literally refers to the service itself. For instance, I can't sell "Soda" brand soda and forbid others from using the term, or open "Grocery Store."

These type of IP questions are interesting consequences of the digital age and what it means to truly 'own' an idea.

 

[markot86]

TouchWiz replicates the iPhone iOS experience pretty closely. The international i9000 looks to be designed very much like the iPhone. "Free market" doesn't apply when there's design, UI, and UX copyrights involved. If they were readily available, everyday design ideas, Apple wouldn't be able to patent them.

This. TouchWiz is a fairly shameless replica of the look and feel of iOS. The hardware may look fairly different in the case of the epic, but take out the keyboard and the differences between a galaxy S phone and the Iphone are fairly hard to discern to the average consumer. The last time I walked into a verizon store I overheard a sales rep describing the fascinate as an "Iphone with a better screen" to a potential buyer. I would not be surprised if this comparison is made nationwide, and I'm sure it's definitely improved the sales of these devices.

Samsung makes some of the most impressive hardware out there, and has some of the best engineers in the field. Their ability to push quality products to market quickly is truly impressive. However, there's no doubt that they are willing to cut corners and potentially step on a few patents in order to push out a product. There is no doubt that apple's potential patent infringement was weighed when they decided on touchwiz, and they decided that the financial benefit would outweigh a lawsuit's cost.

My guess is that they will end up settling with Apple, but who knows.

 

[Andrew Ruffolo]

so why is the Nexus s included?

 

[eerongal]

Honestly, i think they're grasping at straws with it. The interfaces and experience are so significantly different that they have nothing, in my opinion.


Also, i had this sent to me a moment ago, and thought it worth a chuckle and sharing here.

 

[Mike77]

Apple sues everyone. They sue companies that they themselves took ideas from claiming it was the reverse.

 

[StoneRyno]

User interface and hardware setup and casing design are not protected under copyright law. This is simply apples way of trying to squash or hurt the competition by costing them money in court. The MPAA and RIAA use the same tactics. If you have no legal grounds to get your way sue everyone to try and still get your way. The only thing that is copyrighted is the code behind the UI and hardware. It's as stupid as saying I'm going to sue you because you made an action movie about cops stopping bad guys because I made an action movie about cops stopping bad guys. Or expecting to trademark a common use word like app or app store. I believe app store is currently being contested because it should not have been: trademarks are "to identify and distinguish the goods of one manufacturer or seller from goods manufactured or sold by others". app store fails to meet this portion of the definition just as drug store doesn't distinguish one's specific drug store from any others drug stores.

 

[alexnaoumi]

http://www.designbyinfinity.com/internet/73e7bcd2.jpg ------ found that in the thread in the homepage's article.

 

[Donmeister85]

Also, i had this sent to me a moment ago, and thought it worth a chuckle and sharing here.

Haha. Nice.

I've never been a big fan of Touchwiz, but as many have said before, it strikingly resembles iOS4 UI. Even so, I still don't understand Apple's rationale about the whole thing. I hope they get their butts handed to them in court honestly.

 

[jrz5024]

User interface and hardware setup and casing design are not protected under copyright law. This is simply apples way of trying to squash or hurt the competition by costing them money in court. The MPAA and RIAA use the same tactics. If you have no legal grounds to get your way sue everyone to try and still get your way. The only thing that is copyrighted is the code behind the UI and hardware.

Please cite a source with your claim, because I don't believe that's correct. If Apple can't patent user interface, how did they claim pinch-to-zoom?

 

[Officerpolabear]

Touchwiz does look like iOS but Apple better watch who's toes they're stepping on. I think they forgot who makes their cpu, gpu, ram, and flash memory, which pretty much are the components that make the phone work. I see this as a lose lose situation. If Apple wins, Samsung will just be pissed at them, maybe causing problems in production or Apple loses and nothing happens.

 

[Officerpolabear]

Actually on second thought, samsung should give apple the hummingbird for their SoC on the iPhone 5 and keep the exynos for themselves. Muahahahahahahaha

 

[StoneRyno]

Please cite a source with your claim, because I don't believe that's correct. If Apple can't patent user interface, how did they claim pinch-to-zoom?

Here some quotes from wikipedia: "Copyright does not protect ideas, only their expression."; "In addition copyright can only protect the artist's expression of his/her work and not the ideas, systems, or factual information conveyed in it." Wikipedia cites sources for these two quotes. A patent protects an inventors invention (or unique process). For example one can not patent the light bulb (general sense) but rather must have a unique method of producing light from a bulb. Which is why you see patent numbers on each manufacturer's packaging. Similarly a trademark uniquely identifies a company distinguishing it from other companies. Which is why common terms are not allowed as trademarks.

 

[jerseykat1]

Just one more reason why I have NEVER and will NEVER purchase an apple product or ever buy from itunes.

its too bad that most people are sheep, there is nothing special about apple products.

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[brillrick]

I am not a patent, trademark attorney, so I cannot tell if Apple truly has a case here. However, I am surprised that people are so vehemently denying that Apple doesn't have a slight point.

To me, it seems that samsung designers and engineers looked at an iPhone and said "How can we best iterate on what apple is doing here?" rather than trying to start from scratch on their own. It is blatant to me when you see the icons in the touchwiz app drawer and every icon has a rounded square backing behind it, so it can imitate iOS rounded square icons. I believe Samsung did some slight improvements on iOS, but for sure they want the look of Touchwiz to be like iOS.

The thing is I do not know if this is patent, trademark or copyright infringement. That is for lawyers and judges to decide. What may be obvious to the common person may not legally correct.

 

[StoneRyno]

The thing is I do not know if this is patent, trademark or copyright infringement. That is for lawyers and judges to decide. What may be obvious to the common person may not legally correct.

An icon (image that is used to represent an app) could be a trademark. Though I doubt apple or anyone would trademark all of their icons that would be quite costly. But if they did trademark them and samsung duplicated then to the extent that they are nearly indistinguishable compared to the ones in iOS then there would be trademark infringement. But outside of that remote possibility they haven't infringed on anything. UI is nothing more than a conveyed system, it is the code underneath it and distribution choice of the software (the code) that is protected by copyright. In other words duplicating code is kind of like plagiarism and installing and running iOS on anything but an iphone would be like printing copies of a book without permission.