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Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions

By | December 4, 2011, 5:04pm PST

Summary: Apple’s “suggestions” to Samsung on how to avoid infringing its iPhone and iPad intellectual property design claims show just how idiotic its over-reaching claims really are.

Apple and Dunder Mifflin-Sabre agree that the pyramid makes a fine, legal tablet design.

Apple and Dunder Mifflin-Sabre agree that the pyramid makes a fine, legal tablet design.

I’ve been poking fun at Apple’s intellectual property design claims for some time now. Then, I got a look at Apple’s “suggestions” on how Samsung could avoid Apple’s legal wrath and I realized I hadn’t even scratched the surface of how absurd Apple’s claims are.

In a recently revealed Apple court document (PDF) we see an Apple-paid expert witness explaining why Apple’s designs should be protected under intellectual property law and how Samsung could have avoided Apple’s unique design decisions.

On the iPhone side, these include:

    Front surface that isn’t black.
    Overall shape that isn’t rectangular, or doesn’t have rounded corners.
    Display screens that aren’t centered on the front face and have substantial lateral borders.
    Non-horizontal speaker slots.
    Front surfaces with substantial adornment.
    No front bezel.

For the iPad, Apple’s expert presented a nearly identical list of other possible designs:

    Overall shape that isn’t rectangular, or doesn’t have rounded corners.
    Thick frames rather than a thin rim around the front surface.
    Front surface that isn’t entirely flat.
    Profiles that aren’t thin.

To all of these suggestions, I can only say, “Seriously?” Black? No smartphones except iPhones can have black on their fronts!? Only iPads can have thin rims? ” But, the one that really got my attention was that crack about the overall shape of both smartphones and tablets not needing to be rectangular.

Apple iPad design - it’s been done before (images)

I guess Apple has a point. After all, that great design genius of The Office, Dwight Schrute, came up with Dunder Mifflin-Sabre’s new tablet, The Pyramid. So why can’t other tablet design ideas work? Like say the circle! The square!

To anyone with two functioning brain cells and opposable thumbs, it’s clear that a rectangle is the best and obvious shape for a phone or a tablet. It would be funny if this was just a joke on The Office. It’s not. This is exactly the kind of design idiocy that Apple is using to keep rival smartphones and tablets off the market in its worldwide attack on Samsung. Software patent laws were bad enough. Now simple, common design elements are being used as bludgeons in the 21st century intellectual property legal wars. I’m beginning to seriously wonder how any non-multi-billion dollar companies will be able to get any product out on the market in the years to come.

If Apple has its way, not only oranges, but any fruit-shaped or fruit-colored objects would be kept from competing with apples.

Related Stories

U.S. court denies Apple’s bid to halt Samsung sales; Patent infringement ’still likely’

Apple’s Worldwide War on Samsung and Android

Samsung’s Galaxy Tab sales ban lifted in rare Apple patent defeat

European antitrust regulators: Global patent battle could be ‘used as tool for abuse’

Samsung alters Galaxy Tab design to avoid German sales ban

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Topics

Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Apple Inc., Tablets, Sales Strategy, Notebooks, Intellectual Property, Smart Phones, Hardware, Notebooks & Tablets, Sales, Research & Development, Business Operations, Consumer Electronics, Personal Technology, Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, aka sjvn, has been writing about technology and the business of technology since CP/M-80 was the cutting edge, PC operating system

Disclosure

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols is a freelance writer. He does not own stocks or other investments in any technology company.

Biography

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, aka sjvn, has been writing about technology and the business of technology since CP/M-80 was the cutting edge, PC operating system; 300bps was a fast Internet connection; WordStar was the state of the art word processor; and we liked it!

His work has been published in everything from highly technical publications (IEEE Computer, ACM NetWorker, Byte) to business publications (eWEEK, InformationWeek, ZDNet) to popular technology (Computer Shopper, PC Magazine, PC World) to the mainstream press (Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, BusinessWeek).

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Never underestimate the power of human stupidity
Cynical99 6th Dec
@WinTard
You should listen to your own quotes. Apple wins.
View in thread
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
jmiller1978 4th Dec
As rediculous as you think it is and yet Samsung is the only manufacturer whose own people can't distinguish their product from Apple's. Apple isn't suggesting that they change everything on that list, just one thing would have made it different but no, Samsung copied the design of the tablet, plug, box, marketing and even the "smart cover" (which they didn't even bother to rename).
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
gbrowerjr 4th Dec
@jmiller1978
Lawyers who probably don't use either can't distinguish from a distance. Can your grandma?
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That is besides the point; Samsung should have more dignity than behaving
dderss 4th Dec
@gbrowerjr: ... as Chinese no name manufacturer of forged products.

Samsung had their own tablet designs before iPad was released -- these devices with shaped gray plastic bezel that looked nothing like iPad.
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There was also some photoshopping...
robsku 5th Dec
@gbrowerjr
I don't know if it was this particular case, but I read from news some ago that Apple had photoshopped images to use in court so that the devices look even more alike. Dirty, no?
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Peter Perry 4th Dec
@jmiller1978 I gOT news for you, Blackberry has been using a smart cover design for years on their phones!

As for rectangular shape, that is exactly what Tablet PC's had as well and nobody ever stopped them from being black!

The only thing I can honestly see any basis in is the proprietary connector but even that isn't unique to Apple!
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
wright_is 5th Dec
@jmiller1978 The word SAMSUNG on the front, in big silver letters should be the giveaway... :-S
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Pete "athynz" Athens 5th Dec
@wright_is If that is the case then how come Samsung's lawyers could not positively identify the Samsung Tab 10 when held int he air next to an iPad?
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
wright_is 5th Dec
@Pete that always puzzled me, maybe they had their reading glasses on and couldn't see that far?

Given that the iPad is 4:3 format and the Galaxy 16:9 and doesn't have a hardware button, it seems baffling, that they couldn't tell the difference! I guess that the lawyers were so dumb, that they'd never even looked at their client's own product, let alone the oppositions product before they entered the courtroom...
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Samic 5th Dec
@jmiller1978
Let's see...

design of the tablet: Apparently not every court agree that square slab is Apple's patent. Just ask the Dutch court.

Plug: The cable plug is based on PDMI design. It's an ISO/ANSI standard. Check it out. Don't tell me the power plug can't be small and squary, that would be the same arguement of this article had made.

Box: If you want to squeeze as many units as possible in a shipping container, that would be the box design that eventually come up with. It's just natual logistic evolution. Debating something like this with someone who believe Apple invented everything would be like debating the Intelligent Design.

Marketing: I don't think Samsung ever caught up with this.

"Smart Cover": You meant Apple didn't also rip off Smart Cover from InCase's "Convertible Magazine Jacket"?
Xerox must be turning in it's grave.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
ebfarris 4th Dec
Apple can go f**k themselves until they start manufacturing stateside and paying their taxes. The iPhone alone could probably have brought back our economy.
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They pay taxes, as do their employees.
otaddy 5th Dec
@ebfarris Apple already has a huge corporate presence stateside.

If they are taking advantage of loopholes, then your complaint is with the govt as they created the loopholes.
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Reality check
use_what_works_4_U 5th Dec
@ebfarris
Will you say the same for:
Dell
HP
Amazon
Barnes and Noble
Intel
Cisco
Microsoft
Motorola
Vizio
etc...
The companies in this list are all U.S. companies manufacturing through Foxconn, the same contractor Apple uses. The list of total clients for Foxconn is huge, international, and includes most companies that design and sell products with Integrated Circuit Baords.

Or are you just railing against Apple because you have some issue with them?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
WinTard Updated - 5th Dec
Oops, double post due to lag. My apologies
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
WinTard 5th Dec
@macadam

Ironically, it is Samsung that invest $12 Billion dollars into the USA to date, brings permanent high-tech, high-salary jobs to NY and Austin TX. Plus the peripheral boost to local economy economy in terms of utilities + taxes paid.

Source: Google samsung invest austin tx ny


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samsung#History
...
and another facility in Austin in 1996. In total, Samsung has invested about $5.6 billion in the Austin location ??? by far the largest foreign investment in Texas and one of the largest single foreign investments in the United States. The new investment will bring the total Samsung investment in Austin to more than $9 billion.[16]



Now what's wrong with this picture? Why should a Korean company invest into the USA, whereas US companies invest elsewhere, but the USA?

I say kudos to Samsung! Shame on Apple!

~~~~~~~~~~
Good sense about trivialities is better than nonsense about things that matter.
~ Sir Henry Maximilian Beerbohm
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
use_what_works_4_U 5th Dec
@WinTard
And I am also glad for any investment in the United States. Most of their manufacturing work occurs outside of the U.S. though so it's not like this is a panacea. The Samsung plant that (currently) produces products for Apple is in Asia, for example.

Let's not overlook the fact that, like all U.S. Companies, Apple also adds value to the U.S. economy. Their technical and design work is all done in California. They have a few hundred retail outlets in the U.S. The sales from their website are U.S. profit centers. Virtually all of Apple's support infrastructure is located in the U.S. Advertising is done through a U.S. firm. In this way they are much like your beloved Microsoft, or Dell, or HP.

I am delighted to find out that Samsung has a facility in the U.S. but they also own (per your link)
a German camera maker
a Swiss watch maker (Rollei, which inspired a similar battle with Rolex - it seems Samsung has a history of trade dress issues) and a Dutch aircraft manufacturer.

Also, they bought a California research firm that they weren't able to keep open.


This is what it means to live in a World Economy. It's not a matter of a Korean conglomerate (Samsung is a conglomerate, not a single company for decades now) investing where an American company won't. It's a matter of a Korean conglomerate placing a small portion of their overall corporate activities in the U.S. and an American company placing one of many of it's significantly more limited activities overseas.

Welcome to the 21st Century. Enjoy your stay.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
ThatOtherApple 4th Dec
Here's an idea: copy everything ever written by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, aka sjvn, then slap your name on it and claim it as your own. Then, when Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, aka sjvn, complains, reply with, "Seriously?" Come on, it's just intellectual property, right? What's so intellectual about anything ever written by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, aka sjvn? Surely, that prestigious body of work can't compare to the millions (billions?) spent by Apple to research and build the technology they're selling around the globe.

Or can it?
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Frenz9 4th Dec
@ThatOtherApple

Except using your analogy - The original Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols was also copying from other peoples articles that were around years before & then claiming his as the original because hes the popular mainstream writer.
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Question - Why?
Cynical99 4th Dec
@ThatOtherApple
Why would anyone want to copy any of SJVN's work?
It's not original.
It's not inventive.
It's designed to inflame.
It's of poor quality.
It lacks substance.
It barely qualifies as a blog
It's inacurate.

Yes, he owns the IP (copyrights) to his so-called work,
but much like Android, no one wants to copy it. It's already second rate.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
anono Updated - 5th Dec
@Cynical99
And his work draws trolls like Cynical99 to the comment section.
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Second Rate
Cynical99 6th Dec
@anono
I suspect you are talking about the second rate comment as much as anything else.

Have you actually compared, side by side, Android to Apple? I doubt it. I bought an Android, foolishly believing the hype that it's ready for prime time, and then brought the IT department iPad home for a week.

There is no comparison. Apple wins hands down. Android, still very rough around the edges.

Steven starts all articles inaccurately by assuming Android and Apple systems are equal, and that Apple did not invent anything. Android did not copy anything. Both assumptions are incorrect.

Starting from a foundation if lies, Steven then fabricates articles, himself copying from other "news" sources without checking accuracy.

A journalist he is not, a researcher he is not.

CW finally had enough of the inflammatory rhetoric and seems to have separated him from their staff, while ZDnet allows him to continue.

By the way, you can always tell when Steven feels lonely and wants hits on this site to go up. He concocts an article like this, designed to get those all necessary hits. Truth is always a casualty in his world, after all, he never let the facts get in the way of a good, inflammatory article to drive the hit counts up.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
gbrowerjr 4th Dec
@ThatOtherApple
... You analogy is seriously flawed. What you described would be like samsung copying iOS code and passing it off as their own.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
ThatOtherApple Updated - 4th Dec
Do you understand that Samsung is a major component supplier for Apple and that they had access to Apple's designs and specifications? They didn't provide unimportant parts, like a button, or a headphone jack. Sumsung didn't just whip up designs for their tablets on some cocktail napkin, they used their access as a trusted vendor to copy Apple's work and presented it as their own. http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/samsung-makes-a-quarter-of-the-parts-in-the-iphone-4/
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Apple used their access as a trusted vendor...
otaddy 5th Dec
@thatotherapple I think you are right. This is probably the key reason why Apple is going after them.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
WinTard 5th Dec
@ThatOtherApple
Do you understand that Apple is like a mere transient customer going to a pastry shop or delicatessen and asking for some chef to prepare stuff they couldn't achieve themselves?

Apple didn't design the electronic components nor the internals, they just shop for it. They designed the exterior casing, and packaging retail box, but that's it and that's all. Just as iPhone and iPad customers are not necessarily all Electrical Engineers? But anyone can choose or not whatever is being offered and available? Why do you think all Apple products and Dell and HP and Microsoft (such as Xbox 360) and Sony PS/3 are manufactured by Foxconn by the same people in the same (or sister) factories? Using the same widely available electronic components from real manufacturers like Samsung?

Most the real technology comes from elsewhere but Apple. Apple just 'designs'... Costumes? Or maybe puts lipstick on a pig? Or Whatever that design term means.

As to who is slavishly stealing and copying:

How can Apple claim Design Patent on something manufactured and sold by Samsung, prior to the appearance of the first iPad?

Google samsung photo frame 2006 and witness some of these 2,610,000 results...


h t t p : / / l a w p u n d i t . b l o g s p o t . c o m / 2 0 1 1 / 0 8 / s a m s u n g - d i g i t a l - p i c t u r e - f r a m e - 2 0 0 6 - i s . h t m l
The design that Apple registered in the EU is a rectangle with rounded corners (EU Community Design 000181607-0001) and it is that design upon which the sought injunctions against Samsung for design infringement of the iPad and the iPhone are based. That design is so absurdly simple that one is skeptical.

When we look at the image below, which in the year 2006 precedes the introduction of the iPhone and the iPad, it would look as if this Samsung digital picture frame design has been copied by Apple for its iPad and iPhone.



Why do you think both the Netherlands and US court threw out those cosmetic "proudly designed in California" {but expertly and diligently crafted with acumen in China} patent claims by Apple against Samsung? And when the full due diligence trial comes to the USA, then we will know who is slavishly copying who after some trivial pantents are invalidated...

~~~~~~~~~~
There are two kinds of people, those who do the work and those who take the credit. Try to be in the first group; there is less competition there.
~ Indira Gandhi

Those who believe in telekinetics, raise my hand.
~ Kurt Vonnegut

Originality is the fine art of remembering what you hear but forgetting where you heard it.
~ Dr. Laurence J. Peter
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Pete "athynz" Athens Updated - 5th Dec
@WinTard Methinks thou protest too much...

Do you understand that Apple is like a mere transient customer going to a pastry shop or delicatessen and asking for some chef to prepare stuff they couldn't achieve themselves?

Because they use Foxconn? Right, right... and your precious Microsoft does not? Nintendo does not? Dell? Sony? It looks like a lot of companies are "transient customers"...

Apple didn't design the electronic components nor the internals, they just shop for it. They designed the exterior casing, and packaging retail box, but that's it and that's all.

Right, right so Apple did NOT design the A5 chip that runs the iPad2 and the iPhone 4S? Really? FAIL. Do some research there WinTard.

Just as iPhone and iPad customers are not necessarily all Electrical Engineers?

Speak for yourself.

But anyone can choose or not whatever is being offered and available? Why do you think all Apple products and Dell and HP and Microsoft (such as Xbox 360) and Sony PS/3 are manufactured by Foxconn by the same people in the same (or sister) factories? Using the same widely available electronic components from real manufacturers like Samsung?

Overhead costs. Cheap labor. The almighty bottom line. The same reason why quite a few American companies outsource.

Most the real technology comes from elsewhere but Apple. Apple just 'designs'... Costumes? Or maybe puts lipstick on a pig? Or Whatever that design term means.

Yeah... okay.

As to who is slavishly stealing and copying:

Ummm Samsung is. Hello!

How can Apple claim Design Patent on something manufactured and sold by Samsung, prior to the appearance of the first iPad?

Because Apple designed everything about the iPad right down to the packaging and Samsung slavishly copied it with their Galaxy tab 10 right down to the packaging. Also the iPad is based on the design of the iPhone 2G/3G/3GS. That's how. My God man, open your eyes!

Google samsung photo frame 2006 and witness some of these 2,610,000 results...

h t t p : / / l a w p u n d i t . b l o g s p o t . c o m / 2 0 1 1 / 0 8 / s a m s u n g - d i g i t a l - p i c t u r e - f r a m e - 2 0 0 6 - i s . h t m l
The design that Apple registered in the EU is a rectangle with rounded corners (EU Community Design 000181607-0001) and it is that design upon which the sought injunctions against Samsung for design infringement of the iPad and the iPhone are based. That design is so absurdly simple that one is skeptical.

Those are digital picture frames not tablets. Tell me why Samsung could not evolve the original Tab line without making a carbon copy of the iPad? Come on WinTard, you seem to have all the answers here - tell me why Samsung had to copy the iPad design.

When we look at the image below, which in the year 2006 precedes the introduction of the iPhone and the iPad, it would look as if this Samsung digital picture frame design has been copied by Apple for its iPad and iPhone.


Why do you think both the Netherlands and US court threw out those cosmetic "proudly designed in California" {but expertly and diligently crafted with acumen in China} patent claims by Apple against Samsung? And when the full due diligence trial comes to the USA, then we will know who is slavishly copying who after some trivial pantents are invalidated...


Sure that's why when both an iPad and a Tab 10 were held aloft by a judge for Samsung's lawyers to identify they could not positively identify which product they were defending. Please.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Europeforvisitors 4th Dec
I wonder if anyone has ever walked into a Best Buy looking for an iPhone or an iPad and walked out with a Samsung product by mistake.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
pdq 4th Dec
I wonder if anyone's ever gone into a Best Buy because they've seen someone with a (thin, black-faced, narrow silver-edged) "tablet" (with a touch-based array of icons) or heard about the interesting apps you can run on them and walked out with a knock off that won't actually run those apps or work as well?
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Frenz9 Updated - 4th Dec
@pdq
Someone sees a white fridge at somebody's house & heard about the interesting cooling & storage you can do with it and then walked out with a cheaper fridge that doesn't actually preserve the food as well.

Maybe [insert big fridge company] should sue the other fridge manufactures and suggest they use purple star shaped paper fridges instead.

A non informed customer will always loose out, its the Salesmens job to sell the product they have in the store.
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Comparing Apples to 'Fridges ?
jscott69 5th Dec
@Frenz9 ... I get your point ... buyer beware and all that. But you're overlooking one very critical part of the lawsuit: Apple has patents that cover the design aspects of the iPhone and iPad. The patents can be challenged, but until they're defeated, Apple has the right to prevent others from making products that look too similar to its own. That's the point of patents.

Without looking it up, I suspect that the first company to invent the modern electric refrigerator probably had a patent on it. But patents eventually expire, so now, all 'Fridges are pretty much the same ... quality not-withstanding.

BTW, someone mentioned that Windows Slates were typically black and rectangular. This is true. But they were typically thick -- like an inch -- and usually had thick borders around the screen, rarely had a flat front panel and usually had numerous buttons on the front. Oh, and their corners were basically right-angles. Sure, they were generally rectangular, but it's unlikely anyone would confuse an older Windows Slate for a sleek, slim, practically-buttonless iPad ... or is that a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1?
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Quite so -
Cynical99 5th Dec
@pdq
Yes, I made the mistake of buying an Android Tablet, then comparing to an iPad. What I found was that as one person said, Apple is a museum where everything is perfectly displayed and works together for a flawless customer experience.

Android is a noisy technical ghetto where the edges are rough and user experience is inconsistent.

To assume that Android (any version) and iOS are comparable is like comparing an early Chevy Vega to a Rolls Royce. There isn't a comparison on quality, yes they both get you from one location to another but one does it sooooo much better! Do you want to guess which is the Vega with bald tires?
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
gbrowerjr 4th Dec
@Europeforvisitors
Lucky them! They have a better product and can afford to get a case...and screen protectors...warranty...backup battery...big sd card...extra chargers...and lunch
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Frenz9 4th Dec
Funny, id take that list and also issue it to apple. All of that criteria has been done before.

Would also like to mention black & silver have been the professional product colours of practically every device for decades.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
z2217 4th Dec
Wow! Isn't it about time we started asking why it is Samsung, HP, HTC, RIM and the rest of the tablet/smartphone crowd haven't offered something substantially better than what Apple is giving us.

Apple started off re-thinking what a phone was supposed to be. Companies who had been in the phone business for years on end never managed to deliver anything nearly so innovative prior to seeing the iPhone. And since the iPhone what have the band of Apple competitors given the market? Just one iPhone copy after another. Nobody has re-rethought what a phone should be. Period.

Same thing with tablets. Apple rethought how the computer experience should be presented to the user. Thin, Flat, Carry-around, Long battery life, Multi-touch interface, Integrated cloud functionality, Voice-AI control, etc. So far, Apple's competitors aren't even copying Apple's design all that well, let alone bringing significant, new innovations into the space.

HP and Samsung are both huge companies with immense resources. They could be competing seriously with Apple and bringing the market truly new, innovative solutions that advance the art. Instead, best they seem to offer is me-to copies. So far, these companies are behaving like a bunch of hide-bound empty-suits. Maybe that is all they are. And, if hide-bound empty-suits is all they are, then IMO, we should not want to do anything to encourage, or support, or sustain their continued substandard behavior.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
gbrowerjr 4th Dec
@z2217

"Wow! Isn't it about time we started asking why it is Samsung, HP, HTC, RIM and the rest of the tablet/smartphone crowd haven't offered something substantially better than what Apple is giving us."

They already have.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
z2217 5th Dec
@gbrowerjr
Sorry. I have to disagree. While Samsung and others have arguably improved one spec or another, NONE of Apple's competitors has come out with a new category of device. When are one these companies going to reinvent the phone or the tablet or something else.

Years and years ago Sony reinvented music with the Walkman. They made music portable in a way radio didn't. Subsequently we got mp3 players and it was Apple that made these (iPods) the success this category has become by combining the player with music sales / distribution and management in a seamless experience.

The problem I have with all these competitors 'copying' what Apple has done isn't simply that they are ripping off someone else's (Apples) development effort. To me, the big failing here is that the very smart, very well resourced folks at places like Samsung and HP have failed to deliver the very best innovation of which they are capable. And, this is probably the result of their hide-bound, risk-averse, cheap, MBA'ish management.

I just don't think the world gets better when a pack of cheap dullards set out to commoditize and dumb-down someone else innovative products. This is the sort of evolutionary race for the bottom that will end up with all of us reduced to so much pond scum...
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Frenz9 4th Dec
@z2217 With the technology becoming more easily available companys were innovating their phones too, apple simply beat them to the punch.

But why does it matter, support Apple with your wallet if that's the device you prefer.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Peter Perry 4th Dec
@Frenz9 Actually, Apple has been lagging for 2 years now and the latest iPhone has already been surpassed by the Galaxy Nexus in pretty much every area but the camera!
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Peter Perry 4th Dec
@z2217 They have on multiple occasions and then Apple catches up and the whole thing starts over again.

Now we have the 5 core Transformer Prime and the Galaxy Nexus which both out do the Apple Products! Apple will take another year to catch up on the phone and will likely catch up on the Tablet in March but the Android Tablets this time around will surpass the latest iPad by May.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
dave95. 4th Dec
@z2217

Let's add in the recent crop of MacBook Air clones from Asus, Samsung and the other usual suspects.
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It's not the shape or color
tyoungsf@... 4th Dec
It's the operating system that makes them different. How many cars look alike? Yet they are not wasting money on these silly court cases. I use both Apple and Android so keep an open mind. I've had 3 generations of the iPhone, use an iMac for my desktop and have a Macbook pro, and bought the first iPad. I now use a Samsung phone, and an Android Tablet. I tried both and did not assume anything. I just use the best product that meets my needs.

It's not about the shape or color. And to assume that Apple made the first squarish tablet is crazy as evidence shows that in movies they had non-working devices that look just like an iPad in the past. Calculators looked alike but I did not see them in court fighting with each other.

Come on Apple, spend your money on creating great new devices instead of court cases. Or maybe donate more of your money to charity. But stop already!
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
ThatOtherApple 4th Dec
Okay, for Samsung's designers: a transparent screen computing device with the computing and display electronics contained in an opaque, side-mounted aluminum bar bar; a thin-sheet computing device that can be rolled and folded and placed into a pocket; a computing device that uses a projected screen and keyboard image; a computing device that replaces white boards; a computing device that covers table tops; a computing device that projects within the lenses of eye glasses; a computing device that uses a specially painted wall as its display and input; a computing device that is mounted to ceiling light fixture and responds to voice command and can project onto nearby screen or onto a floor and/or output sound... let's see.. there are probably a dozen more I can think of. No need to copy Jon's work.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
qolitz 5th Dec
@ThatOtherApple

The most flawed, not to mention patronizing, comment ever.

What you're suggesting is not alternative designs. You're entering completely different markets.

It's as if a car manufacturer was suing another company for similar designs, and suggesting them to make trains, boats, rocket ships, roller blades, luges, etc instead.

By the way you're not as clever as you think you are for doing nothing more than regurgitating known facts, so don't pretend you're "coming up" with these yourselves. The real geniuses at Samsung have already innovated much of what you listed. But once again, completely different market than a tablet.

Oh and Jon. No need to copy Braun.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
themarty Updated - 4th Dec
"I will spend my last dying breath if I need to, and I will spend every penny of Apples $40 billion in the bank, to right this wrong. Im going to destroy Android, because its a stolen product. Im willing to go thermonuclear war on this."

That kind of sums it up.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
WinTard 5th Dec
@themarty

Steve Jobs' madness will ruin and bankrupt Apple. He fooled so many gullible people, he started believing in his own lies, deceptions and imaginary powers of Reality Distortion Field. And with his megalomaniac neurotic tendencies, couldn't stand it when someone else outdid what he thought he accomplished but simply stole, re-invented, embellished, then claimed as original design.

Apple never invented anything. But they re-invent the wheel... And find gullible people to believe in it?

Did Apple invent:
CPU - NO
PC - NO
Software - NO
Computer Science - NO
Microchips - NO
Displays - NO
Touch screen - NO
iOS & OS X - NO (based on open-source FreeBSD, removing the open-source components making it closed-source in the BSD loader & signed binaries through EFI) OS X is NOT open-source. But stolen from open-source.
EFI - NO
Mouse - NO
MP3 - NO

Hey Apple followers, what did Apple really invent, other than the RDF? Just Google reality distortion field and see what comes back. (no need to specify Apple...)


Alas for Apple and Steve, he chose the wrong company to mess with. Because Samsung has the muscle, stamina, and intellect to take on Apple, head-on. And win a protracted battle.

Actually, all Samsung has to do is to stop delivering any essential and critical parts to Apple, to see them starve and die. Well, you can't make any money without complete products?

All the high-tech parts in Apple mobile products are made by Samsung, such as the critical and essential A4, A5 and future A6 CPU. Nobody else but Samsung can manufacture them at the utmost quality, reliability, quantity, and price.

Only stupid animals bite the hand that feeds them.

The amount of business Apple buys from Samsung for parts is insignificant (4%) of Samsung revenues. If they stopped selling any parts to Apple, that 4% would be recouped easily, by Samsung selling finished products, instead of just parts. The profit margins are much higher per unit sold. Basically, Samsung doesn't need Apple for survival, yet Apple desperately needs Samsung for parts, or their entire business will come to a screeching halt and then collapse.

Now how stupid from Apple to attack their ex-business-partners?

Just Google Steve Jobs madness, and see what comes back.

Steve was jealous of Samsung's success and potential.

~~~~~~~~~~
A competent and self-confident person is incapable of jealousy in anything. Jealousy is invariably a symptom of neurotic insecurity.
~ Robert A. Heinlein

Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.
~ Robert A. Heinlein

Love is that condition in which the happiness of another person is essential to your own... Jealousy is a disease, love is a healthy condition. The immature mind often mistakes one for the other, or assumes that the greater the love, the greater the jealousy.
~ Robert A. Heinlein
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Pete "athynz" Athens 5th Dec
@WinTard Actually old boy Apple DID in fact invent the capaicitive multi touch screen used in the original iPhone, invented the retina display used in the last 2 iPhone models, and did in fact invent the Personal Computer.

Apple did not invent the CPU, the GPU, the mouse, the GUI nor any of the assorted parts inside of a PC but they were the first ones to put it all together into a cohesive whole.
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Interesting examples there..
daftkey Updated - 5th Dec
@WinTard

Apple never invented anything. But they re-invent the wheel... And find gullible people to believe in it?

Have a look back at your own examples. Sure, Apple may have re-invented the wheel, but in their case, their re-invention was to add an engine, transmission, and steering column to it, while everyone else was still arguing over the correct composition of axel grease for their carriages.

CPU - NO
Of course, Apple didn't pile a whole boatload of money and R&D along with IBM and Motorola into the design of what has since evolved into the POWER processors used in most current gaming machines, many supercomputers, and is used as a reference for other high-performance-low-power processor designs. Oh wait.. yes they did.. a lot more than Samsung (or any other asian manufacturer), if I do recall correctly.

PC - NO
Nope, IBM did that one.. a full five years after Apple released the Apple I. Of course, there were computers before the Apple I, and a few of them were even portable, so I guess that makes the Apple I nothing to sniff about..

iOS & OS X - NO (based on open-source FreeBSD, removing the open-source components making it closed-source in the BSD loader & signed binaries through EFI) OS X is NOT open-source. But stolen from open-source.

Okay.. so following your logic here, since FreeBSD is open source and Apple "didn't invent anything", just made an OS based on FreeBSD by "stealing" their code, why aren't there more successful FreeBSD-based OS's out there with the same look-and-feel as Apple's? Could it be that the FreeBSD part is really the part that not a lot of people really give a lick about, and the parts Apple wrote on top of it are REALLY what makes Mac OS X so coveted?

Kindof getting confused between where the "street" ends and where the "car" begins, aren't we?


EFI - NO
Mouse - NO

True enough - but these are two excellent examples of technologies whose real inventors owe a lot of thanks to Apple - they would be crying the "icouldabeenacontenda" blues if it weren't for Jobs & co.


MP3 - NO

And I'm sure your 32MB Diamond Rio did a great job of playing the 6 or 7 songs that it was able to carry when the iPod was first invented.
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
WinTard Updated - 5th Dec
@Pete "athynz" Athens

Sorry young boy to burst your innocent Apple bubble of FUD+BS...

Source: Google who invented touch screen


http://inventors.about.com/od/tstartinventions/a/Touch-Screen.htm
History of Touch Screen Technology

1960s
Historians consider the first touch screen to be a capacitive touch screen invented by E.A. Johnson at the Royal Radar Establishment, Malvern, UK, around 1965 - 1967. The inventor published a full description of touch screen technology for air traffic control in an article published in 1968.

1970s
In 1971, a "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. The Elograph was selected by Industrial Research as one of the 100 Most Significant New Technical Products of the Year 1973.

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 a resistive touch screen technology, the most popular touch screen technology in use today.

In 1977, Siemens Corporation financed an effort by Elographics to produce the first curved glass touch sensor interface, which became the first device to have the name "touch screen" attached to it. On February 24, 1994, the company officially changed its name from Elographics to Elo TouchSystems.



Source: Google who invented multi touch


http://www.osnews.com/story/23089/Apple_Slapped_with_Multitouch_Patent_Lawsuit
Apple Slapped with Multitouch Patent Lawsuit
posted by Thom Holwerda on Wed 31st Mar 2010 21:55 UTC

I guess this is what some people would call "karma". Apple may shout off the rooftops that it invented multitouch, and that anyone else using it is clearly stealing it from them - but another company has taken offence to that, and has slapped the Cupertino giant with a patent infringement suit over multitouch.

The company in question is Taiwanese chipmaker Elan Microelectronics, and they are suing Apple over patent no. 5,825,352, filed in February 1996, and granted in October 1998. The patent calls for a "method and apparatus for detecting an operative coupling between one or more fingers or other appropriate objects and a touch pad includes processes for detection of multiple maxima with intermediate minima in appropriate sequences to emulate the operations of cursor control and button actuations in a pointing and control device".
...
In other words, multitouch. In 1996. More than ten years before Apple released the iPhone.



Retina is just Steve Jobs' marketing magical fantastic new term for a medium resolution LCD display manufactured by Korea's LG Electronics, patented by Hitachi. Available to anyone who wishes so. But nowadays, everybody is moving to Samsung's Super-AMOLED displays without any of the drawbacks of the LCD such as polarizing filter, low brightness, limited viewing angle, thickness due to LED backlighting, more power consumption, less resolution, doesn't work in cold climates (hundreds of miliseconds response time) etc... Basically Retina is OBSOLETE technology. And was never invented nor manufactured by Apple. The only invention is coining the term 'retina'. If you call that an invention, then my condolences...

Since you presuppositions were false above, what makes you think you know about "the first to put it all together into a cohesive whole". That unfortunately, is mere Apple BS+FUD indoctrinated through self-serving propaganda.

So I'd suggest, even challenge you to provide independently verifiable facts on the Internet with links supporting your rationale?

Just like I do? You know not just mere opinions and biases? But supporting evidence as well.

That will cut through the crap pretty quickly don't you think?

~~~~~~~~~~
Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired.
~ Jules Renard

I am not young enough to know everything.
~ Oscar Wilde

The young man knows the rules, but the old man knows the exceptions.
~ Oliver Wendell Holmes
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Samic Updated - 5th Dec
@Pete "athynz" Athens
Actually Apple didn't invent the capacitive MT screen. It was ordered and custom made from Sharp. Apple gave the specification to Sharp and Sharp produce it, that's all.

If order a custom made Capacitive MT LCD = invent, that would equal to Boeing ordering an Rolls Royce engine and claiming they invented the said engine.Even worse, that design may not even invented by Rolls Royce, but Lockheel Martin.

Same thing goes with the retina display. Sharp has a hi-def LCD and Apple secured an exclusive right to it, doesn't necessary mean they invented it.

You do know Micral and Altair 8800 are both "Personal Computer" (or then called "micro-computer" before Woz created the first Apple, yes?
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
WinTard 5th Dec
@Pete "athynz" Athens

Oh my bad, I missed one of your Apple claims...

You said

and did in fact invent the Personal Computer



Well that is what Apple wants you to believe, but could Apple be less than honest about this?

The rest of the world honored Charles Thacker a computer scientist with the Turing Award (equivalent to Nobel Prize for computer science). And guess where Charles Thacker works?

Simply Google charles thacker inventor of modern pc, see who he is, what awards and other contributions recognized and distinguished from and by his peers; Last but not least where and who he works for?

Hint: Google microsoft fellow turing award

Apparently Microsoft's got many distinguished fellow scientists that have achieved the highest honor in their industry? Still working there?

Please enlighten me as to how many Apple Turing Award scientists work at Apple?

Just wondering?

Bottom line the person recognized for inventing the modern personal computer, works at Microsoft. Always has (well maybe not). Always will (well maybe)?

Anyway, links please. Thanks.

~~~~~~~~~~
A lie told often enough becomes the truth.
~ Lenin (1870 - 1924)

I'd rather live with a good question than a bad answer.
~ Aryeh Frimer

The Argument from Intimidation is a confession of intellectual impotence.
~ Ayn Rand

The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.
~ B. F. Skinner
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RE: Apple and Oranges: Apple's tablet design suggestions
Pete "athynz" Athens 5th Dec
@WinTard Retina display: http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2010/06/apple-files-two-retina-trademark-applications.html

Capacitive multi touch screen: http://macdailynews.com/2011/06/22/apple-granted-major-iphone-patent-for-capacitive-multitouch-interface-rival-smartphone-makers-face-big-trouble/

I'll grant the two above are patents.

Samic says: "Actually Apple didn't invent the capacitive MT screen. It was ordered and custom made from Sharp. Apple gave the specification to Sharp and Sharp produce it, that's all. "

It was custom made by Sharp from Apple's specifications... Sharp did not invent it they just produced it.

Personal Computers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh This one I have to take the hit - I loped Micro Computers into a separate category... my bad. Apple did however invent the first commercially successful PC with a mouse and GUI.
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Never underestimate the power of human stupidity
Cynical99 6th Dec
@WinTard
You should listen to your own quotes. Apple wins.

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