Apple has been granted what has been described as “the mother of all software patents,” which covers a whole host of features that Apple pioneered with the iPhone. Not only is this huge for Apple in its fight against copycats, but it could have a significant affect on almost every single device that rivals the iPhone or the iPad.
US District Court Judge Lucy Koh rejected requests today from both Apple and Samsung regarding the parties’ proposal to keep portions of key legal documents out of the public eye during their upcoming patent case in California this month.
If you’ve been following all the current pre-trial back and forth between Apple and Samsung in the Apple Inc v. Samsung Electronics Co Ltd et al, 11-1846 case, in which Apple has claimed Samsung is infringing on several patents, Samsung has counterclaimed similar infringement arguments, and Apple’s request for a temporary sales ban on the Samsung Nexus Phone has been accepted and enforced by the court.
You’ll also know that Judge Koh has been steadily, one might say doggedly, dealing with both parties, trying to keep the case as relevant, simple, and direct as possible.
In an effort to make its sixth-generation iPhone slimmer than previous models, Apple will reportedly introduce a new display that features clever “in-cell” touch technology that allows it to become significantly thinner than existing iPhone displays by negating the need for a dedicated digitizer. According to sources for The Wall Street Journal, mass production of these displays has already begun.
In the continuing saga of Apple and Samsung in the copyright infringement trial in California recently, it seems as if Apple has a much stronger position than many people might believe. This isn’t a case of Apple stifling innovation, but rather of Samsung knowing very well that it has a weak case in both the claims it is defending against as well as the claims it has brought to court itself.
After landing on Android and iOS yesterday, Rovio has confirmed that Amazing Alex will be making its way to Mac and PC. The new physics-based puzzler is Rovio’s first break away from the hugely successful Angry Birds series, and it’s already gotten off to a great start, rocketing up to the number one spot in the App Store’s paid charts in several countries.
Both Samsung and Apple filed pre-trial juror screening questionnaires with the US District Court that is handling the patent dispute originally filed by Apple agains Samsung. Potential jurors will have to answer close to 750 questions unless Judge Koh, the District Judge who has been handling this case, asks for some winnowing of the number of questions. 49 of those questions are from Apple, with the remaining 700 filed by Samsung. That’s six pages to forty pages, respectively.
Since its debut back in 2009, the iPad has dominated the tablet market. At the time of writing this piece, the device holds around 55% of the market share in the United States. Rival tablets from the likes of Amazon, Samsung, and HTC have tried to do battle with it, but they’ve had very little impact on its success.
But there is one tablet that Apple will need to keep its eye on: Microsoft’s new Surface. It’s already being dubbed an “iPad killer” by some, and although we’re skeptical the Windows-powered slate will “kill” Apple’s device, there are a number of reasons why the “Pro” variant will have more of an impact than you think.
No sir, that’s not an Apple store you’re looking at, that there is a bona fide Samsung store. What looks like an episode of Punk’d, is actually Samsung’s first Canadian retail store in Metro Vancouver. This 140-square-metre store is located in Burnaby’s Metropolis at Metrotown and offers a plethora of Samsung’s latest mobile devices, as well as demo stations to see how they function and interact with other Samsung products such as TVs.
Following earlier rumors that claimed Amazon is gearing up to launch a smartphone that will rival Apple’s iPhone, The Wall Street Journal has confirmed with sources that the retail giant is currently testing the device with its suppliers, and that it could enter production as early as the end of this year.
Apple has been handed yet another blow in a U.K. courtroom after the High Court of England & Wales sided with Samsung today and decided that the Korean company’s Galaxy Tab series does not infringe Apple’s designs. The judge said Samsung’s products are recognizably different to Apple’s, and are therefore free to remain on sale in the U.K.
The US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit granted Samsung’s latest motion for an immediate, temporary stay of Apple’s injunction against the Galaxy Nexus.
The temporary stay only covers now through the time when the Federal Circuit will decide on Samsung’s motion to stay the ban on a more permanent basis. According to Florian Mueller on FOSSPatents today, Apple has until July 12th to respond to the motion. The court will then decide on the possibility and duration of a stay for the entire length of the appeal process. This could lead to a yo-yo effect, as each side responds in their own timeline and the Court puts any stay in force, or disables it, as they did today.
Apple is very quick to jump on rival companies who infringe upon its patents, and the company is currently embroiled in a number of legal battles with the likes of Samsung and HTC. But sometimes, Apple is on the receiving end of these complaints. In China, the Cupertino company is being sued for infringing upon a voice assistant patent with its Siri feature.
Samsung’s new Wi-Fi-enabled EX2F compact is a nice example of Apple-like design thinking: In order to do some things really well, it sacrifices other options. Instead of the indecisive kitchen-sink approach of Microsoft to its Surface, Samsung has laser-focused the design of the EX2F. But that’s not to say it lacks features.
Apple and Samsung already narrowed the field of their California-based lawsuits against each other back in May of this year, pending a July 30 trial. Late yesterday, however, both parties filed a joint statement about narrowing the complaint field further in response to Judge Lucy Koh’s request they do so.
This makes perfect sense, especially when she already restricted their court time back in June. As Florian Mueller (FOSSPatents) points out, each of the large number of intellectual property (IP) arguments is already fairly complex. Trying to argue a ton of them at once would be unmanageable.
After all the back and forth-ing going on between Apple, Samsung, Google, and the US District Court lately, it’s hardly a surprise that the Nexus phone has undergone some changes on the Google Play website’s “Devices” sales page.
The target of Apple’s successful request to ban US sales of was taken down earlier this evening from the Play site, as reported on 9 to 5 Mac, and is currently back, but only as a “Coming Soon” item.
Apple won a preliminary injunction against US sales of the Galaxy Nexus phone last week. Today, Samsung was denied a stay on the ban by Judge Lucy Koh, the main judge in the current case brought to court against Samsung’s smartphone as well as its Galaxy Tab.
It may not matter as much, however, as Google and Samsung have readied a patch to address the specific grievance, according to a post on The Verge.
In another setback for Samsung today, a US judge rejected Samsung’s request to lift the injunction against United States sales of the Galaxy Tab, a tablet computer than runs Google’s Android and competes with the iPad.
As we reported last week, US District Judge Lucy Koh granted Apple’s request to block any US sale of the tablet. Apple claims that the Galaxy Tab infringes on several of Apple’s patents that apply to it’s iOS devices and operating system. Samsung had appealed the court to stay the injunction pending resolution of an appeal, but today’s judgement seems unequivocal.
Judge Lucy Koh handed Apple an injunction against Samsung selling their Galaxy Tab 10.1 in the US in the latest round of legal warfare between the two companies. Her decision comes after her previous denial of Apple’s request as well as a federal appeals court ruling for her to reconsider the request.
Both Apple and Samsung have been engaged in a courtroom battle for what seems like ages now, bickering back and forth like an old married couple. Like a parent intervening between two fighting kids, Judge Lucky Koh has finally stepped in between Samsung and Apple to lay down some rules.
It’s no secret, Samsung has been crawling under Apple’s skin for quite some time. Now, with the release of the Samsung Galaxy S III, Samsung wants iPhone users to know they can make the switch effortlessly thanks to a free app they’re making available to UK Galaxy devices. The app is called Easy Phone Sync, from developer Media Mushroom, and promises to makes transferring your iOS content over to your new Galaxy device a breeze.
Sometimes, something so traumatic happens to the human body that a person undergoes a complete personality shift. The girl who was, before, a model member of the Christian league gets hit by a car suddenly becomes promiscuous and violent. The good-natured guy who helps everyone has a wrench fall on his skull from fifty feet and becomes a drug-addicted psychopath. And the alpha businessman who is in a car crash goes from trading on Wall Street to rambling incoherently and exposing himself on subway platforms.
It’s sad, but it happens, and Samsung wants people who have been unfortunate enough to undergo such mental trauma ending in a complete personality shift to know that they’ve got a friend in them. That’s the only explanation for the Korean manufacturer’s latest play: an app for the deranged minds who are switching from the iPhone to a Galaxy smartphone.
The MacBook Air has never been a slouch in terms of performance, but with the 2012 model, SSD performance is scoring a whopping 217% higher than ever before.
In tests run by OSXDaily, read speeds reached a maximum of 461MB/s, and write speeds hit 364MB/s, a dramatic increase over the 2011 model, which scored just a modest 145MB/s read speed and a 152MB/s write speed.
Samsung rips off everything about Apple.
They’ve ripped off the iPhone. They’ve ripped off the Mac mini. They’ve ripped off the iPhone 3G. They’ve ripped off the iPad Smart Cover. Heck, they’ve even ripped off Apple’s commercial actresses.
We were wondering, then, what it would look like if Samsung just went whole hog and decided to design themselves a new logo the same way they “designed” their smartphones and tablets: by stealing their ideas wholesale from Apple.
Ready? Without further ado, here’s Samsung’s new logo:
Samsung’s a company of shameless copycats. They’ve ripped off the iPhone. They’ve ripped off the Mac mini. They’ve ripped off the iPhone 3G. They’ve ripped off the iPad Smart Cover. Heck, they’ve even ripped off Apple’s commercial actresses.
So it’s kind of nice to see Samsung ripping off someone else for a change. That all said, this is beyond parody: Samsung is now looking to create its own social network, and their top-super-secret codename for the endeavor? “SAMSUNG FACEBOOK.” You can’t make this stuff up.
Apple typically score high in brand loyalty and product satisfaction. As a result, it doesn’t come as a huge surprise to hear that the new iPad and iPad 2 are leading tablet satisfaction surveys. Nor is it surprising that the iPads aren’t just scoring better than other tablets, they’re kicking some Android butt.
According to the latest numbers from Changewave, 81% of new iPad owners are very satisfied with their devices and while an additional 15% are somewhat satisfied. That means 96% of users can be called happy with the new iPad.