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Apple Never Invented Anything

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Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#71

Post by lttlrck »

kybernetikos wrote: post #55
arrrg wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the first two paragraphs you seem to say that they innovate while you deny that in the last paragraph. Perfecting fit and finish is quite obviously innovation.

The way I use the word, I usually intend it to mean covering a completely new idea. For me, execution, no matter how superior can never be innovative. It can of course be important, world changing, profitable, etc. If I say that the ipad is not innovative, I mean precisely that there was no element of it that was an implementation of a completely new idea, but I don't mean to suggest that what Apple did with it is no…

what about the magic mouse? If you think making mice optical was innovative it'll be hard to say that wasn't....

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#73

Post by lttlrck »

cheald wrote: post #49
ThomPete wrote: post #21

Apple invented the ability to take geeky stuff and turn it into cool stuff for normal people. That's a pretty big feat in itself.

That's called "marketing". It's not really new.

neither is "inventing" or "innovating" or "manufacturing"

Your point?

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#74

Post by cromwellian »

podperson wrote: post #63
cromwellian wrote: post #42

One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. Notice that in the scientific community, humanity has been building upon previous work for centuries with no copyright or patent protection, and nothing more than honor, citation, and shame against plagiarists. The fundamental defense made by many is that without patent protection for software, people would not put much effort into innovating.…

> But 20? It's absurd. If pinch and zoom is such a trivial thing then invent some other thing to use instead. The patent system by-and-large doesn't pick and choose patent durations based on the kind of patent. Theoretical physics and patentable technology are quite different things and the comparison is not helpful. Before patents we had a guild system where people who made almost anything -- pottery, telescopes, po…

Trivial doesn't mean valueless. A "1 click buy" patent is trivial, but forcing everyone to "invent something else instead" (e.g. 2 clicks) is stupid. And what if 2-click is patented? Then the next guy to come along has to have a 3-click system, or some obfuscation that convinces a jury.

Pretty soon, consumers are confused, because every website they go to has a radically different user interface brought on by patents on ideas that should be basic commodities.

When we had the guild system, we also didn't have universal public education, and instantaneous near zero cost publication of ideas.

Plus, you analogy makes pinch-zoom patents look even worse. You can keep how it is implemented a complete trade secret, and from looking at it for a few seconds, I can produce an equivalent implementation.

Apple has already obfuscated their techniques anyway. Why not release iOS as open source then, if it's protected by patents? The reality is, these patents are read by no one except lawyers, and in many cases, they under specify the implementation by being very abstract.

I really don't see how anyone who writes software for a living can defend these things and defend the status quo of not even supporting reform. You are asserting that something like an XOR-cursor (another dumb patent) is equivalent to a manufacturing process deserving 20 year protection?

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#75

Post by smartkids »

The iPaq was/is a fantastic device. You could attach peripherals. Try doing that with an iPad. I could put an entire OS on a CF Card and assuming I could boot from the card, the expanded functionality is limited only by the hardware specs. They are durable. I've seen consumer electronics businesses still using them to track inventory.

I wish HP would revive the iPaq.

My only imagined use for an iPad is as a portable display. I want the Retina quality, but I have a more powerful hardware to attach and I need a real keyboard. There's nothing the iPad can do that my open, unlocked hardware cannot do.

I believe it was even possible to attach a real keyboard to an iPaq. That's the kind of flexibility I want. I can get data into and out of the device in any number of ways, without hassle.

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#76

Post by podperson »

drats wrote: post #5

I made this case last week. "Apple products are like a good classy restaurant or hotel chain. They take ingredients everyone has and put a lot of work into fit and finish, they make the customer feel special for a slightly higher price."[1] And I stand by it. I'll go even further actually, I think Apple is one of the least innovative big companies. Look at all the big research labs at Microsoft, Yahoo, IBM or Google.…

It's a heck of a lot more than "fit and finish". This is just another way of dismissing what Apple does as frippery.

A Mont Blanc pen is prettier than a bic biro, but it doesn't really write any better. A fabulous meal is probably not as good for you as plate of boiled vegetables.

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#77

Post by Evbn »

smartkids wrote: post #26
drats wrote: post #5

I made this case last week. "Apple products are like a good classy restaurant or hotel chain. They take ingredients everyone has and put a lot of work into fit and finish, they make the customer feel special for a slightly higher price."[1] And I stand by it. I'll go even further actually, I think Apple is one of the least innovative big companies. Look at all the big research labs at Microsoft, Yahoo, IBM or Google.…

Yes, but perhaps _making things easy to use_ and _sexy hardware design_ might have something to do with their success? The problem with the research labs at those example companies you cited is that those businesses have little incentive to introduce innovation that would compete with "yesterday's ideas" that are driving their profits. This is why Bell Labs was so unique. They could basically do whatever they wanted…

RMS picketed Rob Pike over Bell's patent aggression.

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#78

Post by walterkim »

w1ntermute wrote: post #28
potatolicious wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UI and UX are innovations. The silly notion that only hard, technical inventions with academic papers attached are innovative is the reason why Apple has eaten everyone's lunch up till now. "Fit and finish" is as innovative as a new algorithm, it's shocking how much of the industry still treats it as a footnote and a detail, despite the entire history of the tech world since iPhone 1 would indicate.

> The silly notion that only hard, technical inventions with academic papers attached are innovative is the reason why Apple has eaten everyone's lunch up till now. No, the reason why Apple has eaten's everyone's lunch up till now is because they're interested in being profitable, not innovative. The GP is correct in stating that Apple isn't innovative - they just take other people's innovations and monetize them by…

> No, the reason why Apple has eaten's everyone's lunch up till now is because they're interested in being profitable, not innovative. The GP is correct in stating that Apple isn't innovative

This is decidedly backwards. From the start, Apple's focus was creating great products (by their definition of great product), and only later did they learn how to maximize their profit from them. There's a pretty good and influential taxonomy of "value disciplines": product leadership, operational excellence, and customer intimacy. Historically, Apple was good at the first and not so great at the other two. Since Jobs' return, they've really ramped up on all three.

A classic way in which companies undermine themselves is by pursuing profit through cost-cutting rather than improving product/service quality. I don't have any hard data on this, but I suspect that's what happens to intiially innovative tech companies that have non-engineer/designer business types that take over.

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#79

Post by linuxhansl »

podperson wrote: post #63
cromwellian wrote: post #42

One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. Notice that in the scientific community, humanity has been building upon previous work for centuries with no copyright or patent protection, and nothing more than honor, citation, and shame against plagiarists. The fundamental defense made by many is that without patent protection for software, people would not put much effort into innovating.…

> But 20? It's absurd. If pinch and zoom is such a trivial thing then invent some other thing to use instead. The patent system by-and-large doesn't pick and choose patent durations based on the kind of patent. Theoretical physics and patentable technology are quite different things and the comparison is not helpful. Before patents we had a guild system where people who made almost anything -- pottery, telescopes, po…

pinch-and-zoom is a good idea. But it is just that: An idea.

Its invention cost no money and society as a whole is not served by granted exclusive monopoly over it to any entity.

The entire discussion is turning to be absurd. Is pinch-and-zoom (and friends) all that separates Apple from the competition?

In other industry manufacturers learn from each other (seatbelts, suspensions systems, transmissions, etc), but somehow when it comes to software and electronic devices we want to stop progress and grant monopolies to every oh-so-little idea.

Re: Apple Never Invented Anything

#80

Post by mbell »

cromwellian wrote: post #66
mbell wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> One interesting point is he brought up Einstein's invention of relativity. He didn't invent, he discovered. I'm not just being pedantic, I think the approaches signified by these two words goes to the root of the differences your describing.

Do you invent, or do you merely discover an optimum in solution space? This is really just semantics that changes nothing, regardless of what you want to call it, there is a history of people spending decades of effort to describe new math, new models, new mechanisms, all prior to patent protection. That reforming copyright and patent laws will reduce innovation is unproven scaremongering. There are other industries…

My point is the differential in mental approach.

In a classical sense, science is an act of discovery, of learning and understanding that which already exists, that which is the fundamental nature of the universe. These are things done out of a quest for knowledge and understanding. The entire concept of a patent is foreign to such an approach.

Invention on the other hand is a concept rooted in taking a knowledge base and using it to create something new. Something that isn't just the fundamental nature of things but rather using such fundamental rules to create a novelty. The concept of a patent is founded on this ideal.

Ultimately what I'm saying is that science marching along just fine without patents is a poor comparison to use, it has a completely different basis than what patents were created to protect (theoretically, I think they are just a mess at this point).

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