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The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

groklaw.net

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Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#51

Post by da_n »

nitrogen wrote: post #12
Steko wrote: post #6

Some companies will have to pay a slightly higher per device royalty than they had wanted to and/or remove/modify some functionality. It's the Apocalypse! It's Thermonuclear War!

Requiring royalties for open source, independently developed software is Wrong. An attack on Android is an affront to all independent software developers. Also, Apple has said they are not interested in licensing.

Just being open source should not provide blanket immunity. This is also hardly some small, independent developers we are talking about, they are very large international companies. IIRC Android Alliance rarely, if ever, accept 'independent' contributions, it is just a dump of source code when they feel like it (Android 3?).

I am a big fan of open source but I totally disagree on this specific case.

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#52

Post by da_n »

esolyt wrote: post #36
Steko wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"independently developed" This is a new claim and not one that will find many takers imho. "Apple has said they are not interested in licensing" This is far from the truth. They certainly offered licensing to Samsung. $30/device might sound like a lot but that was a starting point in a negotiation.

Samsung isn't the only Android manufacturer. It also isn't the only one being sued by Apple. One of the benefits of Android being open source and free software is that it encourages small players to start competing with giants by giving them a nice OS and the ability to tweak it. This is why we can have smartphones, tablets, netbooks, smartwatches, ski goggles, cameras running Android. All designed and produced by ma…

If you don't like Apple Open WebOS and MeeGo are interesting open options, I hope these will gain traction. I have never been a fan of the whole Dalvik/JVM architecture on Android. The update mechanism has always been especially shitty as well, every single device seems to need massive amounts of driver tweaking and customisation making the whole point of Java and its high portability rather pointless.

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#53

Post by gurkendoktor »

spaghetti wrote: post #48

I'd love to see control of the "mobile space" be in the hands of individuals instead of large, for-profit and often evil companies. Clearly mobile computing is here to stay. If it wasn't then companies like apple and google wouldn't be fighting so hard for control. Imagine a decentralized app store where people can make a living without having to deal with apple's ridiculous review process or ideas of what's appropri…

> Imagine a decentralized app store where people can make a living without having to deal with apple's ridiculous review process or ideas of what's appropriate.

So far, "freedom of App Store speech" and money don't seem to be correlated at all. (Or all the millionaires on OpenMoko and Cydia are being quiet to prevent a gold rush on their turf.)

I think the only instance where Apple's guidelines are prohibitive to making a living is porn. I for one would be a thousand times more likely to pay for porn on the trusted platform that is Apple, rather than on some dubious website.

Is it possible to use this as an advantage against established app stores? Or is Google already established as the platform to be on for mobile porn? (I can't check first hand, thanks to Google's GeoIP madness.)

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#54

Post by chii »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #10
w1ntermute wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And didn't Google devise a workaround for Unified Search in a week or so?

That's the thing: It doesn't really matter. Take any given software patent and throw a research team at it, chances are you'll find invalidating prior art. Take any given software patent and give it to a CS major, chances are you'll have a work-around inside of a few days. But that's not the problem. The problem is that you never know which patents will be asserted against you, and by that point the horse is out of t…

I think there is a middle ground - patents, if done "properly" is useful.

Perhaps, firstly, you have to have a more vigorous application process that is peer reviewed (where peers are basically your competitors!).

Secondly, you have to declare the valuation of the patent. This is then taxed by the government, similarly to property tax. If you decide to value your patent at $0, then you pay $0 tax.

The valuation of the patent determines the damage payment.

This combination means that you can't just keep a patent indefinitely, waiting for someone to infringe and then extract money from them. Peer review means that you can't patent something that will stop your competitors from continusing business. Real innovation will get thru because your peers will have no case of prior art, but "bad" patents won't get thru as your competitors will search hard for prior art to stop you (aka, incentives are aligned amongst the parties).

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#55

Post by ender7 »

spaghetti wrote: post #48

I'd love to see control of the "mobile space" be in the hands of individuals instead of large, for-profit and often evil companies. Clearly mobile computing is here to stay. If it wasn't then companies like apple and google wouldn't be fighting so hard for control. Imagine a decentralized app store where people can make a living without having to deal with apple's ridiculous review process or ideas of what's appropri…

The huge, HUGE advantage that the App Store brings to the average consumer is a feeling of safety. An app installed from the App store:

- Can be uninstalled easily, and leave no trace behind (remember "Register cleaners"?)

- Cannot interfere with other apps

- Cannot run in the background and spy on your surfing habits

- Cannot steal your credit card information and upload it to Russian mafia servers

For a long time, the standard geek response to these problems is "that's the user's problem -- they should be more careful about what they install". The response appears to be "fuck you, I don't want to waste my time worrying about whether this purple monkey screen saver will secretly empty my retirement account."

If you can find a way to make this "free and open" system also safe, then I think you'll have a winner.

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#56

Post by 001sky »

For those who would like to read them, here are all the Apple patents in play in this case:

    5,946,647 (the “’647 Patent”), System and method for performing an action on a structure in computer-generated data
    6,847,959 (the “’959 Patent”), Universal interface for retrieval of information in a computer system
    8,046,721 (the “’721 Patent”), Unlocking a device by performing gestures on an unlock image
    8,074,172 (the “’172 Patent”), Method, system, and graphical user interface for providing word recommendations
    8,014,760 [Part 2] (the “’760 Patent”), Missed telephone call management for a portable multifunction device
    5,666,502 (the “’502 Patent”), Graphical user interface using historical lists with field classes
    7,761,414 (the “’414 Patent”), Asynchronous data synchronization amongst devices
    8,086,604 (the “’604 Patent”), Universal interface for retrieval of information in a computer system*
- Short form summary of the IP. Useful for reference.

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#57

Post by lowboy »

adsr wrote: post #16

Why would you need bounce back at all? It's one of those things that gives iOS it's personallity, you could definately make a touch based user interface without bounce back.

Bouncebacks and inertia scrolling help the user experience because they're closer to real world behaviour. On a subconscious level, people more easily interact with something that has a little weight and closer to real physics to it.

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#58

Post by 001sky »

othermaciej wrote: post #45
vacri wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Her point was that the patent shouldn't have been granted in the first place. It shouldn't take the expense of big enterprise teams of corporate lawyers taking it to a jury trial to say that the patent wasn't infringed (I take it that's all it was, and that the patent hasn't actually been invalidated, either). Copy-and-pasting from a comment I just made in another thread about how merely having an obvious patent does…

Her apparent point was that there is no way to design around it, which is false. The claim was not about obviousness or validity of the design patent, but rather that it's really dangerous because there is no way to design around it. Which is clearly false. You may well have a valid point, but it's not what the Groklaw post said.

How do you code around it? A tablet in the shape of a parallelogram?

- She got you | Rhetorical questions != Not False Statements.

[Edit: Agree she could have been more informative.]

Re: The Next Step in Apple's Thermonuclear War Against Android

#60

Post by esolyt »

da_n wrote: post #51
nitrogen wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Requiring royalties for open source, independently developed software is Wrong. An attack on Android is an affront to all independent software developers. Also, Apple has said they are not interested in licensing.

Just being open source should not provide blanket immunity. This is also hardly some small, independent developers we are talking about, they are very large international companies. IIRC Android Alliance rarely, if ever, accept 'independent' contributions, it is just a dump of source code when they feel like it (Android 3?). I am a big fan of open source but I totally disagree on this specific case.

If you are big fan of open source, I would suggest you to consider diving into source and send a few patches. Because AOSP receives about 100 independent contributions every month and almost half of term are merged into the master tree.
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