The SBB should be careful. If Apple's unhappy, they can move the rail lines into the nearest river. They have that power now.
Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
171–180 of 260 posts
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#172I don’t understand why Apple made such blatant mistake. The clock app wasn’t included on the iPad and an alternative version clearly missing on the Appstore.
This version of click is well made, simple to use as this kind of app should be..
Borrowing the design of very well known clock is a good idea too.
But Mondaine (the owner of that design) have licensing option already in place : http://www.mondaine.com/private-label/
So clearly Apple could have just bought the licence of this design.
But they could also have taken this opportunity to ask worldwide watchmaker to give their clockface designs for the official Apple Clock application.
I am sure every watchmaker in the world would have paid without questions. After all they are all spending millions in magazine adverts.
I don’t understand the position of Apple just after the Samsung lawsuit.
The result is to show Apple being arrogant once more and it put the company in a mismatch branding situation that could have been avoided.
Clearly somebody at Apple is not doing his / her job.
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#173No, no, no you guys don't understand. This is not a cheap rip-off. It's an homage and the Swiss will be honoured that their famous clock has been elevated to the high-art status of Apple design and innovation. The critical eye of an average iPhone user will appreciate the fine craftsmanship & precision of the painstaking work that went into translating the iconic clock into an exact digital replica.
Sorry, I don't understand the satire here. It sounds like you're mimicking the response to claims that Apple stole designs from Braun? But the two situations are nothing alike -- cribbing industrial design elements from defunct products is a far cry from duplicating a trademarked image more or less exactly. It seems more likely you're trying to dig on Apple for going thermonuclear on trade dress while at the same tim…
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Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
>And when someone is being an asshole, I just don't care about their arguments. But that's too bad. Better to do what a hypocrite proposes if it's the right thing, than to ignore it because of what he does. Here's a nice article on the topic: There are many reasons a charge of hypocrisy might be reactionary and counter-productive. First of all, the hypocrisy mindset pays too much attention to people's personal lives…
Sounds like the end result could have been avoided had the "visionary" simply not been hypocritical and avoided doing "a bad thing".
Yes, and it also could have been avoided if everybody paid more attention to what is beneficial for them (i.e what the visionary said) than to what the visionary does or does not.
You just gave a perfect example of the narrow minded logic explained in the article, that cares not what is good for them to do, but if the guy that advocates it is "consistent".
Not to mention the other three paragraphs I quoted, that explain why "avoiding being hypocritical" is not always possible.
To put it in very crude way, if you see a beaten-down meth addict telling you "just say no to meth", I'd say DO listen to him, even if he's doing it.
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#175Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not. Saying that everyone should murder (all the time), and not doing it, would be hypocrisy. But yeah, you're right. People would probably be distracted by the whole "murder" thing. Even if there's no consensus on whether some beliefs are good or bad, such as in politics, doesn't hypocrisy show some sort of "character flaw" in the perpetrator? It's dishonest to push views you don't hold yourself, or rules you d…
Yeah, my bad, your example is better. Regarding showing dishonesty - yes, but "supporters of X are dishonest" is "ad personam" - that's poor argument. Better to use hypocrisy to show "even supporters of X don't really believe their view is right, so it probably isn't".
>Better to use hypocrisy to show "even supporters of X don't really believe their view is right, so it probably isn't".
Still, not a good argument.
Their view could be right, whether they do really believe it or not.
E.g a politician could say "don't steal", and he could be stealing himself. That he is hypocritical about it, doesn't mean stealing is "probably" right.
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#176Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many people accused Hitler in hypocrisy. Then he killed itself. Sorry, it's a horrible and non-factual joke. But your theory is still wrong. There is consensus in society that racism is bad and racist with friends of other race is a classical example of hypocrisy. And if by lack of consensus you mean existence of other view then murdering example is wrong because it suppose lack of consensus and your theory is tautol…
If someone thinks of himself as racist, then he probably don't think racism is bad, so there's no consensus. EDIT: eh, I've read your post again and I'm wrong, you're right, it's the same situation. But is racist with with friends of other races really classical example of hypocrisy? I hadn't encountered it (but I live in monocultural country).
>But is racist with with friends of other races really classical example of hypocrisy? I hadn't encountered it
He probably means the classic "I'm not racist, I have black friends and all, but blacks in general do [this and that]".
Which is often considered a classic example of hypocrisy but I don't think it is. In a lot of cases it's not even racism.
E.g a guy could have Mexican friends (in the US or Mexico) but be against mexican illegal immigrants.
This is often taken to mean he is racist, but in actuality he is against illegal immigration, not against a race in general (he might consider that low end jobs are numbered, or that wages in those jobs are getting lower due to increased competition from illegal immigrants, or that lots of hungry, unemployed opportunity seekers from Mexico could resort to crime to feed themselves etc).
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#177No, no, no you guys don't understand. This is not a cheap rip-off. It's an homage and the Swiss will be honoured that their famous clock has been elevated to the high-art status of Apple design and innovation. The critical eye of an average iPhone user will appreciate the fine craftsmanship & precision of the painstaking work that went into translating the iconic clock into an exact digital replica.
Misguided sarcasm. It is indeed a homage. 1) Apple didn't copy the design to make it's own clock rip-off. It is for a very tiny part of their original product. 2) Apple didn't copy the design to sell more iPhones. 3) The design is famous. It's not like Apple sneakily copied it thinking no one will notice. 4) It's a common "click of the eye" gesture to design-savvy public, like their basing their podcast app to classi…
It seems to me that a lot of people on HN are assuming that this design is an intentional rip-off. It's entirely possible that whoever did the icon didn't realize that they had seen a clock like that before and thus didn't realize they might infringe on someone else's trademark.
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
Serious question, if the Railway company was a government institution when the design was released, is the design not in the public domain? Nowadays, it seems they're quasi-governmental, but back then I think they were strictly a national org. It'd be like DARPA trying to get royalties on the internet or something similar. I could be wrong in this line of thinking, of course.
if the Railway company was a government institution when the design was released, is the design not in the public domain? In the USA, the government cannot have copyright and everything is in the public domain. This is not the case in many other countries.
> In the USA, the government cannot have copyright and everything is in the public domain. This is not the case in many other countries.
This is an overly broad statement. Federal government agencies in the USA can hold copyright in certain situations, and the rule doesn't apply to state or local government.
This is a really interesting page that lists ways that the government can own copyrighted works.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_status_of_work_by_the...
(Also the design that Apple lifted is trademarked, not copyright, but that's a different issue).
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#179Earlier quoted context omitted.
For years and years writers have been able to employ sarcasm and dark wit without resorting to blatant labels tipping off the reader, "Joke ahead!" Why now is this linguistic bludgeon required?
When I read your comment I agreed. After reading the many comments down-thread which missed rather obvious sarcasm, I reluctantly disagree.
I hate to be all "in the old days", but, really, threads on HN didn't used to be full of snark and jokes, which obviated this problem. I miss that.
Re: Apple accused of ripping off famous Swiss clock design
#180On an unrelated note, I wish there was a wall clock with the real Swiss stop-to-go[1] action... Edit: and [2] would make for a great 11.5" laptop sticker [1] http://www.3quarks.com/en/StationClock/index.html [2] http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b2/SBB-CFF-FFS.sv...
The 3quarks.com page is exhaustive in detail about the station clock, with a customizable working clock well worth a look.
At the end the author, Rüdiger Appel, points to his free iOS clock app: http://itunes.apple.com/en/app/clockmaker/id493255256?mt=8