This is particularly interesting because it seeks to characterise Apple as a patent troll (ie, owning patents and enforcing them, or features of them, without actually using the tech themselves).<p>Apple has had a lot of problems with patent trolls[0] and seems to be campaigning against trolling [1]. This isn't how Apple is usually characterised so the comparison really will sting their pride.<p>Seems like it might be true though...<p>[0] <a href="http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/02/apple-top-target-of-patent-trolls-faced-92-lawsuits-in-three-years/" rel="nofollow">http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/02/apple-top-target-...</a><p>[1] <a href="http://9to5mac.com/2014/04/03/apple-microsoft-and-others-group-to-lobby-against-upcoming-patent-troll-legislation/" rel="nofollow">http://9to5mac.com/2014/04/03/apple-microsoft-and-others-gro...</a>
> "It's true that if you don't practice a patent, that doesn't mean you can't collect damages for it"<p>When an attorney nests negatives three deep, is that brilliance or incompetence? I'm trying to decide.
"He added that Apple's patents are narrow and cover specific ways of performing tasks, not the entire tasks -- such as universal search or word suggestion -- themselves. And while Apple tried to downplay the role of Google in the trial, Google is relevant, Price said."<p>To my big surprise I found out that Google is indeed the owner of patent entitled "Extensible search term suggestion engine" [1]. Does it mean we infringe it writing simple AJAX suggestion search?<p>[1] <a href="http://www.google.com/patents/US8515984" rel="nofollow">http://www.google.com/patents/US8515984</a>
UK end user here. Is this case really a sensible way to divide up the market share for middle to high end smart phones? I mean what would be gained by the <i>ordinary customer</i> if Samsung lost and decided not to make phones any more as it wasn't worth the hassle?<p>Am I being naive?<p>I presume Apple does not want to compete in the low margin part of the market (which I imagine will see the largest growth as the higher end saturates).
I had 'slide to unlock' phone a year before iphone... what a moron would go to court about such a triviality?
isn't it all because apple guys have tiny weenies and seek to compensate for it in the court so that someone would say they are cool and 'innovative'?
Some will say that Apple chose to sue Samsung rather than HTC or whomever else uses Android, because Samsung are their biggest competitor. ISTM that the real question is why they didn't sue the company that created Android. The answer that comes to mind is that it would look ridiculous to sue <i>Google</i> over a <i>search</i> patent.<p>EDIT: ha!