Apple v. Samsung heads to Supreme Court: What you need to know

CNET ^ | October 9, 2016 | by Shara Tibken

[Swordmaker]

FAQ: Remember that tiff about how Galaxy phones look like iPhones? That'll be heading to the highest court in the land.

The biggest patent case to hit the modern tech world is back again.

Apple and Samsung will appear before the US Supreme Court on Tuesday to argue why their opponent was wrong when it came to a patent case from 2012. This is the first time a design patent case has been examined by the Supreme Court since the 1800s.

A decision by the court could have a ripple effect across the technology industry and ultimately affect the gadgets you buy. What's at question is how much money one company has to pay for copying the designs of another. Samsung says an Apple victory would stifle innovation. Apple argues that a Samsung win would weaken the protections afforded to new creations.

Notably, none of the devices in question has been on the market for years.

[USMCPOP]

Apple and Samsung will appear before the US Supreme Court on Tuesday to argue why their opponent was wrong when it came to a patent case from 2012.

"He hit me first!"

"But he stuck his tongue out at me."

And so on.

[Swordmaker]

CNET provides an up-to-date report on the status of the Apple v. Samsung Patent Infringement lawsuit as it enters the final stage Appeal brought by Samsung before the US Supreme Court for oral arguments on Tuesday. Apple contends that Samsung illegally copied Apple's design patents on the look and feel of the iPhone and iPad when it released almost exact copies of its iconic mobile devices. A jury agreed, originally awarding the entire profits Samsung had made on about a dozen Samsung Android products. Federal Judge Lucy Koh, a Korean American, reduced that judgement by $450 million or so. Samsung finally paid Apple $548 million, but only $399 million is still in dispute, because Samsung claims that contrary to the wording of the law Congress passed, they should only be required to pay a portion of their profits attributable to that percentage of the product the infringing patent encompasses, similar to a utility patent infringement would require. However, DESIGN PATENTS are, in many cases, what attracts customers to a product for them to buy the product in the first place, and duplicating the design is the entire widget and Congressional intent was that the entire profits were to be disgorged for any infringement of a design patent! Samsung has lost every appeal, so far. This is the last possible chance to get the intent of the law reversed. — PING!

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Apple v. Samsung Design Patent Infringement
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[Swordmaker]

"He hit me first!"

"But he stuck his tongue out at me."

Not exactly. The iPhone design was patented in 2007. The Samsung copies, with evidence in the form of a 125 page internal memo from Samsung's top management on how Samsung's design department needed to change each feature of their current phones to match the Apple's iPhone, came out in 2009-2010. That's smoking gun evidence of intentional patent infringement.

Samsung went so far as to use Apple's icons in their stores! They duplicated the look of the Apple BOXES their Samsung products came in, attempting to make their products look like Apple's. Samsung copied the power cords, and power bricks, changing only the color. Cult of Mac used a tongue-in-cheek approach when Samsung claimed they never copied anything from Apple and presented the following photo array:

[fireman15]

The thing that I find so amusing is that Apple often has followed Samsung and other manufacturers over the years in very substantial ways. They do not innovate as much as they perfect the external appearance of a product and then add a few bells and whistles. Then you and the other fan boys proclaim that Apple has done something revolutionary.

I can come up with plenty of examples to make my point and you can come up with plenty to make your point. The two of us have gone round and round on this point over the years and there really is no way to win the argument. In human history there are few revolutionary developments and many evolutionary developments and tech companies give us many perfect examples. They all copy from each other and we never typically find out who the true innovators really are because they are treated like cogs in the wheel by the lawyers and executives who run the companies.

I recently reread THE HOME COMPUTER WARS by Michael S. Tomczyk, An Insider’s Account of Commodore and Jack Tramiel. We keep seeing the same things over and over again and it is going to keep going the same way for years to come.

Apple is a highly successful company with many mazing products that have helped shape the technology world as we now know it. But it is more the corporate savagery that has got them to where they are now as opposed to true innovation. Their teams of lawyers and aggressive executives greasing the palms of crony-capitalist politicians here and abroad are the true heart and soul of the company.

[Falconspeed]

Swordmaker has brilliant posts and your comments from rereading Tomczyk’s book are accurate, in my opinion. “Their teams of lawyers... are the true heart and soul of the company.”

Good thieves feel regret when busted and bad thieves blame others when busted. Let’s see how Samsung responds in court. It is clear that Samsung stole from Apple.

I read Gil Amelio’s Firing Line in 1999 and learned how Amelio was blamed for many of Apple’s weaknesses by bad thieves who could not keep up with Jobs or Gates. Of course, Jobs stole from his engineers and blamed others when they asked for credit. Thus, Apple is genius, Samsung is copy cat, and both are not squeaky clean.

[fireman15]

I agree that swordmaker’s posts are brilliant. No one knows more history of the tech sector over the past 30 years on this site. Sometimes his complete devotion to Apple does cause him to slant his posts a bit, but I certainly respect his knowledge and am grateful that he continues to share it.

[fireman15]

I agree that swordmaker’s posts are brilliant. No one knows more history of the tech sector over the past 30 years on this site. Sometimes his complete devotion to Apple does cause him to slant his posts a bit, but I certainly respect his knowledge and am grateful that he continues to share it.

[Svartalfiar]

Good thieves feel regret when busted and bad thieves blame others when busted. Let’s see how Samsung responds in court. It is clear that Samsung stole from Apple.

Meh. I don't see how this should even fall under patent law. It's a design/shape/where the button is. Anyone can do that. Patents are supposed to protect the design, the HOW of how something works. If anything, Apple should have trademarked their designs, not patented them. And their software would be copyrighted.

[Swordmaker]

Meh. I don't see how this should even fall under patent law. It's a design/shape/where the button is. Anyone can do that. Patents are supposed to protect the design, the HOW of how something works. If anything, Apple should have trademarked their designs, not patented them. And their software would be copyrighted.

That's why some of the issues in question are DESIGN Patents and not UTILITY Patents. They are different and protect different things. . . and the placement of buttons etc, are not part of design patents and, by definition, cannot be part of Design Patents. Look up the differences between the two types of patents. For example, the shape and look of the bottle for Coca Cola is protected by a Design Patent because it is merely ornamental, but a bottle that holds Coke would be protected by a Utility Patent because it has a real function.

Some of the issues in suit are utility patents because they have real functions that had not been done in that way on such a device before, and Apple had found a way to do it.

[Edward.Fish]

Is it wrong to wish that both companies and the supreme court all lose?