Apple: Samsung Copied Design

It turns out Stanley Kubrick invented the iPad. :laughing:

I’d say the mess is just beginning for Samsung;

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/27/us-samsung-shares-idUSBRE87Q00120120827

They’ll be just fine. Investors will jump right back in at the right price and continue to make money. Samsung makes good products, thats what will keep them going.

It’s way more than chassis design: “The iPhone features Samsung coveted”
“The “relative evaluation report” on the Galaxy S1 and iPhone, published in March 2010, goes through Apple’s iPhone features one by one, pointing out the differences lacking in Samsung products and “direction for improvement” steps Samsung must take to offer the functionality of the wildly popular device”

I wonder if the person who created that internal document is still employed by Samsung.

I love the “Icon detailing” slide that says “Remove a feeling that iPhone’s menu icons are copied by differentiating design”. :laughing:

(it’s #6 in case you are curious)

It’s funny that they say 1) Lacking 3D effect in form of lighting and 2)Lacks edge curvature, and then 3)Remove the copy feeling. Must have been frustrating for the designers, they proabably just went “Fck this sht, I’ll just do whatever the boss tells me to do and start looking for another job”.

Interestingly, Samsung products are now thinner, faster and more robust than the iPhone / iPad. The Galaxy SIII is the best piece of work I’ve seen and it far exceeds the latest iPhone. If you’ve seen the commercials or played with that model, you quickly see they have introduced features and user interaction that no one else has - and you can bet they patented those new features too!

I think Samsung is slowly leapfrogging Apple - which would mean the protections Apple is defending are being evolved by the competitors…and we all know how that goes. Meanwhile the lumbering giant named Microsoft is close to introducing the first batch of a 5 year product road that aims to return control of hardware AND software to them and them alone. Important to note is that their Windows 8 approach unites the user interaction of both phones and tablets with desktops.

Now we’ll have to sit back and see what Apple uses it’s gazillion dollars to develop and introduce.

This whole trial has made me more aware of Samsung products, I find them quite advanced. I tend to agree that with all of the different size offerings Samsung is pushing farther than Apple with evolution and choices. In Asia now, the amount of really large scale mobile phones ala Samsung are really becoming prevalent.

After this trial I think that the probability of my next phone being an Android - Samsung is about 90%.

The verdict found that the tablets had no infringement. Rectangular slabs for tablets are not an Apple “paradigm”.

Above all, the trial is great for designers in general. It shows that investing and spending more time in original, differentiating & thoughtful design pays off and is far cheaper than hiring lawyers & paying a billion dollars.
Even with the technical constraints, there are a million different ways to create a unique smartphone design. HTC’s One & Co are doing it all the time. And just check out the Sony XPERIA series.

Copying the iPhone archetype was just willful laziness by Samsung managers and their lack of vision & trust in their own design team. Those managers were just reacting on the iPhone and thought time-to-market was more important than innovation and originality. I’m happy that Samsung got humiliated for this!

nxakt: I just got back from China, you are right, many Samsung large cel phones. I think Apple missed out here. It will be interesting to see if the iPhone 5 “copies” this aspect from Samsung.

Many iPHones in China too. Although, this is among factory owners. I’d be curious to see what the workers use.

Daniel: You are right, many other designs that are as interesting and well detailed as Apple in the cel market now. It’s a shame the iPhone copies get so much press and the other good designs get no attention.

Harmon Kardon headphones make you look like you have two iPhones glued to the sides of your head.

It is unfortunate that patent law can be manipulated to give one company a monopoly over rectangles with rounded corners…

My favorite quote from this whole ordeal.

I believe that Apple’s enforcement of interface patents are hurting the consumer of touch screens. To use an admittedly extreme example, imagine car safety patent-hoarding by a lone automaker.

Three-point seatbelts, advanced airbags, ABS, backup cameras, etc. are not only expected features, they are all required or becoming requirements for future vehicles. The smartphone industry won’t become dangerous to consumers just because one company has exclusive interface patents, but it would make it a whole lot less convenient.

Is it a lack of imagination that makes it hard to imagine browsing maps/web/games without pinching to zoom on a Samsung… or have gestures like this become ubiquitous to the point of being completely expected throughout the industry?

A great read discussing use (and misuse) of design patents in this case.

And so now Apple has lost it’s lawsuit against Samsung in Japan (the HOME of electronic devices) and has also lost it’s key arguments in the UK and elsewhere in the EU. Only in the US have they won outright (South Korea gave them a tie score!) And so as Larry Page and Tim Cook begin discussions to call a truce for issues between iOS and Android what does Apple do - files another lawsuit, this time against Google, Samsung & HTC. I think there’s a really big law-firm in California that has a monthly Apple income comparable to the annual GDP of Kenya.

Enough already - it’s on its way to being as annoying as politics.

Another great viewpoint, thanks for sharing that.

Annoying to some of us (miniscule percentage of the total) that sense the wider implications, however to the average consumer this discussion is far too remote of a chain of concepts. I expect near zero blowback from the consumers, which is the only voice to which Apple will listen. The most profitable company in the world will keep on suing their competitors to protect the heap that they fought to the top of, shiny gadgets.

How about this iPhone flashlight? Pretty sure it was designed before Apple was founded.

I realize there is topic fatigue on this issue. However some of the biggest issues that I face as a designer are related to patents. As this development did not get any play here, adding it to the topic roll now. Something uncommon.

The US Patent office “disavowed” a patent at the core of the dispute.

Also strictly for amusement, gone are the days when you could assume that judges were not web publishing savvy:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-01/apple-ordered-to-change-notice-in-u-k-samsung-case.html

http://news.cnet.com/2300-11386_3-10013173.html?tag=contentMain;mGalleryUL

I think Apple overplayed its hand with regards to patents. They’ve scaled the wall but are now tumbling downward quickly.
Their Senior Patent Counsel’s office door should read ‘i-used-to-patent-everything’.

Personally, I think Samsung is an unstoppable small consumer product machine, much like their S. Korean cohorts LG is an unstoppable large consumer product machine and Hyundai is an unstoppable transportation machine. Pretty convincing trifecta they’ve got going on at the moment.