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This trial was never about patentsThis trial was never about patentsPosted Aug 28, 2012 21:01 UTC (Tue) by sblack (subscriber, #81076)Parent article: Look and feel lawsuits, the second time around
From statements that have come out since the trial, I suspect that the jurors were simply punishing Samsung for "copying" Apple, which there's pretty blatant evidence that they did. (Whether or not there's anything *wrong* with copying something wholesale, it does tend to "feel wrong" to most people).
I doubt a single person in that room took the time to debate the deeper issues of prior art, and the triviality of the patents themselves. In fact, one juror almost admitted as much: "we were debating about the prior art [...] In fact we skipped that one," Ilagan continued, "so we could go on faster."
To my mind, the issues of prior art and the patentability of look-and-feel were not at all addressed by this trial, because the copying was so blatant that it obscured the more important issues.
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This trial was never about patents Posted Aug 29, 2012 9:07 UTC (Wed) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] To my mind, the issues of prior art and the patentability of look-and-feel were not at all addressed by this trial, because the copying was so blatant that it obscured the more important issues. Even if this is true they still are supposed to interpret the law. Consistently interpret the law. I doubt a single person in that room took the time to debate the deeper issues of prior art Actually they did: "The software on the Apple side could not be placed into the processor on the prior art and vice versa. That means they are not interchangeable. That changed everything right there." (about 1:30). And this admission indeed changes "everything right there": if you decide to ignore the prior art which can not run the iOS software then you should equally apply the same principle to the next question too! This will mean that Samsung can not infringe on any Apple patents because it's phones and tablets can not run iOS! This is one of the gravest errors Jury can ever do: they are supposed to apply the same law to the plaintiff and defendant—and in this particular case they clearly failed to do that. Jury have huge leeway WRT their decisions, but this one of the few things it can never do. It'll be interesting to see what Samsung lawers will do with this information.
This trial was never about patents Posted Aug 29, 2012 13:08 UTC (Wed) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
> Even if this is true they still are supposed to interpret the law. Consistently interpret the law.
One of the most important features of the USA justice system is called 'Jury Nullification'.
It's a Jury's right that even if they believe that the defendant has violated the law they can still rule the person innocent if they believe the law is bullshit or the government is behaving badly.
Of course this, like most things that limit government power in some way (like the 10th amendment), have long since been swept under the rug.
BTW,
Copying is NOT illegal. Copying is not illegal, immoral, or a bad thing in any way shape or form. Copying is HARD REQUIREMENT for human progress.
The very idea that copying is a bad thing and that there is a such thing as a 'punishment' for 'blatant' copying is completely and exceedingly repulsive. Anybody that thinks along those terms is utterly confused and should be ashamed of themselves for falling for such blatant propaganda.
This trial was never about patents Posted Aug 31, 2012 14:16 UTC (Fri) by wookey (subscriber, #5501) [Link]
Quite. Way too many people have forgotten/never understood this.
On the other hand, you can make a good case that really blatent copying is unwise in the current social and legal context, precisely because you might end up in the situation Samsung has (of doing a good job and being condemned for it).
Perhaps join the pirate party to press for the restoration of some kind of meaningful balance to copyright and patent law.
Not all 'driods infringe. Posted Aug 29, 2012 13:12 UTC (Wed) by gmatht (guest, #58961) [Link]
Interestingly, about 15 minutes in: "Not all Samsung's ... phones infringe property rights... [also] Motorola is an example, just because it has a 'driod OS that may seem apple-like, it isn't". He also mentions that they didn't look at individual patents in detail, but instead considered them in combination. This suggests to me that the jury first decided that Samsung infringed based on the design patents, and having already decided in favor of Apple they then decided that each sale of an infringing phone cost Apple 14% of the sale price. Having already essentially come to a decision, they didn't want to spend too much time considering whether Samsung also violated functional patents.
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