Android in Canada Blog

By Ryan Moore on March 11th, 2012 0

#Patentfun is a weekly round up of all the legal battles surround the Android OS.

So… some heady stuff this week… I’ll do my best to try to sort it out.

• Report: Apple Opts for Detente in Patent War Against Motorola and Samsung

  

  Is this the start of the end?  Now, the article is from Giz, which is a super huge Apple fan group… but remember when Steve said he was willing to go thermonuclear?  I really wonder why they’re suddenly ready to talk licensing.  And, it’s to Samsung (one of their more hotly contested enemies) and Motorola (soon to be Google itself!).

  The article suggests that they’re opting to go for a similar licensing structure as MS where they get like ~$15/handset sold.  I’m wondering if this is a sort of nice way to show that they’re willing to stop all the insanity as a lot of these battles are going back and forth.  Maybe they’re starting to realize that this “I got you on this, but you got me on that” is really hampering each others’ images.  If we all go an eye for an eye, it’ll leave the world blind! (~Ghandi)

  Some more reading on this is also at Foss’s.

• Samsung‘s new lawsuit against Apple in South Korea: no détente between those two companies

  I had to look this up in terms of when it came out, this was posted a few days before the Giz article.  Samsung wants to hit Apple hard… on their own turf too.  We have heard that Samsung has ponied up some big cash to set aside specifically to weather the patent storm.  They don’t look like they’re slowing down.

• Apple wins claim construction battle against Samsung at the ITC

  This one’s pretty legalese, and for that matter may omit it for publishing sake, but I’ll keep it here for the time being.

  But… it sounds pretty flaky.  They won on ‘detection of plugged in devices’ … i.e. it’ll know when headphones are plugged into the jack.  Now, a claim construction win, which is the first step in going forward… doesn’t guarantee anything.

• Google/Motorola Ordered To Relinquish Development Data To Apple

  What the wha?  In Apple’s suit against Motorola, they’re making GOOGLE hand over data?  Too far Apple… too far!  That’d be like suing Ford and then making Bose hand over how they make speakers.

• June will be key month for Apple’s disputes with Motorola and Samsung in the United States

  That’s the thing about lawsuits.. people raise them, but it takes FOREVER for anything to REALLY happen.  Well looks like some proverbial excrement is being prepared for the month of June:

  1. May 31-June 6: ITC hearing on Apple’s complaint against Samsung
  2. June 4-June 15: ITC hearing on Samsung’s complaint against Apple
  3. June 7: hearing on Apple’s motion for a preliminary injunction against the Samsung Galaxy Nexus (United States District Court for the Northern District of California)
  4. June 11: start of Apple v. Motorola Mobility trial in Chicago (MMI’s claims against Apple will be tried immediately thereafter)

• Pressure mounting on Oracle to drop patent claims against Google and focus on copyright

  I really think I’m losing my mind on just trying to stay up to date on that on this suit alone … it went from pretty damning to just crazy stuff in the past while.

  It has just been dragged out WAAY too long.

• The Reason Apple Is Becoming A Patent Troll: Calling Out Apple “Innovation” For What It Really Is

Now this comes from another Android site, so take it with a grain of salt really. But I just loved the picture, plus with all the crazy iStuff this past week flooding our streams, I’m all for something anti-Apple right about now…]

An interesting read to say the least.  And provides some input into the whole schema… but I’m not sure I totally agree with the patent troll definition applying to Apple.  I’d say it’s just somebody with an overactive legal trigger finger with a grudge.

• Totally Cool: Samsung’s Smart Device-Skin patent brings skinning to a whole new level

 I’m not sure how really cool this is… or how it’ll help them protect against the patent trolls knocking on their door, but it does do something I’ve always recommended for any Android user… help personalize your phone.

Why rob of us any screen space as it is?

• Google Applies For “snap a landmark, find your location” Patent

  This may actually be kinda useful.  A sort of “Goggles” that references maps.  Neat.

  

I included the last 2 bits of new patents just because you know, any patent nowadays is just fodder for a lawsuit!

Ryan Moore

Follow Ryan on G+ I no longer write for AiC, but you can follow me on over to Android Coliseum Oh, and here's my shameless plug for more space! Minus (I've maxed out!) | DropBox | SugarSync | CX