Apple-Samsung Case Muddies Future of Innovation - NYTimes.com

Apple-Samsung Case Muddies Future of Innovation - NYTimes.com:

Oh boy, this is gonna get ugly. Especially if you are in the habit of ripping off other companies technology.

Samsung, just got smacked down hard. A $1B verdict is just the beginning. Apple will of course, try to get treble damages for "willful" infringement of Apple's technology. But the $1B is only the beginning. On September 20, the hearing (resumes) related to an injunction of the sales of Samsung's offending products.

One would assume that the new Samsung line (Galaxy) does not infringe, but that too may soon become subject to tighter scrutiny.

Faced with injunctions or licensing Apples technology, that is the issue that will be confronting players in the market, including Google.

The war chests of patents are: Apple; Samsung (kinda); Google (now with Motorola wireless that they seem to have bought primarily for the patent portfolio); and Microsoft (now with a boat load -- $1B worth actually -- of patents from AOL).

Who else is there. RIMM? Palm's technology that went to HP is dwindling fast.

Of course, Samsung is appealing. But it's outlook is not, well, appealing. And this loss in the US, is going to seriously shape the face of the screen in there rest of the world.

Samsung is down 7% in Asian trading on Monday Aug. 27, 2012. Expect Apple to open up big on Hurricane Isaac Monday.


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AP: Yahoo, Facebook strike patent truce, ad alliance

The Associated Press: Yahoo, Facebook strike patent truce, ad alliance:
"Yahoo's legal assault had exposed Facebook's vulnerability to patent claims as it prepared to complete the biggest initial public offering of stock by an Internet company."

So Facebook had to go out and build its own war chest of patents: 750 here, 650 there. Now the law suit goes away and everybody's making nice.

"Facebook insulated itself by buying 750 patents from IBM Corp. for an undisclosed amount and spending $550 million to acquire another 650 patents that one of its biggest shareholders, Microsoft Corp., had purchased from AOL Inc. Armed with its own arsenal of intellectual property, Facebook signaled that it wasn't backing down and filed its own patent infringement lawsuit against Yahoo in April." That's 1400 patents from IBM and AOL (via MSFT).

For those people who used to think that anyone could duplicate Facebook; that's going to now require some rethinking. Plus, if everyone you know (and a whole lot of "friends" who you don't really know) are on Facebook, there's really no easy way to switch. Unless, of course, you have become tired of your old friends and you wanna start over by looking for new ones:-)

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Msft does more patents for their slate... msPad...

Microsoft has a user interface patent working for their mobile devices (and more) that are related to visual controls. Read about it here ms patent. This is really good for those of us that speak mostly with hand jestures, especially while driving!