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You must be young. Sony was the king of elegant design in consumer electronics, before the rise of the ipod. Growing up, if you didn't have a Sony walkman/discman/minidisc, you were roundly mocked.

Sony always worked better from day one, looked better, and lasted longer than anything else.

I think they would be a much better consumer electronics company today, if they had not entered the record and movie business. That started their crippling of products to proprietary drm laden formats.

Yeah, DRM kills the brain of those who promote it.

I can see why a company like Sony would get into the content business.

It's an often repeated mantra. It isn't the internet providers or the owners of the glassfibre in the ground that get rich. It's the content creators. "infrastructure" isn't where the money is.

So Sony wanted to be in the content business, instead of only creating the "underlying infrastructure".

Steve Jobs wasn't the original author of the quote. I always found it ironic; that he took somebody else's quote to complain against plagiarism.

Edited 2012-07-31 23:32 UTC

Fwiw, Jobs never claimed to have originated that quote. I believe he attributed it to Picaso.

I did not say he claimed to have originated the quote. I found it ironic (or is it hypocritical) that Steve Jobs used somebody else's saying to complain about microsoft's supposed plagiarism and lack of originality. I, for one, found such lack of self awareness amusing, except for the part where people took him seriously...

Lol, quoting somebody else and citing your source is the direct opposite of plagiarism, and of course it's in no way hypocritical.

As I'm pretty fed up with the Jobsian religion and its tireless acolytes, I've just registered to vent my rage. I would like to make a few points (I thought they were platitudes, but it seems I was wrong):
1. Steve Jobs was not an artist of any kind; no Apple product is a work of art by any "artistic" standards (more of a sexual fetish or a religious totem).
2. "Good artists copy, great artists steal" is not an original quote by Jobs, but by Pablo Picasso; similarly T.S. Eliot had already remarked that "Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal" (perhaps Picasso stole the quote, by he was a great artist after all).
3. Apart from quotations, Jobs and Apple stole many of their "new" concepts and designs.
4. If you aren't a great artist -- not even a good artist or an immature one (see point 1) -- and you steal nevertheless (see points 2 & 3) then you are a thief. (Mind you, this does not mean that other companies are not thieves too.)

+1 on all counts.

additionally, in **1870** this little genius said:

"Plagiarism is necessary. Progress implies it. It holds tight an author’s phrase, uses his expressions, eliminates a false idea, and replaces it with just the right idea."

– Isidore Ducasse, Comte de Lautréamont, Poésies II

Steve admired Sony and his turtle neck outfit has a direct link with Sony:

http://www.geekosystem.com/why-steve-jobs-wore-turtlenecks/

I wouldn't wanna call Steve a hack, I guess the only thing he is good at is having taste/vision and saying: no

With vision I mean, like the people at Xerox didn't know what they really had when they let Apple see and use it.

That also is a talent, maybe his only talent.

Steve had a couple of talents: vision, eye for details, taste, forcing/persuading people do to his bidding and indeed saying no. Interestingly the co-founder of the world's most successful tech company wasn't very technical.

Xerox didn't know what they had, Parc Xerox did. Some at Xerox Parc were happy that Apple wanted to do something with their technology, others weren't.

It's funny how these seemingly small lucky events. I'd really love to know what would have happened in an alternate universe.

What if Steve hadn't visited Parc Xerox or didn't return to save Apple?
What if IBM didn't bother with the PC or Microsoft didn't buy QDOS?
What if Commodore hadn't gone bust?
What is OS/2 did manage to succeed?
What if Microsoft gave up after Windows 1.0?
What is Google had stuck to search?
What if Apple didn't think a mobile phone would sell?
What if BSD didn't have legal problems and Linus never started Linux?

Yes and with hindsight the tech battle moved to mobile stuff, but mobile phones were and are a risky business to get in to. In 2007 Nokia and RIM were big players and a load of "others" were in the game too.

Most mobile phone makers aren't doing very well. Had the original iPhone been a bust, it's second generation may not have created enough buzz to make it sell like it did.

If Apple now wants to build television sets I suspect it will be even more difficult to do. Even though phones and televisions kind of share the same price segment people are less likely to replace a working television. I would only do that if it was something I couldn't resist, meaning it would have to be a television+++.

That is why everyone is surprised Apple want to make TVs, the current Apple TV device and devices like Nexus Q are much more likely to be sold. As they are an addon which makes it an easier sell.

The Nexus Q is very unlikely to be sold. ;-)
http://www.osnews.com/story/26234/Nexus_Q_delayed_pre-orders_will_s...

Apple is yet to announce their television. So far it's just a rumor, but it's one of the strongest yet.

My guess, if it comes, it will be US only at first. No doubt it will feature downloadable content and subscriptions. Apple needs to get all the big parties on their side in the US, see how it goes and then try to pull it off in more countries.

Great artists may steal, but cannot sue everybody later saying it was his idea, since he admittedly stole it in the first place.
How times have changed, huh?

Whatever it takes!!

Solid post!

I would add, don't look beyond the religious stuff... Chesterton was pure genius, his protégé, CS Lewis wasn't bad either.

Thanks - that's kind of you to say. Yes, their ways of using paradox to unpick apparent logic or rather customary thinking, were often quite striking.

I sometimes go to church, sometimes don't, and this person has kind of said it better than I could do as to why that is:

http://hypocritereader.com/18/if-i-told-you-i-went-to-church

Cheers,

Orf

Meh, Chesterton's prose had lots of stylistic merits, it's intellectual content however was rather pedestrian. E.g. The piece by him that you linked earlier was a colossal "no true Scotsman" type of arguments, and those are just run of the mill fallacy...

“There are no uninteresting things, only uninterested people.”
― G.K. Chesterton

;)

Samsung only has to prove their were designs like the iPhone on the market before the iPhone. Besides, the reason phones look the way they do is because it is an obvious implementation for touch screen technology.

Apple isn't making the claim they are the first to invent the idea of a touch screen.

If touch screen phones weren't a rectangle with a touch screen on one side then what else would they look like? Other electronics like monitors and digital photo frames already used that basic shape before phones did so Apple certainly didn't invent the rectangle with a screen on it.

Besides, Samsung had a photo frame in 2006 that had the same form factor as the iPad here: http://www.androidauthority.com/behold-samsungs-ipad-made-in-2006-2...

It predates the iPad by 4 years. If that isn't enough here is a prototype tablet from 1994 that looks like the iPad: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1381528/Knight-Ridde...

iPod.

One word, your answer.

Actually, a circle or oval could be interesting...

You're both right, I failed to take into consideration Nokia's non-S60 models, most likely due to the very limited presence Nokia has here in the U.S. compared to the rest of the world. I do recall seeing a Nokia Communicator in some 2000-era spy film set in Europe, but I've never seen one in the flesh, so to speak.

Have fun:

http://starringthecomputer.com/features.php

You are so wrong for linking that! I just got off from a 12 hour shift and should be going to bed now; I have to be up in six hours for an appointment. I don't think I will be sleeping today after all...

Well, you don't have to watch every movie/episode of course!

Here is the most important one (for you):

http://starringthecomputer.com/computer.php?c=71

Edited 2012-08-01 11:02 UTC

But the problem is not Apple claiming it has "invented everything". The problem is Apple being granted the patents that it applies for. It would be irresponsible (from the point of view Apple's shareholders, for example) for any company not to apply for patents to protect things it believes it has invented. The problem is the patent system. Apple is not the only company that applies for and is granted patents, you know!

Agreed, but can you name a company that isn't using patents in the same way as Apple? This year-old chart seems to suggest that they're all at it!

http://flowingdata.com/2011/08/22/mobile-patent-lawsuits-2/

andydread,

"From the chart you posted I dont see Google suing anyone."

Yep, it's humorous that the poster would say something that disagrees with the evidence he provided, but he probably meant to illustrate the chaos rather than make a literal statement.

Arguably google entered the game so late that it lacks the portfolio needed to mount a successful attack, but I won't read into it that way - they appear to genuinely believe that it is wrong to use patents offensively.


A piece of information that is missing on the chart is timeframe, and whether lawsuits were filed in response to an attack from the other party. That might show a much better view of who the aggressors and defenders are. We already know where apple lies, but some of the other companies I'm not so sure.

Edited 2012-07-31 16:03 UTC

tomcat,

"Um, dude, Google doesn't have the patent portfolio necessary to mount an attack on any of these companies"

Point me to where that contradicts anything I said.

Google's Motorola acquisition *could* help it mount offensive patent lawsuits, but I don't believe that is their intent. Either way, we'll have to watch their intentions pan out over time.

While you are here, maybe you could clear up a few questions: when did the lawsuit between ms and motorola begin and how does that relate to when google was able to effectively take over the company? Was it a countersuit? This helps to answer whether google had a causal involvement.

Edited 2012-08-01 04:12 UTC

Although Google effectively now owns Motorola, and it was Motorola's patents that were part of the motivation for Google's purchase: http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/07/24/google-says-patents-tech-wer...

that is because Google doesn't make money directly from their IP they are an advertising company so they most be everyone's best friend.

Both apple and samsung should get a kick in their butt because both of them are playing the "sue eachother" game.

And i cannot believe that people have the time to write and comment on there apple vs samsung all the time, it feels like this is most of the stuff posted on osnews nowadays.

Give it a rest and report on more fun and interesting stuff.

OSNews is not a moneymaker. This is a labour of love. Whether we have x hits or x+1, it makes no difference. We get about enough to keep hosting up.

We're not John Gruber who makes hundreds of thousands of dollars per year with his site. Would be awesome though.

I only owned one Apple product and it broke within a year.

Probably never gonna buy from Apple ever again, because of their business practises

Edited 2012-08-01 09:12 UTC

Lucky you, it was still under warranty.

Long story short: it wasn't in my case.

I wanted a similar HTC phone, but I was waiting for wifi, which never came.

I came.

Where were you in 2002 when I really needed you? Ten years later, I can't go anywhere without running into you.

But it never made any sense to me to have a smart phone without you. GRPS internet access was worse than dial up most of the time.

I would have killed for the p900 back in the day, I just couldn't afford it.

Things usually start going bad when a company becomes publicly traded. After that they need to show profits every quarter.

It is a bad movie . . . . . ;-))

featuring the corrupted sherrif Epplby!

Edited 2012-07-31 10:47 UTC

Truth hurts?

The evidence was deemed inadmissible because it was submitted late, not because it wasn't valid.
I'm guessing that you knew this already but it didn't fit in with your argument.

Not invent, implement. No one else implemented it in any practical way.

You're doing this for the last few years now, I doubt that you read Apple's legal brief from this case years before it started.

Legal briefs are designed to stand up in court. Lawyers spend their lives picking holes in other peoples lives/interests. That has little to do with the reality outside of the courtroom. And Samsung's lawyers will be doing their best to do the same. Once you enter a Court of law, gloves come off and reality ceases for both parties - seriously. It's all about painting the most believable picture, otherwise injustices would never happen. Reality outside of litigation, on the other hand, there's a different outlook. You seem to miss that entirely. You also seem only to be able to see black and white in any argument. There's no black and white in this, nor any other court battle. Human's are fallible, weak and have extremely selective memory (and this is even in built as many studies have shown.) We remember what we want to, not what necessarily actually happened. End of story.

I personally still don't really see the need for multitouch. Doesn't really provide anything special. Pinch to zoom is annoying and other than that, don't really use multitouch for anything. I'm sure there are applications out there that depend on it but I haven't come across any that I need yet.

The power cable that Samsung "copied" happens to be a standard non proprietary plug. Its meant to be copied. As for design, its very simple. Phones led to the design of a touch screen front on a device. Lots of examples of this. The iPad is just a giant iphone. If Samsung was truly copying Apple, Samsung devices wouldn't lack the polish in certain places. Because its not so much the quality of the software (granted bad code leads to bugs) but the design which shows off the polish of the OS.

Sources please. No seriously, just wan't to read that.

he said:

>The iPad is just a giant iphone.

You said:

>"That's got to be one of the most clueless comments I've ever seen.....VERY different. The bigger screens gives the app maker room to do things in very different ways"

Since we are talking about hardware I think "giant iPhone" and "bigger screen" aren't terribly far apart. Besides, here is a tablet concept from 1994: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBEtPQDQNcI

The idea goes back to the 60's.

I've got a 1st and 3rd gen Apple iPad with an Apple bluetooth keyboard.
What do/can I create on them?

Spreadsheets. No I don't create thousands of lines in spreadsheets. I used to but I don't work in a financial company anymore. Numbers is more than capable for this. And I can send my spreadsheets to people with Excel.
Note that people that makes big money don't need big spreadsheets. Only the little worker bees do. No, I'm not rich or poor. I'm in between.

Pages. This is a place where I create large documents of over 200 pages. 200 pages is large for me and not a limitation of my iPad.

Websites. It is very easy to remote into a server and edit HTML and XML using an iPad.

Music with garage band. The limitations are my talent and not the program. Nine Inch Nails often use Garage Band on iPads to sketch out songs and even released an album with music only created and edited with Garage Band. Are they big enough to count?

Do you know that there are been quite a few magazine covers with artwork by renowned artists created on iPhones and iPads? No. Look up the New Yorker for one. I believe there is at least one Time magazine cover.

You can use the iPad and bluetooth keyboard to remote into a remote computer at home or at work and write and compile programs? I won't put words in your mouth that this doesn't count. Tell that to the programmers I know that do this and love the fact that the iPad and bluetooth keyboard weighs less than the Windows laptops they use to use.

People use iPads to write their blogs. Keeps in mind that some of these people make a LOT of money. Not because of what they write it on but because of the content. Oh, the stuff people say can't be created on an iPad? Yes, content. Ok, maybe I did put works in your mouth that time.

Just because you can't create things on an iPad doesn't mean VERY successful people can't because they can and DO.

It's only crippled if you can't figure out how to use them. It's not the device. It's the user.

Thom Holwerda,

"So you have a laptop ."

+1 if I could. It's funny that people buy tablets, and then add on laptopesque accessories. Though I can't say I blame them, having played with my wife's tablet with and without a keyboard, there's no doubt that the keyboard is the uncontested winner for text entry. Maybe the pendulum of time will swing back again and give us tablets with swivel keyboards which give the best of both words, just like we used to have. Only this time they'll be lighter and much more affordable.

What about the linux kernel? Android with a some specific changes uses it, and it's 21 years old.

As far as I remember, the macintosh 128k was a success (or at least not a failure) and released in 1984. So you could say Apple had the first commercially successful GUI OS, just not with the Lisa.

Edited 2012-08-01 09:56 UTC

IIRC the Alto was never sold to the public, only to labs and universities. And not in great numbers.

Wether Thom likes it or not Apple brought the GUI to the homes and they didn't rip Xerox off.

"When you really break it down, Apple only developed the original Mac OS, "

"Wrong. Or is the Mac OS X on my Mac Mini Scotch Mist?"

I have no doubt that Apple would have preferred to use the Linux kernel for OS X but took FreeBSD as their liberal licence allowed Apple to take all their hard work and give nothing back. They made a pretty interface with many fans but can't take credit for the underlying OS.

Oh yeah, as Thom says, you are guilty of trying to move the goalposts on the original argument on the first GUI... at least try to be objective.

So you have some fanboys voting for your ignorance, bully for you.
Apple take the BSD kernel, make minor contributions to make their stuff work and everything useful is closed source. You can't run OS X apps on Darwin, no-one uses it and in fact OpenDarwin closed years ago; citing that it "become a mere hosting facility for Mac OS X related projects,"

I'm guilty of hyperbole but their contribution to the hand that feeds them is microscopic, you're acting like a shill.

My comment was about the 20 years which seemed to imply that there was no other commercially successful GUI in 20 years.

Well, I was pretty sure it didn't really mean "no other GUI for 20 years" since that's an absurd statement but the sentence was so badly phrased and ambiguous that I just had to pick on it.
If you want you can also read it as they kept using Lisa for 20 years.

Both the Amiga 1000 and the Atari ST were on the shelves in 1985, not 1987. The Amiga 500 was released in 1987.

And it's X Window System, not X Windows.

Edited 2012-08-01 10:47 UTC

One must never forget the Amiga! Never mind the ST though.

I didn't say that you said that. But others inferred that Apple ripped off Xerox so I wanted to correct that.

Don't all tv's look essentially the same? Wouldn't the salesperson be to blame for selling a Samsung TV to someone that wanted a Sony TV rather than blaming Samsung for making their TV's look like black rectangles?

I think you would be more surprised than me. I'm been supporting computers since 1979. I've been amazed at how many people mistake something for something else even though it is obvious to us.

And that last part is important. We know what to look for. A lot of people don't and expect to have a certain experience with the product and get a "bait and switch" where sales people (and the company) are paid extra to push device X (such as Samsung) and pretend they are selling the person what they asked for.

Note that this happens a LOT with car dealers. They don't switch brands but they purposely try to sell you a car with less than what you asked for at the higher price because the lower priced car hasn't been selling so the boss tells them to "do whatever you can without lower the price much".

Just ask someone what version of Windows they are using and you'll meet people that don't know, despite having a Windows XP splash screen while booting for years.

And some answer Microsoft, Windows 97, Office or even stranger things.

Some people buy an Android tablet thinking they now have an iPad. Not sure changing the shape or color would/could prevent that though.

These people are out there and have a vote in the next election.

No, I don't remember that but that's because it didn't happen.
DARPA is not a founder of Google.

I remember clearly, some years ago I read the news. Not the same news but is an article about it.


http://bit.ly/NKxwGV

Edited 2012-08-02 04:03 UTC

Anyway, any American company has to do what their government says, otherwise people who does not obey... will go to jail.

The same can be said about communications companies and, of course, any government and its companies.

So your data should be where you trust it.

Sabon,

"Don't read it if you want to stay in the dark under your bed about what iPads and other Apple devices can create and do."

I think you are being overly defensive about legitimate criticism of your favoured tablet platform.

Just because one CAN do something doesn't make it a good tool for the job. Obviously you *can* use your tablet to do things it's not particularly good at, but that's shifting to a "jack of all trades, master of none" philosophy - instead of using a tablet for what it's good at, you try to use it everywhere.

Sometimes a tablet w/stylus may be an excellent artistic tool. On the other hand, many touch interface devices have regressed from the usability of physical counterparts and are far less efficient to use. Just because they can emulate physical devices doesn't make them as good. A typing keyboard is an obvious example. I've seen ads feature a tablet piano and guitar, which a professional would only consider using as gimmicks, which is clearly what they were even in the ads. They certainly don't replace the real deal for professionals.

We weigh the pros and cons between a number of competing factors: cost/portability/power/screens/data entry/interaction efficiency/etc. If the tablet adds up, then great! If not, then maybe you should admit that using a tablet can sometimes be like fitting a round peg into a square hole (so to speak). Just because it's possible to jerry-rig it with accessories doesn't mean it's a good idea...pros and cons.


Edit: one example of a good tablet application is GPS. Our tablet makes an excellent GPS device. But let's not kid ourselves and pretend they're suitable for professional office work unless there are no other computers around.

Edited 2012-08-02 17:26 UTC

Sabon,

"Just because it is not particularly good for you doesn't mean it isn't great, for the things I stated, for other people."

Again, we all know that you CAN do alot on these tablets, but the question is whether it enhances productivity/creativity or imposes a burden.

You brought up the spreadsheet example. Do you think a tablet spreadsheet app is as great as a desktop spreadsheet for entering data, copying data from other sources, and manipulating formulas? Of course not, textual data entry is a sore point for touch interfaces. You can mitigate some of the limitations with laptop accessories, but that's an implicit acknowledgement that a laptop design is better for some tasks.


You also brought up web development...Absolutely unthinkable without a laptopesque keyboard. The inability to view multiple windows for control panels and user pages and code simultaneously is a sure set back. Looking up information/emails and copying code/HTML is awkward on a tablet. Viewing pages in various resolutions is difficult without windows. Selecting/transferring files is faster on a desktop. Running background tasks/monitoring logs while simultaneously hitting a page is impossible with a single window tablet UI. I don't even know if the tablet can run network traces without cheating and opening a session to a "real computer" to do the work. Sure it's *possible* to webdev from a tablet, it's just not ideal. If you do it, don't be surprised when your efficiency goes into the toilet.

"Take the typewriter for instance. A LOT of great movies and books were created on a typewriter. I'm guessing you would not think it would be a good device for creating these."

What's that got to do with anything? Unless they were a raving Underwood fanboy or lacked electricity, said person wouldn't use a one over a computer today.


A tablet is great at some things, not great at others. It's a simple plain truth.

Sabon,

"First of all, have you read __anything__, actually read anything I've typed so far? If yes, you will see that I say that I have an iPad and a bluetooth keyboard."

Yes, actually, it's what I meant by "that's an implicit acknowledgement that a laptop design is better for some tasks."


"I will ONLY admit that laptops can be better for some things if you admit that iPads can be better at creating things than a laptop. I said createing things, not consuming things."

Um...ok, although I never said otherwise. I just think your examples of web development and spreadsheets are terrible illustrations of a tablet's superior creative potential.


"Sometimes a laptop would work better. MORE often, most often, for ME, having a laptop would be a waist as it is heavier and cumbersome and feels like using a typewriter now after using my iPad with Apple bluetooth keyboard and 3rd party bluetooth number pad."


Alfman: "...We weigh the pros and cons between a number of competing factors: cost/portability/power/screens/data entry/interaction efficiency/etc. If the tablet adds up, then great!"

I'm going to assume that we are in agreement then.


I think we might both benefit from a light tablet/laptop combo, since for both of us - touch screens are not enough.

Sabon,
"So we agree that iPads (and other tablets to a lesser degree) can be great tools for creating lots of different things including spreadsheets with say a couple thousand lines (and maybe more) and large documents and taking and editing video without another device and so on."

In principal sure, but frankly you've chosen poor examples. If you want to highlight where the tablet truly shines, you really need to pick examples that benefit from touch interfacing, video editing might be one, CAD might be another, taking handwritten notes and annotations is another, etc.


"No they aren't. My friends do this a LOT and are VERY happy with the way the iPad works as a device to remote into their home computers instead of lugging around their much, much heavier laptops."

The need to remote into a desktop "a LOT" in the first place is a reminder of how the desktop is more useful than the tablet for those tasks, otherwise those tasks would be done on the tablet itself and no desktop would even be necessary.


"Yes they bring their bluetooth keyboards with them. But they are still happier than with laptops."

I suspect many of them would be very tempted by a lightweight ARM touchscreen swivel laptop. It'd be better than toting around a separate keyboard all the time.

Please, spam the comments even more...
(also, while you're at it, could you be any more snide than in some of your comments above?)