Bonum Certa Men Certa

Apple's Strategy Against Linux and Android is Failing

Great background



Summary: More setbacks in Apple litigation and a deposition of Apple's CEO is expected

Apple's obsession with patents is proving to be counter-productive. Wired has published this article which tells the story of SparkFun:



Design Like No One Is Patenting — How SparkFun Stays Ahead of the Pack



Electronics supplier SparkFun designs dozens of products a year and they haven’t patented a single one. It’s worked out pretty well so far.


Also, in a new interview Wired told Google's Larry Page (CEO): "Steve Jobs felt competitive enough to claim that he was willing to “go to thermonuclear war” on Android."

Page replied cleverly: "How well is that working?"

Apple has lost its mind. At Groklaw, which used to sympathise with Apple, Jones wrote: "The color version reads: "The applicant claims the colours black and silver as elements of Mark A in the series." Great. Rounded corners. Now colors." Patently Apple, an Apple boosting site has this report.

Recently, a Dutch court ruled against Apple, which is getting desperate for embargoes because Android devices sell like there is no limit (at the expense of Windows laptops and desktops, not just Apple-branded phones and tablets).

The US media, the corporate press in this case, says: "The outcome of these cases won't be clear for several years, but so far neither company seems to be halting R&D or sales of the phones in question."

Actually, Apple is reported to have halved orders, so sales are affected in some ways. Samsung won't help Apple anymore. There is more about these disputes in the Page interview. Groklaw writes:

Apple and Samsung are having an intriguing debate before the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals. What does a patent holder have to prove in order to get an injunction? That is the question Apple raises. If there are, as claimed, approximately 200,000 patents that could be asserted against smartphones, which ones matter in the injunction analysis? Just a small handfull? Do you have to prove that the patent covers a feature that you can demonstrate consumers want, that it's a feature that *drives* sales, in order to warrant an injunction?

Apple a couple of months back filed its petition for rehearing en banc of an October 2012 order by the Federal Court of Appeals in Apple v. Samsung II that held that in order to obtain injunctive relief in a case where an accused product contains many features, a “patentee must . . . show that the infringing feature drives consumer demand for the accused product”. Apple argues that this so-called "causal nexus" requirement violates equity.

As I read their motion, they are saying that the Federal Circuit's order narrows drastically the ability of patent holders to obtain injunctions, and that there is a conflict with other rulings by this court and the US Supreme Court.


Apple is still trying to ban Android devices, but it's a hard sell to the courts:

Apple Inc faces long odds in its attempt to overturn a U.S. appeals court ruling that threatens to undermine its smartphone patent war against Samsung Electronics Co Ltd.


Apple is said to be working against workers' rights not just in China but also in the US. Judge Koh wants Apple's CEO to be deposed for this:

US District Judge Lucy Koh has ordered Apple CEO Tim Cook to give a deposition about Apple's role in a series of deals between top tech companies to not recruit each other's employees. At a hearing this week, Koh said Cook, Google chairman Eric Schmidt, and Intel CEO Paul Otellini must be deposed to provide testimony about the deals, which the companies had agreed to dissolve after a US Department of Justice probe into the practices in 2010. The testimony is related to a civil lawsuit filed by five former employees of the companies, who claim that they and others lost out on better salaries due to the policies.


Apple's bad practices go beyond that through. It colludes with Microsoft too. As Jones put it, "I told you patent litigation can be anticompetitive. Here's a current example, according to the FTC. I continue to hope the FTC and other regulatory bodies will inquire into the Apple-Microsoft-Nokia-MOSAID et al patent attacks on Android as another." The context was a "Federal Trade Commission staff report [pdf] [which] found that drug companies made 40 potential pay-for-delay deals in FY 2012 (1 October 2011 through 30 September 2012)." (source)

Recent Techrights' Posts

Links 16/08/2025: "Hey Hi (AI) Data Centers Are Driving Up Electricity Bills for Everyone" and the Case Against Booking.com
Links for the day
X.Org is Still Not Dead
Oracle still developing it
Microsoft is getting ready to cause many employees to resign
Having already laid off many workers earlier this month, it now tries another approach
"Maybe the Problem is You"
they probably felt like they had no choice because they really needed this Microsoft money
GNU OS, Powered by Hurd
Choice is good, as long as choices exist that respect the users' freedom
 
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 15, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, August 15, 2025
Slopwatch: WebProNews and Google News Promoting Fake Articles About "Linux"
Google News is being flooded by these slopfarms, so when Linux news is being sought online (via Google News) many people will read bots that spew out FUD
Original European Patent Convention (EPC, 1973), Routinely Violated by the European Patent Office, Now in Geminispace
hundreds of thousands of European Patents must be immediately revoked
Gemini Links 16/08/2025: Politics and Alhena 5.2.8
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/08/2025: Leasehold, Slop Bubble, and Xobaqu
Links for the day
Links 15/08/2025: Flight Attendant Strike, Floods, and Tropical Storms
Links for the day
Links 15/08/2025: German Government Falls Short on Free Software, Russians Breach EU Systems
Links for the day
Microsoft is Still Losing Cyprus
The market share goes down, so share prices go up
Microsoft Accenture is in Trouble
For one thing, its debt doubled in a matter of months
News Will Slow Down and Slop Will Contribute to the Slowdown
In recent years every time there was some holiday or major break the number people who "came back" shrank
Upgrading IRC Network of Techrights
a new version of the daemon we've used since 2021 was released very recently
"Register Debate Series" About Microsoft in the UK is Controlled by Microsoft (US)
The Register is run by Microsoft "Analysts", so the debate is doomed from the get-go
IBM is a Terrible Model for Red Hat
"Most likely caused by laying off too many people"
Microsoft Problems in Palestinian Territory and Israel
Microsoft stock (share price) goes up when market share goes down
Slave is Not a Bad Word, We Need to Use It Sometimes
Who does such exclusion of words benefit? What sort of expression will be deemed impermissible and subjected to CoC enforcement?
National Day of Action
"This Friday, August 15th, there is an organized, petition-based, protest of Wells Fargo in major cities across the US," Richard Stallman wrote
Our Gemini Editions Now Contain 100,000+ GemText Pages
Our Gemini Editions aren't small, even if Gemini Protocol is still the 'underdog'
The Relations Between the United States and Europe Deteriorate, Should Europe Continue to Rely on American Tech Giants?
The shallow notion that made-in-USA software is fairly safe for Europe to rely to is coming to a standstill
Techrights and Tux Machines Running as Usual During Vacations
No interruptions, maybe temporarily slowdowns
Gemini Links 15/08/2025: ADHD and "Random Weird Things"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 14, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, August 14, 2025
"Article 52. PATENTABLE INVENTIONS" in the European Patent Convention
Some time tomorrow we'll have a complete local copy of the EPC
Serial Slopper (SS) Still at It, Still Misusing Plagiarism Tools and Cheatware for Images and Text About "Linux"
All the slopfarms are a very big problem
Reddit Deletes Stuff, But Not for Being False or Misleading
Yet another one of those articles that speak of a man in his 50s as if he's terminally ill
Times of India and India.com Are Clickbait and LLM Slop
Google continues to reward bad actors
The More "Market Share" Microsoft Loses, The Higher the Shares Go
People joke about the same sort of thing in relation to IBM
To OIN, Software Patents Are Not a Problem
Had software patents ceased to exist, OIN too would cease to exist and its staff would be unemployed.
Microsoft's Bankruptcy in Russia is Only the Beginning
Due to politics it mostly makes sense that Windows is being phased out, also in part due to policy changes
Microsoft-Funded Publishers Lied to Us About Vista 10 and Now Advocate Us Owning Nothing
They want you to own nothing, but they also want you to buy a PC on which to become Microsoft's slave and they make it harder if not practically impossible to remove Windows
Articles Promoting and Celebrating Wayland Are LLM Slop
New example (100% slop)
European Patent Office (EPO) Reformation Project
It's a stain on the EU's reputation
The Register MS, Dominated by American Editors, Says UK Should be Run (Digitally) by Microsoft US
The Register MS is sponsored by American money, run by Americans, and its chief editor is a Microsofter from the US
Slopwatch: Google News and Other Slopfarms
Google News is rewarding sites that misuse LLMs and cheat the Web
Gemini Links 14/08/2025: Drought, Climate Experiments, and LLM Slop Considered Detrimental
Links for the day
Links 14/08/2025: Second-hand ThinkPad and Enhanced Surveillance on Chipsets from the United States
Links for the day
Moral Standards From the Masters of Linux
They get hung up on minor language issue and promote this crazy theory that racism will go away if only everyone spoke a little differently (no matter where he or she came from)
Links 14/08/2025: Data Brokers Hiding Opt-Out Pages From Google, "Fight Chat Control"
Links for the day
FSF Infrastructure Under Constant Attack
The disconnect (literally) has had an effect on credibility
Feels Like The Register MS is Trying to Diversify a Bit
If The Register MS goes back to being The Register US (or UK), that will be a nice improvement
Gemini Links 14/08/2025: Reading Journal and LLM Fatigue Revisited
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 13, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 13, 2025