The article and the patent you are pointing to are not in discussion of this case. . . and the proportion and shape ARE exactly protectable for a design patent. . . in context TO THE DOTTED LINES that are included with the patent. . . which are just as much of the Design Patent as the non-dotted lines. Without the dotted lines, there would be NO PATENT GRANTED. The dotted lines are what gives the sold lines context of what is being patented and the limitation of the patent! That is why the context is included. The Verge has no clue about what they are talking about, just as you do not.
The patents in suit were not invalidated and Design Patents are NOT invalidatable due to prior art. Again, you do not understand Design patents. And again, you rely on Utility patent law. . . which is not at all applicable to Design patents. Similarity in Design patents does NOT, and CANNOT invalidate a design patent. You still show your ignorance of the purpose and differences between Utility and Design patents. . . and argue something totally irrelevant.
I am not trying to argue that the only issue Apple brought up was that Samsung devices were rectangular with rounded corners... but it is a fact that it is one of the issues Apple itself brought up in their arguments.
They did not bring that up. . . a design patent has to be taken on its whole appearance in context, not feature by feature, not a list of specs to be checked off until a majority is met, and irrelevancies added by the infringer, such as additional buttons, names, colors, etc.. Apple always spoke in suit about how the Samsung products were intended to look like Apple's products.
Again, you do not at all understand what a design patent is all about. . . what it is for.
The patent you linked to which I am writing this reply is for only a rectangle outline with those exact proportions. . . and again, it is NOT any of these patents in suit. If another maker were to make a tablet/phone with other proportions, there would be no problems. . . Problems arise when they make them exactly to the same proportions so they look like Apple's products. Make the corners sharper, or broader, no problems.
Everything you talk about pre-iPhone are also irrelevencies as prior art. . . if they do not do what the iPhone did with a multi-touch capacitance touch screen without a stylus, and without multiple buttons littering up the face of the phone. . . that used only a finger as the input. They are irrelevant, rounded cornered rectangles or not, because THAT was only part of what was patented. . . and they had their own design patents which are not invalidated by any that went before them either.
Everything you talk about pre-iPhone are also irrelevencies as prior art. . . if they do not do what the iPhone did
If this is all irrelevant then why are you the one who posted the irrelevant picture showing cell phones before the iPhone (minus those that which were rectangular with rounded corners) and cell phones after the iPhone (minus flip phones, blackberries, and other designs still being made that were not rectangular with rounded corners)? The original iPhone... like just about everything else that Apple has come out before and since is almost always an evolution of designs and functions that other developers came up with previously.
Apple is very, very good at identifying great features that others have come up with and combining them into a product that is user friendly adding a little window dressing and then doing what they are the very best at... marketing. I admire what they do very much. However, this is an evolutionary process.
You and I both know that Apple did not come up with multi-touch capacitive screens. They were out there long before the iPhone. Other manufacturers such as HTC who came out with the phones that the iPhone evolved from chose resistive screens largely because with the small LCD screens that were affordable years before the iPhone came out resistive input had key advantages.
As screens and capacitive touch control evolved it was only a matter of time before someone came to market with a device that used the technologies. It was certainly not a revolutionary development that only Apple had been considering. To claim that Apple was the first to think of such a thing is outrageous. Microsoft, Mitsubishi and others were working on multi-touch displays years before the iPhone was in development. Many of Apples patents on “gestures” etc. are travesties at least as bad as their claim on a rectangle with rounded corners. And quibbling over a button or two or three at the bottom of the device... absolutely ridiculous. That is strictly aesthetics and has just about nothing to do with anything.
I do appreciate that you have admitted that “Apple always spoke in suit about how the Samsung products were intended to look like Apple’s products.” To try and claim that a Samsung S3 could be mistaken for an iPhone is ridiculous and I am happy that on appeal this has been thrown out.
then you say, “they do not do what the iPhone did with a multi-touch capacitance touch screen.” Obviously not... they did pretty much exactly the same thing that an iPhone did only without a multi-touch capacitance touch screen. Good for Apple, they bought a screen and used it they way the designer of the screen envisioned it to be used. Then they marketed and developed it in a way that made lots of people decide they wanted it. Again good for Apple, but it is just more of the same evolutionary process that defines nearly all Apple designs.
I admire your knowledge and enthusiasm for Apple products. You are a great resource here. I do disagree with some of your characterizations of me, but I especially reject your defense of Apple’s hired goon legal department. They are the biggest bullies in the tech sector and are responsible for the stifling of much innovation.