How does allowing companies to copy one another increase innovation?

mrochester · 31 Aug 2012 at 19:01

All

As the current hot topic, I'm intrigued and mystified by those who propose the idea that allowing companies to copy from one another somehow increases the level of innovation in the industry (and conversely, by preventing companies from copying one another, you decrease innovation).

The primary aim of a business is to make as much money as possible. This is done by driving down costs and driving up profits. If we mandate that company A can simply copy company B's successful products, we end up with a situation where company A takes the path of least cost and resistance and simply releases a load of products that copy what company B has done. In my mind, this means you end up with a market where innovation is severely reduced because;

a) company A doesn't have to innovate because it can simply copy what company B does.

and

b) company B can no longer make money from it's innovations (as they can be freely copied by anyone else), and thus stops innovating.

All of which makes me wonder what the people who have voted for the first option in this poll on PhoneArena are thinking (http://www.phonearena.com/news/Poll...amsung-case-stifle-or-help-innovation_id33929). Is 'fanboyism' now so peverse that some would rather see innovation stifled just to see Apple not win this case?

The whole contradiction in reasoning just completely flummoxes me and makes me wonder how people can be so stupid :confused:

Thoughts and discussion welcome

Bennie-Mac · 31 Aug 2012 at 19:39

My thoughts on the matter are that if companies have basically the same products, they have to innovate new ways to distinguish themselves from the competition. I'm my opinion the smartphone has reached its "prime" design wise, as has the software. It's not like someone is going to totally reinvent the smartphone and have it be widely accepted as the new must have design. They now have to either perfect the design or innovate useful features or improvements to stand apart, otherwise it's just going to be a brand popularity contest like it is at the minute.

Jake 657 · 31 Aug 2012 at 20:07

I wonder how the PC industry would look today if only IBM made the PCs that the vast majority of us today.
Or the car industry, if no other companies had been able to benefit from the innovations made by Henry Ford etc.

Ksanti · 31 Aug 2012 at 20:10

1) Samsung didn't really copy Apple that badly. The design of the Galaxy S is a definite ripoff, but things like pinch to zoom and tap to zoom are just the best and indeed only reasonable solutions to the design problem of zooming on a multitouch screen
2) People aren't saying you should be able to copy, but when you're able to hold a market lead simply by suing people constantly (for things which really, if you think about it, shouldn't be patentable), rather than innovating, then you have a problem. For example, if android phones no longer have pinch or tap to zoom, then many people who previously used android will be pushed towards iOS devices. When every device becomes hampered because patents made years and years ago are stopping simple solutions becoming commonplace, then you start competing over what patents you have rather than actually innovating and competing over new products.

Apple's multitouch stuff all came with the original iphone (from them, you can look back to 2001 and Mitsubishi to see where multi touch actually came from), technology such as mobile phones moves way too quickly for it to be sensible to let industry patents determine the length of technology patents, as it allows way too much of a market lead, such that the only way to keep up is to infringe those patents as they're fundamental to how something works.

The chief problem isn't that people should be allowed to copy, it's that in the first place Apple didn't come up with much of this, and that there's suspicion apple is favoured too strongly by the US patent office because of the tax revenues it generates, so Apple can generate all these nonsense patents which undeniably inhibit innovation.

Well done, you made and patented a multitouch gesture for zooming, and one that doesn't require multitouch. That should give you a market lead for an absolute maximum of 2 years, not 20 years.

Glaucus · 31 Aug 2012 at 20:12

Jake 657 said:
I wonder how the PC industry would look today if only IBM made the PCs that the vast majority of us today.
Or the car industry, if no other companies had been able to benefit from the innovations made by Henry Ford etc.

Why do people keep saying this rubbish.
No where has smart phones been patented or able to patent it.
No where has design features been patented.

In america and other places you can get trade dress, but that only applies to the product as a hole, yes rounded corners are in it, but that's part of several features that make the iPhone look like an iPhone.
You can still make a smart phone with rounded edges, look at Nokia lumia. What you can't do is just make it almost identical.

Nothing has been patented that means only one company can make a smart phone. Again look at window phones and most of the android phones. Non off these violate patents.

mrochester · 31 Aug 2012 at 20:21

Ksanti said:
1) Samsung didn't really copy Apple that badly. The design of the Galaxy S is a definite ripoff, but things like pinch to zoom and tap to zoom are just the best and indeed only reasonable solutions to the design problem of zooming on a multitouch screen
2) People aren't saying you should be able to copy, but when you're able to hold a market lead simply by suing people constantly (for things which really, if you think about it, shouldn't be patentable), rather than innovating, then you have a problem. For example, if android phones no longer have pinch or tap to zoom, then many people who previously used android will be pushed towards iOS devices. When every device becomes hampered because patents made years and years ago are stopping simple solutions becoming commonplace, then you start competing over what patents you have rather than actually innovating and competing over new products.

Apple's multitouch stuff all came with the original iphone (from them, you can look back to 2001 and Mitsubishi to see where multi touch actually came from), technology such as mobile phones moves way too quickly for it to be sensible to let industry patents determine the length of technology patents, as it allows way too much of a market lead, such that the only way to keep up is to infringe those patents as they're fundamental to how something works.

The chief problem isn't that people should be allowed to copy, it's that in the first place Apple didn't come up with much of this, and that there's suspicion apple is favoured too strongly by the US patent office because of the tax revenues it generates, so Apple can generate all these nonsense patents which undeniably inhibit innovation.

Well done, you made and patented a multitouch gesture for zooming, and one that doesn't require multitouch. That should give you a market lead for an absolute maximum of 2 years, not 20 years.

Industry essential solutions that are patented by someone else should be properly licensed. None essential patents should either be licensed, or worked around. It's this requirement to work around that spurs innovation.

Ksanti · 31 Aug 2012 at 20:55

Perhaps on things that can be innovated upon. Tapping to zoom is the only real way to do it. Stuff like processor design should be a competition, whether or not you can double click to zoom should not.

It's only a short step away from saying that one company has a patent on using a touch screen to interact with a mobile device - there comes a point where monopolistic competition becomes a monopoly, and this list of Apple patents is just that.

SKILL · 31 Aug 2012 at 21:12

The poll isn't whether allowing one company to copy another increases or decreases innovation, but whether the outcome of the court case affects innovation, in this case there are good arguments to say that the difference is quite large...

There are reasonable arguments that the patent system is fundamentally flawed when it comes to Software.

There are arguments that some of the Apple patents should never have been granted (even ignoring prior art), such as the rectangle with rounded corners, and the icons with rounded corners.

And there are arguments that several of the Apple patents have applicable prior art and hence are invalid.

There is also the fact, in response to post #6, that Apple aren't actually paying for essential patents and the court case actually grants them a free licence to continue to steal others ideas as long as they're standards essential. Arguably this is more important than anything else from the court case.

In my opinion:

Samsung clearly have infringed on some valid ideas/designs from Apple, primarily that the design of the Galaxy S is far too similar to the iPhone, and also the 'bounce-back' patent. Hence they should pay damages and either licence, remove from market, or change as applicable.

I also feel that the Pinch to zoom patent has shown distinct prior art that should invalidate the patent.

Double-tap to zoom I'm not sure on.

Rectangles and round-edged icons should not be patent-able.

Apple should be forced to pay for the standards essential patents.

The verdict as it was given is likely to be thrown out/massively amended/fail appeal...

EDIT: Haven't really answered the question have I, But going back to the first paragraph, in the context of the poll I think it could 'stifle innovation through fear', various companies have a large portfolio of either very vague or simply 'obvious' patents that could prevent another company of straying too far from the known safe areas for fear of punitive damages.

It also has ramifications for standards, why bother innovating to create '5G' when your work can be stolen with no comeback?

Glaucus · 31 Aug 2012 at 21:20

SKILL said:
In my opinion:

Samsung clearly have infringed on some valid ideas/designs from Apple, primarily that the design of the Galaxy S is far too similar to the iPhone, and also the 'bounce-back' patent. Hence they should pay damages and either licence, remove from market, or change as applicable.

I also feel that the Pinch to zoom patent has shown distinct prior art that should invalidate the patent.

Double-tap to zoom I'm not sure on.

Pretty much how I see it.

I did read one article on swipe to unlock, that unless the device was released in America, they don't have to accept it as evidence.
However even if the slide to unlock gets overturned the damages ATM do not include the willful damages, that can be upto 3X the damages the jury awarded.

As for roudended eyes as far I understand, that simply is not the case, but it's all part of trade dress that covered your smasung S looks far to much like an iPhone. They havent patented rounded edges, many phones have that. It's a combination off all these features that make an iPhone and make the S a copy.

Simply having a rectangle with rounded edges is not an issue at all.

bam0 · 1 Sep 2012 at 00:09

"How does allowing companies to copy one another increase innovation?"

Because the company that comes up with an idea gets first mover advantage in the market, but because they know that they only have a limited time until others are copying them it drives them to come up with new ideas and implementations. Likewise with their competitors, also there is then a lower opportunity cost to implement new ideas that are based on prior ideas and could possibly be infringing.

JTrickle · 1 Sep 2012 at 00:50

bam0 said:
How does allowing companies to copy one another increase innovation?

Once upon a time there were lots of desktop OSs. But slowly one by one they died until finally there remained only two and a half left. How much innovation has your desktop seen in the last decade?

Now do you think there will be more or less chance of this happening if the minor phone makers can't use things like double tap and pinch to zoom? Does anyone seriously think no one but Apple would have thought of these now mandatory basics within a year or two?

They need to be able to copy basic features to stay in the game. Apple doesn't deserve a monopoly off the back of a few brainstorming sessions. It was more than amply compensated from the standard lead and rep.

muon · 1 Sep 2012 at 10:22

Glaucus said:
Pretty much how I see it.

I did read one article on swipe to unlock, that unless the device was released in America, they don't have to accept it as evidence.
However even if the slide to unlock gets overturned the damages ATM do not include the willful damages, that can be upto 3X the damages the jury awarded.

As for roudended eyes as far I understand, that simply is not the case, but it's all part of trade dress that covered your smasung S looks far to much like an iPhone. They havent patented rounded edges, many phones have that. It's a combination off all these features that make an iPhone and make the S a copy.

Simply having a rectangle with rounded edges is not an issue at all.

This is the Community Design which got the Galaxy Tab in trouble in Germany. Motorola Xoom as well I think.

The document mentioned no other unique features. Just shape and bezel.

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/20407/ocuk/pclass_11_A116_Community-Design-000181607-0001.pdf

Apple very much believe that they should be unique in using a rectangular glass tablet with a glass bezel edge.

Morfik · 1 Sep 2012 at 10:23

JTrickle said:
They need to be able to copy basic features to stay in the game. Apple doesn't deserve a monopoly off the back of a few brainstorming sessions. It was more than amply compensated from the standard lead and rep.

What he said.

Glaucus · 1 Sep 2012 at 10:28

Nope, it is lots of details, shape, bezel, placement of home button, shape of back panel etc. basically to infringe it has to look like an iPhone/iPad. Which is why many other devices do not infringe.
You've also only included half the images, which shows placement and shape of dock for example.

Which is why things like Xoom and play book, do not full foul, despite being a tablet. Or about another thousand tablets don't fall foul.

muon · 1 Sep 2012 at 10:35

Glaucus said:
Nope, it is lots of details, shape, bezel, placement of home button, shape of back panel etc. basically to infringe it has to look like an iPhone/iPad. Which is why many other devices do not infringe.
You've also only included half the images, which shows placement and shape of dock for example.

Galaxy Tab and Xoom have no home button and a central location for a dock isn't absurd. Their back design was very different as well.

The pictures show nothing else they could use to say the Galaxy Tab and Xoom copied. Don't even show a home button as far as I can see.

Randomface74 · 1 Sep 2012 at 10:35

You can either:

a) spend 100% of your time reinventing the wheel
b) spend 50% of your time copying and 50% coming up with something new

That's how copyright stifles innovation.

Russinating · 1 Sep 2012 at 11:09

kitch9 · 1 Sep 2012 at 11:10

http://www.ted.com/talks/jeff_han_demos_his_breakthrough_touchscreen.html

Ok, can we get into our heads Apple hasn't invented anything, just some retards allowed them to whack a patent on obvious stuff and retards keep allowing them the patent obvious stuff that others have displayed YEARS before iTurds were even thought about.

It needs to stop now.....

Fillado · 1 Sep 2012 at 11:43

The myth of pinch-to-zoom: how a confused media gave Apple something it doesn't own is worth a read!

It's such a murky grey area though. I think what annoys most people is the more money a company has and more entrenched in an industry it is the more patents don't apply. Take Windows Phone 7. Not saying it looks like iOS AT ALL but it is bounce-back city in the UI. Microsoft and Apple have a cross-licencing agreement so Microsoft gets to use it without penalty. Samsung on the other head is getting sued for using it.

Glaucus · 1 Sep 2012 at 11:49

Very good article.