Judge Koh: Samsung didn’t ‘willfully’ infringe Apple patents

“U.S. District Court Judge Lucy Koh handed down some of her first post-trial rulings from the much publicized Apple v. Samsung patent case [Tuesday] evening,” Dara Kerr reports for CNET.

“In a 32-page order filed today, the judge said she predominantly agreed with the jury’s decision that Samsung infringed on seven of Apple’s design and utility patents,” Kerr reports. “However, she disagreed with one finding — that Samsung “willfully” infringed on Apple’s patents.”

Kerr reports, “What this means is that Apple will now be unable to triple its damage awards. If Koh had agreed with the jury on this decision, Apple could have collected up to as much as three times in damages from Samsung… Koh wrote in her ruling that in order to find Samsung willfully infringed on the patents, Apple would have to prove “by clear and convincing evidence that the infringer acted despite an objectively high likelihood that its actions constituted infringement of a valid patent.” Samsung has argued that it didn’t think Apple’s patents were valid and therefore didn’t believe it was infringing.”

Read more in the full article here.

MacDailyNews Take: And, so, using logic, something with which Lucy is obviously completely unfamiliar, all patents are therefore rendered meaningless because you can do what’s pictured below as long as you claim “uh, duh, you honor, we didn’t think the patents were valid.”

Apple’s products came first, then Samsung’s:

Samsung Galaxy and Galaxy Tab Trade Dress Infringement

Samsung decided to commit this wholesale theft of Apple IP gambling that they’d make far more than they’d have to pay in punishments and, so far, it’s looking like they made a good bet.

Related article:
Samsung loses bid for new trial after Apple’s $1.05 billion verdict – December 18, 2012

55 Comments

    1. It doesn’t really matter. Apple essentially won on all accounts of infringment, but Samsung, rightfully so, didn’t think the patents were valid.

      Future decisions can no longer have as much leniency as this case will prove that these kind of somewhat general design patents are valid. Apple’s patented interface designs were definitely game changers, in that they brought touch computing to the masses.

  1. This whole episode has been baffling and embarrassing. I am born an American, but I almost can’t recognize the country I learned about in Social Studies and Government classes while in school in the 70’s. That gives a hint of my age, but damn things sure have changed in the last 10 or so years.

    1. All it takes is one or two election cycles and we can get this country back on track to self-reliance and renewed American Exceptionalism.

      The country looked and felt a lot like this under Carter, too.

      Malaise.

      Waiting for the next Reagan, this time without a Cold War to win (lower spending, lower taxes, smaller government)…

      1. Funny how you reach back to Carter to avoid mentioning the Clinton surpluss, the largest in history and the Bush Depression, the worst since 1929, which gave $15.5 trillion to Halliburton.

        1. Clinton had nothing to do the the surplus then, just lucky enough to have been President during that period and Clinton was distracted by White House staff dalliances and setting up his subsequent lying-laden impeachment. Clinton, next to Nixon, was our most disgraceful President. If Bush had been president during that period he would have gotten the credit so this is extremely disingenuous. Presidents are rarely responsible for good times economically. But they can prolong the bad times as Obama is probably doing. I’m a Democrat too btw.

        2. You are saying something totally inane. Bush started two illegitimate wars that has cost this great country over $10 trillion. So no, Bush would have presided over nothing. He was a total failure who stole the first election and got to where he did in life because of his father.
          He is the worse President we have ever had. I love how everyone blames Obama about the deficit but the two Middle East wars have cost us over $10 trillion.

      2. There is not nor has there ever been American Exceptionalism. That is a term reserved by small-minded people who think that somehow historic American behavior is any different than any other em,pure that came before. Conservatism, even extreme conservatism would agree with what Judge Koh ruled. After all, capitalism is a free-for-all system that requires “less government”, “smaller government” or “no government” at all.

        What the Judge ruled is that capitalism is a rough and rowdy game and that the rules are written to not prohibit capitalism from creating baubles for consumers to purchase.

        1. Two of the core values of capitalism is respect for property rights and personal accountability. Samdung stole from Apple, and must be held accountable. Thus, Apple is entitled to compensation. It’s a myth that conservatives equate limited government with no government. In fact, most conservatives I know believe firmly in the rule of law, which Samdung violated when it ripped off Apple’s designs.

          Oh, and America is exceptional. Steve Jobs himself called this “an insanely great country”, and he was right.

      3. American Exceptionalism is a myth like Unicorns, the Loch Ness Monster, the lost city of Atlantis, Fiscal Conservatives or reasonable Teabaggers.

        What is exceptional about America is it’s amnesia about it’s true history, it’s ignorance of the world around it and it’s extreme narcissism. People in the rest of the developed world know far more about America than Americans know about America and that is not a compliment.

        It is quite interesting to see the look on Americans faces when they travel overseas for the first time and realize how much bullshit they have been told about Americans having the highest standard of living in the world. America looks dirty, shabby, poorly educated and very parochial. The stars of the American Conservative movement would be laughed off the stage in most serious discussions outside this country.

      4. Fwhatever, just can the broken partisan record. We had two election cycles of your chosen one, and things did not magically get better. In fact, one could argue with strong support that things got worse and directly led to many of the things that you are blaming on others. Despite your revisionist history, everything was not rosy under Reagan, either. I vastly preferred Bush the elder over Reagan.

        Fwhatever, you said that you wanted to stop this political stuff and, yet, you jump at the flimsiest of pretexts (Judge Koh article?) to launch into yet another political statement on MDN. To add insult to injury, the political statement that you made is full of crap.

        Self-reliance and “exceptionalism” does not depend on elected officials – it comes from the people, themselves. We the people have to take responsibility for ourselves and our country. Perhaps you should be more self-reliant.

  2. Funny…in Copyright Law (different from Patent Law) that once you register your works with USCO (US Copyright Office) that the burden of proof is usually on the infringer. But in this case Koh is putting the burden of proof on the person who filed for patents. It is totally ass backwards.

  3. Dish Network did not “Willfully” try to infringe upon Tivo patents. They even tried to fix their issue with a workaround, but still had to pay up ! It’s time to pay Samsung!!

  4. hehe, if not a joke it is stupid, sorry.

    Like being driven over by a car and the driver response would be “I’m sorry I didn’t mean it” and try to drive away. True but.. not acceptable.

  5. Samsung gets “oopsies”? No one can ever know what is in the hearts of others, that’s why you’ve got to have a higher bar than “we think the official position was wrong, so we decided to ignore it”. Samsung is not Nick Fury.

Reader Feedback

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.