“Last night, Apple posted some new information (in German) to its German support knowledge base, informing customers using the iCloud or MobileMe push email service in Germany of the need to pull their email manually (by bringing up their email client) or configuring their email clients to check periodically for new messages,” Florian Mueller reports for FOSS Patents. “(Just to avoid misunderstandings: iCloud and MobileMe are both operational, but their push notification features are affected, within the borders of Germany.)”
“Apple points to a Motorola patent ruling that is under appeal and stresses that this ‘only impacts customers in Germany who use a Push setting to get their MobileMe and iCloud email,'” Mueller reports. “The affected customers will still receive email — new messages just won’t be pushed to them BlackBerry-style. Apple also says that it is appealing the decision and ‘believes this patent is invalid.'”
Mueller writes, “From a strategic point of view, it wouldn’t make sense for Apple to back down at this stage and settle on Google’s and Motorola’s terms. The impact of this enforced injunction in Germany is visible, but it is clearly limited. It causes a minor inconvenience that won’t result in any loss of sales or any appreciable reduction of customer satisfaction. There are probably some people at Apple who look at this and think to themselves: ‘Is this already all that Motorola can do? FRAND abuse and a push notification patent? And that’s worth $12.5 billion to Google?'”
Read more in the full article here.
GooMoto…. Grasping @ straws. Eric T. Mole Schmidt is at it again. He must feel more confident in the German courts. Eric A. Hole!!!
I’d be pissed if push email stopped working over a patent dispute.
me too, but I dont it wouldn’t stop me from purchasing an iPad or iPhone if I were a German.
^think
I prefer the name Googlrolla. Doesn’t it sound really EVIL?
It sounds like it just attacked New York.
I like Googzilla 🙂
Motoroogle? Moogle? Gorgonzola? …wait, that’s a type of cheese.
Just had an email from my brother in Stuttgart and he says that Motorola (and Android) is widely quoted, saying ‘Motorola welcomes this action as proof that Apple is acting illegally and cannot beat the rule of law in Germany’. Also that it could take up to a year for the situation to change. The story is being spun as a victory for Android and Google against the market bully – they seem to like big flashy headlines there. Moto is not very big in Germany but Samsung is huge and will no doubt milk this all they can.
Actually, this is a very clever move by Apple. The chances of a formal EU investigation into Motorola’s abuse of SEP’s are rising. Now Apple has also proof that this abuse led to damages.
My mistake, it was not a SEP..
Still, abuse of SEPs could result in a serious fine from the EU, which if Motorola wasn’t being bankrolled by Google, would probably result in bankruptcy.