“Understanding Apple’s intent to patent every valuable aspect of the intellectual property that went into creating iPhone in 2007 requires a look at what happened a quarter of a century earlier in the development of Apple’s Macintosh,” Daniel Eran Dilger reports for AppleInsider.
“After two particularly intense years of patent lawsuits between 2005-2007, headlined by the four outrageous patents detailed earlier, Apple announced the iPhone, emphasizing that virtually every significant aspect of its entirely new experience and industrial design was protected by patents,” Dilger reports. “It wasn’t until nearly three years later that a global patent war erupted.”
Much more in the full article here.
A brilliant history of Apple, and what it’s given society and computing, clearly proving how much of their innovation has been quite blatantly stolen by the likes of Microsoft.
Still, I’m sure the usual whiney little trolls will be on here to deny that any of this actually happened, and that Apple has stolen everything from Google and Samsung.
Fuckwits.
The mere existence of Samsung makes me wish that we had totally lost the Korean War.
What? We won the Korean War? When did that happen?
Read the American version of the Korean War rather than the version by the Canadians or anyone else who actually was involved or reported it from an unbiased point of view.
Wow, this is a fantastic article. I have been reading everything i can find on Apple for a decade and yet I have learned so much in the last 20 minutes by reading this article. Every Apple fan, and every Apple hater, should read this article!
Isn’t it amazing and confounding? The idiots that support the slavish copiers form the US and Asian countries justify their actions as perfectly legal, moral and standard procedures that everyone in the industry does. They even have the audacity to point at Apple doing the exact same thing. Which is a blatant lie. All these idiots have to do is read from the creators of the Mac themselves on folklore dot org or go to the Stanford Library Historical files of all things Apple. All the glaring facts and proof is all there.
I bet you don’t see extensive documentation like this from companies who Slavishly copy Apple in the US and Abroad
An enlightening article and a history listen for the ignorati who always thought that Steve Jobs snuck his way into PARC at night and fled with the GUI and the Mouse unnoticed.
A history lesson*
Correct; Xerox GUI was so raw (it did not even have menu bar) that no one at Xerox thought they could make it work. And, indeed, with changes that Apple has done, the GUI would fail. (Plus, Xerox wanted to have some profits from shares that Jobs gave them for two-weeks Xerox PARC sessions — if Apple would somehow succeed, the price of shares would raise.)
Excellent article by AppleInsider’s Daniel Dilger, well worth the read!
Click READER and send it to all your contacts. That stupid movie starring Ashton is going to be put soon. Most people will walk say believing every scene as a FACT. Yes people are that dumb sometimes!
An absolutely brilliant article.
… And, what Samsung and others forget is that consumers have a long memory. Particularly those that use their computers for work or other intense activities.
There are certain companies I won’t touch with a ten foot pole because of crap products or rip-offs and you can guess who they might be. I won’t support those products as long as I live. The next startup will be Apple & FreeBSD all the way.
Samsung makes handsets to order and some of their own too. These phones run on several systems, none which are Samsungs own home brewed os.
Samsung enters the “Smartphone” to compete with its exclusive Contractee Apple… and not only that, Samsung chooses to use Android. A quick and easy step to compete. It is also key to understand, Googles CEO was on the Apple board of Directors during this time and that Google plotted to compete with Apples own Andy Rubin, who headed up Danger, a company Rubin started after leaving Apple to focus on mobile phones.
It is also important to know – since 1997 Apple had closed Newton down – spun some technology to Palm – and secretly had Newton engineers work on Purple – which was iPad and iPhone development… thats right Rubin was there during Purple. But leaves to work on things of the same nature. YOu can not do that in the auto industry, there are contract and work agreements to protect intellectual properties. A practice dealt world wide. Similarly a practice in the pharmaceutical industry.
Android was a completely different beast in 2006… come 2007 when iPhone was launched — Google totally steered Android to look and feel like iOS. Google saw the future – and Apple lead the way already marketing and selling “iPhone”. And well patented too. Googles,
‘, Android and Samsung handset designs are clones – as close as a perfect copy to iOS as possible — noting they tried to APPEAR to avoid infringements — however — the rush and lack of true innovation left trails of evidence that Andy Rubin was a hack-in-stein Apple wannabe.
And lastly Samsung had it all too easy – and earned far too much, as the world waited for the US government and law systems to decide on the verdict. Lets all hope this is the Beginning of the End… as Samsung struggles to perfect a new OS of its own. And alterations of its handset designs… have already well taken note a few years ago. Just not on the cheap models. Leading to the point where, now, Google should becomes the focus… and the show ends when Android finally falls. Samsung had a good run… they made enough money on thier useless none-upgradable cheap crap… and offered high end phones at the price of iPhone though sold far less of those. Nevertheless, Samsung tried but has tarnished it reputation for good now.
Long live Apple innovation – down with copy cats. In my opinion, all are copy cats — Rim, HP, Windows, if truly Apple owns multi-touch gestures – granted the patents from FingerWorx, no other phone should function with a pinch or swipe or flick — this was the software and hardware marriage of the touch screen advancement… all competitors copy this type of gesture. So no matter how you skin or dress up the interface — the function is Apple owned. And now that Apple – shifts slowly to its yet 3rd UI with Siri dictation – this assistant will guide Apple with more innovations — something the competitors should have done. But again miss the boat.
Maybe the new functionality of iOS7 – coining some Android features is no worry… the settlement and death of Android is near.
Apples Personal Digital Assistants research was a complex three part study. Three individual teams worked on the Digital Assistant, one the “Newton” team, two the “PenLite” team and the third was “Paradigm” team. Each had a different focus – but the “Newton” ‘s feature was hand recognition, while the others focused on networking and wireless communications.
“Apple decided to keep Newton, shutter PenLite and spin Paradigm off in 1990 as an independent company named General Magic, which gained partnership investment from AT&T, Motorola, Matsushita, Philips and Sony. It eventually turned into a patent portfolio that was acquired by Microsoft to improve Windows CE.” — macinsider
From South Korea here, we will keep the hawk-eyes on Apple for the next innovative release so we’d copy in no times. If Apple sued us again, we still come out a head with billion-of-dollars in profit. HAHAHA evil laughing.
Excellent and extremely well written article. Kudos to DED. Thanks for posting it MDN.
Did not read the whole article.ay I suggest watching “Triumph of the nerds”. On you tube.
Those Dvorak quotes still put a smile on my face. 🙂
How can someone be so consistently wrong over such a long period of time about such important things, and still have a job where he’s called upon to express his worthless opinions? Baffling.
I know, I know… and it’s been quite lucrative for him, if what I’ve heard is true.
DED leaves out a few crucial parts. Parts most people don’t know or tend to forget.
A few engineers moved from PARC to Apple before the invitation by PARC to Jobs. They were working on graphical interfaces at Apple but not as their primary tasks. Thus people at Apple were working on graphical interfaces BEFORE Jobs ever went to PARC — even before the invite to Jobs. Jobs knew about the graphical interface work at Apple BEFORE he went to PARC. And, DED’s right, Apple got a license for everything they got from PARC (and further developed and innovated upon). Apple stole nothing.
The other crucial thing DED leaves out is that the contract between Microsoft and Apple for the heart of the Mac included the right to use Mac SOURCE CODE in Windows. Unfortunately the wording in the contract (allowed by Apple’s idiot lawyers) allowed Microsoft to use Mac System source code in Windows 1.0 “and subsequent versions”. Apple’s legal team allowed that vague phrase to be in the contract. When Mac System source code showed up in Windows 2.0 Apple sued. When the same source code showed up in Windows 3.0 Apple added that version to the suit too.
Apple’s claimed interpretation of the phrase “and subsequent versions” was that this meant 1.x.x, i.e. it meant Windows 1.1, 1.2, 1.2.1, 1.2.2, and so forth, it did not mean Windows 2.x or Windows 3.x.
Microsoft claimed interpretation was that it mean *any* version of Windows 1.0 and later, i.e., it meant Windows 1.x.x AND Windows 2.x.x AND Windows 3.x.x and so forth, ad infinitum.
To top it all off, Apple’s legal team convinced Sculley and the board that not only could the win the source code issue, but they could stop Microsoft from making Windows anything like the Macintosh System looked or how it responded to the user. Sculley and the board authorize the expansion of the lawsuit to cover the infamous “look and feel” aspects fo the Mac too.
Unfortunately, Microsoft knew they could easily win on the “look and feel” part of the suit as Apple had virtually ZERO protection on that part. Thus Microsoft got the court to focus on that aspect. Apple’s lawyers didn’t care if Microsoft pushed the focus to that since they were idiotic enough to believe they could win anyway. Microsoft was able to get virtually 100% of the world to view this as simply a “look and feel” issue that was not defensible by Apple either in the courts or in the public opinion. The source code issue got shuffled to the side. It was all but forgotten.
We all know what happened. The court ruled 100% in favor of Microsoft. Apple lost everything. And the new Windows OS that even more closely resembled the Mac that Microsoft already had in the works? Well, we all know what a game changer Windows 95 was for Microsoft. Would Windows 95 have shipped if Apple had won? Yes. But it would likely have been delayed and called Windows 98 or Windows 99.
Oh, and one other little known fact: That $150 million in non voting stock that Microsoft purchased after Steve came back? It wasn’t the only payment Steve got Bill to do at that time. Yes, Apple caught Microsoft red handed stealing code that pertained to QuickTime. Steve told Bill he had to do three things to stay out of court and risk a multi billion dollar payout to Apple:
1. Publicly announce the purchase of non voting stock in Apple that Microsoft had to hang onto for several years.
2. Publicly announce that Microsoft would do regular updates to Microsoft Office for Mac for several years (5 IIRC).
3. Privately pay Apple an undisclosed sum.
It’s this third part that many people don’t know. It’s this third part that most of the people who do know keep forgetting.
DED did a good job. He just left a few things out.
Thanks for taking the time to add this. The more I find out about the history of Apple the more I can see what a great company they are, thriving despite the opposition.
Excepting one thing, I’m familiar with everything you wrote… as I know many others are. It’s not uncommon knowledge, which is probably why DED didn’t add those details.
What I’m not familiar with is the very last part… about MS privately paying Apple an undisclosed sum. It sounds a bit like tech urban legend spouted by Windows fanatics as “common knowledge”.
Got any citation for that? I’d like to know more.
thx shadowself – sweet post – very cool
“Privately pay Apple an undisclosed sum” – yeah ofc people keep forgetting this – it was private… hahaha so can you tell me how much that undisclosed sum was????
the LOOK & FEEL of iOS is well patented
and that alone should defend Apples’ innovation
– the single statement that the marriage of “software & hardware” together make iPhone a unique Smartphone – that is so key for Apple.
Google robbed and covered its stolen code from SunMicrosystems (Oracle) – yet – the intent – the initial intent of Google phone was not a multi-touch device but a keyboard device like the blackberry.
Competitors should have innovated with voice rather then copy touch – so all smartphones today are clones and thieves.
I just finished reading this on AI. What a great, concise overview of the troubles Apple has had with unethical people. And of course how they over-came – innovate!
I identified with parts (many people believed MS was responsible for UI in Win 95), laughed out loud at some famous absurd Dvorak quotes and was again reminded of how futile it is to believe medias take of many things…it’s the truth that counts.
Go to Daniels web site – Roughly Drafted, and read through his previous articles.
Daniel was always on the case.
http://www.roughlydrafted.com/archives/
I think it is fair to say Microsoft was founded on other people’s technology. DOS and Basic being good examples.
Microsoft develops sloppy code, puts it out to market and then desperately tries to fix all the bugs after the fact. That is one of the reasons why Windows is still the bloated, buggy mess it was since version 1.
In terms of applications, they simply made poor substitutes of existing competing products and called it their own. Most consumers don’t care for the history or the truth.
And the same situation persists today. Samsung, the next version of Microsoft, couldn’t care less about patents or being ethical.