> Anything that hampers the next wave of innovation is pure evil.
You were on a roll, saying people shouldn't have to innovate, then suddenly you worry about hampering innovation.
Which is it? You want to be able to copy freely instead of innovating, or you want innovation to be protected?
Many comments in these threads seem to think Apple woke up one day in 2007 with the completely obvious idea of an iPhone. That's not how it happened.
Apple had been researching hand held computing since the 80's, bringing the most advanced handheld anyone had ever seen to the market, and iterating the ideas of how the software should work and the usability of that software, in directions quite different from those pursued by others such as Palm or PocketPC focused on limited capabilities more in line with what that era's hardware could actually pull off.
The market wasn't ready for Newton then, but its ideas seeped into engineering consciousness, making its innovations seem "obvious" later. Eventually, physical technology caught up with Apple's ideas, enabling the iPhone and iPod touch.
The Johnny-come-lately copycats are close enough already without their copies having to be "slavish". Whining about this or that feature they can't copy isn't becoming. If inventing's so easy, invent something better that everyone else will complain, after they see it, is obvious.
Or, have the foresight or folly to go spend nearly two decades pouring money and hard work into a product the market isn't ready for, build a huge portfolio of research-driven ideas supporting making the product, finally bring a product to market that for the first time just "feels" to everyman it works exactly the way such a product should work, and then see how you feel about that twenty years of investment being protected.
Arguably, making something feel obvious is an art. What's not obvious is that obviousness can take so much work.
Where did I say people shouldn't have to innovate? My main gripe is with broad patents on software metaphors. You certainly have a point that Apple has every right to bear the fruits of their years of research and hard work. But what do you know, they already are because they redefined the smartphone market and are leagues ahead of the competition. Their mastery of intuitive and elegant interface design just can't be copied. Copycats can only do so much by emulating functionality. I find Android severely lacking and love my iPhone but shutting them out with patent suits isn't going to give them an an economic advantage beyond what they have for creating a fundamentally better product and it's going to be bad for consumers if we have to wait for these patents to run out before we can see competitive devices or buy devices that are perennially more expensive and inferior due to licensing fees.
I just find the legal framework in place for copyright and software patents out of touch with reality and far from ideal. It just seems that with the way the system currently works, science fiction writers should have a mountain of patents covering the next hundred years if only they would do the paperwork and pay the legal fees. We'd still be stuck in a pre-industrial society if we had current patent laws in the 18th century.
And Apple was in a position to make those investments in the first place because they profited handsomely from copying wholesale the fundamental ideas of the Mac UI. Now that the tables are turned they want to change the rules of the game.
Android brings more than enough innovation to the table to justify its existence. If anything Apple is borrowing more from Google now than vice-versa.
This argument is based on repeating an easily debunked falsehood.
Apple did not 'copy wholesale the fundamental ideas of the Mac UI'. They paid Xerox for a license to commercialize the technology via a stock deal, and then they spent significant effort refining it to make a consumer product.
So Apple really just wants other people to play by the same rules they do.
> They paid Xerox for a license to commercialize the technology via a stock deal, and then they spent significant effort refining it to make a consumer product.
You are the first person I've ever heard make that claim. The only support I've found for that statement is a throw-away sentence in Wikipedia's article about a lawsuit between Apple and Microsoft, which does not appear to be supported by the document cited. So, do you have a citation for that?
The New Yorker[1] has one of many references on the internet, but the price was 100,000 shares of pre-IPO Apple stock at $10 per share. The visit happened (over the protests of some at PARC). There are some side comments about the visit in "Triumph of the Nerds“.
Well then, you were entirely correct. I suppose that my search was both fairly cursory and didn't include all of the right search terms. I find it very surprising that this is the first I've heard of it, though; the "apple stole from xerox" meme is really entrenched, to the point that I never really doubted its truth.
I think it's fair to say that Xerox seriously undervalued their IP, but that was a well documented failing of their management who didn't see the potential that Jobs did in personal computing.
Arguably we're fortunate that he struck this deal and brought these ideas into production much more effectively than Xerox was doing.
On the same note, look at the differences in the actual manipulation of the UI elements between the Macintosh and the Xerox workstations. The differences are very interesting.
Comments
> Anything that hampers the next wave of innovation is pure evil.
You were on a roll, saying people shouldn't have to innovate, then suddenly you worry about hampering innovation.
Which is it? You want to be able to copy freely instead of innovating, or you want innovation to be protected?
Many comments in these threads seem to think Apple woke up one day in 2007 with the completely obvious idea of an iPhone. That's not how it happened.
Apple had been researching hand held computing since the 80's, bringing the most advanced handheld anyone had ever seen to the market, and iterating the ideas of how the software should work and the usability of that software, in directions quite different from those pursued by others such as Palm or PocketPC focused on limited capabilities more in line with what that era's hardware could actually pull off.
The market wasn't ready for Newton then, but its ideas seeped into engineering consciousness, making its innovations seem "obvious" later. Eventually, physical technology caught up with Apple's ideas, enabling the iPhone and iPod touch.
The Johnny-come-lately copycats are close enough already without their copies having to be "slavish". Whining about this or that feature they can't copy isn't becoming. If inventing's so easy, invent something better that everyone else will complain, after they see it, is obvious.
Or, have the foresight or folly to go spend nearly two decades pouring money and hard work into a product the market isn't ready for, build a huge portfolio of research-driven ideas supporting making the product, finally bring a product to market that for the first time just "feels" to everyman it works exactly the way such a product should work, and then see how you feel about that twenty years of investment being protected.
Arguably, making something feel obvious is an art. What's not obvious is that obviousness can take so much work.
Where did I say people shouldn't have to innovate? My main gripe is with broad patents on software metaphors. You certainly have a point that Apple has every right to bear the fruits of their years of research and hard work. But what do you know, they already are because they redefined the smartphone market and are leagues ahead of the competition. Their mastery of intuitive and elegant interface design just can't be copied. Copycats can only do so much by emulating functionality. I find Android severely lacking and love my iPhone but shutting them out with patent suits isn't going to give them an an economic advantage beyond what they have for creating a fundamentally better product and it's going to be bad for consumers if we have to wait for these patents to run out before we can see competitive devices or buy devices that are perennially more expensive and inferior due to licensing fees.
I just find the legal framework in place for copyright and software patents out of touch with reality and far from ideal. It just seems that with the way the system currently works, science fiction writers should have a mountain of patents covering the next hundred years if only they would do the paperwork and pay the legal fees. We'd still be stuck in a pre-industrial society if we had current patent laws in the 18th century.
And Apple was in a position to make those investments in the first place because they profited handsomely from copying wholesale the fundamental ideas of the Mac UI. Now that the tables are turned they want to change the rules of the game.
Android brings more than enough innovation to the table to justify its existence. If anything Apple is borrowing more from Google now than vice-versa.
This argument is based on repeating an easily debunked falsehood.
Apple did not 'copy wholesale the fundamental ideas of the Mac UI'. They paid Xerox for a license to commercialize the technology via a stock deal, and then they spent significant effort refining it to make a consumer product.
So Apple really just wants other people to play by the same rules they do.
> They paid Xerox for a license to commercialize the technology via a stock deal, and then they spent significant effort refining it to make a consumer product.
You are the first person I've ever heard make that claim. The only support I've found for that statement is a throw-away sentence in Wikipedia's article about a lawsuit between Apple and Microsoft, which does not appear to be supported by the document cited. So, do you have a citation for that?
The New Yorker[1] has one of many references on the internet, but the price was 100,000 shares of pre-IPO Apple stock at $10 per share. The visit happened (over the protests of some at PARC). There are some side comments about the visit in "Triumph of the Nerds“.
1) http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/05/16/110516fa_fact_...
Well then, you were entirely correct. I suppose that my search was both fairly cursory and didn't include all of the right search terms. I find it very surprising that this is the first I've heard of it, though; the "apple stole from xerox" meme is really entrenched, to the point that I never really doubted its truth.
I think it's fair to say that Xerox seriously undervalued their IP, but that was a well documented failing of their management who didn't see the potential that Jobs did in personal computing.
Arguably we're fortunate that he struck this deal and brought these ideas into production much more effectively than Xerox was doing.
On the same note, look at the differences in the actual manipulation of the UI elements between the Macintosh and the Xerox workstations. The differences are very interesting.