APPLE CRUSHES SAMSUNG IN COURT:

Sarah,

This year, Apple sued Samsung for infringing on patents held by Apple and won.  Apple is an enormous American company.  Samsung is an enormous South Korean company.

What Is A Patent?

A patent is when a country grants a company a monopoly on certain technology for a certain time in return for describing how the technology works.  The technology has to be novel, useful and non-obvious.  In theory this encourages innovation because it provides inventors with a hefty incentive to create. 

What Is The Technology Apple Claims To Own?

Usually the technology in high tech patent cases is difficult to understand.  This case was an exception.  Here, Apple claimed that Samsung infringed on patents that protected general touch screen technology such as pinching, zooming, scrolling, and selecting.  Additionally, Apple successfully argued that Samsung had copied the IPhone’s overall aesthetic design.

 What Did Apple Win?   

A billion dollars.

Are People Pissed?

Yes.  Even people that don’t work at Samsung.  These people believe that the touchscreen technology is too general to patent and that aesthetic design should not qualify as invention.  They argue that by granting such broad patents, the government moves competition between companies into the courtrooms.  Further, so many broad patents hinder innovation because restricting a company’s ability to work with basic touch screen technology stops them from inventing.

Bottom line: Apple is dominating everybody.