Techdirt. Stories filed under "tablets"

Microsoft Sued Because It Overloaded Surface Tablet With Pre-Installed Apps

Mike Masnick — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 07:23:24 PST

Recently, people noticed that -- in classic Microsoft fashion -- its new 32GB Microsoft Surface tablet only had 16GB of free storage when you took it out of the box. Why? Because this is Microsoft and it loaded the damn thing down with pre-installed software that took up a ton of storage (including, of course, its own bloated tablet operating system, Windows RT). Competing tablets, including the iPad and various Android tablets, come with significantly more free space, even on models advertised as having the same storage. Microsoft has tried to play up the value of the pre-installed software, the fact that you can expand storage via a microSDXC card slot and that it offers 7GB of free "cloud" storage with the device. And, oh yes, you can also manually delete stuff and get back some space.

None of this was enough for one guy, however, as Andrew Sokolowski is now suing Microsoft claiming that Microsoft is misrepresenting the device. While he's seeking class action status, unlike many class action lawsuits that are all about money, it's actually nice to see that he's not seeking any money -- just asking Microsoft to stop misrepresenting the product.

I can't find the actual lawsuit on PACER yet, though I imagine it'll be up soon. On the whole, while I find it incredible (and so typically Microsoft) that Microsoft is selling the tablet loaded down with so much software, does that really require a legal response? The story is getting out in the press, and people must know that at least some of the tablets they buy have pre-installed apps on them. It seems like a situation where an informed consumer is likely to know that this is one of the downsides of buying the Surface, and it's not clear that Microsoft needs to be legally compelled to explain how much free space is on the device out of the box.

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This Goes Beyond Tablets: Apple, Amazon & Google Are Betting On Economic Philosophies

Mike Masnick — Thu, 13 Sep 2012 12:36:00 PDT

Amazon's recently-announced tablets are interesting for a variety of reasons, including that Jeff Bezos made it quite clear that he's taking a very different approach to the market than the one Apple has taken. Lots of attention was (quite reasonably) paid to Bezos' key line:

"We want to make money when people use our devices, not when they buy our devices."

It's a great line in so many ways, because it highlights the different philosophies of Amazon and Apple. John Gruber's summary of those differences is a really worthwhile read (you should read the whole thing). His take on that particular line is dead-on:

Bezos's we want to make money only when you use it framing works two ways. First, it explains the Kindle Fires' noticeably lower retail prices in a way that doesn't make them seem cheaper, only less expensive. It frames Apple's prices -- and profit margins -- as greedy. Second, it works as a sort of guarantee -- if you don't actually use it, we won't even make any money on it.

Later Gruber made a second point that got me thinking (and rethinking...)

Apple's goal is to sell as many iPads as it can. Amazon's goal is to sell as many Kindle Fires as it can to a specific audience: active Amazon.com customers.

I've talked in the past about how Apple's digital goods sales have really been about being the "low margin" leader (if not the loss leader) to drive more sales of the hardware. The digital goods -- content and apps -- make the hardware much more valuable and help drive up the amount people are willing to pay. And that tends to fit with the basic economics I believe in: focus on using the "abundant" (digital) to make the "scarce" more valuable, for which people will pay a premium, especially since that "scarce" can't be "pirated." Apple has, in many ways, put that particular economic concept at the center of how it does business, even if I'm uncomfortable with the closed nature of its overall setup around that.

Amazon, however, has flipped the equation. Their "low margin leader" is the hardware, and they basically appear to want to make their money up on the digital goods purchases. Just as Apple doesn't lose money on selling digital goods (it just makes a very little amount), it appears that Amazon will be making only a little bit on the hardware, but hopes to make the big money on selling the abundant: digital goods via the Kindle store.

I will admit that I struggle with this a bit. I find it hard to bet against Bezos, because on an awful lot of things I think he makes the right bet. Plus, frankly, I'm a lot more comfortable with Amazon as a platform than with Apple. Finally, from a consumer standpoint, I think Apple's hardware seems really overpriced, but Amazon's new prices are really compelling. But economically speaking, there's a voice in the back of my head that says that Apple has this right and Amazon has this wrong. Apple is betting on using the abundant to increase the value of the scarce and then selling that. Amazon is betting on using the scarce to increase the ability to sell the abundant. Perhaps it works because of Amazon's closed Kindle platform and its dominance in the market allows it to make this counter-economical bet. Artificial limitations allow for such things, and Amazon's got the power to control a large segment of the ebook market, which really helps the company out.

In the long run, though, if a competitive market is truly created, it seems more likely that there will be more pricing pressure on Amazon's bet than on Apple's. But, in the short term, Amazon's flip-flopped market certainly could make a lot of sense.

Of course, if you really want to make this fun, just add Google to the equation. It, like Amazon, seems to be focusing on cheap, barely profitable hardware, a la the Nexus 7. It's also put a big effort (recently) into selling digital goods via the Android "Play" store. But Google's business has always been about ads, so it actually adds a third factor to how it views the world, and which part of the business subsidizes which other parts of the business.

In the end, you're left with three big bets on tablets, with very different underlying business models*:

Apple: High margin hardware (scarce); make just a little on digital goods (abundant).
Amazon: Low margin hardware (scarce); make the real margins on digital goods sales (abundant)
Google: Low margin hardware (scarce); make some margins on digital goods (abundant), but cross subsidize both with the ad business.

* Yes, there's also Microsoft Surface tablets. For the life of me, I can't figure out where they place in this particular chart. Which may say something all by itself.

Which strategy works in the end may say a lot about how you view the world economically.

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Russia (Yes, The Country) Looking To Enter The Tablet Market

Tim Cushing — Mon, 10 Sep 2012 03:04:21 PDT

The world of tablet computing is highly competitive and everyone's looking to get in on the action. The latest entrant has something going for it that its closest competitors can't touch: the weight of one the most powerful governments in the world.

Russia, yes that Russia, is looking to produce its own tablet, unfortunately titled the "RuPad." It should do well, considering it should be able to corner every market (but the black one) and become the "must have" tablet for both Russian government employees and the general public alike. There's nothing like the implicit threat of general statist unpleasantness to move a few thousand units.

Unlike Android tablets elsewhere in the world, the RuPad will provide users with unprecedented privacy, protecting their info from rogue capitalists like Google:

"The operating system has all the functional capabilities of the Android OS, but does not contain the covert functions of sending private user data to Google headquarters," Andrey Starikovsky, the general director of the university-based company behind the tablet, told Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin.

So, rather than being subjected to targeted personal ads and ~~personally-tailored~~ MPAA-approved search results, Russian citizens will have their personal data harvested by an entity with a long history of disappearing people away into labor camps for little more than looking at the government the wrong way. (I know, I know. That was the old way. The new, friendly Russia just imprisons people for singing partly-naked protest songs and censors the hell out of the web.)

On the bright side, Russians won't have to waste much time comparison shopping or camping out overnight for the latest iThing. I'm sure the RuPad will come highly recommended by salespeople wishing to keep their jobs and family members intact.

The expected retail price isn't exactly consumer-friendly (15,000 rubles/$460), but when you've got a powerful built-in market for your product, competitive prices aren't really a concern.

Developers at the ministry's Central Scientific Research Institute said their main client is—and will probably always be—the state and its top brass. "The military version will be shock- and water-proof," Russian media quoted production unit director Andrei Starikovsky as telling Rogozin at the presentation.

Like the GLONASS satelitte system before it, the RuPad appears to be another state project that results in something usable by the general public. But for it to be Mother Russia-approved, the Android system has to be purged of its innate data harvesting properties. This homegrown Android version may have a chance for some stress testing as soon as it goes live, as Project Manager Dmitry Maikhailov has boldy invited hackers to punch holes in the system.

"They are not afraid of Google or the US government stealing things per se. They are afraid of leaks in general," the operating system's project manager Dmitry Mikhailov told AFP. "There is nothing like this operating system on the market. It is hack-proof," Mikhailov claimed. "There are people who are clamouring for this."

Despite insistence that this is a "military-first" project, pre-orders have already begun piling up, at least according to the manufacturer. And maybe there is a crowd of wealthier Russians looking to get their hands on some retail-ready military hardware. It worked for the Humvee. Why not a "shockproof, waterproof, hackerproof" tablet that runs a proprietary version of Android? (Currently sporting the name "RoMOS," which looks to be another possible name for the tablet itself.)

One would imagine the government/military version would come with all needed software pre-loaded, but the average consumer might need to do a bit of rooting in order to install anything that isn't Russia-approved. Google has been kicked to the curb app-wise, as well:

"Some of the components will be imported, and the assembly will be carried out by a Russian-based leading defense institute. We excluded Google Market from it for safety reasons,” said Starikovsky.

There's no firm release date ("before the end of 2012") on the RuPad/RoMOS/ANTiGoogle, but considering the operating system has been in development for "over five years," it would seem like "any day now" would be a good bet. Of course, it's headed to the military and top government officials first, so it could be several more months before the specs make it out into the wild. Until the illustrious debut of the People's Tablet, feast your eyes on the Glorious Past of Russian Komputing!

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Disruption Starts With A Foot In The Door: Amazon's New Data Plan Is Limited But Potentially Revolutionary

Mike Masnick — Thu, 6 Sep 2012 13:13:00 PDT

Amazon announced a ton of new ereader/tablet devices this morning, which is being covered to death on the various gadget blogs out there. While some of the devices look interesting (and could put some pricing pressure on other tablets), what caught my eye was the addition of a 4G LTE mobile data plan on the Kindle Fire HD. It's $49.99 for the year, though it's limited to just 250MB per month -- which is tiny. Amazon has included mobile data before in its Kindles, but those were strictly for books (which don't take up that much data). As they go further into the fully functional tablet world, this starts to become more interesting. That's because mobile data continues to be something of a racket, with just a few national providers: Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile and Sprint (and there are limitations there). The pricing offered by those guys always seems to border on collusion (amazing how closely they track each other's pricing changes) and is always focused on keeping the prices very high.

Amazon's offer here is a way to tiptoe into that pool with something of an alternative. Yes, they're just piggybacking on someone else's network via some sort of MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) agreement, so you're still really using one of the national carriers' networks. But from a consumer standpoint, it is offering something of an alternative for mobile data, at much more reasonable prices (though, obviously, the super low caps match that super low pricing). That, alone, doesn't revolutionize mobile data pricing, but it does seem like a way for Amazon to get its foot in the door and expand over time. Amazon has a long history of figuring out ways to do things in a consumer-friendly manner, even if it means undercutting others to do so (which has made it a few enemies). In the presentation itself, Jeff Bezos noted that they're focused on making money elsewhere -- basically as people buy things via the device -- and thus the company has tremendous incentive to keep the prices of the devices and the service quite low. And that has the potential to be quite disruptive.

In some ways, I look at it as similar (in a very different context) to Google's fiber effort in Kansas City. In both cases, you have companies sort of dipping their toes in the water of ancillary markets that make their primary markets more valuable. They're very limited at this time, and many people may brush them off as being useless. But that's what always happens with The Innovator's Dilemma. Offer something simple and small, and the legacy players brush it off as too small or too limited to matter. But keep improving on that, and you undercut legacy providers without them fully realizing what's happening -- often because you're using your tiny and "weak" efforts there to actually enhance your primary market, where the traditional players have no presence.

Lots of people are reasonably mocking the 250MB limit. It is kinda useless. But, look at it as a wedge, and the beginning of the climb up the innovation slope, making Amazon's core business more valuable... and things could actually get quite interesting.

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Samsung Routed In Apple Patent Fight; Told To Pay $1.05 Billion

Mike Masnick — Fri, 24 Aug 2012 16:45:59 PDT

The jury in the Samsung/Apple patent fight took nearly everyone by surprise by rushing through its job and finishing it way, way, way before anyone expected. They didn't even ask any questions and with about 700 questions to answer, they breezed through it in no time. It was not a total victory for Apple (apparently the design patent on rounded-edge rectangles wasn't infringed), but it was pretty close. In the end, Samsung was found to infringe an awful lot of things (and sometimes willfully) and the the final bill is a stunning $1.05 billion owed to Apple. There's still a lot to sort through in the details, but this is a massive victory for Apple. Of course, Samsung has probably already written up its appeal (or will ask the judge to set the jury verdict aside or something), so this case is likely to be around for many years, but yet again we see just how ridiculous patent law can be. What the hell is wrong with competing in the marketplace? If Apple thinks Samsungs' phones and tablets are too similar? Well, keep on innovating. It's called competition, and now we'll have less of it...

Minor update: After the rush, the judge came back to point out two problems with the verdict -- including the jury awarding damages in cases where it had not found infringement. While this will be corrected and won't change the results much, it certainly suggests that the jury rushed through this and may not have taken this particularly seriously. When you start talking about the numbers being thrown around in damages here, at some point, it must start to feel like play money. But it's a pretty big indictment of the jury itself that it would make a mistake like this. It raises significant questions about how careful they were in getting to a verdict vs. how quickly they wanted to be done in time for the weekend.

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Apple Has To Advertise That Samsung's 'Not Cool' Tablet Is No iPad Copycat

Mike Masnick — Wed, 18 Jul 2012 14:24:00 PDT

So even as Apple has been successful in getting a US court to rule against Samsung for having a tablet that Apple thinks looks too much like an iPad, things are shaping up very differently in the UK. We already noted that a judge over there had rejected Apple's claims in the UK, pointing out that Samsung's tablet just isn't as cool as the iPad (leaving Samsung in the awkward position of celebrating the fact that it won the lawsuit due to its own lack of coolness). However, now reports are coming out that the judge has also ordered Apple to advertise online and in print that Samsung didn't copy the iPad.

The judge apparently told Apple to put a notice on its own website and in UK newspapers telling people that Samsung's Galaxy Tab -- which Apple is clearly afraid of -- isn't a copy. As you might imagine, Apple is not happy about this -- though it might as well include the stuff about Samsung's lack of coolness, if it must discuss things. Either way, Apple is protesting. According to the Bloomberg report linked above:

The notice should outline the July 9 London court decision that Samsung’s Galaxy tablets don’t infringe Apple’s registered designs, Judge Colin Birss said. It should be posted on Apple’s U.K. website for six months and published in several newspapers and magazines to correct the damaging impression the South Korea-based company was copying Apple’s product, Birss said.

The order means Apple will have to publish “an advertisement” for Samsung, and is prejudicial to the company, Richard Hacon, a lawyer representing Cupertino, California-based Apple, told the court. “No company likes to refer to a rival on its website.”

While I agree that Apple's lawsuit was a bad idea in the first place, and that the company should just compete in the marketplace, I'm at a loss as to the "damaging impression" that this lawsuit would have for Samsung. As the judge himself noted, the iPad is seen as being really cool. And the Samsung tablet... is not. So, why would it damage Samsung's reputation to have Apple claiming that the devices were too much alike? If anything, it seems like it should help Samsung by advertising which tablet Apple thinks is most like an iPad.

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DailyDirt: Technology In Education

Michael Ho — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 17:00:00 PDT

The digital revolution of the education system has yet to really take off. Many students communicate with their teachers via email and have figured out how to use word processors (instead of typewriters), but the widespread use of technology in classrooms hasn't exactly caught on. Cool projects like the Khan Academy are starting to ramp up, but introducing cheap laptops or ebooks into public schools hasn't met with wild success. (Though, if you've heard of any inspiring programs, let us know in the comments.)

Peru spent $225 million on an education initiative that involved One Laptop per Child and 850,000 basic laptops for schools throughout the country. Unfortunately, the results so far have not shown much improvement in math or reading scores. [url]
India's $35 tablet, the Aakash, is being revised and will probably cost closer to $50. The next version will be called 'Aakash 2' (not the 'new Aakash') and offer a capacitative touch screen. [url]
Wilco Electronics is bidding on a contract to make Aakash tablets and to create a pilot program for these devices in underserved Philadelphia schools. But if Peru is any indication of what will happen.... [url]
To discover more interesting education-related content, check out what's currently floating around the StumbleUpon universe. [url]

By the way, StumbleUpon can recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

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FAA Admits That It's Going To Rethink Whether You Can Use Kindles & Tablets On Takeoff & Landing

Mike Masnick — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 03:33:51 PDT

It's been pretty clear for quite some time that there's no real safety reason why electronics are barred during takeoff and landing on airplanes. Furthermore, there's no legitimate technological reason for not allowing mobile phones on planes either -- that one's more just about keeping other passengers from going into a rage at having to hear others' half-conversations. However, it seems that more and more people are getting annoyed that they can't use their snazzy new ebooks or tablet computers (not just iPads, mind you) on airplane take-off and landings. Nick Bilton, over at the NY Times, asked the FAA what was up with that, and they admitted that they're taking "a fresh look" at those devices and whether or not they should be allowed to be used at those times. Of course, as he notes, this might just lead to a bunch of bureaucratic red tape -- including every possible device having to go through significant testing:

Abby Lunardini, vice president of corporate communications at Virgin America, explained that the current guidelines require that an airline must test each version of a single device before it can be approved by the F.A.A. For example, if the airline wanted to get approval for the iPad, it would have to test the first iPad, iPad 2 and the new iPad, each on a separate flight, with no passengers on the plane.

It would have to do the same for every version of the Kindle. It would have to do it for every different model of plane in its fleet. And American, JetBlue, United, Air Wisconsin, etc., would have to do the same thing. (No wonder the F.A.A. is keeping smartphones off the table since there are easily several hundred different models on the market.)

Ms. Lunardini added that Virgin America would like to perform these tests, but the current guidelines make it “prohibitively expensive, especially for an airline with a relatively small fleet that is always in the air on commercial flights like ours.”

But, hopefully, a better, more efficient process can be found, and people will actually be able to use these devices on airplanes that aren't just over 10,000 feet...

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Why Apple Will Not Be Part Of The Real Tablet Revolution

Glyn Moody — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 03:26:28 PST

You don't have to be a marketing genius or industry pundit to foresee that tablets will be an extremely hot sector in 2012. The launch of Apple's iPad in 2010 largely defined the category, just as the launch of the iPhone defined a new kind of smartphone in 2007; in 2012 we will probably begin to see Android tablets start to gain major market share just as Android smartphones have done this year.

Currently, the tablet is something of a cross between the hipster tech toy of choice and a trivially easy-to-use computing device for couch potatoes. But those early sectors are incidental to the tablet's real potential to revolutionize education, particularly in emerging economies.

The devices are perfect: they are compact, connect to the Net wirelessly, run off battery power for hours and can be used by children and adults alike with little or no training. There's just one problem, of course: the typical tablet's high-end pricing – hundreds of dollars – places it so far out of reach for most of the world's population that it might as well not exist for them. That is what makes India's Aakash tablet - basic cost around $50, but only $37 for Indian students thanks to a government subsidy – so remarkable, and so important.

Of course its specifications are somewhat limited compared to the iPad – 256M RAM, 2 GB Flash memory, 7" 800x480 pixel resistive touch screen – but that's not really the point. The key issue is whether it is good enough for the educational purposes governments around the world have in mind. For although the Aakash began as a project purely for India, it has been swiftly taken up by a number of other countries, as this fascinating feature about the creation of Aakash by the Canadian wireless device maker Datawind explains:

[Datawind's CEO] Suneet was invited to meet with Thailand’s Minister for Information Communications Technology (who was so interested in purchasing 10 million tablets that he attended their meeting even as flood waters descended on Bangkok). Calls arrived from Turkey (which wants 15 million tablets), Sri Lanka, Trinidad and Tobago, Panama and Egypt.

This gives an indication of the potential of the Aakash low-cost tablet: to provide portable computing devices and with them access to digital knowledge on a truly global scale. The feature also explains how exactly Datawind managed to produce a tablet for a tenth of the cost of an iPad: Part of the difficulty in engineering such a device is that the underlying goal—that its final price should be within the means of those who can’t afford high-priced tablets—dictates crucial engineering and component decisions. A piece of high-impact-resistant glass, such as the touchscreen face of an iPad, can cost upward of $20. Datawind’s touchscreen glass, which the company had engineered down the street, costs less than $2, though it won’t allow for luxuries like pinch-and-zoom finger swiping. There were also compromises on processing power: Datawind’s 366 megahertz processor costs less than $5, a fraction of the $15-plus price tag on the chips that power iPads and other comparable tablets. And while the decision to run Google’s free Android mobile operating system on the gadget saves money, it requires coders to dig deep into the Linux kernel that underpins the software, tweaking it until it runs smoothly on Datawind’s weaker processor.
As that makes clear, one key ingredient in the design of the Aakash was Android – and hence free software. This meant that Datawind's software engineers were able to build on several years' work by Google – and two decades of coding by the Linux community – rather than starting from scratch.

It's a reminder that even if – as seems likely – Apple's iPad retains its highly-profitable hold on the upper end of the market, it will never be able to offer a model that is competitive with minimalist tablets built around free software at the bottom. And since it is precisely those ultra-cheap models that will be sold in their hundreds of millions, perhaps even billions one day, that means that the real tablet revolution – the one that will transform education in emerging economies and with it, their societies - will not be one in which Apple plays a major part, despite its early leadership here.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and on Google+

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HP Tablet Fire Sale Lets Us Put A Price On The Value Of A Strong Development Community

Derek Kerton — Thu, 1 Sep 2011 15:13:33 PDT

A couple of weeks ago, HP made the significant decision to get out of the consumer hardware business, simultaneously shutting down their PC business and their mobile device business built around the WebOS purchase that came with Palm, Inc. When they abruptly did so, HP also announced they would be clearing out the supply chain by offering their very capable, $500+ TouchPad tablet for $100 (16GB models).

What followed was a mad rush of purchasing, with people clamoring for a cheap, but powerful tablet. This is by no means a bad device: remember that the WebOS was critically acclaimed, and this tablet had a 9.7" screen, webcam for video chat, lightweight, 1.2GHz dual-core processor and more. These are flagship-grade tablet specs, and although we've learned that UX is more important than specs, good hardware is a definite plus. The biggest problem with the device was the lack of developer support for the ecosystem, so there are "thousands" of apps available according to HP, but not the 'hundreds of thousands' that work with the iPad.

This fire sale has provided a fairly interesting experiment in the market clearing price for non-iPad tablets. The base iPad sells readily for $500, and is often sold out. This is the high-water mark for tablets, which no other has matched. Other vendors have built competitive hardware and tried to sell it in the same price range (Motorola Xoom, Samsung, Playbook) but were rewarded with lackluster sales. Some of those devices, on paper, are arguably better than the iPad, so the most likely reason Apple can extract a premium is the power of their App developer community. An iPad can do much more than a Xoom partly because of what Apple offers, but mostly because of the 'whole product' which includes 400,000+ apps.

Device industry executives must stay up at night wondering how to price their tablet. The HP experiment will prove useful. Now we know that at $500, buyers walk away from the deal. But at $100, they literally rush the store like Walmart on Black Friday. This tells us that the correct price for a good tablet with weak developer support is between $100 and $500. That's a fairly wide range. I wish HP had set the price higher, to provide a better test. Unfortunately, whenever an OEM company sets the price, what we get is their desired price, but not the market value. For that...we have eBay. Many of the buyers at HP's firesale were just arbitrageurs looking to flip the tablet to make a quick buck, and those tablets quickly showed up on the auction site. A look at eBay today reveals a high number of TouchPads on offer, and sold for a market price of ~$250.

If the hardware alone is valued at about $250, how does iPad sell for $500? Well, we'll have to attribute some of the premium to the "cool, sexy" mystique of Apple products. But I wouldn't go too far with that. The Samsung Tab or HP TouchPad are both very slick looking products. A chunk of the premium has to be allocated to Apple's excellent and easy UX. The mass market doesn't want to geek out, they want easy products. But Honeycomb and WebOS aren't so far behind...

No, the dominant reason that iPad can sell out at $500 (even as sales have tipped well beyond the fanboi segment) is the value brought by apps. Apple is making cake because it has the biggest developer community coding around the OS, and the value of that community is currently worth something on the order of $200-250 per tablet. It's going to be tough for any other tablet to breach this market, where Apple already has the supply chain dialed in, the developer community, the innovation lead, and the brand. Android may progress bit by bit, but for now Tablets are Apple's private playground. Competition will heat up if Android tablet versions of the Nook and Kindle go to market around the $325 range (making their profit on books instead). Note that the TouchPad has an estimated $318 Bill of Materials (BoM). In a few years, Moore's Law and steady Android progress will reduce the cost and app advantage iPad now enjoys.

HP will be emptying the supply chain in a couple of weeks with the final production run of TouchPads. I wish they would bump up the price to see if the market would bear $318 direct from the manufacturer (ostensibly, a more desirable seller than eBay members), but it seems that they will keep the current fire sale price.

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Samsung Cites 2001: A Space Odyssey As Prior Art For Tablet Design

Mike Masnick — Tue, 23 Aug 2011 12:31:00 PDT

In the ongoing silly patent battle between Apple and Samsung over the design of competing tablet computers, Samsung is pointing to some interesting prior art. It's claiming that the form factor was recognized well before Apple came up with the iPad design, by pointing to a clip from Stanley Kubrik's 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Attached hereto as Exhibit D is a true and correct copy of a still image taken from Stanley Kubrick’s 1968 film “2001: A Space Odyssey.” In a clip from that film lasting about one minute, two astronauts are eating and at the same time using personal tablet computers... As with the design claimed by the D’889 Patent, the tablet disclosed in the clip has an overall rectangular shape with a dominant display screen, narrow borders, a predominately flat front surface, a flat back surface (which is evident because the tablets are lying flat on the table’s surface), and a thin form factor.

Yeah, but without those "rounded corners..."

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Apple Wins Europe-Wide Blockade Of Samsung Tablets; Guess Which Tablet Apple Is Scared Of Most?

Mike Masnick — Tue, 9 Aug 2011 15:43:20 PDT

Man, is Apple ever freaked out by the Samsung Galaxy Tablet. We already pointed out that Apple succeeded in getting it banned in Australia, and now it's got an injunction blocking it in most of Europe as well. And, of course, the lawsuit in the US continues.

It's really sad that Apple simply doesn't want to compete in the marketplace. The thing is, I've used both the iPad and the Galaxy Tab, and the iPad is nicer. The Galaxy Tab is definitely the best Android tablet I've seen so far, but Apple has the ability to compete and win in the marketplace. So why is it going ballistic all over the world about the Galaxy? While it may be causing some pain for Samsung now, all it's really doing is screaming out to the world: "hey, if you want a more open tablet that we think is as good, if not better than, the iPad, check out what Samsung is working on!" In the past, Apple mostly let its own products stand on their own, and they clearly dominated in the marketplace. The fact that Apple is switching from that stance to aggressive litigation should be a warning sign for Apple's future.

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Apple Continues To Scream To The World How Competitive Samsung's Tablet Is By Getting It Banned In Australia

Mike Masnick — Wed, 3 Aug 2011 01:02:40 PDT

Honestly, I'm at a loss to explain Apple's patent lawsuits against Samsung, which seem mainly targeted at the company's Galaxy Tab 10.1 product, which competes directly with the iPad. Having spent time with both devices, I can say that they're certainly competitive. The hardware is pretty similar, but Apple's software is still miles ahead on the tablet form-factor, though I'm sure Android will at least start to get better now that more tablets are on the market. But, really, all Apple has done with this lawsuit is to signal to the world (loudly) that hey, we're really freaking scared that Samsung has built a better product than we have.

The latest in the worldwide legal fight is that Apple has convinced Australia to block the sale of the device in that country, while it reviews some of Apple's more ridiculous patent claims -- such as for "slide to unlock," "pinch-to-zoom," and... for the "edge bounce" feature that happens when you hit the "bottom" or "top" of a document. Seriously, Apple? Get over it. People copy design elements all the time. Apple has done it as well. And the end result is everyone works hard to make a great new product. Going after Samsung for making a quality competitor just looks petty. Go compete in the marketplace.

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Samsung Forced To Hand Over Unreleased Products To Apple In Patent Dispute

Mike Masnick — Wed, 25 May 2011 07:00:43 PDT

In the ongoing silly patent fight between Apple and Samsung, the judge has ordered Samsung to give Apple some pre-release products (found via Copycense). While we've seen similar things before, this kind of order always bothers me, as it just seems wrong to order a competitor to hand over pre-release versions of competitive products. What if it turns out there's no infringement? Apple still gets to play with Samsung's products before they even hit the market? Why is this kind of thing allowed? Apple's -- and the court's -- argument is that this allows Apple to stop any possible infringement before it hits the market, but it also seems like there can be significant harm in sharing still secret info with a direct competitor. Even more bizarre is the basis for the judge's claim: that news reports quoted Samsung execs saying they wanted to change the Galaxy Tab to compete with the iPad 2. So what? In what way is it wrong for a competitor to shift gears once a new product hits the market? That's competition. What doesn't seem fair is Apple getting pre-release access to Samsung's products.

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Details Of Apple's Lawsuit Against Samsung Revealed; And It's Even More Ridiculous

Mike Masnick — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 15:46:24 PDT

When we wrote about Apple's new lawsuit against Samsung over its new phones and tablets looking too much like Apple's iPhone and iPad, the full legal complaint from Apple wasn't yet public. However, it's now coming out, and the detailed list of patents and trademarks at issue make this seem ridiculous. While the initial report we saw yesterday showed only design patents, the lawsuit actually covers utility patents, design patents, trademarks and trade dress claims. Here they are in all their glory, as compiled and described by Florian Mueller:

7 utility (i.e., hardware and software) patents

U.S. Patent No. 7,812,828 on an "ellipse fitting for multi-touch surfaces" (previously asserted against Motorola in an ITC complaint and a federal lawsuit)

U.S. Patent No. 7,669,134 on a "method and apparatus for displaying information during an instant messaging session" (a software patent, presumably infringed by the Google Talk chat client, which I also use on my Galaxy phone and on which this patent may very well read)

U.S. Patent No. 6,493,002 on a "method and apparatus for displaying and accessing control and status information in a computer system" (previously asserted against Motorola in a federal lawsuit)

U.S. Patent No. 7,469,381 on "list scrolling and document translation, scaling, and rotation on a touch-screen display" (previously asserted against HTC in a federal lawsuit)

U.S. Patent No. 7,844,915 on "application programming interfaces for scrolling operations"

U.S. Patent No. 7,853,891 on a "method and apparatus for displaying a window for a user interface"

U.S. Patent No. 7,863,533 on a "cantilevered push button having multiple contacts and fulcrums" (a hardware patent)
3 design patents
U.S. Design Patent No. D627,790 on a "graphical user interface for a display screen or portion thereof"
U.S. Design Patent No. D602,016 on an "electronic device"
U.S. Design Patent No. D618,677 on an "electronic device"
AllThingsD displays various graphics from the complaint that relate to those design patents.
Trade dress rights
Apple claims to hold "trade dress protection in the design and appearance of the iPhone, the iPod touch, and the iPad, together with their distinctive user interfaces and product packaging." (yes, in Apple's view even Samsung's packaging infringes its rights)
Apple asserts its registered trade dresses no. 3,470,983, no. 3,457,218 and no. 3,475,327.
Trademarks (i.e., 6 trademarked icons)
U.S. Trademark No. 3,886,196 on a dial icon
U. S. Trademark No. 3,889,642 on a chat icon
U.S. Trademark No. 3,886,200 on a sunflower icon (for a collection of photos)
U.S. Trademark No. 3,889,685 on a settings icon
U.S. Trademark No. 3,886,169 on a notepad icon
U.S. Trademark No. 3,886,197 on a contact list icon

As the article suggests, Steve Jobs would sue his own family if they made a reasonable Android device. This is a kitchen sink lawsuit, where Apple is throwing everything at Samsung, and once again, the sheer pettiness of the whole thing after looking over the really quite minor patents and trademarks being asserted here seems to scream only one thing: Samsung has apparently designed an awesome phone and tablet device that has Steve Jobs scared of competition.

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Apple Sues Samsung Because Galaxy Tab Looks Too Much Like An iPad

Mike Masnick — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 18:57:00 PDT

We've noticed that Apple's been getting a lot more aggressive when it comes to proactive patent infringement lawsuits lately, so it's not all that surprising to see that it's now suing Samsung for patent and trade dress infringement over the design and packaging of the Samsung Galaxy phone and tablet. I haven't seen the full filing yet (for reasons unexplained AllThingsD mentions the filing, and has a screen shot, but didn't post the full filing), so perhaps there's more to this than what's described in the existing coverage. However, from the screenshot, it looks like Apple is asserting design patents, instead of utility patents. Design patents are pretty limited and a lot more like a trademark than a traditional patent. I'd be interested to see if there were utility patents included as well, and will post an update once I've seen the filing.

That said, this complaint seems pretty silly. Yes, lots of smartphones mimic the basic look and feel of the iPhone these days. But, Apple itself copied many of the design features of the iPhone from others as well... and, let's face it, Apple owes much of its history to copying the look and feel of a graphical user interface that Steve Jobs saw while touring Xerox PARC. Why can't Apple just focus on competing in the market place, rather than worrying about what competitors are doing? And, to be honest, this lawsuit actually makes me more interested in checking out those Samsung devices, because it signals to me that it may actually be getting "close" to the design quality associated with Apple's devices...

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Samsung Hires 'Actors' To Pretend To Be Happy Galaxy Tab Testers?

Mike Masnick — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 15:29:00 PDT

I'm still waiting for Android tablet computers to catch up to the iPad in terms of usefulness, and I'm guessing there's probably still another year or so to go (if the phone market is any predictor). Samsung, of course, has been leading the push for Android-based tablets and they made some news with the launch of its latest version of the Galaxy tab at CTIA. Indeed, the new devices do look pretty neat. But why spoil genuine appreciation of the device when you can hire actors to pretend to like the device... and then claim to the world that they're not actors at all? That appears to be exactly what Samsung did. Much of the launch focused on these interviews with three "regular folks" from "different backgrounds" who were given a chance to test out these new tablets and then be interviewed about them. You can see the full launch video here, and the "interviews" start around the 8 min mark. Intrepid blogger Harry McCracken thought the interviews felt a bit off... and a bit too full of corporate marketing-speak. So he decided to go searching for "freelance travel writer Joan Hess, independent filmmaker Karl Shefelman, and leading real estate CEO Joseph Kolinksi." And he ran into some difficulties: I was curious to learn more about them. So I Googled around and couldn’t find any references to a travel-writing Joan Hess (one with, as she said, a following on Twitter) or a real-estate CEO Joseph Kolinski.

I did notice, however, that freelance travel writer Joan Hess bears a striking resemblance to New York actress Joan Hess:
And that real estate CEO Joseph Kolinski could be New York actor Joseph Kolinksi's twin brother:
Filmmaker Karl Shefelman, on the other hand, looks a lot like... filmmaker Karl Shefelman. Who works for a New York production company. One that's done work for Samsung.
Of course, some people will claim that this is standard operating procedure and that everyone should assume that anyone in such a video is clearly an actor, rather than a real person speaking off the cuff. But this is a press launch event and the clear implication by Samsung officials is that these were real people and real interviews. If the product really is as great as they say, why not actually trust real people to say that, rather than hiring actors?

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Using Technology To Bring Out Creativity In Children

Mike Masnick — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 15:56:21 PDT

A few weeks ago, we mentioned an experiment that we were doing, to try to create more useful and engaging ad products, specifically with a "conversational" ad unit on the front page of the site. The initial ad centered on a discussion of ways in which kids could use tablet computers (the ad and post were sponsored by ASUS and Microsoft). We're running another experiment now. On the article page for this post, or on the front page of Techdirt right after the first post (if you don't run an ad blocker), we have an ad unit that asks for your input on the question of what kinds of computing activities might best develop kids creativity. It shows my answer and asks you to "vote" for one of four activities and then allows to type in a more complete answer -- all from within the unit (so it's not taking you to some other page). This is very much an experiment, and we already learned some things from the first pass at this (some stuff worked, some didn't), and we'll be doing some more as well. In order to keep the feedback in that ad unit, I've disabled comments on this post.

This post should also be considered sponsored by ASUS Windows Slate, in partnership with Microsoft and SAYMedia.

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HP And RIM Produce Similar Device... Don't Freak Out

Mike Masnick — Mon, 14 Mar 2011 21:05:00 PDT

ChurchHatesTucker points us to a recent story about how RIM's Playbook tablet device and interface looks incredibly similar to HP's TouchPad tablet device interface (using WebOS), but rather than get all freaked out about "copying," the two companies seem to handle this maturely, noting that it's just the nature of innovation. HP's initial response more or less suggests that RIM copied HP, but uses it as an opportunity to position itself as a leader in the space, rather than a follower:

From HP:

"It's a fast innovation cycle and a fast imitation cycle in this market, so we just know that we have the creative engine here to continue to build on what we have, and we'll keep innovating, we'll keep honing and those guys hopefully will continue to see the value in it and keep following us by about a year."

RIM (Blackberry) responds.

"Well, when you’re trying to optimize user experience that juggles multitasking, multiple apps open at once and on a small screen, you’re going to get people landing on similar kinds of designs."

Notice no legal threats. No claims of intellectual property violations. Some might claim this is a "non-story," but in an age when the default so often seems to break out the lawyers, cease-and-desists and threats (if not outright lawsuits), it's nice to see a response like this. In some ways it's more of a story, since it seems so rare.

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France Wants To Extend Private Copying Levy To Tablets... But Not If They Run Microsoft Windows

Mike Masnick — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 10:28:49 PST

Kurata points us to the news that French politicians are debating extending the "you must be a criminal" private copying levy to tablet computers -- but, oddly, the new levy would not apply to tablets running Windows (Google translation from the original French). The tax would apply to any iPad or Android-based device, but apparently Windows tablets won't be counted, since they'll be classified as full computers, while the other tablets are in this new taxable category. Not surprisingly, this has some companies up in arms, with the French-based Archos particularly steamed, since it's producing Android-based tablets, and doesn't like the fact that its government seems to be giving preferential treatment to an American company.

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Why Murdoch's iPad-Only Newspaper Misses The Point

Mike Masnick — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 21:23:27 PST

There's been lots of talk about how News Corp. is developing an iPad-only newspaper called "The Daily," but the more I read about it, the less sense it makes. The general thinking behind it seems to come from the same reasoning which explains why so many iPad publisher apps are so bad. They're approaching it as a way to bring back the old scarcities, which are now artificial scarcities. They're looking at the platform as a savior based on what it does not allow, rather than based on what it actually enables.

Creating a platform specific publication in a day and age when platforms have less and less meaning seems like a recipe for disaster. It's based on the idea that the Murdochs want to go back to an age of control, rather than embracing the age of enablement.

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Why Can't All These Ideas For Content On The iPad/Tablets Also Work On The Web?

Mike Masnick — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 06:19:14 PST

Last month, at a panel in Silicon Valley on the future of journalism, one of the topics of discussion was whether or not tablet computing would be the "savior" of news, with most of the focus being on a recent video put together by Sports Illustrated of what a specialized tablet version of the magazine might look like. More recently, Wired Magazine demonstrated a working prototype of a tabletized version of the magazine. Both of these demos are certainly impressive -- but I'll say the same thing that I said about the SI demo on that panel discussion: why is the focus on the hardware? Nothing in either demo really requires a tablet. If this format is so compelling, why aren't these publications already offering it for use on regular computers? Certainly, the ability to use touchscreen controls is nice, but you could easily replicate the basics with a mouse. If the overall format is so compelling, then what does it have to do with a tablet/iPad, specifically? Now, perhaps Wired does intend for this to be useful on other platforms, as its version is just an Adobe AIR app, and so it could function just fine on a desktop/laptop, but again, the video seems to keep focusing on the tablet as if that's necessary. Yes, perhaps the form factor of a tablet computer makes this experience more enjoyable, but I think it's important in judging whether or not these apps actually make sense to separate the hardware from the software, to see if either makes sense without the other, or if they really are joined at the hip.

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No, The Apple Tablet Won't Save Publishing Nor Will It End 'Free'

Mike Masnick — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 12:48:00 PST

We've been seeing an awful lot of chatter in the past couple months over the idea that some sort of "tablet" will somehow "save" the media business by suddenly making people start paying for content again. We've yet to see any sort of analysis that explains why. Nearly all of it seems to be from journalists who are involved in wishful thinking and rarely are they able to explain the reasoning. Brian Sheehan points us to the latest in this sort of thinking, an editorial by a writer for Macworld, Kirk McElhearn, which also attacks the very concept of free, which it insists needs to end. It starts out by making the claim that the Apple tablet might "save the press from its demise" and then explains that it's because it will end "free." Seriously:

At the end of a failed 15-year experiment in giving away its product, the press (newspapers and magazines) has begun to renounce free. It's slow in starting, because of the inertia of this decade and a half, but the New York Times announced recently that it would begin charging for its Website, and others are sure to follow.... But payment for Websites alone won't be enough to change newspapers' and magazines' bottom lines from red to black. Apple's tablet, however, will.

Bold claims. Let's see if they can be backed up.

It's time for free to end. Newspapers and magazines made the mistake, in the early days of the Web, of giving away their content for free, in exchange for revenue from Web advertising.

Wait, there are tons of companies that are making a ton of money off of ad supported content. Why is it time for that to end? Free was never the mistake of the publishing business. It was a combination of factors, such as not recognizing that they had much more competition than in the past, and they couldn't just sit back and ignore it, but had to build out real web presences that offered more value to their communities. But few did that. And, with newspapers in particular, the bigger problem wasn't "free," but the fact that many of them took on staggering amounts of debt that they couldn't repay. That's got nothing to do with free.

In the past few years, tens of thousands of jobs have been lost, and newspapers and magazines are cutting back and folding all across the U.S.... Yet we need the press: the fourth estate is a necessary check for our government and business. As long as free thrives, the press can't do its job correctly. Free may be good for freeloaders, but it's bad for society. Those who want things to be free forget that there are still people doing the work they get for nothing, and those people need to be paid. As the old saw goes, there ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

Oh goodness. Where to start. Just about everything above is wrong, misleading or simply ignorant of what's happening, what critics are saying and basic economics. First, yes, there are many fewer jobs in traditional journalism, but that's not due to "free," but due to a changing marketplace. That happens. Lots of people used to be employed making horse carriages. Not any more. Lots of people used to be telephone operators, connecting callers from one to another, but then the technology made it so that wasn't necessary any more. But telephony was better off because of it. Maybe we don't need all those journalists in traditional roles, but who says journalism will be worse off for it? We're seeing lots of interesting new business models developing, and many new sources of journalism.

And, while some might argue that we need "the press" (I would suggest we need journalism, which is a different thing), if that's true, then there will be business models to support it. Demand creates supply. But there are lots of "checks" on the gov't beyond the press -- and there are some pretty serious questions about how much of a "check" on the government the traditional press has been for the most part. The idea that the press can't do its job if "free" thrives is as ridiculous as it is wrong. The "press" has always been paid for via advertising. The cost of a newspaper didn't even cover the cost of printing and delivery. The money was made in advertising. Ditto for television and radio journalism. None of it is paid for. It's all "free" to the consumer. The argument that journalism can't be done if it's free to the consumer is laughable. Ditto for the claim it's "bad for society." What does that even mean? If free is bad for society then the history of the press has been bad for society.

Finally, I never understand the argument that "free" means that employees don't get paid. No one makes that claim. No one says journalists shouldn't be paid. We're just saying that publications need to come up with new business models that allow them to pay journalists.

What news agencies can't do is the added-value reporting, the analysis, opinion and in-depth reporting that we want to read to better understand, and that we need for society to thrive. It may be a coincidence, but in recent years, investigative journalism was severely lacking at a time when it was needed the most. Only when people pay for news can we have quality reporting.

Huh? Again, people have never paid for news. Arguing otherwise is pure ignorance. Also, there is more analysis, opinion and in-depth reporting going on now than ever before in history -- it's just that much of it no longer comes from traditional journalists.

To those who protest that "no one will pay for a newspaper on the Web", consider some very successful experiments in paid online content. The Wall Street Journal charges around $100 a year for full access to its Website, and plenty of businesspeople pay for this. This is because the Journal provides the kind of news that is not plentiful; people pay for the quality of the business news and analysis that they can't find elsewhere, as well as its timeliness.

Yes, people love to show the WSJ example, but the WSJ's paywall has become increasingly "leaky" as its subscriber growth has slowed. Convincing new people to sign up when they're getting plenty of free content elsewhere? Not so easy. It's easy to call the WSJ a success today, but the likelihood that it remains that way over time? Small.

I'm betting that Apple will get it right, as far as features, interface and usability are concerned. It will also be an excellent tool for reading the news. Newspapers and magazines will be able to package their content in multimedia bundles (either as apps or something similar to the iTunes LP) that will be designed for reading on a portable screen; this won't simply be web pages viewed on a smaller screen.

The key to hardware being successful is the software that supports it. One of the main advantages to Apple's tablet, as far as the press is concerned, is the iTunes Store. Since Apple already has this platform to sell and deliver that content, even on a subscription basis, readers will be able to easily buy their favorite newspapers and magazines and get them delivered instantly. They'll be cheaper than the print versions, and they'll be a lot greener too. And the iTunes Store will be able to provide a better selection than readers can find by going to individual Websites. Whether by subscription or by single issue, it'll be extremely simple to buy newspapers and magazines to read on the Apple tablet.

So that's it then? Because Apple designs a nice product people will suddenly buy? Okay. Would be great if it happens, but I doubt it will. If newspapers do lock themselves up behind a paywall or only offer paid versions on these tablets, people will just go elsewhere -- really quickly. And for those smart publications that understand this, every new paywall becomes an opportunity to build an even larger (free) audience, which will help support all kinds of business models that don't involve direct payments. I don't doubt that some people would pay for the convenience of subbing to newspapers or magazines on a tablet, but it's difficult to look at the details and see how it ever becomes a significant part of the market in any way. You simply won't get enough buyers for it to make a difference.

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