Apple Awarded Design Patent For Slide-to-Unlock UI

[AndrewMD]

[citation][nom]spectrewind[/nom]They surely didn't... I can recall visiting some technically entertaining Macromedia Flash sites from around 10 years ago, when Flash 4 & 5 were king. Sites with interesting intro/time wasters and cheesy event driven slide-to-open bars like this that developers would stitch into a site to allow a user to navigate it. That's just an example.Prior art alone should invalidate this patent.[/citation]

You don't get it do you? Someone paints a yellow arrow on the inside of their house.. who cares? Now use that same designed Yellow arrow on a sign that points people somewhere, that is different. There is a purpose. millions of people didn't see that slide to unlock demo 10 years ago. People did see it on an iPhone though..

So just to be fair, they did design it for an application of unlocking their smartphone...

 

[dark_wizzie]

If rounded corners can get patented and wedged shape laptops also can, can Apple just patent every possible shape?

 

[Guest]

[To be fair, they didn't come up with the concept, they just updated it so that the graphics follow your finger.

Still, doesn't really matter since all a competitor needs to do is have their slide to unlock feature work left-to-right as well as right-to-left or similar and they wouldn't be infringing on this.]

You are talking about the jury of a joke from California court in Apple vs Samsung case. A patent like this should be enough to down the round circle slide to unlock UI feature in Android Jelly Bean. Don't believe me? Look at the appearance of the iPhone and the original Samsung Galaxy S. Do you notice the button is round in the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy S has a rectangular button? But Apple designer testified that she cannot differentiate between the two phones, and the jury believed her.

Like someone said earlier, Apple is just a spoiled brat which US government and the patent office is giving everything they want, probably because they think Apple is the poster child in such a bad economy.

 

[m32]

Apple owns the U.S. Patent Office, so I'm surprised it took this long.

 

[cRACKmONKEY421]

They make it really easy to hate Apple.

Seems bizarre that you can patent rounded corners. It's not really rounded corners though. There were plenty of full screen Samsung phones with rounded corners before iPhone. It was more about the overall shape. However, still stupid. So many PDA phones were around before iPhone. I wonder how many ideas iPhone creators borrowed (intentionally or not) from all the other phones. There are only so many designs for a phone that make sense. Perfectly rectangle with rounded corners seems like one of the most obvious ones.

 

[cRACKmONKEY421]

They make it really easy to hate Apple.

Seems bizarre that you can patent rounded corners. It's not really rounded corners though. There were plenty of full screen Samsung phones with rounded corners before iPhone. It was more about the overall shape. However, still stupid. So many PDA phones were around before iPhone. I wonder how many ideas iPhone creators borrowed (intentionally or not) from all the other phones. There are only so many designs for a phone that make sense. Perfectly rectangle with rounded corners seems like one of the most obvious ones.

 

[fuzzion]

[citation][nom]Shin-san[/nom]I can't believe that "rounded corners" got a patent[/citation]

I cant believe Apple gets any patents at all.

 

[bllue]

Apple is BRIBING the USTPO

 

[bigdragon]

Patents are how we measure innovation in the USA now. It's not about quality anymore. It's all about quantity. Patent EVERYTHING if you want to be innovative! This is way easier than subjectively determining what is or is not innovative. What a great thing for lazy patent office workers! Wouldn't want them actually doing their extremely difficult and taxing jobs now would we?!

 

[p05esto]

My god do I hate Apple on every possible level. If you are a tech lover, a Toms reader you sure the hell etter not be buying Apple crap. So many reasons a tech person shouldn't touch Apple with a 10 foot pole. Their time in the sun is over, take em out guys.

 

[liquidchild]

I'm going to patent breathing and sue all of you......

 

[Guest]

Didn't you guys read the recent PR article. This is just a run-off of that. Isn't it obvious?

 

[scotv453]

I am going to patent sex. So anyone doing that needs to pay up. Patent pimp!!!

 

[Guest]

Time to patent round wheels. Apple certainly would be granted THAT patent, apparently!

 

[virtualban]

This goes beyond voting with my wallet. This affects me as Android user. I hate it! And I don't even liven in the US.

 

[kewlmunky]

[citation][nom]sacre[/nom]To be fair, they did introduce it. I don't see anything wrong with this.[/citation]

The neonode smartphone with an infrared touch screen was the first phone to have slide to unlock, and that was a few years before the first iphone was out.

 

[Soda-88]

Meanwhile IBM is patenting legit things at a 10 times faster pace and gains 1/1000th of the media's attention.