Why is Apple suing HTC but not suing Samsung?

Samsung has just released a new line of Android phones. They are coming across all four major U.S. carriers and while each carrier and phone is a variation of a theme, they are collectively called the Galaxy S series.

I became aware of them because as a T-mobile customer, like most carriers, they send you email offers always trying to hook you in again. The T-mobile version of this series is called the Vibrant, has a 4 inch screen and looks ridiculously and suspiciously like a slightly upgraded iPhone 3GS in many ways. (Again there are four or five of them and a few don't look like this but the T-mobile version does)



If you have watched video of it working, you will see it is running a custom skin from Samsung that makes interacting with the applications approximate an iPhone experience. (Also go to almost the very end (last 10 secs) to see how much the form factor approximates the iPhone 3GS)

Apple clearly sued Nokia and also HTC. They declared they had patented all manner of items related to the iPhone and would vigorously defend them in court. Now it appears they aren't doing this. Another slip up on their part related to that strategy (in my opinion) was allowing themselves to get outbid on the purchase of Palm. If there is one company out there that was Apple-ish at one time and failed to recover from initial failures, it is Palm and the their patent portfolio and examples of prior work could seriously undermine Apple patents.

Apple was supposed to defend the iPhone from all the iClones. Now it is feeling freakishly like we are going to watch it happen all over again only instead of Mac vs. Windows it will be iPhone vs. Android with plenty of people willing to 'skin' Android to close the gap that Google has not closed.

Given how blatant the copying clearly is here, why do you think Apple has not taken more action?

So Apple can't find another subcontractor for parts that doesn't steal it's work outright?

This is an article from Phonedog about the phone.

Like the myTouch 3G Slide, icons in the menu are in box format, with the ability to scroll sideways versus down (think iPhone versus vanilla Android).

WIRED notes it rips off the iPhone design.

The Vibrant’s industrial design is shockingly similar to the iPhone 3G: The rounded curves at the corners, the candybar shape, the glossy, black finish and the chrome-colored metallic border around the display. The Vibrant even has its volume and ringer buttons in almost the same spot as the iPhone 3G.

Samsung’s skin for the Android is clean and easy to use. But the square icons are, again, very similar in their looks to the iPhone 3G’s.

It ends with a pic of them side by side.



This is about more than protecting similar innovation. People could obviously mistake this for an iPhone. Much like how clueless people think all MP3 players are iPods, for many of them all smartphones are iPhones. This work is too similar and should be fought against.

Fortune magazine notes the same thing as well.

The Vibrant looks like a thinner, lighter -- but also bigger -- iPhone 3GS

Multiple sources all saying it looks like an iPhone.

Of course it might be beating a dead horse, but Samsung and their Galaxy-S series, which skins Android so that it approximates the iPhone interface in several ways, has just raised their estimates for smartphone sales from 17 million to 25 million a year.

As the article also notes, Samsung sold 6 million smartphones all of last year. It is also 5 million more smartphones than Apple sold in all of 2009. While I bet Apple will sell around 32-36 million iPhones this year, these types of numbers are coming from one company, selling an Android-based iClone and they are serious and massive numbers.

Since when does honoring a contract involve forgoing the right to copyright and patent protection?

Maybe it's just me but I think the guy that started this thread should be sent a nice little gift from Apple.

 

Can I call it or can I call it?