Apple vs HTC: Is Apple in Danger of Suing Itself Out of the Game?

I’ve always respected Apple.. I’ve respected quite a bit of their products for their creativity and ingenuity and just overall marketability in the world of technology. The fanboy-like hysteria that people have for their products amazes me but is definitely something that I can understand. I’ve never respected Apple, the lawsuit juggernaut. I’ve never respected their desire to not push their devices into a technologically advanced scene at the same pace as other manufacturers, but instead take to the courts to stifle progress and push money into marketing to brainwash people into thinking their product is special or unique. All this being said, they’re at it again…

Apple’s most recent lawsuit is against the Taiwanese superstar HTC. The lawsuit stated that various HTC phones across all carriers (primarily Android, but some were WP7) were infringing on several of Apple’s ridiculously vague patents. Some of these patents don’t even refer to anything specific to phones, but are more common software oriented patents. Although the lawsuit is geared towards HTC, the point is fairly clear; Apple is targeting Google and the Android OS. Are they feeling threatened?

The details of these lawsuits isn’t really important here. I’m not trying to describe what’s right or wrong in these patent violations but instead I’m wanting to just simply discuss the unnecessary need for Apple to go lawsuit happy towards any competitor with a touchscreen. It’s annoying, frivolous, and as history has shown, fairly costly for Apple. They don’t win very often in these types of lawsuits. They lost against Nokia in a similar type of patent violation lawsuit, although Nokia has Ultimate Warrior-like patent lawyers fighting for their side. What benefit does Apple truly have in throwing millions upon millions of dollars towards something they most likely won’t win? Is it to just make it seem like they’re fighting for their products? Is it to slow down the progress of a competitor? Is it the hope that if they win, they could actually have the competitors phones banned from being imported?

Apple has several good product lines in the IPOD/IPAD/IPHONE. These products serve the purpose of their respectable markets very well, dominating quite often. Sure, Apple as of recent has struggled against Google in both the smartphone and tablet markets, but they have quite a bit of followers to justify their success. Suing various companies over patents that are ridiculously vague don’t accomplish anything and just waste both sides money. Apple will most likely not win or at least settle out of court and nothing comes out of it. They’ll pay millions to their legal team to fight an unnecessary fight only to end up in the same place they started.

Apple can sue all day and all night, but when they’re falling behind a tad on their software progress, that’s when you have to question their motives. I hear IPhone users get giddy when they’re told that the new IPhone will have an led for notifications. Really? Are you actually that excited about something I had on my cell phone literally 10 years ago? They get so excited when they hear that IOS will have notification updates through a status bar (welcome to literally 8-10 year ago on Windows phones and at least 6 years of Android phones and potentially an entire decade of Blackberry phones). It’s nothing new, yet it’s made to seem like it’s novel or groundbreaking. Maybe these lawsuits are intended to slow down the progress of Apple’s competitors?

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Apple doesn’t need to sue anyone besides Samsung. That one I totally understand.. I mean.. look at the Galaxy S phone..

I mean.. really? Samsung you didn’t think this was kind of a bad idea when you made this phone? No one in your quality control and monitoring said .. “eh guys, this looks really like an IPhone, do you think we’re going to get in trouble?”

Please..

ALTHOUGH, Samsung does produce a lot of components for Apple.. so as much as Apple is hating on Samsung for the outright copying of the IPhone, they have to realize that this can’t necessarily be a great thing to do to one of your major suppliers. Will the partnership between Samsung and Apple dwindle after these various lawsuits are settled? Only time will tell.

Sorry.. I had to throw Samsung under the bus.. I love them to death but honestly, I was just waiting for Apple to sue them.. it made all the sense in the world for that lawsuit and Apple is ridiculously justified in winning that lawsuit.

Overall, Apple has gone into a lawsuit frenzy with various manufacturers of hardware and software and have rarely come out victorious. They exhaust countless millions of dollars on legal proceedings and waste hundreds of man hours simply to try to prove a point that they created something first or own the patent to something (usually the big companies just buy smaller companies for their technology and patents, it’s a pretty common practice). The problem here is that it’s hard to decipher some of these patents and on top of that, virtually impossible to award someone monetary damage if something is infringed.

Unfortunately this most current lawsuit will most likely get either settled out of court (boring) or we’ll see a winner in the next few weeks (decision is due by 8-05-2011). I surely hope Apple loses, not because I dislike their mentality, but maybe it’ll make them stop this unnecessary process and perhaps concentrate on incorporating features onto their IOS that have existed on other softwares for several years.. or wait, will the other companies sue them then?