[raverbashing]

Round shapes weren't uncommon until someone used it for displacing things, hence inventing the wheel.

Syncing data over a network wasn't unheard of as well, but then someone came with dropbox.

Nothing today is "really new", but the novelty is in the way this is put together and used.

[yock]

There's a big difference between "uncommon" and "untried". Fact is, most of what Apple has popularized with their line of iDevices has already failed previously in the market. This just proves Apple's ability to iterate, perfect, and market their products. It has no bearing on how well they innovate.

There may well be something special about the packaging of a particular set of features, but that isn't the standard for patent.

[jcbrand]

And what would have happened if round shapes or syncing data over a network were patented and everyone who tried to reuse them in novel ways were aggressively sued?