Are you saying there is nothing to patent about the implementation of gestures on your touchscreen, as opposed to hitting widgets like scrollbars ? You couldn't be more wrong.
And people who cite things like the people who did multitouch with an array of cameras obviously don't understand patents. Patents are not about an idea but an implementation. The earlier multitouch stuff had nothing to do with the multitouch on a capacitive screen.
"Are you saying there is nothing to patent about the implementation of gestures on your touchscreen, as opposed to hitting widgets like scrollbar?"
Aren't touchscreen gestures just mouse gestures where a touchscreen replaces the mouse? That seems like an obvious amalgamation of two pieces of prior art.
EDIT: That doesn't mean that particular aspects of the implementation of touch gestures on iOS aren't patentable, but AFAIK that hasn't been what Apple has been suing on the basis of.
You can definitely patent the specific things that makes it better and perhaps even arrange a bunch of things that, by themselves, would not be patentable into the right order to make one bigger thing that is patentable.
You should google "design patent". If the quality can be distinguished by an ordinary person, then the design patent is upheld. I think everyone on HN thinks patents are "utility patents".
And people who cite things like the people who did multitouch with an array of cameras obviously don't understand patents. Patents are not about an idea but an implementation. The earlier multitouch stuff had nothing to do with the multitouch on a capacitive screen.