[josteink]

If nothing else, it reinforces that people who think they are being hip when they make Apple-only or iOS-only or iOS/Retina-tailored solutions are working for the dark side(tm). Heck, even if you make mobile apps, also for Android, but do iOS first, you are part of the problem.

I think these people need to hear it again and again and again until they actually get it and stop supporting one of the least ethical companies in the tech industry today. You are giving the wicked emperor more power. Stop doing that! It wont make him any nicer.

I say keep them coming. Filtering news to ease the conciousness of people assisting "evil" makes no sense.

We should be the ones driving Apple. Apple should not be the one driving us. We've seen the result of that already.

Edit: specific industry-niche qualifier was needed.

[Volpe]

>... one of the least ethical companies around today.

Are you serious? You believe a computer company is one of the least ethical companies?

[josteink]

Fair enough. Let me make an edit and prepend "in the tech-industry" to that statement and I'll stand for it.

Apple has joined the rank of patent-trolls and turned what used to be a tech-industry into a litiagative minefield where you need more lawyers than engineers to do a business. They are the front-runners of software-patents and they deserve all the flack they get for it.

I don't think there's any debating that patent-trolls are evil and that supporting them are wrong.

[Volpe]

Did they turn it into this minefield? Or do they just play the 'evil' game better than others.

I'm don't like to split things into 'Good' and 'Evil' (as they are inherently subjective). But the patent system seems to be the problem here, and until it is removed one has to work within it.

[talmand]

They are not the only ones turning it into a minefield, but they most definitely participate in making it a deadly game to play. If they were using their patents in a defensive way I would have a different attitude but it seems to me they are rather aggressive in using their patents to go after people they feel are a threat.

[halostatue]

Yet they're also stepping up to the plate to defend their platform developers in the Lodsys dispute.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2012/04/court-allows-apple-to-i...

As with most of life, this is not the black-and-white situation that people make it out to be.

Samsung clearly did everything they could to make a bunch of their products seem like Apple products and increase customer confusion.

Apple clearly got patents for things which seem to be fairly obvious or which under better analysis would not have been granted. It's also easy for me to say that something is obvious…five years after it became widely available to the public, and seven years after most of us first saw similar stuff shown in a TED video.

Gooterola (Moogle?) clearly is abusing FRAND obligations on some of their standards-essential patents. As far as I can tell, Samsung is trying to abuse some of their FRAND standards-essential patents, too.

    Mercutio:
    I am hurt.
    A plague a' both your houses! I am sped.
    Is he gone and hath nothing?

[icarus127]

  Gooterola (Moogle?) clearly is abusing FRAND obligations 
  on some of their standards-essential patents. As far as I 
  can tell, Samsung is trying to abuse some of their FRAND   
  standards-essential patents, too.

This is probably true but looks a lot like of case of "when someone attacks you reach for whatever is at hand". Samsung and Motorola clearly believe that those patents are the best thing they've got to counter Apple's attacks. Unfortunately it seems that because those patents are standards-essential Apple's absurd patents have more legal power than patents that are actually interesting.

[talmand]

The Lodsys dispute has nothing in common with what I was saying. Lodsys overstepped by trying to sue individuals for patent infringement when they were covered because Apple already licensed said patent for their platform.

Plus the fact this isn't Apple using a patent defensively, or in fact has anything to do with Apple having patents in the first place, they are defending developers that are part of their ability to generate profit. You can say they are stepping up to do the right thing by getting involved but it doesn't excuse their antics with being aggressive with their patent lawsuits.

I agree that Samsung copied aspects of Apple products, my dispute is whether there was anything technically wrong with them doing so. I say in many cases it was not, regardless of whatever patents they may have.

I like Moogle better but I'm betting Rowling would sue since it's so close to her creation.

[Osiris]

I cannot believe that anyone that bought a Samsung phone thought they were getting an iPhone. As much as they may have tried to make it look or act similar, it's still not an iPhone. Now if they made a phone like those Chinese knock-off iPhones that literally looks exactly like the iPhone, then sure, they violated trademark or something. But the whole idea that Apple lost sales to Samsung because people were confused an thought they were buying an iPhone is crazy.

[greedo]

I take it you haven't had to deal with Oracle much? That's an easy target, and I could list many more that exhibited far worse behavior than Apple has in the last ten years. But hey, Apple is the new evil for everyone who feels compelled to periodically pick up a pitchfork and torch.

I wonder what company it will be in 2020?

[Terretta]

Apple didn't start this. Incumbents did, Apple is better at it and better funded than incumbents, yet even so settled with Nokia. Don't hate them for hitting back hard.

[koide]

Supposing he meant "least ethical computer companies" it's still very doubtful, assuming all of Apple's marketing about worker conditions improvement and recycling is true or near true.

Disclaimer: I do believe walled gardens are evil and software patents should die.

[gridaphobe]

I generally assume that all marketing, regardless of who produced it, is a lie.

[koide]

That's a good maxim to live by, but lies come in different flavors. Are they not improving conditions at all or just not in the amount they claim they are? Are they just throwing all the recycling material they get in the dumpster or they recycle less than claimed?

I expect the latter in both cases, which put them in a better ethical standpoint than many competitors, who are just as readily patent trigger happy and actually use minor labor and recycle nothing at all.