LG Prada Try again. Apple wasn't the first, and the only thing that makes them "trying to look like the iPhone" is the focus on a large touch screen rather than tons of buttons. Seems the entire "Apple transformed the market" is the straw man.

Again, the LG Prada made that change and won awards for its design repeatedly. It sold millions, consumers "adopted it in droves" It would seem that even Apple and all their innovative glory, imitated the LG Prada. The difference between them, was that the software for the iPhone was better. Also, don't misinterpret what I said. I said that consumers "don't like huge changes" not that they never work or result in successful products. Apple marketed the HELL out of the iPhone (as they do with every product) to get the consumers adjusted to the change, not only that but the LG Prada that came out before it broke the ice so it wasn't as big a change.

Wow, your entire argument is predicated on the falsehood that only Apple thought of removing the buttons and using a large touch screen. The idea was to create something similar to tablets and PDAs but smaller and easier to use. The idea of using only the touch screen and a single button makes perfect sense when you realize that and considering they weren't the first to make a phone like that, isn't what created a transformation. It was the software in the iPhone that made it so popular.

Before the release of the iPad tablet PCs never got the type of market penetration that it did, mostly due to the lack of good user friendly software. Tablet PCs were developed more with the Geeks and enthusiasts in mind so the average person couldn't figure out how to easily use it. With the creation of the iPad, Apple was riding its own coattails to success. It was marketed, essentially, as an iPhone with a bigger screen. They capitalized on the iOS software that scaled well and chose the size well, probably after some good R&D. However, the form-factor concept of a flat, rectangular screen, with bezels on the side is nothing new. Tablet PCs before the iPad did it just as well. The iPad's name is reportedly a homage to the Star Trek PADD, which looks extremely similar to the iPad. As I said, the concept of a flat, rectangular, bezeled device is nothing new at all. There's nothing novel about it.The software running on it that takes advantage of the form factor and makes it as useful and easy to use, that is novel.

That's a good straw man. The question was with the popularity of the iPhone as it is now, not if it bombed. I agree that if it bombed, the cost would have been tremendous. However, with its popularity, the only reason to continue to substantially upgrade it is to keep people buying and using it. If there's no competition, they know everyone is going to want their product still (since nothing better has come along) and thus they can create a few small improvements to get people to buy a new model instead of hold their current one. Apple is notorious for small incremental improvements so each model has some feature that makes you want to get it instead of keeping your current one. However, when faced with competition, Apple then makes their upgrades more substantial. Without competition, there's no need to put massive amounts of money into R&D when you know everyone is just going to continue to buy your device. As long as you have a profit margin on every device manufactured, you just continue to make money.

The Android tablets are already starting to gain market share against the iPad. Just in one year alone (2010 till now) Apple has dropped from around 80% market share in tablets, to 63%. The Kindle and the Galaxy Tabs are making the most headway. And if you don't see these lawsuits against Samsung as Apple attempting to slow down the competition, then you aren't paying attention.

By a few months, you mean nearly a year. Verizon's iPhone was released in Feb. Also, the high-end Android phones that actually compete with the iPhone directly on hardware, cost about the same as the iPhone. The fact that you can get some Android phones cheaper than the iPhone is a GOOD thing and is one of the reasons more people own Android phones. Also, recent surveys show many people considering (and switching) to Android after being disappointed by the 4S not being quite as much of an improvement as they hoped. Essentially, you can come up with whatever excuses you like, but Android has the higher market share and, similar to Windows vs Mac in the past, it's going to stay that way. Though I'll admit, for now, that the iPhone does have the advantage in developers.

So is the price for all the people buying unlocked Android phones off of contract. I fail to see your point. Tons of people purchased the Galaxy Nexus, unlocked, for hundreds of dollars more, because they didn't have their upgrade yet. That doesn't mean anything except people are willing to pay lots of money for new technology regardless whether it's Android or iPhone.

"Completely transformed the marketplace." Oh give me a break with the exaggeration. Yes, they made the smartphone more popular through ease-of-use and marketing. They did not, however, completely transform the marketplace any more than someone who comes out with product which becomes the leading product in its category. Smartphones existed before the iPhone, which allowed applications to be installed via a store. Apple made it more user-friendly, thus revisionist history makes it seem like they revolutionized things. They simply made a great product. In technology, everyone tries to follow the current latest-and-greatest while they research what will become the next latest-and-greatest. It happens in cycles.

The biggest hang-up for originality is the consumer. Consumers don't like huge changes. Which is something else that proves Apple didn't revolutionize the industry, they just found the right balance of marketing to get Consumers to accept the things they changed, while touting the things that they made better. Not even that, but most phone manufacturers aren't just playing "follow-the-leader" they are actively trying to differentiate themselves and improve upon the iPhone's design. Look at the variety in the hardware and phone design in Android phones. The originality in their sizes, shapes, and hardware, is driven by consumer requests, usability, and competition. Every single one is copying some aspects while changing others to try to appeal to the consumers. If anything, I'd say that Google and Android had a larger impact on the industry simply because so many phone manufacturers are competing solely on hardware specs and design rather than locked down software features. Of course, one could argue that the only reason why the phone manufacturers are doing that is because they have to compete with the iPhone but...well you get the point.

Sure there were, the problem was that the software at the time that accompanied them wasn't sufficient to support that form factor. A flat, featureless tablet, with nearly no physical controls, has literally been the dream of huge swaths of consumers. It's been the dream of every geek and person who enjoys sci-fi. Every single depiction of "future technology" involves a pad that looks quite like an iPad. Where do you think the idea came from anyways? The hardware and technology has existed for a long time, the only hold-up was the software to support it. That's what Apple brought to the game and why it worked.

In fact, that is still conventional wisdom and a selling point for a lot of Android phones. Many people purposefully get an Android phone with a hard keyboard rather than an iPhone. They get the features and functionality they want, with the keyboard they wanted.

Researching and coming up with something genuinely novel takes time. Saying that no one else but Apple is allowed to make a bezelled, minimalistic, rectangular, tablet...in other words, what consumers in that category want, just hands Apple a monopoly for the time being. All it does is reduce competition which is bad for consumers. And then when something novel does come along, which will take longer than it otherwise would (incremental improvement works much faster, history shows) it will just be another monopoly until someone else creates something. As Steve Jobs himself once said, "Good artists copy, Great artists steal." Saying that everyone needs to stop "imitating" Apple and come up with a "novel" approach to the tablet that's not flat, featureless, etc, is like saying that everyone needs to stop making vacuum cleaners that have a handle, a flat portion on the bottom where it makes contact with the floor, and uses suction to clean. They are aspects that are intrinsic to the form factor and what are necessary for it to be useful. Notice that companies like Samsung, Motorola, and Amazon, aren't just ripping Apple off, but changing the design with different shapes and sizes.

Quite the contrary, if they just kept putting out the same thing and didn't create a new one, and had no competition to the iPhone, their profits margins would increase because they wouldn't have to spend the money to develop and create something new. Competition drives development.

Sure they had competition, the motorola Xoom, the Nook Color, etc. They were lower cost alternatives to the iPad. So they reduced the price of the first iPad to compete with the lower cost alternatives, and upgraded the iPad to keep themselves on top. If they didn't do the upggrade, then when the Android tablets further improved, they would lose their advantage.

Surveys also show that more people own Android phones than iPhones. In addition, buying a new model doesn't break their contract, they just don't get the subsidy. All that means, however, is that people are willing to spend lots of money on technology. Plenty of people also paid full price for off-contract unsubsidized Android phones. None of this has anything to do with what the landscape would look like if they didn't have to compete with anyone. Historically, if a product has no competition, then it stagnates. There's no reason to make large developments and improvements if you know for a fact that people will continue to buy your product because it's the only product that exists.

Sorry for the giant rant. It just baffles me how people seem to not understand that monopolistic behavior is bad and competition is good.

Looks like you're wrong now

It took time for Android to overtake iOS in the smartphone market. But not only are there more Android users, there are more total apps downloaded also. Currently, the iPhone has only more apps downloaded per user than Android. The more total apps downloaded is chalked up to the open policies of the Android Market.

Does the "one stop shop with strict rules approach" work? Of course it does. Does it result in many apps that would be great, innovative, and novel not being put onto that platform? Yup. See, you're falling into what TFA talks about. The problem with the iOS App Store is not that the strict rules don't work, because they obviously do. The problem is that more and more companies are seeing the walled garden strict rules approach as a viable option (look at Windows Mobile). If every company takes up that walled garden approach, then tons of creative, innovative applications will be disallowed from being created simply because some corporations don't allow it. If people don't make the fuss and aren't outright vocal about the restrictiveness of the rules, then it will continue to be seen as desireable.

Does it work? Sure it does. But if you're restricted just to the one market, then you're missing out on lots of applications. Many of which you might find useful, fun, productive, etc. You stay satisfied with "good enough" I'll stick with better

So why is there a lawsuit when it is a completely different size and aspect ratio? Along with having the word SAMSUNG on the front of it?

They get enough reward by being first to market if it sells. Everything else is just anti-competitive

Flat, few to no buttons, clear screen, bezels, rectangular. That is the form factor that Tablets serve, and is what consumers want. So you have two choices, give consumers what they want or try something new that may or may not sell. Obviously the safer choice for a company is to pick one or two areas where you can distinguish yourself (color, size, aspect ratio) but keep the rest (flat, bezels, rectangular), thus detrimental not to follow what is currently selling, unless you get lucky.

Apple introduces a new iPhone and iPad every year because other companies are releasing other phones and tablets to compete with them. If there were no other competitors in the smartphone or tablet spaces, I can guarantee the actual improvement year to year for their devices would be substantially smaller. You have proved GP's point. Competition has given Apple pressure to improve.

Notice how none of the Android makers are suing Apple without having been sued first. Why should you have to pay a license fee to say, "hey, people really like that feature! Let's figure out how we can do it too!" Or even worse, why should you be barred completely from doing it no matter what if they don't want to license the patent? In few cases does this result in "better" features. Better features tend to come around, not because of patents and having to work around them, but by a company saying "how can we improve upon what people currently like?". Generally patents just lead to inefficient designs used as a workaround. Notice I'm not saying that the benefits you tout never happen, just that they are rare enough that the benefit does not outweigh the cost to society.

Think of it this way, if everyone was allowed to just go "hey, people like that, we should figure out how to do it!" then everyone has to turn around and come up with something completely different and new to differentiate themselves. They will need to constantly improve and innovate to make their product better than their competition. Because they know if people like the thing they come up with they get the advantage of being first to market with a really good thing. Which gives them the ability to come up with more improvements before the competition. Patents just slow this entire process down.

I'm confused, isn't a Design Patent......by definition, a kind of patent?

There are very draconian rules about what is not allowed based upon a company playing morality police and using anti-competitive behavior. Which I would have no problem with, if you were allowed to install whatever you like from outside of Apple's app store.

You also ignored the first point I made. If your rules prevent any novel and innovative applications at all, then your rules aren't good enough. Either ease up on the restrictions or allow applications to be installed without the app store. Without one of those, Apple will continue to be bashed for its walled garden.

1) Policies that target specifically removing malware should not be targeting anything legitimate or innovative. Essentially, if your policies to remove malware result in anything that is not malware being prevented, then your policies are wrong.

2) I'd rather wade through and avoid malware, then prevent the novel and innovative applications from being made.

Simply having the Android Market does not in fact make an Android phone proprietary and locked-down. For example: the Nexus series of phones. Thus is Chase only wants to release their application the Android Market and limit the amount of people they can reach, that is their perogative

Except the Democrats have compromised on nearly everything already, hell they even put up cuts to Social Security and Medicare to compromise, but the Republicans refused to entertain any Tax Increases at all and shot it down. It would seem the only one's playing the game of "We get what we want or else" is the Republicans.