http://business-news.thestreet.com/mercury-news/story/apple-clobbers-samsung-and-possibly-consumer-choice-0/1 (hidethestreet)
Samsung got stung. As in $1 billion stung. Eventually, consumers, too, could feel the sting.
(See the news article by the Mercury News’ Howard Mintz, who reports that the three-week patent trial ended with a sweeping victory for Apple, the beloved Silicon Valley company, in its own back yard.)
Regardless of whether you think that the jury got it right that Apple was first to invent many of the features most of us now take for granted on many a smartphone â iPhone or not â it’s not a good day for the mobile-device world.
Some have argued that the decision could force other phone makers to “innovate” instead of copying Apple, that it’s actually a good thing. But if Android and others examine this blowout victory by Apple and decide they have to tiptoe around the gazillion things that Apple has patented â yes, the patent system is broken â they will become more hesitant. And that’s terrible news for consumers in the long run.
Patent questions aside, Samsung became the top seller of smartphones by creating many Android-based products, giving consumers a choice â in more ways than one. Samsung gave consumers a choice in the number of actual products. The Android operating system gives consumers a choice when it comes to how they use their smartphones, something that’s fairly limited on an iPhone. If there’s a major pullback by Samsung on its Android development after this verdict, it’ll be a loss for choice.
Even worse, if this victory emboldens Apple to keep up the “thermonuclear” war it started against Android, it could result in fewer Android makers. (See ‘Destroying’ Android, and other Apple vs. Google news.) There aren’t many companies out there that can afford to compete with Apple’s deep pockets.
Side note, and one we’ll probably be going back to: This patent verdict could provide a glimmer of hope for Microsoft and Nokia and… dare I say it, BlackBerry maker RIM, whose smartphones are distinctly different from Android and Apple devices. Can these companies whose phones have lagged so far behind somehow take advantage of whatever momentum Android may lose? There would be a silver lining, a shot in the arm for consumer choice.
But back to the verdict. I don’t argue that Apple’s products aren’t shiny and sleek and technologically innovative. (I own a few.) There’s no denying the iPhone changed computing forever. But market share should be determined by the many, many consumers who buy the products, not â with apologies to the nine men and two women who decided this case and had to sit through all the exciting patent talk (hey, at least the judge had some pithy quotes) â a jury of 11 people. Consumers win when companies duke it out and try to outdo each other with their products, not when they send their lawyers to court.
