Posts by a_been

Brussels 'mulling probe' into brutal Apple negotiations with networks

Re: If Only They Made usable Telephones For a Sensible Price

You are a whinning troll though, you dont want to use an iPhone ans so don't use onw but still feel the need to whine.

Inside Microsoft's Surface Pro: A fiendishly difficult journey

Re: who's gonna pay for disposal?

No there shouldn't, the company that makes the product is responable for disposal in the EU, which in this case is Microsoft.

'Disturbed' Dell investors could tank private buyout

Re: Not exactly.

"No one can force them to sell at any price."

Wrong, when they bought the shares they agreed that all descisions would be decided by majority vote. Now some descisions may need 50%+X% but once that leval has been reached, it's game over. So they can be forced to sell.

Apple 'slashes iPhone 5 screen orders', tight-fisted fanbois blamed

Did Miss Leach know that Apple can't comment? SEC rules prohibit Apple from talking publicly about the company. This is known as a quiet period and all publicly traded companies must adhere to these rules. The WSJ and the Nekkei would have known that Apple can't comment due to releasing it's earning on the 23rd.

If Miss Leach didn't know this then why is she being employed?

Crushing $1.17bn Marvell patent judgment could set record

Re: Blackboard patent

Marvell don't make real devices either. There business is based on developing theoretical ways for microchip to do things then getting others to build the devices.

Samsung still faces EU antitrust charges, says official

Re: cannot think of a more deserving candidate

WTF, all Apple asked Samsung to do is not rip them off, Apple got an agreameant with Microsoft and Nokia and HTC, with 2 of them we know Apple have licenced patent with ,just don't clone us, clause. How does that make Apple deserving, they have stated many times that they will never seek an injuction over SEP patents unless sued first over SEP patents and even after being sued havn't used their SEP patents to sue anyone!

It is not bad form to abuse FRAND, it is illegal, you ask for a monoply and say you will licence under FRAND, once you get the OK, you turn around and say "nah nah fuck you", that's not bad form, that is criminale behaviore. If someone says "hey you can trust me" so you give them they keys to your house and ask them to look after it while your away, you come back and find they have sold everything it it and then gone and sold your house, would you call that "bad form"?

Here's another Question, do you go and steal from friend? or just work for Samsung?

@Peter 48

You don't understand what an SO is, it is not a "we suspect you may have done this"; it is a "Your Guilty but we will give you a chance to explain how we got it wrong". A better analogy would be "we saw you shoot the person, you have the gun but we havn't found the bullet yet". SO's are very rare as it requires the belife of guilt to start an investigation. That is, the CC must do an investigation to work out if there is a need for a formal investigation. It was designed this way to make sure the CC couldn't be manipulated to help one countries companys against another.

Also the CC tries to resolve any problems before an SO is declared as they don't like to make rulings as that will effect the law's of every EU contry (27 at present) and no one likes that. So when an SO is declared it's only when the CC is at least 99% sure that the company is guilty. FRAND is very clear, very simple to understand and Samsung are blatently guilty of abuse. The fact that Samsung has droped the injunction demand in Europe wont help them as they havn't droped it in other countries showing "bad faith", that is "we droped it in the EU because we didn't want to get finned but we will try this shit in other countries".

This is going be bad for Samsung, the FRAND agreemeant was made in France which is a member of the EU and it was a Global agreemeant. Not only can Samsung get fined on there Global profits but if they win a case on FRAND SEP's somewhere outside the EU, they can get fined again! This is the reason Motorola droped their FRAND SEP case's in Europe (not that it will help them, im starting to think that Apple let Motorola win in Germany so that they could ban Apple products for a day, there by proving that some sales where lost by the abuse of FRAND).

Intel got fined, what $1.5 billion for much less, Samsung will be lucky if that all they get hit with as that will be only 18-24 month's of profits in Europe. I'v read some people saying it could be $3-4 billion which would, with the US judgmeant, wipe out all of Samsungs smartphone profits since the introduction of the iPhone. I don't think it would be that high as the CC normaly fines less than it could. Still it is along with the Motorola investigation, the most blatent case of abuse of monoply since the founding of the common market. RAMBUS comes to mind but that was mostly handeled in the USA and they got their arses sliced, diced and handed to them on a fake silver platter for trying to use their patents to extort money without even agreeing to a FRAND, they just got fucked for being on a SEP group andd not telling others as required, about their patents.

Samsung drops five European anti-Apple injunction requests

Re: "wouldn't be surprised to learn that there's more than a little back-room wrangling going on."

I'd be very surprised if there was any backroom deal over those FRAND patents. Motorola did the exact same thing then backed down and agreed to offer FRAND terms to Microsoft. Now that Samsung having given up trying to use it's FRAND patents to seek an injunction the only thing to argue over if if Apple already has a license due to buying the parts from Qualcomm. There won't be an argumeant over money as Apple has already agreed to pay a FRAND fee to everyone who owns the FRAND patents it needs; So if it get's to trial then the first piece of evidence Apple will introduce will be how much Samsung charges everyone else for it's FRAND patents. That's almost case over as to how much Samsung can ask for.

Samsung could ask for interest but it would be cheaper just to get the accountants in a room for an hour than pay the outside lawyers more than the difference would be. I would not be surprised if in the next week we hear a joint annocmeant over a FRAND rate just to make the case simpler, faster and cheeper. Samsung v Apple could be over by Christmass if not for Qualcomm as that's all that is left and that part looked as dodgy as seeking the injunction.

Will Apple v Samsung be setteled anytime soon, NOPE. Neither will give up for different reasons. Apple would offer Samsung the same kind of deal Microsoft and HTC got, that is "No cloaning" as Apple thinks it's brand is worth a lot; iirc it was in 2nd or 3rd place, valued at over $50 billion (Coca-Cola was #1). Samsung won't take that as one of the three pillars of it's mobile strategy is "copy Apple" and that's been insanly successful; Remember for 2010, just under 2 years ago Nokia was selling more smartphones than Apple, RIMM and Samsung combined (before it partnered with Microsoft, so 98% Symbian, which has only been overtaken by Android and IOS in installed base in the last 12 months).

What we have is a case where Apple has to much to lose and Samsung has to much to gain to settle until at least the stuff in the USA has been sorted, probably 2014. If Samsung lose and has to pay $3-4 billion extra, well that just cost of business. At the rate Samsung are taking all the profit from Android, in a couple of years time that may just be 1 quarters profits from the mobile division. All they have to do then is partner with Intel, ie agree to Intels "all you can spend Gold, now please use Atom". Buy the husk of Nokia for Navteq, by far the best mapping provider; cut a deal with Microsoft to use bing and call it Samsung serch and in the meantime improve Bada hich is alread outselling all of Microsofts phone OS's combined.

APPLE reveals complete updated blueprints of SPACESHIP JOBS

Re: Euripides Pants

So your saying that Android is based on the belife in magic where as walled gardens were built becauce they worked.

Re: Never a good sign

So Apple build a new building and bother to not make it crap, wankers moan about it. I thought "lets see what the wankers moan about" and first comment was by a wanker. If Apple cured AIDS wankers would mouan about the loss of money to doctors.

HTC: $8 per phone for Apple patents? We're not CRAZY!

@danny 14

Apple proved in court that Samsung ripped off it's IP, the fact that HTC licenced some IP just proves that HTC belives Apple owns that IP. That won't help Samsung avoid having to pay Apple. Pointing to HTC and saying "see they are paying Apple so we shouldn't have too" wont get them far.

Post-defenestration Microsoft: It's the APIs, stupid. And Metro

Wang went out of business because it could not addapt.

Steady Antarctic ice growth 'limits confidence in climate predictions'

Re: Based on what?

The models have been predicting it will get warmer for the last 15 years, for the last 15 years they have been wrong. The models from 40 years ago were predicting cooling, they got it wrong as well. Maybe and I know this is radical but maybe the models are crap and we shouldn't drive ourselves into poverty based on a jumped up game of tetris.

Microsoft v Google judge could shape the world in new patent punchup

Re: Or...

No, it won't Microsoft has said they will pay whatever the court determines. Motorola has failed, it has tried, to get the case dismissed. No idea what the final figure will be but Google will never be allowed to get away with what is basically blackmail.

Apple said "we will pay up to this amount and nothing more" so the judge said "fine fuck you, you 2 work it out between yourselfs or go to court"..

If Microsoft wins this the Google and for that matter Samsungs cases fall apart in the USA and Microsoft has a very strong case. In fact I can't see how Google can win without chucking out the last 100 years of antitrust law. Still we will find out in a couple of weeks and if Google wins you want be able to buy a game's console, smartphone or tablet in the USA as everyone else that are part of the same patent pool, including Microsoft & Apple, will demand the same 2.25% of the end product value, which means not much change from $1500 for an Xbox or Wii or playstation and a hell of a lot more for any smartphone.

Apple retail stores most productive in US – by far

Re: Should we be dancing?

What are gold and diamonds worth once you are dead? For that matter, your in a desert and will be rescued in 9 days, which is worth more, a tonn of gold or enough water to last 10 days? Value is subjective.

'I'd buy that for a dollar': Apple on Moto phone patents

Of course it's not mentioned, the sock puppets and idiots arn't paid to point out bad news for google

Re: @a_been

Well guess the register has become a lets hate Apple zone, no problem with that, i'll comment on this thread and then you babies can cry over your inability to use reason to judge tech or get a job. 25 years in this business and im so happy that i started my own bussiness. Good by reg, you traded page clicks for reporting and i hope you drown like those before who did the same.

Re: Microsoft and Apple are twins

Ahh, the truth comes out, the free market you hate, your just another parisite who expects others to work to provide food on your plate.

@EddieD

"Getting this in the right place...

For the record, Apple want $24 per unit from Samsung for the rounded corners"

No Apple want $24 for Samsung imitating Apples products or did you forget when Samsungs own lawyers couldn't pick out which was a Samsung and which was an Apple product.

Re: wipe your glasses, Mr. iFanboy

"Apple is known to patent the obvious", thats not how patents work, you can't patent the obvious.

Your argumeant is "na na na, I hate Apple", grow up.

Apple is part of many patent pools for SEPs, It bought the main part of Nortels mobile patents.

Are you saying that Apple should licence IOS becauce someone else want's it? Isn't that like saying "hey I like your GF, lend her to me for a night, here's some money"

How difficult is it to undertand FRAND, SEP and patents!

Re: Earth to Apple

You still fail to mention why if it worth nothing, Samsung would want to use it. Clearly Samsung thought it was worth it otherwise they would not have bothered.

@Craigness

Yes but Apples case is that it has not been offered FRAND by Motorola, Apple is saying that it has been desciminated against by Motorola and the evidence is clear that it has. Apple bought components from a suppier that licenced Motorolas SEP's under FRAND. Motorola said your licence to our SEPs is withdrawn for Apple but nobody else. Motorolas problem is that for the first 3 years the iPhone was on the market they had no problem with Apple buying the components, it was only with the 3GS and their profits tanking that they tried to extort money.

Yes with 120 billion in the bank, it is extortion and there are 120 billion reasons.

Re: wipe your glasses, Mr. iFanboy

I'll try and make it simple for you,Motorola agreed to licence some patens under FRAND and because they did they were given a monoply. Apple wants Motorola to do what it said it would do as Apple does with the SEP's it has agreed to licence under FRAND.

Is that to hard to understand?

As to Samsung, if they don't think Apples design patents and technology patens are worth anything, why did they write a 120+ page suicide note saying "copy Apple more"? Nokia never bothered, RIM never bothered, Palm never bothered and Microsoft never bothered to copy Apple!

Or do you just think that the only Android handset maker that is making money is the company that riped off the most succesfull hadset maker? That in case you are wondering is Samsung, the leaders of which have had to get 2 presidential pardons for coruption to avoide jail.

Re: @a_been

Yes you still miss the simple fact that Motorola has not according to Apple offered a FRAND licence, the courts have been very clear on this (Motorola has lost every case). Apple dosn't think Motorola has offered a FRAND licence, the courts will decide. It's a binary arrgumeant, either Motorola has or they hasn't. If the courts think Motorola hasn't then Apple will get the courts to force Motorola to do so. If Motorola has then the courts will make Apple pay.

So far you all you have done is say "na na na, i dont understand FRAND", it's very easy to understands. But I guess when your paid not to see it's easy to be blind. Clearly your a sockpuppet.

Also you seem to forget that Apple bought the majority of nortels patents giving them over 10% of all mobile phone SEP's, they also testified to congress that they would licence them all under FRAND as that was their legal requirmeant, Motorola refuced to say if they would meet their legal requirmeants.

Still in 2 weeks time the trial will be over, Motorola will lose then appeal and lose again and it seems Google are about to get slamed by the DOJ for abuce of FRAND SEP, so you will have a chance to moan about how the 7th largest company in the world, a company worth more than $220 billion, is somehow being treated unfairly.

@paul shirly

Motorola have to offer Apple the same terms as everyone else, that why it's called "Fair, Reasonable, and Non-Discriminatory". It is Motorola that made the agreament, they have to live up to that. No negotiation is required because Motorola have a legal duty to offer Apple the same terms as everyone else.

As for the judge, well Motorola has so far lost in 7 different courts on 2 continents against both Apple and Microsoft over FRAND, how many more times does it have to lose before you start wondering if maybe it's not the courts that are acting illegaly but Motorola?

Re: Earth to Apple

You do get to when the compertition has entered into a legal agreameant to offer everyone a FRAND deal.

Re: wait

The FRAND deal was worked out by all the patent holders before the standard became a standard. Thats the SOP and it's worked well for decades, think CD, DVD, BlueRay, Bluetooth, FLASH memory, DRAM memory, HDTV, MPEG, GSM to name a few.

Apple is saying that Motorola has a duty to offer a FRAND contract, basicaly it has to offer Apple the same deal it offers everyone else. Motorola is saying it want's 2.25% of retail and if Apple dosn't like that it should negotiate but until they reach a deal all iPhones should be banned.

The problem is that if 2.25% of retail is FRAND then Motorola cant offer Apple better terms than it offered everyone else, assumadly 2.25% of retail. As it would get sued by everyone else. Motorola could win this case very easily by asking the court to force some of the companies that have agreed to 2.25% to testify. I assume any of the other patent holders in the SEP pool would do or anyone competing with Apple. HTC seems like a good choice as Apple buys nothing from them and so getting Apple to pay more wouldn't hurt them. But for some reason Motorola hasn't done that.

Re: Apple to court

"Apple being a c*nt that it is, refused to reciprocate."

Now your just making up shit, Motorola is the one refusing to meet it's FRAND agreemeant. It was also Motorola that sued Apple & Microsoft first.

Re: Apple to court

No one pays on retail price, imagine you have a $200 million boing planes, Motorola is saying that if Boing put's a single $5-8 chip in one of it's planes it would have to pay 2.25% of the sale price of the plane.

The licence amount varies by what is being licenced, some thing are fixed rate, firewire iirc was 25c per licence, others are a % of the component, memory chips are done that way since it's easy to work out the commodity price of memory. Then you get maximum costs, MPEG has a maximum that anyone company has to pay. After that it gets complex.

Remember the idea is to make a standard that will be widly used yet earn lots of money for the SEP holders. So you want the licence to be both cheap yet expensive and everyone want's their patents in a SEP pool while at the same time having as few other companies patents in the pool.

Re: wait

Missing the point of FRAND, this isn't about if Apple is using Motorolas SEPs, it is and their is no debate on that. It's about if Apple already has a licence by buying the chips from Qualcom which has already agreed a licence with Motorola (which Motorola then pulled but on for chips sold to Apple, this is where FRAND comes in) or if Apple must get a licence diretly from Motorola and if so, how much that will be.

A history of personal computing in 20 objects part 2

Re: Hmm, iPads?

Well with over 100 million sold in under 3 years anyone who says it's becase of the name will have to explain why it's outselling the iPod Touch by over 5 to 1.

Forstall ousted from Apple after refusing to apologise for Maps

Re: Guess the fairness of it depends on the situation

Forstall got canned because he pissed of the enginners and the designers ie everyone who counts. Siri and Maps as a reason is BS, both need user input and more data to improve. When. Google maps came out it was rideculed as a joke by the satnav companies and they where right, of course what they didn't understand was that "good enougth for free" kills "best but not needed and expensive".

Cook understands this, Forstall was not sacked because the wern't as good as as Cook thought they were, that would imply a leval of stupidity that would have got Cook canned years ago. He was fired because, to quote another site "he was job's man, not steve jobs" and no one liked him.

If I was to guess, which I will, im guessing that he didn't like the reorganisation so Cook said, "take it or leave it". Look at what happened, siri and maps got given to the guy running Apples cloud inferstructure, that makes sence as it's back end, the IOS UI gets moved to the design centre, well doh. Hardware got changed around but that would not have effected Forstall.

Forstall basically got demoted and I would guess he didn't like that, you don't work out the hardware or the interface or the connectivity. Thats a big loss of influence. The big clue is that he is still there so his share options will vest, everyone says he is fired but thats wrong, the guy from Dixon got fired but Forstall will stay till he can pick up the share options. Funny thing is that that is like Jobs at Apple, never fired just sidelined.

The interesting thing will be to see what he does, he clearly has a lot of talent, is regarded as an egotistical arsehole and is vey rich (give Apple there due, they have no problem making you rich is you deliver). He reminds me of someone that used to work at Apple.

@ bobdobbs

Your sir win a cigar, or a cash value of 0.0001p, while stocks last.

Samsung ships two smartphones for every one Apple sells

Re: But who has an app store up their sleeve?

Google used to kick back cash to the handset vendors as well as the carriers, don't know if they still do that. Still the different app stores arn't making anyone much money. Apple has made ~2.5b from it's 30% over 5 years before costs.

Apple squeaks over revenue estimates, misses earnings target

The end is nigh

Well that's it clearly Apple are doomed.

Wonder why you live longer than a chimp? Thank your MOTHER IN LAW

Re: So

You seem to have missed the part where no test was done.

So

Kristen Hawkes creates a computer program to comfirme her belife and this is called science!

Panel production problems may stop iPad Minis getting into fans' mitts

What an idiot

This is a fine example of DisplaySearch getting free publicity by mentioning Apple. A fine example of "artificial demand" is all the robots saying "I want an Android tablex that has X,Y,Z" and then not buying one.

Apple's skinny new iMac line: Farewell, optical drives

Re: I dunno....

I need a DVD drive due to some IBM software that only comes on DVD and gets upgraded every year, so with my last laptop I decided to get a blue rayplayer. It only because of the blueray that I'v given any thought about how often I use it which has been never, not once apart from the yearly updates from IBM and they still need an internet connection to activate.

Next upgrade im going to drop the drive, drop the weight and get the cheepest USB drive on the market. That assumes IBM are still doing their retarded security (guessing each of the disc's may have some slightly different code on it). Noticed in Africa and SE Asia disc's arn't being used that much anymore, still for installing software and burning movies but apart from that it's either the internet or the sneeker net with USB devices.

Re: Niche legacy hardware?

I think they should bring back the 5.25 floopy, when they droped that I swore i would never buy an Apple product. They just want to keep us on the upgrade treadmill. They should follow the example of companies like Tandem and DEC , when was the last time you saw them make a product that wasn't backwards compatible. Im pretty sure you can still connect stuff from the early 90s to Tamdems PC's.

iPad Mini: Why is Apple SO SCARED of the Kindle?

Re: eh?

"If it isn't intended to compete with the Kindle(s), what *is* it designed to compete with? The only other big seller is Apple."

It designed to complement the iPad range. This is the same play Apple has done with the iPods, over half of the ones sold are iPod touch,s but Apple still makes lower priced nano's and shuffles's. You may have noticed people saying that the iPad is to big and how they want a smaller tablet, here's Apple saying "fine, here's the iPad mini".

I'm assuming the event is about a smaller iPad.

Googorola yoinks Android mobes off German shelves

Re: Obligation on Microsoft to negotiate a licence

Motorola must offer FRAND terms, it can't offer whatever it likes and say "you have X amount of time to negotiate" which is what it has done. That's why Motorola has lost every recent court case involving FRAND patents and is being investigated in both the EU and USA.

Also it is Google using Motorola to "extort potentially unlimited royalties from others, for patents that were supposed to be fee-capped". Microsoft hasn't refuced to pay a FRAND licence fee because Motorola hasn't offered a FRAND licence.

Motorola has a legal undertaking to offer a FRAND licence, not just any licence and say "now we negotiate". There is no fundamentally problem with FRAND, it's worked very well in the IT world for over 3 decades. There is a problem with companies like Motorola & Rambus trying to game the system and how long it takes the courts to force them to meet their obligations, however as more cases are decided against FRAND abusers it get harder for them to game the system.

Google 'dominance abuse' games may yet mean monster Euro smack

Re: There are plenty of other search engines out there.

You are not Googles customer, it's not about you. If you wish to advertise you product via a serch engine then you use Google or 75%+ of you potential customers will never see your product. That's the monopoly part, which is not illegal, it's also the part where Google makes its GOLD (95%+ of profits).

What seems to have happened here is that Google acted without thinking and went in with sleghammers looking for balls and that's always gona get noticed. No reason really for that except laziness or hubris. Now they and the EU are both up shit creek and neither knows how to get out. I can't see either side making a concession that they or a neutral third party would consider fair, so one side is gona get pissed on.

Eco-nomics: Was Stern 'wrong for the right reasons' ... or just wrong?

Re: Those gdp growth figures sound extremely unlikely

The simple fact is that you don't understand the meaning of the words "wealth" or "productivity" and so you can't understand what GDP means. Neither has a connection to the word "money" though that word is used to describe the accumilation of one and the creation of the other.

Google defends drowning Acer's newborn Alibaba Linux mobe

Re: @AC15:20GMT - @Ilsa Loving

But Google isn't resorting to the Law which is the point I belive he was making.

Re: cyanogenmod

Neither is Android Open Source.

Hmmm, Mr Amazon, a call on line one from China.

Android was never open source, some of the tech was but as a whole it was never open. It was and is always Google, look at Amazon, they use none of Googles Apps, they can't as all are covered in IP honey (sweet and very sticky) and because they don't, Google can't touch them. What Google did will not make any difference to "Open Source" as that is safe.

Google went after Acer as they sell in the west (NA, EURO,JAP) and the money they make is more than the Chinese market. The average (excluding Apple) smartphone sells for under $50 in China. In the West it is over $350 and thats being distorted by Apples market share. Acer can't compete in the low end smartphone market, hardly anyone apart from Nokie (at that level, whats a smartphone, whats a feature phone?) and Samsung can* which lead to Acer being easy to push around, also we must remember what happened when they went for market share in the PC buisiness

Having said this, I not sure how this will be good for Google. Alibaba must now be thinking of looking at hooking up with a big firm that Google can't bully to release a phone for the China market.

Hmmm, Mr Amazon, a call on line one from China.

*Nokia could have competed in the lowend smartphone market with symbia and developed it to move up market if they hadn't had dick's running the company and been blinsided by the iPhone and their inability to undestand where their cash came from.

Re: "what appears, at a glance, to be clear abuse of market power."

Alibaba wern't using Google Play or any of Googles own Apps or for that matter asking for Googles support. They agreed with Acer to design and manufacture a phone for them. Still on a positive note I guess we can now expect Google to insure that all official Android phones can run all the Apps from Google Play and that they will make sure there are no more pirated Apps, good for Android developers if it ever happens.

Judge: Apple not liable for dropped, broken iPhone screens

Re: Glass

The same could be said about wine bottles.