As much as we like to rag on Maple and their Eye Devices, we also like to keep things civilized (protip: sarcasm is your greatest weapon). Of course we can't say the same for Microsoft's lawyers, who are probably digging around through mountains of paperwork right now to see if they can pursue a case against their bitter rival.
In case you haven't heard, iOS 5 was announced last Monday to the world and people noticed a lot of..."borrowed" features. A majority of the lending seems to have come from Android (notifications), some copied Eye OS's own Jailbreak developers (Wi-Fi Sync), but there are also some noticeable Windows Phone imitations found in the tech giant's latest software update.
So what exactly did Maple rip off to receive potential scorn from Microsoft? Well it looks like Maple decided to borrow one of Windows Phone's most prominently advertised features: the integrated viewfinder. It's the feature where you take a picture, the picture preview slides to the left of the screen leaving some of it visible, and then swiping from left-to-right to see your most recent pictures. If those words aren't clicking in your head, watch the Windows Phone "Skydiver" ad above and you'll see what we mean. After you're done with that, take a look at the iOS 5 video below Redmond Pie took of the imitated feature.
See what we mean? But you may respond, "everyone in the tech industry rips each other off! No one actually owns any of the features they use." For the most part that would be true, but Microsoft actually does own a patent entitled "Integrated Viewfinder and Digital Media" which was filed in February 2010 and it pretty much covers all of the bases. Here's a quick description of the patent:
A user interface can display active and passive content. For example, a camera viewfinder image can be displayed on a screen, as part of a strip, concatenated with one or more other images, for example, images that were previously taken with the camera. A user can cause the viewfinder image and the other images to move together across the screen. This can allow a user to easily examine the other images and the viewfinder image without, for example, switching between different screens in a user interface. Media captured with a device can be associated with a media category by positioning a user interface element near one or more other elements associated with the category.
There are more claims which the patent specifies ownership over, and it looks like Apple may have been caught red-handed here. So do we think Microsoft is going to sue Apple over this? Frankly, no. They certainly could if they wanted to, but Apple owns at least one patent (but probably many more) that Microsoft is in violation of and if they did meet in court it would most likely only result in a stalemate. Why do you think Apple and Microsoft almost never sue each other? They've been stealing from each other since the 1980s!
But then again this is a very specific patent and it is meant to protect their ownership of its implementation, which really is the most advertised feature of Windows Phone 7 right now. Microsoft could very well pursue this if only to temporarily stop Apple from using the feature in iOS 5 (it's been done before) or to at least request Apple to not advertise it. It'll be interesting to see where this goes from here and certainly gives us a lot to think about when it comes to technology patents. To read more claims applied to the patent, visit the United States Patent & Trademark Office (USPTO) link in the source below.
Via: Redmond Pie
Source: United States Patent & Trademark Office
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