[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by Graham

Sorry, Andrew, but you're just commenting on my first paragraph again.

Here's the rest of my original post:



My point, which you have not addressed simply by continuing your argument that the Tab shares design elements with the iPad, is that the Tab also looks to me like a natural progression from Samsung's own products. We've earlier shown that those design elements were present in photo frames and at least one video player from before the iPhone was released, and in televisions from soon after. The screen of my Samsung XP netbook -released years before the iPad - would also look very, very like a Tab if removed from the keyboard.

By upholding the injunction, the German judge appears, to me at least, to be telling Samsung that they have to change a look and feel that is as much theirs as Apple's.

More than anything, I'm trying to explain the rationale of the German court's decision. I'm not really sure how important or unimportant the "natural progression" theory is. But I don't think that Samsung made that argument to the court, so it may not be significant.

And it may not even be right: this Samsung tablet from 2007 doesn't seem to be part of a natural progression to the Tab:



And while the front of the picture frame does look an awful lot like an iPad, the picture frame as a whole does not:

(And of course there is the 2004/2006 issue)

Now, it can certainly be argued that Apple's community design document from 2004 predates the emergence of Samsung's design (their products begin to get this styling from 2006), but there were no Apple products with this look visible in the market until more than a year after those first Samsung products were released.

This is true enough.

And there was plenty of prior art before 2004, so as Dulin's Books points out, the real issue here is that the community design document should never have been granted.

Graham

I'm not really convinced by the prior art issue. The Dutch court did the community design on the basis of prior art, specifically mentioning this compaq tablet:



And this may be right as a matter of Dutch law - I don't know anything about Dutch IP law. But purely as a matter of design, I really don't think that that looks much like an iPad at all.