News - Apple and Samsung to sit down and work things out over patents

[HEXUS]

As law enforcement begins to lose patience, the two firms are ordered to sit down and talk.

Read more.

[Biscuit]

About frigging time!

[edvinasm]

Won't work. Apple being dominant and Samsung being stubborn. Best of luck.

[anselhelm]

About frigging time!

My thoughts exactly!

Just goes to show how fundamentally broken the patent systems are around the world, especially in the USA and the EU when it comes to software or system patents.

I'd like to hope that the patent systems around the world will eventually wake up to the increasing problems and change accordingly, but I'm too cynical to believe that much good will be done whilst large corporations are in charge.

[brasco]

The problem is, they've unleashed this whole industry of patent trolls and it's not going to go away quietly..

[Scribe]

The funny thing is, if you add the amount of patents each firm uses from each other together, you probably end up with a net not unreasonably far from 0, at least in a civil world.

[crossy]

Patent systems throughout the world are put in place to ensure that compensation is received for the money and effort involved in developing new technologies, however, more recently, firms in the mobile segment have been using patents to quash competition by withholding licensing or by offering unfair licensing terms on patented technology

Oh so true, so anything that helps to stop, or even slow, the tide of moronic legal tit-for-tats is to be welcomed enthusiastically by all right thinking folk. It does nothing positive for the companies concerned, annoys the consumer and damages innovation (which is ironic since patents were supposed to encourage innovation!).

Just wish that the judge could have insisted on a timeline for a settlement, rather than the conference to discuss same. Perhaps he/she should have threatened both Apple and Samsung's legal team with jail (for contempt of court) if there's no agreement!

Won't work. Apple being dominant and Samsung being stubborn. Best of luck.

Not sure I agree with that assessment - remember that Apple started the current round of idiocy - as pointed out in the article they also like the cudgel of software patents. Also remember that Apple is also suing Motorola and HTC. However, I'm not saying that they're solely to blame - merely the company with the highest profile in this activity.