Update: Why Apple Will Not Pursue A Palm Lawsuit

• You’ve probably heard Apple may be suing Palm over the new Pre phone, but will they? Tim Cook started the conversation out the other day with “We like competition. As long as they don’t rip off our IP and if they do we’re going to go after anybody that does,” he said. If it there is one company that Cook was pointing a finger at, it is definitely Palm. Although it has yet to hit the hands of consumers, Apple is supposedly concerned about the multi-touch screen on the Palm Pre that can be controlled using a two-fingered pinch, just like the iPhone. Apple has applied for a patent to cover that multi-touch gesture technology in mobile devices, but it has yet to be granted. One thing for sure that was sure to set off Apple was that the engineer on the Palm Pre is an ex-Apple product engineer.
• Nonetheless, Apple will not win any case against Palm nor will they pursue it but damn does it look similar). Patent pending multi-touch gestures for different surfaces are a dime a dozen. To name a couple, there is HTC (and 5 other OEM’s) who is working with Android on their soon to release multi-touch phone. On wall surfaces and tabletops, Perceptive Pixel has patents pending for their signature gestures. Each surface uses the similar pinch move in some way or another to re-size certain areas, photos, browser windows, etc. Because it is reasonably necessary for a user to interact with the device in that manner to reach its full effectiveness (which has been proven with current and prior pending patent applications to Apple), Apple will do nothing more than flex their general counsel power to try and scare off anymore competitors trying to intrude on potential IP hijackings. It’s not like Apple hasn’t gotten a little overzealous with their treatment of others IP in the past . Cough cough, Visual Voicemail.

Update: There are bold claims coming out of VentureBeat today that they spoke with an Android developer who claimed Google did not integrate multi-touch on the G1 because Apple ‘asked them’ not to. MG Siegler, a VB writer, claimed that the G1 is capable of multi-touch gestures, but the code to enable it was taken out. This is not true. My article stands, Apple will not sue Palm over the Pre.

Tagged as: Apple, lawsuit