Who is saying that Apple invented the touch UI? This is a false argument. Apple's patent is on a very specific type of touch interface and the interactions with it. Apple-style multi-touch interfaces did not exist before the iPhone.

And if they did, you could be damn sure that whoever did invent it would have been suing Apple left and right.

Come off it, there's no such thing as "Apple-style multi-touch", there's only multi-touch, and it doesn't belong to anyone.

It's disappointing to see people actually siding with Apple here. Is it brand loyalty that blurs people's judgement?

The fact that icons are sized and spaced similarly across these devices is because most people have a similar index finger size. It's obvious what the ideal icon size and placement should be on any touch device for optimal touch usability.

The legal defense of "obvious concept" is absolutely true. There are limits to how design can optimize details such as icon display, and touch input. The concepts Apple are trying to own simply do no belong to them due to their obvious nature.

Slide to unlock, the page bounce, the icons, all of it is obvious stuff once you have the hardware pieced together.

As a result of this lawsuit, Apple has lost me as customer. I am not rewarding childish hypocrisy. I do not respect billion dollar playground fights in the courts because someone else made a similar phone that has icons and multi-touch. What a waste of time and money.

A poster previously in the thread has said that touch screens did not exist before Apple used them; then when presented with a bunch of touch screen devices has said that touch must only be fingers.

But to address your point: multi touch OS

iPhone - 2007

Minority Report - 2004 (design ideas, not working implementation)

>A poster previously in the thread has said that touch screens did not exist before Apple used them;

This is a flat out lie.

>said that touch must only be fingers.

This is also a lie.

>Minority Report - 2004 (design ideas, not working implementation)

Completely different method, used cameras to sense hand positions in air, not physical screens.

And even if minority report showed a PDA with a touch UI in it, it would be completely irrelevant to the point I was making.

Having read some of your (very many) posts (that were made after mine) it appears you're now saying that Apple does not just assemble existing parts to create iPhone - that innovation happened in software and hardware to existing stuff and that iPhone is not possible without that innovation. (I think this a fair paraphrase of the most important point you're making; please let me know if I've got it wrong, and realise that I made a mistake and that I'm not lying to distort facts).

If we limit conversation to the sentence fragment "assemble components like lego" then most people would agree that Apple does more than that. It's unfortunate that someone in this thread used that phrase; it's unfortunate that you wrote such a broad response.

So, now we discuss whether what Apple (and it doesn't need to be Apple, my view would be the same about other companies) did amounts to patentable innovation.

We're not going to agree on that bit. But for me that's fine. You think the money and research and work that Apple did, and the result, is a significantly different implementation and so is patentable. I think it's a refinement upon existing technology.

nirvana is.

In the first two paragraphs of the post to which I replied, he explicitly says that finger-based touch "is a major invention".

It is, it is not an off the shelf component that apple just bought and assembled as other people were claiming.

I think its funny that people are responding to what I said, pretending I said something else, and then others are attacking me for saying what I didn't say... and you're saying I said it!

I guess it doesn't matter what I say does it? Everything gets distorted by the google distortion field.

After spending way too much time reading all of these comments, I think I have figured out the difficulty behind most of this subthread:

You're simply not clear or precise enough in your comments and statements. It takes you awhile to fully explain what you mean, and in the interim, rather than immediately realizing what has happened and making yourself more clear, you convince yourself that everyone else is crazy for not understanding exactly what you mean.

Please don't take this as a personal attack. I am merely observing. I don't think anyone here is out to get you. Most people are well-intentioned and are arguing against the precise statements you've written, not the ideas in your head. If you can't see that, then there may be no hope. But I'm hoping you will re-read some of this thread and come to the same realization.

Here's a quote from you:

    Except that the major parts- like a touch oriented
    UI- don't exist until Apple develops them.

This statement is horribly imprecise if, as I now believe, what you intended to convey was something like:

    Apple does not merely put together existing pieces of
    technology like legos. They created iOS from scratch,
    which represented a significant amount of original work
    in the area of touch oriented UI.

If you slow down a little, and really read what you are about to post to ensure that it reflects the thoughts in your head, I think you'll have a much more successful time debating with others here on HN.

>Except that the major parts- like a touch oriented UI- don't exist until Apple develops them.

Look back a few comments.

Your third sentence proves the first in the general sense. Prior to the iPhone no such Apple-style multi-touch interface existed.

My claim was merely that Apple invented the first Touch UI of that style.

Not all touch UIs.

You misunderstood what I was claiming. I was rebutting the claim that Apple just assembled the iPhone from off the shelf pieces.

Some restaurants do have iOS devices in them.

For you to claim that Apple didn't invent a touch UI, you would need to show that someone prior to Apple shipped iOS on one some device.

That's not the way Apple works. Apple doesn't license someone else's operating system.

Apple created iOS.