Silicon Valley: the breeding ground of ludicrous lawsuits

Lee Bell
December 21, 2011
1 Comment

Silicon ValleyThe global terrain of consumer technology is rife with lawsuits these days. Silicon Valley must have seen more injunctions and patent infringement cases in the past year than a retired prostitute has seen STIs in her lifetime.

But we haven’t seen the end of ludicrous lawsuits in 2011 just yet. The cases keep on coming, and with each that gets reported, it seems they get even more ridiculous. Take for example news today that Apple still ain’t happy with its pal-for-life Samsung.

Since winning the appeal case to lift the ban of its iPad-esque Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet Down Under, the South Korean gadget vendor has been taunting Apple through a commercial that take the piss out of its fans. As well as launching marketing campaigns that use past lawsuits to its advantage.

Hilarious for us on-lookers, but dear old Granny Smith isn’t having none of it. Bloomberg reports that Apple’s lawyer, Stephen Burley, said at a hearing in Sydney that Apple is now suing Samsung for its case designs. Yep, after accusing Samsung of “slavishly copying” the iPhone and iPad, Apple is now going after Samsung’s accessories.

Sound too absurd to be true? Samsung’s lawyer, Katrina Howard, confirmed at the same hearing the company was served with the notice from Apple, accusing it of infringing at least 10 patents.

However, we already know Samsung are working with Apple to make its new iPhone, providing import internal parts. Get your head around that one. Perhaps all this lawsuit malarkey is sheer publicity stunt work? What do you think?

Those companies who live in fear of getting sued have one way they could work around it – though it isn’t working out too well for Sony so far. Today a report by the BBC reveals the Japanese PlayStation manufacturer is being sued for making changes to its Terms and Conditions, which were designed to prevent users from suing it en masse. How ironic.

The class action lawsuit, filed in California, claims changes in Sony’s PS3 User Agreement Update forces customers to give up their legal rights and are unfair; but Sony disagrees. Sony said it was “legally entitled” to make such changes to its terms. A spokesman told the BBC: “We chose to make the changes after the Supreme Court clarified the law. Lots of people, including Microsoft, do this now.”

But if Microsoft was to jump in front of a bus, would you? Come on, Sony.

The claim – which argues Sony’s decision to institute a no-suing clause in its terms and conditions is an “unfair business practice” – was filed on behalf of all customers who had bought a PlayStation 3 and signed up for PlayStation Network (PSN) access before the changes were made.

Those of you sick to the back teeth of “class action lawsuits” put up your hands. Can we no longer just play nice in the virtual meadow of consumer technology? Seems not. Will it ever end? Doubt it. Silicon Valley is the breeding grounds of such behaviour and the rate of which it is growing shows no sign of slowing down.

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Tags: Apple, Article, microsoft, samsung, Sony
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