On July 9th Judge Colin Birss issued a ruling that the Samsung’ Galaxy tablet did not infringe Apple’s registered designs as it was unlikely to be confused with the iPad because they are “not as cool.”
Yesterday the Judge stated that the decision of July 9th should now be published widely, including posted on Apple’s U.K. home page for six months and published in a number of newspapers and magazines, including, according to the draft copy of the order, the Daliy Mail, Guardian Mobile Magazine, the FT and T3.
The logic being that it would correct any impression that Samsung was copying Apple’s product. This will essentially become an advert for the Samsung tablet on the Apple website. Although if Apple had any sense it would certainly include the on record comment from Judge Briss, about the reason the Galaxy tablet is not a copy of the iPad, that is to say, its lack of coolness.
Apple is fighting patent lawsuits around the globe with Samsung In relationship to the Galaxy tablet, how these other lawsuits will be impacted by Apple having to publish on their own website that the Galaxy does not infringe Apple’s registered designs is yet to be determined.
It might be a struggle to be claiming the Galaxy infringes on your design in a US court while at the same time publishing the fact that it does not infringe your design on your UK website.
