Yesterday marked the height of absurdity for the Apple vs Samsung trial, as both sides presented their closing statements and rebuttals. Bryan Bishop reported live from the courtroom at The Verge. The lawyers from both Apple and Samsung went hyperbolic with their attempts to woo the jury, hitting ironic home runs on several points that they may have not even intended.
Apple’s lawyer pleaded that if they find Samsung in the wrong, “you will have reaffirmed the American patent system,” while Samsung’s lawyer argued that Apple was “attempting to block its most serious competitor from even playing the game,” and that “competition is what built this country.”
The American patent system is incredibly screwed up. The software patents being granted reveal the patent office as being completely out of control. The patent system needs legislative change – but that won’t happen until the courts and juries in the courts start throwing down the gauntlet by invalidating patents and making it clear in their statements that they will continue to do so. Jury nullification in the United States is one of the last few peaceful opportunities in which the people of the land can fight against a broken system. It was intentionally set up this way as a stop-gap in preventing violent revolution.
Competition is what built this country. In the past, companies could not rest on past innovation and just magically hope that they would stay ahead of their competitors. In the past, companies that made incredibly poor business decisions that bankrupted them actually went bankrupt. Today, rather than constant innovation we have constant legal battles. Today, rather than actually failing and providing opportunities for new companies to take their place, failed companies are bailed out by the government to the tune of hundreds of billions of dollars. Competition is what built this country and the lack of competition is part of what is destroying it.
I would love to see the jury come back from their deliberations and find both Apple and Samsung’s patents invalid, and impose a large fee on both companies for wasting the time and funds of the government.
