The culprit of course is a patent held by Apple, this time relating to touchscreen tech. This injunction will probably make Samsung miss the all-important holiday shopping season in Australia, so there may be some financial consequences for the Korean giant as well. Although, in fairness, with the teeny tiny market share that Android-powered tablets have been able to gain thus far, this is more of a symbolic win for Apple.
Still, the Apple v. Samsung battle continues. In the Netherlands, Samsung announced that it will start selling modified versions of its Galaxy S, Galaxy S II, and Galaxy Ace smartphones. These devices were previously banned from being sold in the Netherlands because they infringed on an Apple patent relating to flicking through photos (seriously). So Samsung decided to update the software, and will start selling the ‘new' smartphones tomorrow, on October 14. What's the big difference? Well, if you get one of the ‘new' devices in the Netherlands, when you touch a photo in order to flick to the next one, the photo currently on screen won't appear to ‘bounce' as it did before, rather a ‘blue glow' will appear and highlight the edge of the picture. Yeah, sounds exciting.
Samsung probably won't be able to pull off something similar with the Galaxy Tab 10.1 to get it reinstated in Australia as soon as possible, but not for the lack of trying. The company has reportedly offered to make a deal with Apple, a deal which had Samsung modify some software bits. Apple didn't want to take that deal, as it insists that Samsung's hardware is infringing as well. And Samsung may just decide to give up on selling the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia, as it has previously hinted that it would do. Since the next hearing will probably only be held next year, the holiday shopping season will be gone. And in February or March Samsung is expected to unveil this tablet's successor anyway. At least now they know what to avoid putting in so as not to make Apple angry again.
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