Can we agree to stop buying Apple products?

Apple has gone too far in starting legal proceedings to stop sales of the Samsung Galaxy S III phones. Have you seen these? Carol and I both have them. It looks to me like Samsung bent over backwards on this product to not infringe.

I have a long happy history with Apple: I wrote the Chess playing program they gave away on the free demo tape for the early Apple II, I did quite well with a commercial AI product for the Mac in 1984, and I respect their technology.

That said, I think that the iPad 3 that I bought for my stepson a few months ago might be the last Apple product that I buy unless they have a turnaround in their business strategy and stop trying to be the world's largest patent troll. I have already decided to not buy one of the retina MBPs and to not renew my iTunes Match service subscription when it expires. Apple has the legal right to pursue any legal proceedings they want but as consumers we can vote with our wallets and stop buying Apple products! Obviously I want you to make your own decisions - I am just sharing my thoughts on the best strategy for affecting a company whose actions I don't like and a boycott of Apple products seems like the best strategy.

And, there are now some very sweet non-Apple laptops :-)

Comments

  1. Nigel8:38 AM

    I'm with you - but I was already there ;-)

    ReplyDelete
  2. acagle10:27 AM

    Mark,
    Do you want to share your ideas for alternatives to Apple laptops? Oddly enough, I was already looking at the Samsung Series 9 before the patent case. I run Ubuntu in VirtualBox all the time, so I foresee no difficulty moving to Ubuntu, but I'm still wondering what is the best alternative for running Linux on a laptop.
    Anthony

    ReplyDelete
  3. Mark Watson, author and consultant10:58 AM

    I asked this as a question on Hacker News and got a laptop recommendation for: Thinkpad X1 Carbon

    It is due to be released in a week or two and the pre-order price on Amazon is about what a MacBook Air is, but with much better specs. I would need to check to make sure it has Intel graphics and wifif, and the other usual checks for Linux compatibility.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Jack of all trades9:21 PM

    I've been saying this for quite some time now. I have no problem agreeing that they do have great technology.. and am happy there is something out there to provide competition with Android and soon MS products to keep innovation going and we all benefit. But this patent crap has gone way too far, all because of Apple. Now that they've proven they can win in court over patents that clearly just about everybody agrees should never have been awarded in the first place in a beyond broken patent system that was never designed with computers and tech in mind. If they can patent a rounded rectangle and the human movement to push two fingers together, what's next? Staring into a camera? Thinking? It's ludicrous that this was even awarded, much less that a lawsuit was fought in court (and won) about it.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Mark Watson, author and consultant9:26 PM

    Jack, it is also telling that Apple is losing some cases in other countries but seems to be winning most cases in the US against foreign companies.

    ReplyDelete
  6. tjclancy5:23 PM

    I never thought I'd feel this way, but no more Apple products for me. Period.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Edwin McConnel7:34 AM

    No, I'll keep buying Apple products for the time being, or as long as I can afford them...

    I think most boycotts are just silly. There are plenty of companies that do things with which I do not approve (like giving away profits to be "socially reponsible" instead of compensating thier employees more and/or hiring more people...but I digress), but I still do business with them because of business reasons.

    But let us be honest here, Apple is merely playing the patent "game" which is clearly useless and broken at this point.

    "Hate the game, not the playah."

    ReplyDelete
  8. Chris Cambron12:15 PM

    I just came here from a Web search on Sproutcore/Sinatra, but I disagree on boycotting Apple. Apple is being agressive in protecting its turf - to be sure - but I see patent challenges against Apple from other parties in the media every other day. I think Google, Motorola, et al, totally copied Apple - Samsung did so down to the icon level - pathetic. Thank god for Apple or we would all be typing on tiny keyboards looking at tiny screens reading hobbled WML pages. The system needs fixing, but patents exist for a reason and this decision was made by a jury.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Chris Cambron12:16 PM

    just came here from a Web search on Sproutcore/Sinatra, but I disagree on boycotting Apple. Apple is being agressive in protecting its turf - to be sure - but I see patent challenges against Apple from other parties in the media every other day. I think Google, Motorola, et al, totally copied Apple - Samsung did so down to the icon level - pathetic. Thank god for Apple or we would all be typing on tiny keyboards looking at tiny screens reading hobbled WML pages. The system needs fixing, but patents exist for a reason and this decision was made by a jury.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Mark Watson, author and consultant12:19 PM

    Hello Chris,

    The problem I have with the recent jury decision was that the jury foreman did not even know what prior art is. Also, the jury spent relatively little time on their verdict.

    ReplyDelete

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