Hasta La Gadget!

This morning Apple has made its opening statement in a landmark case vs Samsung which will result, more than likely, in the exchanging of billions of dollars in damages for patent infringement on the part of one or both of them in the mobile device realm. Apple’s opening remarks come with what we’ve seen several times before, including such remarks as, “we all know it’s easier to copy than to innovate,” from Apple lead attorney Harold McElhinny. Samsung’s opening statements will come later in the day while Apple has had the first hour and a half.

Apple’s set of statements came after a video which was put on display for the benefit of the jury. This video contained a relatively easy to follow explanation of what patents were and how the USA patent system works. Have a peek at what they saw in this, the same video, as hosted by YouTube:

The video comes from PublicResource.org and is designed to be shown to jurors in patent jury trials in general. McElhinny spoke starting on how the iPhone was born, noting specifically, according to Ina Fried at AllThingsD, that Apple took a risk creating the iPhone.

“They were literally betting their company.” – McElhinny

Facing off against then giants like Nokia and Motorola, and of course Samsung as well, Apple went all-in with the iPhone, taking out applications for 200 innovations related to the device alone. McElhinny promised to show never before shown confidential Samsung documents that show Samsung’s first reaction to the iPhone. With these documents, McElhinny says, they’ll prove that Samsung decided to copy the design rather than innovate as a reaction to it.

“To be blunt, the testimony is going to show you that Samsung has not been honest about this copying.” – McElhinny

Stay tuned as Apple continues to expand on how they’ll be pushing for Samsung to admit their wrongdoing as well as Samsung opening up with comments on how it wasn’t they who broke the sacred bond of innovation, but Apple. Have a peek at the timeline below as well to catch up on this case as it expands quickly through the next few weeks.

Apple opening remarks vs Samsung “easier to copy than to innovate” is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

There’s been an abnormal amount of clues this season leading up to the idea that several new devices are coming from Apple, the iPad mini being one of the most-denied yet most-seen. What you’re about to witness here is a set of iPad mini cases, each of them appearing to come from Devicewear, a company that we’re pretty sure won’t be invited back to the Apple party any time soon should these renders be proven real. What they show is the iPad mini – or whatever it’ll end up being called in the end – complete with volume buttons, a back-facing camera and microphone, and the lovely new miniature dock connector for all to see.

This case is nothing too exciting on its own, but what you’ll see inside is a next-generation iPad that’s seemingly smaller than its predecessors. The front-facing render of the device does not seem as realistic as the back, on the other hand, appearing here to be more of a photoshop effort than anything. The back of the device though, again, looks to have many of the same features the iPad 3rd generation device does, including the ultra-thin profile the newest iPad works with like a champ.

The screen-lock is there, the volume buttons look fabulously black, and the back-facing camera once again appears without a flash. The lens for the camera does appear quite large, leading us to believe that it may indeed be working with the same technology that the iPhone 4S works with – great news for you iPad photo shooters out there. There’s also a top and back facing set of microphones for next-level noise cancellation.

The bottom of the device has the new dock connector we’ve been hearing so much about. This dock connector is much smaller than the current 30-pin port, this thusly making room for the speaker grilles to face downward rather than relatively backwards as the current model iPad does. Now we’ve just got to convince Apple to go all the way forwards somehow or another for some real front-facing entertainment action.

Check the timeline below for more iPad mini news bits to add it all up for yourself – with more on the way, to be sure!

[via 9to5mac]

iPad mini cases appear with tiny tablet details is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

With smartphones on the rise these days, apps are pretty much what makes a platform more attractive than the other, apart from the hardware specs being offered. That being said, there also seems to be an increase in developers who range from veteran software programmers, to teens who are looking to cash in on the app fad, which basically means that anyone can learn to program an app if they wish to. If you’d like to try your hand at coding apps for iOS, there’s a Kickstarter program that has been recently launched that wants to teach you how to program and it will only set you back $25, which is about the cost of a programming book but a lot less compared to attending classes. This Kickstarter program was launched by the folks at Code School who have experience teaching people how to code Ruby and CSS, so we guess that they do have some credibility.

A pledge of $25 will net you access to the course once it has been put together which they expect should be ready by October or November later this year. There is a caveat though – Code School expects that you have some form of basic programming knowledge as this will not be a 101 course. However if you don’t have any programming knowledge, fret not as free lessons can be had at the Code Academy site. However if you have tinkered around with coding in the past, perhaps this might be something worth checking out.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Facebook for iOS gains a new Save feature, Total Recall video game arrives on iOS and Android for $1.99,

Apple had three favorite typefaces: Myriad, Lucida Grande and Helvetica Neue. Now there’s a new favorite: Avenir. It has appeared simultaneously OS X Mountain Lion and iOS 6—which means you will see it featured in the next iPhone. More »

In what seems to be an unintentional response to our previous report surrounding the supposed rampant piracy on Android, another developer believes that the reverse is true. Chris Pruett, a developer for the popular game Wind-up Knight and founder of Robot Invader, said that the company’s piracy rate on the said game was about 12% on Android and about 15% on iOS. Pruett added that back when Wind-up Knight for iOS was a paid app, the piracy rate reportedly went 80%.

The developer also mentioned that roughly 100% of their pirate users on Android and iOS are in China. “I think piracy is, as always, a red herring. You can’t stop it, but as long as it’s slightly arduous, it’s not a lot of lost sales. Because a huge number of people who pirate software would never buy it in a million years,” Pruett explained. “You aren’t losing a sale to them. Piracy starts to matter only when pirate users can cost you money in other ways, e.g. network bandwidth and server cost. Yet another reason to be a free app in today’s mobile marketplace.”

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Android smartphone sales hit the jackpot with 888.8% jump, Android U.S market share declines, according to research,