Apple finally gets its patent on a rectangle with rounded corners

[mercurial]

There's been a lot of talk over the last couple of years — especially by Samsung during the course of its recent patent infringement trial — that Apple has obtained design patent coverage on rectangular devices with rounded corners. While that may not have been true before, it is now. The US Patent and Trademark Office issued patent no. D670,286 to Apple yesterday and it really does cover the outer edge shape of a device. There's no other way to look at it.As we've explained before, the scope of a design patent is defined by the drawings, and the solid lines are what counts —the dashed lines are just there for context. As you can see below, the 'D286 patent has a lot of gratuitous context but just a single solid line defining what is being protected.



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[MrXidus]

Can't wait until I get a completely circular or triangle shaped phone! /s

inb4 Apple patents the triangle shape with rounded corners.

 

[imsoadude]

Wow these people are stupid, so what happens to my samsung galaxy that already has round corners and rectangle... Hopefully apple wont come after me

 

[Ink]

http://mathworld.wolfram.com/RoundedRectangle.html

 

[imsoadude]

The website you posted will be sued showing their secret round corner formula I hate how they can make patents about the stupidest little things that dont even matter..

 

[Exterminator]

wow,so does Dove have to change the shape of their bar soap? Casinos are going to have to get cards without rounded edges.Makes you want to just slap someone,preferably from Apple.