Barrapunto

Es que, de hecho, no estoy yo muy seguro de si se refiere al concepto de "pantalla en la que puedas pellizcar, rotar y toa la pesca" (sería propiedad intelectual, puesto que es un concepto), o concretamente a la tecnología utilizada por Apple para conseguir llevar a la práctica ese concepto (sería propiedad industrial).

En cualquier caso, creo que todos estaremos de acuerdo en que a Apple no le hace falta esta patente para defenderse, ya que sus productos son los más caros del mercado, los más reconocidos y seguramente los más vendidos en este sector (me refiero al iPhone y al iPod Touch).

Si sabes inglés, en este link [engadget.com] te pone las posibles implicaciones reales de la patente aprobada que, finalmente y ha quedado lo suficientemente restringida en su ámbito como para que su influencia sea bastante limitada.

"although we teasingly referred to it as "the iPhone patent" when it was initially filed, it now only covers touch devices that have a very specific interface feature: sensing whether or not you want to just scroll up and down in one dimension or pan around in two dimensions based on the angle you initially move your finger relative to the screen."

"There's a little more to it, but that's really the key element covered in the broadest claims of the patent. If a device doesn't have this feature, it doesn't infringe this patent. So in order for Apple to win a case against Palm based on this patent, it would have to show that the Pre has the same scrolling behavior."

Hay videos en ese enlace, que son más explicativos de lo que pueda ser yo con palabras.

"So where's the "multitouch patent" everyone keeps going on about? Well, we certainly couldn't find the sort of broad patent that would qualify, and we didn't find much of anything that would keep anyone from using multitouch gestures like pinch-to-zoom -- in fact, Apple has a better patent position with regard to pinching gestures to cut, copy and paste than it does on pinching to zoom. We're not kidding: it picked up #7,339,580 "Method and apparatus for integrating manual input" last year, which straight-up covers "generating a cut command in response to a pinching motion between a thumb and a fingertip detected on a multi-touch-sensitive surface.""

En cualquier caso, añade:

"Of course, just because Apple's current multitouch patents aren't as broad and sweeping as commonly assumed doesn't mean it can't put the hurt on Palm with what it does have"