Het zat er al aan te komen, maar het is nu dus ook bevestigd: Apple heeft een rechtszaak aangespannen tegen Emachines, fabrikant van een iMac-achtige alles-in-één pc. Hier heb je wat spul uit een artikel van News.com:
Apple Computer has filed a second iMac-inspired lawsuit, this time against low-cost PC maker Emachines, alleging that the company has wrongfully pilfered the design and feel of its popular translucent computer.[...] This is the second suit Apple has filed against a PC manufacturer for allegedly improperly appropriating the design of the iMac. Apple also filed a similar suit against Future Power and Daewoo in July.
A major issue in both cases is the concept of "trade dress," that is, the distinctive style or look of a product. Historically, the courts did not extend copyright protection to design. A desk or a pencil, for instance, could not get copyright protection. Design, courts held, was a result of function and could not be protected by copyright.
However, courts have begun to grant copyright protection to "stylized" items on the grounds that novel industrial design can communicate a distinctive idea or image.
Recently, for example, a court held that a Gucci watch in the shape of a large "G" could be protected by copyright, because it communicated an idea and was not merely shaped that way for utilitarian purposes. It's an evolving area of the law, lawyers say.
Apple's theory is that trade design protection exists. These companies, after all, could have chosen a number of different styles for their computers.
