And again the patent war is back. This time Motorola is being accused of infringing Apple’s patent in Europe. The patent that is in question is related to how pictures are viewed in the photo gallery.
The case hearing is due on February 16 in the Munich I Regional Court. It is being said that Motorola has implemented a certain method of flipping pages in a photo gallery and this could be an infringement of a patent (EP2059868) that Apple is holding in Europe.
Mueller of FOSS patents notes that the Android photo gallery constitutes a violation of that patent at least in its “zoom in” mode and possibly (though this is not yet certain) in its “zoom out” mode and this could cause a problem for Motorola. Also Apple had pulled Samsung in this case a few days back for the same patent, but Samsung made a few changes and survived the injunction. We really don’t know when all these legal wars will see an end and consumers will be able to enjoy a product freely.