Grover Cleveland was president the last time the U.S. Supreme Court heard a case on design patents, but Apple and Samsung forced the issue is around 130 years later on Tuesday, To look into the context before Tuesday's confrontation between Apple and Samsung within the US Supreme Court file, it is essential to turn more than a century into a row on some reasonably attractive rugs.
It is 1885, and John and James Dobson are accused of cutting designs from different carpet manufacturers and promoting them as their own.
A few corporations, the Hartford carpet and Bigelow's carpet, had been so enraged that they carried the Dobsons to the highest path to the best court record in the land.
Businesses have been quite appropriate to be disgusted, the Supreme Court agreed, however, got extra sophisticated. The court file struck a stumbling block and over the sum of money the corporations deserved in damages.
The difficulty was that the judges could not be decide exactly how precious the design was compared to every other part that goes into making a nice carpet. A beautiful design on a poor quality poor carpet did not promote, despite everything.
And so it meant that businesses bought just six cents each. and Which, again, was regrettable. Nominal damages.
This drew the attention of Connecticut Senator Orville Platt, who, pressured by fearful carpet makers, lobbied Congress to amend the Patents Act to ensure design patents had added weight. By 1887, these modifications have been written into regulation.
