(Reuters)-In a pre-
In the IPhone era, mobile phones of all shapes and sizes appeared.
Remember to flip, candy bar, rotate, flip back, slider, double
Slider, lipstick, and, of course, taco?
Nowadays, most mobile phones have a touch screen, rows of icons, which are rectangular.
In short, they all look like iPhones.
Now, after Apple's trial of Samsung Electronics, the United StatesS.
The company has won what South Koreans call a "monopoly on rounded rectangles," and it is worrying that the fast and exciting era of innovation in mobile design is over.
The IPhone has won, and all the people who use Google's Android operating system for their phones will give up or act carefully for fear of litigation.
But others are the opposite.
Paul pug, vice president, frog ideas, San Francisco
Design companies owned by India-based Aricent Group believe that the company may now lift the shackles of designers and launch schools --
Destroy the shape and user interface that inject fresh vitality into the industry.
"We don't know to what extent these effects will develop," pug said . ".
"I hope this is the inspiration moment for Android platforms and manufacturers to bet on innovation. . .
Provide a good user experience according to the needs of users, rather than stagnation because Patents weaken them.
"Frogs know how difficult it is for the market.
Bring SmartPad;
The company released a prototype Android phone last year, in the words of a reviewer on the technology website Engadget, at first glance, like "another ordinary smartphone --
Dark, indescribable, maybe a bit like the iPhone 4, it has its rights --
Most of them were cut off.
However, with the two layers on, you have a phone with a screen size that is twice the size of the normal screen.
"All of a sudden, it turned into a tablet and two screens made up a 6-
"One-inch slate," wrote the Engadget reviewer.
The prototype belongs to Imerj in Singapore --
Flextronics International, a closely watched listed contract maker: The Engadget article has attracted more than 400 comments.
It's not a whole new concept, but the design is impressive, including software, which includes apps that make the most of the extra screen.
Imerj promises to provide a toolkit for software developers, and a team has developed a range of applications using innovative dual screens.
They dream of doing research on Motion's BlackBerry.
"We have an idea that smartphones will be the main computing platform for most people in the future," recalls Brett Faulk, then vice president of marketing at Imerj.
"However, it has two challenges: a small screen and a small keyboard.
So the concept is to create a product that expands as my productivity needs increase.
After a few months, however, everything became calm.
Imerj's Twitter account and website are dead.
Both are offline now.
Faulk and others left the company.
Flextronics declined to comment, and frog's Pu declined to comment.
A former member of the Imerj team said the project aims to stay away from the niche market of Apple consumers --
But that is part of the reason for its demise.
It will take at least five years to build a device and a set of office applications, an investment that the parent company will eventually be unable to make.
"We are very ahead," said the person who was not authorized to talk about the project and declined to be named.
"We are very sad to see innovation pushed aside.
"The question now is whether there is competition between Apple and Apple.
Samsung's decision could upend this conservative calculation.
This may have happened: the latest addition to Samsung's Galaxy series devices --
In the center of a court case-
It is a camera with a monitor that looks, feels and behaves like an Android smartphone, including WiFi and 3g connections.
According to patent blog patentbolt, Samsung has its own patents on dual-screen devices.
Com, looks a lot like SmartPad.
But there are limits to what hardware can do.
"There is a lot of ingenuity in designing buttons and cameras and showing the mechanical structure of these special features," says hachie Dediu, a former Nokia engineer, it now runs a consulting firm called Asymco and has an influential blog.
With the rise of the iPhone, "When you have a clean glass display with a touch interface, all of this is gone.
The problem, he said, is the operating system that equipment manufacturers can use.
Windows Phone for Android and Microsoft to a lesser extent
Designed for that shape.
So, if there is a change in the appearance of a phone, Google needs to change.
"In theory, if Google thinks it's not their winning game, they might go to the manufacturer and say OK, we'll give you a mechanical difference," Dediu said . "
Prior to this, the manufacturer had limited space for action.
They can play with toys according to the specifications and proportions of the equipment
Samsung's oversized Galaxy Note was hit by an unexpected shock, and its second version was released on Thursday.
Or by adjusting the Android operating system itself.
In fact, frog's most obvious success in smartphone design is the user interface that sharp recently launched for its Android phone in Japan.
Sharp said that as Japan moved from old feature phones to smartphones, sharp wanted to keep the market ahead and gave frogs a broad range of authority to stand out from their Android devices. The so-
The software called "fresh ui" adds an extra layer or skin to Google's basic operating system, which he says improves access to the most commonly used features on the device.
In fact, this skin is an increasingly popular way for handset makers to differentiate their devices from those of their competitors.
Huawei released its own "emotional ui" skin on Thursday, saying it would give consumers "more reasons to choose Huawei smartphones than other brands ".
"It's not just for big boys: Meizu, a small Chinese smartphone maker, has gained a fanatic following with its quirky Android customization, which once won the wrath of Steve Jobs, but now they are holding on to their imitators.
But there is no problem with this road.
On the one hand, the skin is usually just a surface layer that the user likes or hates, which quickly breaks away from the standard Android interface, which makes no difference whether the device is selling for $500 or $50.
While their goal is to be different, they may eventually push the Android interface closer to Apple's own iOS.
In fact, Apple showed the slides at the trial, claiming that Samsung's adjustment to the home screen on 13 devices made it similar to the iPhone.
The jury agreed.
Some manufacturers have noticed.
When the home screen of one of the models of the Chinese manufacturer Meizu was quoted by the Apple court as an example of not infringing its design patent, Meizu was happy, but according to Zhuhai, the Chinese company is still "modifying some aspects of our user experience" for future products"
Yang Yan, product director based in the company.
Nevertheless, Brandon Edwards of Shanghai believes that innovation needs to go beyond mere adjustment in the long run --
Pug's colleague.
He believes that with the launch of the Kindle Fire, more manufacturers will follow Amazon's path and push Android in their own direction, thus effectively parting ways with Google. Such so-
Forks may attract device manufacturers other than mobile phones, Edwards said.
Customers have been talking to frog about embedding technology into smart systems, cars, and healthcare that are likely to run Android.
At the same time, smartphone innovation may move beyond the form factor and apps to the way they interact with their surroundings.
It is expected that smartphones will be better controlled by voice and gestures in the coming year or so, beyond the limitations of device shape and touch screen.
However, the most important result of Apple's Samsung quarrel may be that the design is no longer just an afterthought.
There may be a lot of different shapes of equipment in the pre-
But that doesn't mean they provide a better user experience for consumers.
"All of this confirms that the design has monetary value," he said . ".
"In the past, they competed on the basis of speed and technology.
These things are now relatively standardized, and the design really defines the device and the device experience.