Tech Roundup – More Lawsuits, Attack on Free Speech and Some Good News

It is after some time interval that I am writing this post in quick succession after the last one – and therefore, I will start with much ado.

More Lawsuits in the Mobile World

In the Mobile world, lawsuits and more lawsuits seem to be the flavor of the season. And conforming to its recently gained notoriety, Apple is once again the chief purveyor. Recently, it added six more devices to its list of Samsung products that it wants banned in the US – taking the total to an astonishing 14!

Indeed, the battle, now spanning continents, is getting more and more curious! For example, Apple seems to have won the suit in US, but lost it in the UK – where it had to even apologize publicly (although some legerdemain saw it getting away from a seemingly humiliating apology). However, in South Korea – the court ruling has been mixed – Apple has been held guilty of two patent infringements, and ordered to pay USD 20 million for each, while Samsung has been held in reach of one Apple patent, and ordered to pay 25 million in damages.

Nokia also seems to have jumped in the lawsuit bandwagon, and recently filed patent infringement suits against RIM (makers of Blackberry), HTC and Viewsonic. Perhaps, all the warring parties can take a cue from HTC, which settled its lawsuit with Apple (who else!) to better focus on product development.

Silver Lining

All is not gloom and doom in the mobile world – it is well and truly clicking! One of the brightest sparks is the rumors regarding the impending launch of Samsung IV – which will be reportedly equipped with a 5” full HD AMOLED screen and a Quad Core CPU.

For the resurrected Akash tablet project in India, some encouragement came from unexpected quarters – a decently attended function of global envoys at the UN saw the UN chief – Ban Ki Moon – publicly praising the tablet as having the potential to reach millions of young people who want information and education. However, all is not rosy for the Akash tablet venture, which is facing sustained questions on the device being sourced from China, opening a potential can of worms regarding false commitments, inflated pricing, and kickbacks.

Microsoft also got some encouragement in the form of healthy figures for its recently launched Windows 8 – which has reportedly sold over 40 million new licenses in a month since the launch.

Attack on Free Speech

The Indian Constitution guarantees freedom of speech under Article 19(1) – as one of the fundamental rights to Indian citizens. However, this right seems to be coming under sustained attack over the recent past. We have frequently seen bold statements over social networking sites being withdrawn, and users being randomly arrested and harassed over critical remarks against establishment.

Just following the Aseem Trivedi fiasco, one Twitter user in Tamilnadu was arrested by overzealous cops when he made a critical remark against business dealings of the Finance Minister’s (of India) son. More recently two girls were arrested in Mumbai for the simple “crime” of questioning the city shutdown following the death of Bal Thackeray. And just a couple of days back, another youngster found himself in deep trouble when he made “derogatory” comments against Raj Thackeray.

Perhaps the Indian polity, and the society at large, has a long way to go before we understand the true import of the freedom of speech.

Other Noteworthy Developments

Akai, a brand well known for affordable products, launched two HD LCD TV models – in 15 inch and 17 inch screen versions, and priced ate Rs 8,000 and 10,000 respectively.

Flipkart.com, one of the leading online retailers in India, announced the launch of its e-book stores, and a dedicated app that is compatible with Android OS. The e-book store also carries around 4,000 free titles.

For those looking to send large sized files over e-mail, here is some good news – Google has integrated its Gmail service with its cloud storage service – Drive. Using Gmail, users can now send files as large as 10GB!