Apple is not new at playing bad.

What I like about Apple is their skill to surprise people, but when it comes to their aggressive legal behaviour with competitors, well… that’s definitely no longer the case.

News is that Apple recently sent a cease and desist letter to Procreate, claiming copyright trademark infringement cause by their product Podium. The claim is about the name which too closely resembles iPod and the product’s design which closely resembles Apple products design.

screenshot32

Here’s an excerpt of the letter, provided by TUAW:

The term POD has also been adopted and used extensively in the marketplace by consumers as an abbreviation to refer to Apple’s IPOD player. The IPOD and POD marks indicate to consumers that a broad range of products, including portable electronic devices, computer software, and related goods and services bearing those marks and marks similar thereto originate from or are sponsored or endorsed by Apple.

Now, about the similar design, the thing I can think of is the iMac. For the sake of comparison, here’s Podium:

Podium

Here’s the iMac:

512-imac-white

How similar those two products really are ? And being so simple in design, are any of them copyrightable ?

Apparently, Apple’s letter also cites Procreate’s website being too similar to Apple’s. Here’s Procreate’s websiste, and here’s Podium’s website. Has apple copyrighted the white and light gray colors or what ?

My take is they just want third party gadget vendors to pay Apple tax on what they earn.

Procreate’s defense until now, is as simple as in “take a look at the dictionary“:

Podium (noun)
Etmyology: Latin
Date originally used: 1743 (a good 243 years before Apple was founded)
1: a low wall serving as a foundation or terrace wall: as a: one around the arena of an ancient amphitheater serving as a base for the tiers of seats b: the masonry under the stylobate of a temple
2:
a dais especially for an orchestral conductor
Source: Merriam-Webster

As for me, I bought three Apple products until now. Do I feel bad about that ? Yes, somehow.