January 16, 2011 at 3:37am - LegalAs I was browsing around Apple's website today, I noticed a rendering issue on one of the pages. As I went to report it via their Contact Us form, I noticed a link just before the submit button regarding the submission of ideas. The very fact that it had to be written out was just plain sad, and a clear reflection on the American legal system. Apparently many users that submit their suggestions for product updates to Apple think that just because they submitted an idea, they have the right to sue Apple if they ever dare to implement it. Sounds completely unreasonable does it? IT IS!
Think of it this way. If I blogged and announced to the world that I had a great idea for a flying vehicle, and 40 years from now a brilliant engineer manages to build something very similar, am I entitled to any compensation? The bottom line is: ideas are cheap. I can come up with 100 brilliant ideas within a couple hours (although many of them would not be currently feasible with today's technology). What really matters is the execution. And if someone tries to sue another over execution, it had better be a complete carbon copy (or very close to it) for there to be any merit to the case.
So why does this irk me so much? It's because there are tons of very smart people out there that want to create "something cool" to offer to the world. But because of the way copyright and patent laws are set up in America, many people feel that they have to tread lightly or else get blown up by a landmine in the form of an epic lawsuit. In fact, there are many smaller companies that get sued out of business by bigger companies, including one of our clients at my workplace. It's just a dismal situation to be in.
And so, with all that said above, I had to make some changes to the
Terms of Service (which hardly anyone reads anyways).
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