macnn/electronista
05/29/2008, 10:30am, EDT
Thursday, May 29thSamsung still calling L870 browser Safari
Samsung is still insisting that it can call the L870's web browser Safari, according to a Samsung spokesperson contacted by Phone Arena. While the cellphone is now believed to just have a standard version of the Nokia Mini Map browser, which shares much of Safari's WebKit rendering engine, a Samsung media official continues to refer to the phone's web app as a Symbian Series S60 version of the "Safari browser" and equates it to the Nokia software. Press materials also continue to mention Safari.
It's currently unclear as to whether or not Samsung at large is aware of the discrepancy. The decision to capitalize on the Safari name potentially violates an Apple trademark on the Safari name in software; Apple first filed for the trademark on January 7th, 2003 and so staked an early claim to the title well before the development of WebKit for non-Apple browsers used by Nokia and other companies.
Multiple inconsistencies also apply to the description of the phone itself, reporting an LCD with either 256,000 or 16 million colors along with different size measurements.
Filed under: gadgets, software
Other story tags: Samsung, Nokia, Safari, WebKit
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what tools
Why don't they just call it "The Samsung iPhone knockoff with Safari knockoff"?
They insist on copying a registered trademark verbatim. How likely is it that they'll come out with any innovation or any improvements of their own, if they can't even come out with an original name?
At least they didn't call it the Safair Xpert Mobile Edition.
Another case of a company running out of ideas following the leader.
Re: what tools
Hey, take a look at the phone in question, and point out exactly how this is an iPhone knock-off? It doesn't look like an iphone. It has a keypad that slides out.
Or have you just decided that any phone from now on that has a screen with icons on it must be a knock-off.
It is probably Konqueror
If I recall correctly, Safari is based off of Konqueror, and that Apple does feed back into the development stream for that. Though I doubt every advancement in Safari is fed back I suspect this may be one reason Samsung is claiming Safari.
KHTML
Safari is not based on Konqueror
The common link is that WebKit is a forked version of KHTML the base for Konqueror.
source: http://www.konqueror.org/features/browser.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KHTML
not good
The bottom line is it can't be called Safari unless it really is Safari and is licensed from Apple. They might be able to get away with calling it "a Safari-like full web browser," but they can't list it as having "Safari (full browser)" like they do.
re testudo: the front screen is an imitation of the iPhone screen (though ugly and poorly done), but that's not illegal. It's not a "knockoff," but they're obviously trying to make an association in customers' minds.
Re: not good
But the front screen looks barely different then the menu screen on my razr. Does that mean Apple stole the idea from Motorola?
They can call if Safari..
until Apple sends the lawyers after them.
@ elroth
I agree with what you're saying about samsung using using the safari browser name, but I really can't see what you possibly can mean with the home screen of that samsung phone resembling the home screen of an iPhone. At all. I am a proud owner of an iPhone and I can tell you with confidence that the home screen of that phone looks nothing like the home screen of my 'so beloved' iPhone.
From what I can see, the phone itself is not a knockoff of the iPhone. I think that samsung is probably just trying to get attention by using the safari browser name: what they're using is clearly not a real version of safari. Even if it is based on webkit like Apple's safari, they shouldn't be able to use the safari trademark.