Smartphone lawsuits explained, visually

Earlier today, Engadget editor Nilay Patel tweeted a link to a website titled FOSS Patents, maintained by Florian Mueller, who is devoted to covering lawsuits based on software patents — a complex issue, without a doubt.

FOSS Patents has posted a 13-slide document outlining the complex lawsuits between several smartphone manufacturers, including Apple, Motorola and HTC, play-by-play.

You can view all of  the documentation as a PDF here.

Needless to say, this is a complex situation, with lawsuits layered upon lawsuits. It’s pretty mind-boggling, honestly. Software patent law is more complicated than most of us can really understand, but thankfully, sites like Mueller’s really help sort things out.

Stephen Hackett, formerly a Lead Mac Genius at Apple, now spends his days running the IT department of a large non-profit in Memphis, TN. He writes about Apple, design and journalism at forkbombr.net. Like all twenty-somethings, you can find him on Twitter. Oh, and he has a dogcow tattoo.