Apple secured an injunction against the sale of the Samsung Galaxy Nexus last week, and it looks like Google is finally ready to provide a fix so the court will allow the sale of the device.
The patent Apple successfully leveraged to earn the injunction covers the quick search function on the Android OS that retrieves information from both the web and the devices phone. Google’s fix will limit the quick search function to returning only online results, preventing Nexus owners from searching the contents of their own phone.
Google will push an over-the-air update to Ice Cream Sandwich sometime in the near future, effectively crippling the phone’s quick search function. Apple has successfully forced Google to make its product worse just so it can be sold in the U.S. If the court ultimately upholds the preliminary injunction, expect Apple to sue other handset makers for similar patent violations.
The overwhelming irony that Apple successfully blocked the sales of a Google device by leveraging a “search” patent almost outweighs the absurdity of Apple’s claim in the first place. Almost.
Source: ABC News [via The Verge and Gizmodo]
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