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Is iPhone Nano Still in the Works?
Apple’s original patent applications for the iPhone showed a product that resembled an iPod Nano more than the iPhone we know today (I’ll call it the iPhone Nano but apparently the project was called the P1). Conversely, the iPhone seems to have been born out of an Apple touch screen tablet concept which, at least initially, didn’t seem designed to be a phone. It would make sense that as the iPhone adds features (3G and perhaps GPS) and perhaps increases in size, a smaller Apple phone product could find a niche- Cheaper, smaller and simpler. A dribbling of patent applications showing an iPhone based on an iPod Nano are coming out- here is the latest.
This new Apple patent application has Steven P. Jobs as the lead inventor (he’s only listed on a few of the Apple patents - some weird, some wonderful). This patent deals with using the iPhone Nano for conference calls. Previous applications have dealt with the iPhone Nano design for entering text for messaging and using the address book etc.
Title: Method, System, and Graphical User Interface for Making Conference Calls
Inventors: Jobs; Steven P.; Christie; Greg; Ording; Bas; Chaudhri; Imran; Forstall; Scott
A user interface for handling multiple calls includes displaying an image associated with a first party on a first call and an image associated with a second party on a second call. When one call is active and the other call is on hold, the image associated with the party that is on the active call is visually highlighted to make it more visually prominent relative to the other image. When both calls are joined into a conference call, both images are displayed adjacent to each other and neither is visually highlighted relative to the other.
This is a CYA/RH patent. Apple has a huge stack of them.
Their purpose is to cover every variation your products could conceivably come in. This has the side-benefit of allowing you to not tip your hand while coving your butt.
…and you HAVE TO cover your butt! Remember: Creative sued (and WON) because they had the “alphabetical listing of songs on an MP3 player with blue colored highlight” patented. Even though iTunes was “alphabetical listing of songs with blue colored highlight”, until the iPod Photo Apple’s MP3 player version was always monochrome.
The red herring in this patent is the photo. The pictures in a patents do not have to reflect the looks of a final product, it just has to illustrate the method being patented. In this case, “dialing a phone on the touch screen of a portable music player” and “joining two separate calls into a single conference call” is illustrated without giving away the final iPhone design.