An Eastern Texas Federal Court has ruled Apple’s Cover Flow interface feature infringes on patents owned by Mirror Worlds, and has ordered the Cupertino-based company to pay US$208.5 million in damages, according to Bloomberg.
Apple’s Cover Flow Interface
Mirror Worlds filed its case against Apple on March 14, 2008 alleging that the Cover Flow and Time Machine interface styles showing files or albums flipping back and forth violates patents it owns. Despite the fact that many of the concepts were in use in Apple’s Hypercard product years before the patents were filed, a jury ruled in favor of Mirror Worlds.
The jury’s verdict wasn’t clear as to whether Apple must pay a lump sum of $208.5 million, or pay that amount individually for each of the three patents they ruled Apple violated.
Apple hasn’t commented on the jury’s ruling.