Apple countersues Nokia for patent infringement

Nokia's intention is not so much to make piles of money off Apple - that's the fall-back plan.

It's to try and tie them up in courts worldwide (probably starting on "home turf", Europe) and get injunctions to stop them trading the iPhone in the hope of slowing their charge to the top of the market sufficiently for Nokia and its partners to "catch up".

Remember the hefty "ransom" RIM had to pay to NTP just to keep on trading? Well, what Nokia is looking for from Apple will dwarf even that - they want open access to private Apple patents from various parts of their watertight media eco-system in return for licensing of their bog-standard Wi-Fi and GSM patents. Fat chance, now that the Apple counterstrike has been launched.

If I was a Nokia investor, I'd be very worried, as this strategy smacks of desperation, hopelessness and outright poverty of ideas.

Alex: Stay classy... by not doing anything and letting them steal Apple's technology... by not defending your turf.

Nokia started this... the problem with Nokia is that it's technologies are industry standards and one must use the protocols to connect to the network... there is no other way unless Apple builds it's own standards and therefore it's own network. The network equipment is either built by Nokia or it licenses the technology... isn't that enough, or does both ends need to licenses it.

Nokia is using touchscreens with Apple's patented swipes and gestures... this is going to be interesting.

Without wanting to defend the existing patent system, this is one of the main reasons why companies like Apple aggressively file patents: so that when someone sues you, you can sue back, and then everyone can just agree to step away from the court room. I think it's less like what 3 year olds do and more like what super powers do with nuclear weapons. If only everyone would agree to put down their weapons in the first place.

This is just a corporate equivalent of what 3 yr olds do.

Stay classy Apple.