The correspondence between Apple and Proview Technology chronicling what looks very much like the successful sale of the iPad trademark between the two companies has made its way into the wild.

Fifteen pages that include e-mails between Proview and IP Application Development Limited (the U.K.-based firm that bought the name off Proview), were posted this afternoon by All Things D.

The files are in conjunction with a Hong Kong court decision from July of last year, wherein the judge sided with Apple, saying the company continued to own the rights to the iPad trademark in the country.

In … Read more

The group that hand-delivered printed petitions to Apple's retail stores last week plans to come back for round two.

Last week, SumOfUs delivered boxes containing some 250,000 printed signatures from its petition asking Apple to require more "ethical" working conditions from its supply and manufacturing partners. In a statement issued this afternoon, SumOfUs said it plans to do it again.

Next Thursday the group is taking what it calls a "distributed" approach, delivering the same petition to Apple's stores anew. However this time, the group is plans to have "hundreds of its … Read more

Apple has won a key victory in its German patent battle against Motorola Mobility.

Earlier today, a Munich Regional Court offered Apple a permanent injunction against several Motorola mobile products. The court ruled that the devices infringe the iPhone maker's slide-to-unlock gesture patent.

The court was tasked with evaluating three slide-to-unlock gestures, and found that two of them violate Apple's patent. A third, which is used by the Motorola Xoom, was found to not be in violation.

FOSS Patents' Florian Mueller, who was first to report on the story, said that judge Dr. Peter Guntz's permanent injunction … Read more

The facilities at Chinese factories manufacturing iPads and iPhones are better than other factories in the country, the head of the labor rights organization tasked with inspecting the plants told Reuters.

With his iPad in hand, no doubt.

The nonprofit Fair Labor Association (FLA) was asked by Apple earlier this week to investigate conditions at Foxconn facilities in China following reports of unsafe working conditions and a significant uptick in worker suicides. The FLA expects to make its Foxconn audit results available on its Web site next month, with inspections of Apple suppliers Quanta and Pegatron to follow.

"The … Read more

Apple has asked a bankruptcy court judge for permission to sue Eastman Kodak over alleged patent infringement.

The iPhone maker filed its request with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Southern District of New York. Apple says that it plans to file a complaint against Kodak with the International Trade Commission (ITC), as well as a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of Manhattan, for allegedly violating patents it holds related to printers, digital picture frames, and digital cameras.

As Bloomberg, which first reported on the request, points out, Apple isn't required to ask the bankruptcy court for permission to sue Kodak. … Read more

Apple's supply chain is once again in the crosshairs, after a South Korean newspaper today reported that Chinese factory workers are paid substantially less than their counterparts elsewhere around the world.

According to the Korea Daily, citing sources, factory workers in China who are producing iPads collectively earn about $8 per unit among them, or about 1.6 percent of the cheapest iPad's selling price.

Korean factory workers, on the other hand, share about $34 per unit among them, giving them 6.8 percent of the sales price, according to the report.

Over the last several months, complaints about working conditions in factories … Read more

China's customs authorities were recently asked to make a choice between Apple and one of their own country's companies. They chose Apple.

In an interview posted today by Reuters, Proview Technology, which is suing Apple over its use of the iPad name, said that it was told by Chinese customs that the popularity of devices like the iPhone and iPad is enough for the country to likely keep them on store shelves, regardless of what Proview wants.

"The customs have told us that it will be difficult to implement a ban because many Chinese consumers love Apple … Read more

Apple's CEO Tim Cook took to the stage earlier today, but it wasn't to announce a new tablet.

Instead, Cook was making a rather rare public appearance as part of a keynote interview at the Goldman Sachs' annual Technology and Internet Conference in San Francisco to discuss everything from worker safety to what the company plans to do with its growing pile of cash and liquid assets.

Cook spent the first part of the interview, led by Goldman Sachs analyst Bill Shope, detailing the company's efforts to improve the conditions at its suppliers and manufacturers. It was … Read more

"The way we always view cannibalization is that we'd prefer to do it than have someone else do it."

Apple CEO Tim Cook held a fireside chat earlier today at Goldman Sachs and most of the headlines took note of his comments about working conditions at Apple's overseas factories. But the above observation, which Cook made almost in passing, goes to the core--no pun intended--of Apple's ongoing success.

The context here was that Apple is perfectly sanguine about the cannibalization of the Mac--so long as Apple is the one doing the cannibalizing. If ever some … Read more