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HTC Pulls an Apple, Sues French Blog for Early Unboxing of HTC One S and One X Smartphones

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It appears that HTC may not be just gunning after the iPhone 4S’s acclaimed camera with its HTC One X Android flagship, but the company wants to be like Apple in other ways as well. After French HTC-centric blog HTC Hub had uploaded unboxing videos of the HTC One S and HTC One X smartphones hours before the devices were scheduled to go on sale in Europe, HTC had pulled its legal muscle together to seize the smartphones from blog HTC Hub.

According to HTC Hub, it did not obtain the phones through HTC and therefore are not subject to the typical non-discosure agreement (NDA) or embargo that media outlets are confined to if they receive early review units prior to public availability of devices. The site did not disclose from where or whom it did obtain the phones however, and HTC has started filing civil action against HTC Hub. The French arm of the smartphone manufacturer is also seizing the units from HTC Hub. It is unclear at this time if the units were illegally obtained.

Readers may see some similarities between HTC’s actions with Apple’s scuffle with Gizmodo over the case of the missing iPhone 4. What’s different in this case is that the HTC One X and One S were both already announced prior to HTC Hub’s unboxing videos.

According to HTC Hub, the blog had approached HTC’s PR agency to secure review units for the new phones, but the agency had told them that they were not able to procure advance units. As such, HTC Hub had managed to secure its own units without any assistance from HTC nor from its agency. Given that HTC Hub had acted independently, it conjectures that it did not need to act in accordance with HTC’s media policies for NDAs.

The HTC One X, One S, and One V smartphones were introduced a little over a month ago at Mobile World Congress and marks a new era of HTC branding, uniting its various smartphone offerings under the ‘One’ line much like how Samsung uses the Galaxy brand or Sony employs the Experia moniker.

1 Comment

1 Comment

  1. qingming90

    04/02/2012 at 6:31 pm

    viptoshopper.com

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