{"id":394121,"date":"2026-01-28T01:18:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-28T01:18:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/394121\/"},"modified":"2026-01-28T01:18:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T01:18:10","slug":"an-app-developer-is-suing-apple-for-sherlocking-it-with-continuity-camera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/394121\/","title":{"rendered":"An app developer is suing Apple for Sherlocking it with Continuity Camera"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reincubate, which makes the Camo and Camo Studio apps for turning your iOS or Android phone into a webcam for your Mac or PC, is suing Apple, alleging anticompetitive conduct and patent infringement.<\/p>\n

Camo first launched in 2020<\/a>, but two years after, Apple launched a similar feature<\/a> called Continuity Camera, which works just with Apple devices. Reincubate alleges that Apple \u201ccopied the technology\u201d and \u201cused its control over its operating systems and App Store to disadvantage that interoperable solution and redirect user demand to Apple\u2019s own platform-tied offering,\u201d according to the lawsuit<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cCamo was used by thousands of Apple employees, across all divisions of the company,\u201d the lawsuit says. \u201cAt first, Apple encouraged Reincubate to increase its investment in Camo. But when Apple recognized that Camo was a threat\u2014it took steps not only to copy it, thereby infringing Reincubate\u2019s patents, but also to undermine Camo\u2019s functionality such that Reincubate could not compete with Apple\u2019s rip-off, called Continuity Camera, which was only operable between Apple devices and Mac computers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reincubate CEO Aidan Fitzpatrick says in a blog post<\/a> that Apple was an early supporter of Camo in beta, claiming that the company had \u201cthousands of staff\u201d running it internally and had made \u201call sorts of promises\u201d about how they could help with the app. \u201cYet once we\u2019d proven it could be done and users loved it, they took it and built our features into a billion iPhones, Macs, displays, iPads and TVs, while shutting us out and preventing additional interop we could provide to the ecosystem,\u201d according to Fitzpatrick.<\/p>\n

Fitzpatrick says he was \u201cpuzzled\u201d by the launch of Continuity Camera. \u201cConnecting two devices and seeking out a mount didn\u2019t seem like the sort of setup that Apple would lean into. A global pandemic had been underway, and I figured that if Apple was focused on user needs, recognised the problems with their cameras and the move to remote and hybrid work, they might seek to rapidly replicate innovation, perhaps even with a point release, while also putting in play some multi-year initiative to lead with the cameras in MacBooks.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Fitzpatrick argues that they did neither, and says that \u201cas I write this the webcams in many Windows devices still outclass the one in my MacBook.\u201d If Apple wasn\u2019t going to \u201ctackle video holistically, why bother cutting our legs off? The answer soon became clear: we\u2019d not come between Apple and users, we\u2019d come between Apple and their walled garden.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Fitzpatrick, this suit raises questions about larger concerns than Camo, namely, \u201cwhether there\u2019s room for developers to stimulate the building blocks of the digital experience, or whether we must limit ourselves to building platforms that stand alone in the cloud, or ideas that are too insignificant to duplicate and freeze out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Apple didn\u2019t immediately reply to a request for comment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Reincubate, which makes the Camo and Camo Studio apps for turning your iOS or Android phone into a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":394122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[304,226,84,59,50,227,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-394121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-apple","tag-apps","tag-business","tag-gb","tag-news","tag-tech","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=394121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}