I think there might be two things happening. When students work in groups they not only share ideas (which help solidify concepts), but you also share answers. In my experience (in physics), most students worked together and when you get stuck on a problem you go and ask someone else how to do it. Obviously you end up doing better on the homework (because you complete all of it), and you also understand how to do the problems a little better, so the end result is you get a better grade in the class.
The better solution is to do it all yourself. But often that's not possible (because you simply don't know how to do some problems) or you simply don't have to time. So in a per-hour-spent sense, working together and copying solutions probably makes you learn faster, and it definitely gets you better grades on the homework (and consequently in the class).
Also, it's much easier to work 14 hours with some friends, then 8 hours in solitude.
Yes, that would be the problem I described in my last paragraph, but that has no bearing on the facts of this case. Just because they could be counter sued (though I'm not completely convinced it's that east), doesn't mean the original law suit has no merit. Large companies routinely ignore the intellectual property rights of others (in part due to so many of them being bogus), but that doesn't make it okay. HTC is completely within it's right to demand compensation for technology they own, if their claim is legitimate. There is nothing in this article that suggests their claim is absurd or unjustified. Maybe the patent is on some amazing piece of compression technology that took years to develop. People are just jumping to the conclusion that it's yet another "toast" or "pop-up text" patent.
Nothing in the article suggests HTC's patent is ridiculous like what was portrayed recently in the TAL program about Intellectual Ventures.
There doesn't seem to be anything inherently absurd about patenting an image compression system. I mean, imagine it was a small company that invented a new compression system that was 20% better then all the competition. Would they too be chastised if they tried to protect themselves from large corporations that ignore intellectual property law?
Patent are supposed to incentivize innovation and give the patent holder an edge against the competition as a sort of prize for his work. This "edge" was sold to HTC, and now HTC has every right to protect it. Seems like Apple should just either suck it up and pay a licensing fee, or change their hardware/software to get around using this technology.
The problem with the patent system is the disgusting legal harassment done by patent trolls - where smallish companies are sued over absurd patent and because they don't have the financial means to legally defend themselves they're pressured into settling; this case doesn't seem to exhibit any of those problems.
The better solution is to do it all yourself. But often that's not possible (because you simply don't know how to do some problems) or you simply don't have to time. So in a per-hour-spent sense, working together and copying solutions probably makes you learn faster, and it definitely gets you better grades on the homework (and consequently in the class).
Also, it's much easier to work 14 hours with some friends, then 8 hours in solitude.