Perhaps this exact patent of Apple is the reason why Dells are blinking faster. And not because they failed to copy Apple properly as the blogpost implies.
It probably is why, and it indicates that they failed to copy Apple properly: Apple chose the rate to correspond to a restful breathing rate. As I can attest from a quick test, 40/min is more like someone exercising, hardly a soothing assurance that the Dell is happily sleeping. Furthermore, blinking is not very smooth, either. Dell apparently saw the idea "visually indicate sleep mode". So what Dell has is a blinking indicator light that happen to mean "in sleep mode". What Apple has is a light that intuitively means "I'm happily resting and saving power. When you want me again, open me up and I'll be right where you left me." The first time I saw Apple's light, I immediately knew what the computer was doing. If I saw a Dell blinking a lot, I would have no idea if it meant "sleep mode", "charging", "charging in sleep mode". The blink rate might even be how quickly it's charging or how much it needs to be charged. So yes, Dell did a bad copy.
