You'll notice in the photo application that he pinches to zoom in and out.
I pray that the difference between using the exact same technology on a 4 inch screen that you had seen on a 40 inch screen isn't novel, but with our patent office these days it won't surprise me.
The article also mentions Apple began filing patents for these things in 2004, and they acquired FingerWorks, which may have been working on such technology for even longer.
I believe Apple's implementation of the multitouch hardware/software is unique (very different than Jeff Han's FTIR method) which certainly is patentable, though that's a different issue than the gestures.
Of course I haven't done any research on the matter either...