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Microsoft Patents Interactive Entertainment

Posted by timothy on from the getcher-patents-get-'em-while-they're-hot dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Embedded-Watch is carrying a story regarding the award of patent number 6,571,390 to Microsoft. The patent would seem to cover pretty much any implementation of a video-on-demand system that you (or at least I) can think of. Read for yourself to decide whether this patent either is not original work or is blatantly obvious to the most casual observer. The patent could certainly be invalidated by the courts on either point, but that'd take a fight in court that won't be cheap."

5 of 466 comments (clear)

  1. What this patent is. by hackwrench · · Score: 5, Interesting

    So they patented a directory of videos in thumbnail view?

  2. AOL will.. by Flamesplash · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The patent could certainly be invalidated by the courts on either point, but that'd take a fight in court that won't be cheap.

    I'm sure AOL will happily buy Tivo and sue MS for any sort of award a la the Netscape vs. IE award.

    --
    "Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
  3. Re:It's been done before... by tomhudson · · Score: 4, Interesting
    The patent says that it was filed Oct 6th, 1998. Unfortunately for Microsoft, the "prior art" includes Microsofts' own first attempt at video-on-demand several years prior.

    Do a search on google for "microsoft tiger video on demand server" and you'll see they had this out in 1995, years before they filed the patent. Sorry, it's in the public domain, microsnot.

  4. Re:big surprise... by larien · · Score: 4, Interesting
    First of all, the history is that they made several attempts to trademark the word "Windows" but were rebuffed repeatedly until their bribes, sorry, campaign contributions finally paid off.

    Given that trademark, they have to protect it; similar sounding names trying to cash in on that name have to be pursued, just as Pepsi would undoubtably chase a company makeing "Bepsi cola" or whatever.

    The Lindows defence is trying to use the leverage that "Windows" should never have been trademarked, which I don't believe it should have, since WIMP was a term dating back to, IIRC, the late 80's (or possibly earlier) and the trademark wasn't approved until the 90's.

  5. Easy to implement around. by ivan256 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This patent is and interface patent on an interface that allows you to scroll through a list of videos one item at a time. You could make a system that didn't violate it by only displaying one video item at a time in a page style instead of list style, or by displaying a multiple item list but change the entire list on a button press instead of scrolling one at a time, which is arguably more useful anyway. This patent is pretty narrow as to the type of interface it covers. Congratualtions Microsoft, you have exclusive rights to an annoying interface.

    Somebody should patent exactly this, but add a claim for a "page down" feature. Microsoft will be forced to cross license that patent in order to implement this one in a user-pleasing fashion.