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Microsoft Pockets Patent for Encouraging TV Viewing
theodp writes "Through its WebTV unit, Microsoft was awarded a patent Tuesday for a system and method for encouraging viewers to watch television programs, such as offering viewers frequent-flier miles for identifying the name of a sponsor or the color of an announcer's shirt. In other news, Microsoft took a District Court to task for failing to recognize the existence of prior art for the Eolas web plug-in patent, resulting in a $521 million judgment against the software giant."
They are trying to play both sides of the field. To me, Microsoft is like watching the homeless guy down the street have an argument with himself. Very entertaining, but it's advisable to keep your distance.
I remember when good tv shows used to be the incentive to watch tv.
And inevitably, some schmuck comes along and points out a fairly trivial point that invalidates someone's joke of "Foo, but ... ON A COMPUTER", makes an anti-anti-patent rant, as if the system must not be broken just because if you look through all seventeen pages of lawyerese there's a single new idea.
I hope you aren't gunning for an 'insightful' mod.
It doesn't take a patent lawyer to judge the worthiness of the system. (There's a perfect example of attempting to put a fox in charge of the henhouse.) It only takes someone who can see that the patent office sees nothing wrong with the single-click patent (or any patent on a result for that matter) or with RAMBUS's submarine tactics. Both of these are obvious innovation stifling patents, yet the PTO's comment is that it's not their job to validate patents... !?!
So, because they've got some budget trouble, they issue government-mandated monopolies to people on whole areas of technology, making it the responsibility of everyone else to police the system. That's like me saying I can't afford to do my job and charging you, at random, for the results of fixing my lack of work.
But yeah, I don't have a degree in patent law so obviously I can't see how patents are getting broader and broader, until they barely mention any specific technology, and are being used to blackmail whole industries.