Microsoft's Online Spectator Patent

Next Generation reports on Microsoft's 5000th patent: an online spectator mode for competitive games. From the article: "The system will allow online viewers who are not involved in actual gameplay to view game highlights and instant replays, as well as let them control camera perspectives. A statement from Microsoft also describes 'A portal such as a Web site to access spectator-related services such as schedules and information on multiple games and events as well as the number of spectators and participants in each. The portal allows the spectator to find the most popular games to watch, preview the action, and then connect to the desired game or event.'"

Comments

Done before?

[evilNomad]

Hm, I could have sworn that HLTV, done by Valve does just this, and that it has been out for the past 5 years.. And not only that, then i also happen to run the biggest portal for HLTV doing exactly what Microsoft wants their portal to do.. I wonder if my 4 year old portal is now patented, and i should be paying royalties to Microsoft.. Good thing I live in Europe I guess :-)

Patent Protections

[Swanktastic]

Patent Protection of an invention is a two-part process. Step One: File for and receive a patent. Step Two: Defend the patent in court. Both pieces are essential.

This won't stand up in court. It used to be that the most challenging part of invention protection was receiving a patent. Once you had a patent, most federal courts would uphold the defensibility of the invention.

Today, the patent office has pushed the responsiblity of invention defense to the federal court system. The statistics bear our that many, many more patents are being awarded, with much higher percentages of success. On the other hand, Federal Courts are siding with patent holders much less than they used to. The system is not necessarily broken, it only means that a patent is worth less and easier to obtain than it used to be.

Legitimate Via Bungie?

[Bloodmoon1]

The oldest example I can think of (about 10 years old, give or take a year or two) off the top of my head of this is the Myth games (at least Myth 2, and I think the first one had it as well), which actually did the spectator mode (and pretty much everything else) surprisingly well. You could control the cameras, save the replays, everything this patent sounds like it covers.

Since Myth was a creation of Bungie, who got bought out by MS some time ago, I think, as loathe as I am to admit it, that MS might actually have a legitimate claim to this patent. Well, as legitimate as any software patent can be, anyway.

Re:Anti-patent and proud of it

[Jon Luckey]

Rather than try to use "men with guns" to protect inventors, how about we level the playing field and require people to actually create items and find a way to market them before they're knocked off?

Of course "men with guns" are not only involved with just patents, but with other types of IP laws as well. So if "men with guns involved" means somethings needs to be done away with that means:

• No Patents. as per your speculation.
• No Copyrights. Feel free to copy those bits. $20 Mil to make a movie. With just the help a friend at the development lab, anyone can undercut your price without the megabucks investment
• No Trademarks. Worked hard on your brand? Tought dookie. Someone else can call thier product the same thing and milk your reputation. Its not that they are counterfiting, because there is no such thing. They just like the name. Or they can claim its a now a generic term. Who is to stop them? Men with guns?

Defensive Patent

[tokabola]

I'm certainly no MS fan, but this sounds like another one of their defensive patents. MS has thousands of patents like this that they don't enforce, and don't really plan to. All they are probably doing is making sure someone else doesn't patent the idea and shut them out. Many big companies do this, including IBM.