Microsoft Seeking to Patent Automatic Censorship

theodp writes "Microsoft is back at the USPTO, this time seeking a patent for the automatic censorship of audio data for broadcast, a system and method for automatically altering audio to prevent undesired words and phrases from being understandable to a listener as originally uttered."

Comments

Well, sounds like a good idea

[moochfish]

Sounds like it will be used primarily for Xbox Live to make sure 9 year olds don't get cussed out by some pissed off gamers. Sounds like it'll be a feature most consumers will welcome.

This sounds a lot more novel than most of the other patents they get that tend to get highlighted on Slashdot. Is it totally novel? Well, I can't speak for any of the experts out there, but at least it's not blaringly obvious, commoditized technology.

Re:Well, sounds like a good idea

[humungusfungus]

You're probably right about this being welcomed by the masses. Excuse me while I hijack this thread to appeal to anyone who might even consider this a worthy application of such technology:

Simple argument:

Fuck, Shit, Piss, Cunt, Motherfucker

I learned those words years before the Xbox came out.
Dammit, I learned them years before people started carrying around suitcase-sized cell phones!

Ask around. You can probably find a few people who learned to swear before the evil internet with it's foul mouthed masses even existed.

Swearing is, was, and always will be part of language. The trick is to teach your kids**** when it is appropriate/useful/damaging/self-degrading etc.

Even if you don't they will learn to use it, for better or for worse. ...and don't believe for a second that this Xbox scenario will be the extent of it's application.

Repeat after me: Censorship is bad.

**** WARNING: Involves actual parenting!

New Words

[ZachPruckowski]

The rest of the world will do what Battlestar Galactice does: Made up swear words. BSG can't drop the F-bomb much for administrative/ratings reasons, so they use the word "Frak". I could see a lot of new swear words popping up if this happens.

Awesome!

[pestilence669]

I forsee a future where you cannot criticize Microsoft in podcasts created and streamed using Windows. "Microsoft Sucks", could be considered offensive.

Re:Sounds very sick

[Maestro4k]

What kind of fucked-up parent lets their 9 year old play XBox Live in the first place?

Let me change that just a bit, make that "play XBox Live unsupervised" and the answer is the same kind of parent who will buy their kid the latest Grand Theft Auto game even though it's rated Mature and the employee at the store points out them it's rated mature and explains what that means then let them play it unsupervised. Then they later discover what they'd already been told is true about the game and they raise hell about their kid being able to play it and blames the store, the game company, some vast conspiracy, aliens, etc. anyone but themselves.

And yes, I speak from experience, worked for a while at a Wal-mart between IT jobs back around the time GTA Vice City came out. Had plenty of parents that I explained to very politely what a Mature rating meant and what was in the game and had them shrug and say "Well he wants it" and them buy it anyway. The reason I modified that is because I ran into a few (very few sadly) parents who knew what the ratings meant and would take the time to read all the info on the game boxes, all the sub-warnings, etc. and decide whether or not they would buy the game. I saw one Dad look through 4 different games and tell his kid "you can't have this one or this one, but either of these will be fine, we'll play it together". Now if only more parents did that.

Musing on the subj

[mapkinase]

As some of the posters rightfully noted, this won't solve the problem. One of the symptoms of not solving would be "invented" cursive words. The problem lies deeper.

Think for a minute, why do we curse? We curse to express our emotions. Instead of using words that describe the emotion exactly, like: "I am very angry right now", we spit expletives. We do that to alleviate the anger (for example) caused by this situation. Emotiones expressed in this way help quickly release the pain caused by the anger. But.

But they do not remove the cause of the anger. Bad driver manners will continue, and there is little you could do about that whether with anger or without it.

So what would be a healthier reaction? Right. Anger management. You will train yourself not to react angrily, by channelling anger into correct actions, not emotions.

This is what we have to teach our kids spending on that much more effort than protecting them from hearing infamous seven words.

won't someone think of the children

[soupforare]

"Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it."

Re:Sounds very sick

[Aranth Brainfire]

People who aren't ass-backwards and try keeping any mention of sex five miles from children.

Seriously, the sex in that game is-

Spouse: What, aren't you going to come to bed?
You: (yes | no)
(insert black screen with ridiculous giggling and spouse saying "ooh")
(return to game with spouse making some sort of lame joke)

Twelve-year-olds might get all giggly about it, but it's nothing new. Hell, if you're not loitering around your house for no reason all the time it's not even very likely to happen...

Nevermind theories about that other stat, your character's sexuality...