Slashdot Mirror
Microsoft Patent Envisions Free Computing
Dotnaught writes "A Microsoft patent application published on Thursday shows the company contemplating free computers and software for its customers. It suggests 'a service provider such as a telephone company, an Internet service provider, or a leasing company may provide computer systems or components to users at a reduced charge or for free in exchange for targeted advertising delivery.'"
Patents are never filed because someone plans on doing something.
they're filed because someone wants to stop someone from doing something else. this is the case here. I hope it doesn't get accepted.
Actually, I like everything about this idea except for the words "targeted" and "advertising".
Seriously, if the offer is that someone can data-mine everything on my PC and send me lots of pop-ups, spam, and flash banners, then no thanks. If computers are really cheap enough to make this business model viable, then I'd just as soon buy the really extra-cheap computer myself anyway (if it's cheap, why not?), which means the business model still wouldn't be viable.
My guess is Microsoft is just patenting vague advertising-revenue stuff to block others from patenting it. This does not mean Microsoft actually plans to move to advertising instead of paying for software.
Rather than misunderstanding like you say, I think most people on here are smart enough see through the smoke of the grossly-obfuscated language used in most of these patents. With the recent patent news, I think most people by now are aware of items #1 and #2 that you mention. But then we get to item #3, which is where the problem lies. If you understand technology and/or are highly literate, as is the case for most Slashdot readers, you can read the claims for many of these patents, see through the obfuscatory smoke, and realize that what they describe is either something that is blatantly obvious and/or something that has been done before.
For example, the portion of Microsoft's claims that you included above can be summarized as follows:
A program that runs on a customer's PC, letting the customer opt-in and select how they want their ads delivered, stores information about the customer, and then delivers the ads according to what information has been collected from the customer.
Just the fact that these companies would even dare to apply for things like that should naturally be enough to set off alarms. So I believe most people do in fact understand quite well what is going on.