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IBM Patents Tweeting Remote Control
Fluffeh writes "IBM has applied for a patent on a network-enabled smart remote control that sends out a message to Twitter, Facebook or a blog when you start watching a TV show." Hopefully this launches an exciting patent landgrab of devices that are socially enabled. Your car can tweet when you leave your garage. Your dishwasher can tweet when the load is done. Your skillet can tweet when your eggs are burnt. And they say innovation is dead.
Hopefully this launches an exciting patent landgrab of devices that are socially enabled.
... or suppresses any such innovation, since there's a prior patent.
There's a lot of twits out there, and they needed their own messaging protocol.
As far as I see it, it doesn't break my leg or steal my car. They can have at it. Just like they had at Second Life and whatever the revolution-of-the-future was before that.
Use the Firehose to mod down Second Life stories!
Twitter is just an extension of MyFace & SpaceBook in that it allows you to create an even greater illusion that the mundane and tedious facets of your everyday life are something that thousands, nay millions of people are desperate to read about. So desperate, in fact, that they can't even wait for a daily rundown and must instead know about them within seconds of them occuring.
Now, not only can you pretend that you've got more friends than some random people on the internet, but also that said friends care in the slightest about what you do.
Frankly, I prefer being anonymous for most of the time, until "I" choose to make myself known to my friends. I call it 'getting together with them for drinks....'
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
It's not necessarily that I do or don't want anyone to know what I'm doing, it's that I have this overwhelming feeling that nobody gives a shit. I've tried twitter, and I will "tweet" maybe once or twice a month, but even at that pace I pretty much assume that no one cares about what I decide to tweet about and I'm essentially just wasting time shouting into the ether. So, I mostly stick to the occasional humorous (to me, anyway) comment, and don't bother with the day to day details of my life.
It seems to me that people who regularly tweet about every little thing have some sort of deep-seated need for constant validation from the outside world. They post personal details in order to evoke some kind of response just to show that someone, somewhere is paying attention to them. I find that sort of mentality kind of sad, but apparently it's a lot more common than I would have thought.
I really wish people would stop saying the equivalent of 'oooh oooh read the patent' without ever considering how unoriginal these minor variations being patented are.
The primary reason why the patent shouldn't be granted is it's a minor variation on existing ideas that takes no real effort to dream up or create. A 10 minute brain storming session could come up with dozens of ideas of equivalent value. Also, a prototype of the device could probably be created in minutes using a computer or smartphone with an IR port. Or look at a custom pvr setup.
This is hardly a patent protecting any real R&D. This is like patenting different configurations of three blocks of Lego. Oh yes, my patent is original! The top block is shifted one peg farther to the right! It's a completely new design!