Apple Seeks Patent On Operating System Advertising

patentpundit writes "On April 18, 2008, Apple Computer applied for a patent relating to an 'invention' that allows for showing advertisements within an operating system. The first named inventor on the patent application is none other than Steve Jobs. The patent application published and became available for public inspection on October 22, 2009. If implemented, the invention would make it possible for advertisements to be displayed on a variety of devices, including desktop computers, cell phones, PDAs, and more. In one alarming aspect, the device could be disabled while the advertisements run, thereby forcing users to let the advertisement run its course before the system would unlock and allow further use. In an even more invasive scenario, explained in the patent application, the user could be required to do something, such as click to continue, in order to verify that they are actively watching the advertisement and haven't simply walked away while the ad runs. Whether Apple would implement such an invention is unknown, but it is possible that they think there are others out there who might want to implement such invasive advertising. It is possible Apple wanted to get ahead of the curve and file this patent so that if any company is silly enough to engage in Big Brother advertising, then Apple will get a royalty. I sure hope this is not the future of advertising."

Comments

Good

[amicusNYCL]

Confine advertising to OSX, sounds good to me.

Re:Very impatiantly waiting...

[xednieht]

Apple.... the new Microsoft

Re:There are other OS's

[Linnen]

Apple could get away with doing it. No one else could. Now if Apple wants to do it, Microsoft will be making double profit (1) switching users (2) royalties.

Fixed it for ya.

If Microsoft would do anything of this nature, they will get called on it. The only defenders that I can think of would be Ballmer and the rest of the MS marketing team.
Apple, OTOH, has the non-corporate defenders to get away with this. They could install this on every Mac, iPhone and iPod complete with 'you will brick your device if this is modded away' utilities, and Apple fans will still say combinations of "Jobs is brilliant!", "Apple needs this to compete." and "MS/LINUX Biter!"

Re:I sure hope they get this patent

[Grishnakh]

I don't see the problem. If they're just getting the patent in order to profit off of other companies who use these ideas, what's the problem? If someone really wants to insert advertisements into OSes or other mediums, these patents aren't going to stop them (as long as the fees aren't too high), but with the patents at least Apple and its shareholders get some extra cash. Sounds good to me.

Personally, I'd love to see Microsoft put ads in their OS, and have to pay Apple for the privilege. It's not like I'm going to be using a MS OS at home anyway (or an Apple one for that matter).

Re:I sure hope they get this patent

[m.ducharme]

(and it's not that awesome yet).