Khan Academy Seeks Patent On Education A/B Testing

theodp writes: The Education Revolution will be patented. USPTO records show that Khan Academy is seeking a patent for Systems and Methods for Split Testing Educational Videos. From the patent application: "Systems and methods are provided for comparing different videos pertaining to a topic. Two different versions of an educational video may be compared using split comparison testing. A set of questions may be provided along with each video about the topic taught in the video. Users may view one of the videos and answer the questions. Data about the user responses may be aggregated and used to determine which video more effectively conveys information to the viewer based on the question responses." Now it's up to the USPTO to decide if something like the test and control studies conducted 40+ years ago (pdf) by the PLATO system to measure the effectiveness of different teaching methods would count as prior art. In response to an earlier post on Khan Academy's pending patents on learning computer programming and 'social programming,' Slashdot user Khan Academy said that the nonprofit is using patents for good, so not to worry.

Comments

Uh huh...

[waspleg]

Gandalf: Don't... tempt me Frodo! I dare not take it. Not even to keep it safe. Understand, Frodo. I would use this ring from a desire to do good... But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine.

Some how I think Sal Khan is less high minded than Gandalf...

Re:Open Source

[Anonymous Coward]

Caldera was once a very pro-open source company. Then they morphed into The SCO Group. Top executives come and go.

Twitter pledge is too weak

[Eloquence]

As the summary states, Khan follows Twitter's patent pledge. This is a good first step as far as it goes, but it still explicitly allows for offensive litigation if the "inventor" agrees. That's not sufficient. At the very minimum, Khan should adopt a clear, irrevocable policy never to enforce patents against open source projects, like many Patent Commons participants. Ideally it should partner with Creative Commons to work out an even stronger patent license, consistent with its mission. CC has previously developed model patent licenses and I'm sure they'd be happy to help.

If the Khan Academy user who originally posted in Slashdot in response is reading this -- please bring these resources to the attention of management.

Re: Twitter pledge is too weak

[martin-boundary]

That doesn't work. What if Khan gets a new management and/or new owners? They can change the rules and repudiate all those promises, no matter what. For example, Google used to be trustworthy in the early days, now they are an evil spying organisation who takes so much heat that even the founders are distancing themselves with a nondescript holding company called alphabet. If it can happen to Google, who had so much promise in 1999, then you betcha it will happen to Khan once the pressure of economics start to bite them. Trusting the intentions of companies is simply a woeful approach to economic decision making.

I read the patent application. Need prior art

[raymorris]

I actually read the patent application and it is bullshit; the summary isn't misleading. Normally when a Slashdot headline says "Company X trying to patent Y", that really means Company X is trying to patent some specific invention RELATED to Y. Not this time. They're actually trying to patent A/B testing of videos.

To prevent this patent from being issued, someone needs to send USPTO -printed- prior art such as a magazine or journal article describing A/B testing of educational videos. Along with the printed prior art, they need to include a "301" letter. The letter and prior art will become part of the patent file which should be examined before any patent is issued.