I’ve ranted about frivolous patents more than once here. Others far closer to the issue do it daily, so my voice is but a drop in the ocean (and yet nothing happens). This time it’s a little different, and yet familiar (read my April post Patents versus Accessibility). Thanks to…
Just one example of the many gesture patents rolling around in the USPTO database, this one for denoting something important by making a heart shape over it. I haven’t ranted about patents for a while, which doesn’t mean there hasn’t been any activity. In fact, there has been activity in…
As of Monday, April 23, The W3C has announced that it is looking for a new editor for the HTML Working Group specifically tasked with shepherding HTML5 through the process until it reaches a formal recommendation. Ian Hickson (Hixie) made the request for a call for his replacement so he…
I’m giving in to the cool hip trend of infographics that has been popping up like pinkeye across blogging and tech sites lately. These infographics are typically nothing more than data points (sometimes just narrative) strewn about with mathematically suspect charts or somewhat-related design elements. But they seem to draw…
You may recall from my post in February, WebM, H.264 Debate Still Going, that the H.264 video codec is considered patent-encumbered (which resulted in its dismissal from the HTML5 specification) and Google has argued that its own WebM / VP8 codec is made up of patents it owns, releasing it…
The timing on my post yesterday (More Frivolous Patents) was pretty good. The patent trolling issues have been getting some coverage lately in more mainstream press (not just in legal or industry press) which has the potential to actually get noticed by someone (or someones) who can make a change.Unfortunately,…
The patent trolling continues, which should really be no surprise. Consider that Nortel put its portfolio of 6,000 patents on the auction block, with Google starting bidding at $900 million dollars only to be beat out by a consortium of Apple, Microsoft, Research in Motion, EMC, Ericsson and Sony for…
On February 2, Microsoft released a plug-in for Chrome on Windows 7 to allow users to play H.264 video directly in Chrome. In addition, Microsoft has said that it will support WebM (VP8) when a user has the codec installed. And so began the fragmentation of the HTML video model,…
The history of the web is littered with unexpected patent claims that feel frivolous to nearly all. These are driven partly by a terrible system for reviewing and awarding patents and a litigious society that sustains a business model of lawsuits in the hopes that some will just pay.The latest…